Hull Trawlers. Fortune and Fates of War

This is the first new piece of writing for some time on the Hull Maritime Theme which I find very fascinating. 

It is a testament to the engineering quality and durability of Hull based Trawlers that many were requisitioned by the Admiralty for service in the Second World War as Auxiliary Support vessels. 

One such Trawler was Lady Shirley with the original trawler number H411. 

She was just one of the prolific output of the Beverley, East Yorkshire shipbuilders of Cook, Welton and Gemmell and was completed in 1937 for Jutland Amalgamated Trawlers Limited of Hull just a short trip along the river from that great Maritime Port City. 

The outbreak of hostilities in 1939 saw Lady Shirley, now with the HMT designation and number T464 equipped with armaments including a 4 inch deck gun, machine guns and depth charges. 

In February 1940 whilst on patrol in the Firth of Tay, Scotland she was strafed by enemy raiding aircraft but not as the man focus of their intentions in what was a busy shipping lane. 

Lady Shirley was typical of the Cook, Welton and Gemmell pedigree at 177 tons, 164 feet in length and with a top speed of 12 knots. Her principal wartime role was patrol and support for Convoys and reconnaissance aircraft and by 1941 she was operating out of Gibraltar in the very militarily active waters of the Atlantic and Western Mediterranean. 

The crew were not re-purposed Hull Trawlermen but Royal Naval Patrol Service Ratings. The total on- board compliment was 33 under an Australian, Lieutenant Commander A H Calloway.

Meanwhile, on a fast converging course was the German U Boat U-111. 

Built in Bremen in 1940 the submarine was quickly into service and on its first active service foray in May 1941 the U-111 ranged widely from the Faroe Islands and Iceland claiming the sinking of two convoy ships and damaging of another contributing around 20000 tons to the fast accelerating Merchant losses on the perilous North Atlantic supply routes. 

Amongst other U-Boats there was the targeting of Convoy 12 HX126 off Greenland although the Captain, William Kleinschmidt, was thwarted in further kills by the activities of competing submarines in what was, for the Kriegsmarine, a successful campaign. 

When other U Boats were recalled to their base in Lorient, France for replenishment of armaments, supplies and crews or given fresh orders to relocate the role of U-111 was as a spotter for the battleships Bismarck and Prinz Eugen as they sought out and sank HMS Hood. 

It must have been a tragic sight, subsequently for U-111 to help look for survivors of the Bismarck after the Royal Navy hunted down and sank the major threat in the following weeks. 

In July 1941 the inaugural mission ended with a return to base and much welcome shore leave and maintenance, To acknowledge the action of U-111 in northern waters the conning tower was decorated with a polar bear and iceberg motif.

By all accounts U-111 had been an effective weapon and this will have been much exploited by Nazi Propaganda in the portrayal of the great morale and efficiency of its naval forces. 

However, there was a degree of disquiet amongst the crew with criticism of Captain Kleinschmidt being, at 34 years, too old for his command. The usual U-Boat deployment was 43 crew but for the second mission, this time in the theatre of war in tropical waters, there were 52 on board of whom only 5 had any previous experience of action. Conditions will, at best have been cramped and claustrophobic with the additional contingent. The excessively high casualty rate amongst U boat crews, to reach 75% by the end of the U Boat campaign,  will have been well known. This did not augur well for the appetite to fight and morale, unlike the propaganda portrayal, was likely to be low.

The Lady Shirley and U-111 came up against each other on Thursday 9^th October 1941 in the Atlantic just to the south west of Tenerife.

Cruising on the surface, Captain Kleinschmidt, mistook the smokestack and superstructure of Lady Shirley for a stricken vessel separated from a convoy formation and not therefore a perceived immediate threat. 

At the same time the masthead lookout aboard the armed Trawler saw the distinctive conning tower of a U-Boat and in an aggressive action Lieutenant Commander Calloway headed for the enemy position.

Kleinschmidt ordered a rapid evasive dive but not enough to avoid the depth charges from Lady Shirley and with a now panicking crew and taking on water he decided to surface and confront the ship directly. 

The deck gun and machine guns on Lady Shirley were quickly causing damage although return fire from the German crew killed Seamen Pizzey, a side gunner. 

U-111 received several hits and the death of Kleinschmidt and 7 others in the gun battle caused the submarine crew to signal they wanted to surrender. The 44 survivors, now in the water as U-111 sank beneath the waves, were rescued. 

When seeing the actual smaller size, crew numbers and lesser firepower of Lady Shirley two senior German officers tried to organise a plan to storm and take the Trawler and head for the neutral Spain. 

The demoralised and defeated crew had no compulsion to continue the battle even though they could not believe they had succumbed to an inferior foe. Although U-111 did sink this was not from the initial depth charge attack and so the emergency surfacing might not have been necessary. 

As always, in a conflict there is a footnote.

Just two months after the action the Lady Shirley was on an operation in the Straits of Gibraltar. 

Whilst on patrol with another Cook, Welton and Gemmell built vessel, St Nectan (incidentally resuming work as a trawler until 1967) there was a prolonged squall. 

After the storm had passed it was found that Lady Shirley had disappeared without a trace with the loss of Calloway and all crew members.

There was a reported claim by an active submarine, the U-374 that they had torpedoed the armed trawler although this could not be substantiated as the U Boat was lost shortly after and no validation of the sinking was possible.. 

It was suspected that Lady Shirley had been sabotaged through a time bomb placed on board, whilst in Gibraltar Dockyard, by a Spanish Agent for the Nazis

The heroism of Calloway and his crew had resulted in the first time that prisoners of war had been captured from a U-Boat in the South Atlantic. The U-111 was the first submarine to be lost in that theatre of war..

 Calloway received a Distinguished Service Order Medal for the action. 

                                The photograph is of Lady Shirley in what could be Gibraltar