Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A fine post-war M.B.E., Second World War submariner’s D.S.C. group of eight to Lieutenant-Commander (E.) M. N. Stevenson, Royal Navy, who was decorated and mentioned in despatches for gallant deeds as Warrant Engineer of H.M. submarine Saracen in 1942-43: most unusually he was present in two successful “Sub.-on-Sub.” actions - the destruction of the U-335 and the Italian submarine Granito

The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, M.B.E. (Military) Member’s 2nd type breast badge, in its Royal Mint case of issue; Distinguished Service Cross, G.VI.R., reverse officially dated ‘1943’, hallmarks for London 1942, in its Garrard & Co. case of issue; 1939-45 Star; Atlantic Star; Africa Star; Italy Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-45, extremely fine (8)
£1800-2200
M.B.E. London Gazette 10 June 1954.

D.S.C. London Gazette 20 July 1943:
‘For successful patrols in H.M. Submarines.’

The original recommendation states:
‘For outstanding bravery and devotion to duty as Engineer Officer of H.M. Submarine Saracen during the following successful patrols: during her 5th - 8th patrols inclusive, Saracen has sunk by torpedo two enemy supply ships and one transport, totalling 20,000 tons, sunk by gunfire two enemy tugs of 650 and 350 tons and one A./S. schooner, bombarded one shipyard and carried out a successful special operation. The torpedo attacks have been carried out against escorted ships and Saracen has been subjected to depth-charging in consequence.’

Mention in despatches London Gazette 23 March 1943:
‘For courage and skill in successful submarine patrols.’

The original recommendation states:
‘As Engineer Officer of the P-247, by his example of coolness and devotion to duty in the face of the enemy, he played an important part in the successful destruction of an Italian U-boat on 9 November 1942, and in the probable destruction of an Italian destroyer on 17 December 1942.’

Malcolm Neil Stevenson, a pre-war regular who was appointed Warrant Engineer in October 1937, was serving in the aircraft carrier H.M.S. Ark Royal on the renewal of hostilities in September 1939. Shortly thereafter, however, he transferred to the submarine branch and, by May 1941, was serving in the training submarine L-27, commanded by Lieutenant H. N. Edmonds, D.S.C., R.N.

Then in October of that year, he removed to the Saracen (a.k.a. P-247), then nearing completion and shortly to go into action under the command of Lieutenant Michael Lundy, R.N. Thus her first “Sub.-on-Sub.” victory against the U-335 off the Shetlands on 3 August 1942 - three enemy crewmen were found on the surface after the U-Boat’s demise, one of whom raised his arm in the air before sinking below the surface, another of whom transpired to be a corpse, and a third, a signalman, who was rescued. Lumby was awarded the D.S.C.

However, it was for subsequent gallant services as Saracen’s Warrant Engineer in the 8th Submarine Flotilla in the Mediterranean during four war patrols in the first half of 1943 that Stevenson was awarded his D.S.C., during the course of which she operated out of Algeria and Malta. A glimpse of her arrival during an air raid at Malta, where she was briefly attached to the “Fighting Tenth” Flotilla, may be found in Peter Padfield’s War Beneath the Sea - Submarine Conflict 1939-45:

‘The S-class P-247 (later Saracen), arriving by night to join the 10th Flotilla in September, was shown the way by the pyrotechnics of a raid in progress. The following morning she was guided by two minesweepers along a swept channel through mines laid by the enemy. She passed the entrance to Grand Harbour, opening the view of sheer fortress walls that stretched back through centuries of maritime command in peace and war, and the partly ruined buildings, towers and domes beyond, ‘all white or pink and sand-yellow against the blue sky.’ She was cheered round Fort St. Elmo by a group of Maltese children, entered Marsamxett harbour with the seamen lined smartly at attention on the fore casing, and turned into Lazaretto Creek where the blue-painted submarines were berthed, each at the end of a floating catwalk before the partly wrecked, colonnaded façade of the old Lazaretto building. Her First Lieutenant, Edward Young, writing a decade later, could ‘not remember anything quite like the Malta submarine base at this time.’ Food was still miserably short; air raids occurred around the clock ... ’

Two months later, Stevenson won a “mention” for his part in Saracen’s second successful “Sub.-on-Sub.” action, namely the destruction of the Italian submarine Granito off Cape San Vito, Sicily, on 9 November 1942, the day of the North Africa landings, an action summarised by Peter Padfield in the following terms:

‘Here [Cape San Vito], on the day of the landings, the Italian submarine Granito, on passage westwards on the surface, almost overran the position of P-247 (Saracen), whose commander, Lieutenant Michael Lumby, fired a full salvo from 800 yards; he confided to his First Lieutenant, Young, that he could clearly see the smiling faces of the Italian officers on the bridge. Three of the torpedoes struck, blowing the submarine apart. Nothing of her or the smiling officers or the crew below remained as P-247 closed to search for survivors, only three seat lockers floating in a stain of oil.’

Lumby was awarded the D.S.O.

And further successes followed early in the new year, the Italian submarine chaser Maria Angelette being sunk by gunfire about 30 miles south of Isola di Capri on 20 January, and the French tugs Provincale II and Marseillaise V suffering a similar fate off Cape Sardineaux on 12 February. Three days later, while operating off Capo di Noli, south-west of Genoa, Saracen torpedoed and damaged the tanker Marguerite Finaly.

Having then engaged and damaged a brace of sailing vessels off Cervo, Liguria, early on 19 February, Lumby spotted an enemy convoy west of Elba later in the day, and sent the Italian cargo ship Francesco Crispi to the bottom. Then three days later Saracen torpedoed and sank another Italian merchantman, the Tagliamento, off Pianosa.

Stevenson was recommended for the D.S.C. - which insignia he received at an investiture held on 21 March 1944 - and appears to have removed to pastures new by the time of Saracen’s demise at the hands of the Italian corvette Minerva off Corsica in August 1943. Latterly employed at the submarine depot Maidstone, he ended the War on the staff of Ferret IV, the Londonderry base for captured enemy U-Boats.

Adding the M.B.E. to his accolades for services on attachment to the Royal Pakistan Navy in the early 1950s, Stevenson was placed on the Retired List in the rank of Lieutenant-Commander (E.) in September 1956.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including the recipient’s M.B.E. warrant, dated 10 June 1954; his “Crossing the Line” certificate, dated aboard H.M.S. Ajax on 1 September 1936; a fine pencil portrait of the recipient, with French dedication to the “Chef Mecanicen du P-247’, signed by the artist and dated 9 February 1943; his Council of Engineering Institutions certificate of appointment as a Chartered Engineer, on the recommendation of the Institute of Marine Engineers, dated 11 April 1968, all of these framed and glazed; together with two large silk embroidered banners, these of greater age.