Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria to coincide with the OMRS Convention

A Great War D.S.C. group of four awarded to Lieutenant A. E. Thomson, Royal Navy, for gallantry when a Minesweeper struck a mine

Distinguished Service Cross, G.V.R.; 1914-15 Star (S.Lt., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut., R.N.) good very fine (4) £1000-1200

D.S.C. London Gazette 2 November 1917: ‘In recognition of their gallantry when one of H.M. Minseweepers struck a mine. Lieutenant Alpin Errol Thomson, Royal Navy.’ Two D.S.C.’s and two Bars to the D.S.C. were awarded for this remarkable incident.

At dawn on 24 June 1917, three paddlers, the Kempton (Lieutenant A. E. Thomson, R.N.), Redcar (Lieutenant A. Daniels, R.N.R.), and Gatwick (Lieutenant W. H. Evans, R.N.R.), sailed from Dunkirk to sweep the approaches to Calais. It was a calm day with good visibility. No mines were found, and two hours before low water slack Lieutenant Thomson took his three ships inshore to anchor during the ‘prohibited period’ for sweeping. While still at anchor he was informed by a patrol drifter that enemy moored mines had been sighted. As soon as the tide was running, the three paddlers weighed and proceeded to clear the area.

‘We were sweeping three abreast,’ he writes. ‘The area was dotted with wrecks - quite safe for navigation but the devil as far as sweep-wires were concerned. As soon as we were coupled up mines began bobbing up to the surface. Then the Gatwick’s sweep parted, so I ordered her to sink the three mines that had appeared, while the Redcar and ourselves continued to sweep. No sooner had the signal been sent, than the Redcar struck a moored mine fair and square under her mess-deck. The fore-part of the ship was blown away as far as the bridge, and the water was covered with debris and wounded men supporting themselves as best they could.’ The gun’s crew, and four other men in the bows, were killed instantly.

‘We immediately closed the wreck,’ Thomson continues, ‘and sent away all our boats to pick up survivors. Incidentally, she was well down by the bows, and appeared to be anchored on a shoal by the mass of wreckage forward. Most of the survivors came on board my ship, and as there was considerable delay in getting them inboard, and I was anxious to get out of the area and to transfer the wounded to a drifter for passage to Dunkirk, I left the bridge to try to hasten things. On my way forward again I found the chief engineer working over a casualty on the starboard sponson. The poor man had lost one foot, and the other was hanging by about an inch of flesh, while his abdomen was cut clean open with the intestines hanging out. We amputated the foot with my sheath knife, put on tourniquets, replaced his inside, and tied him as best we could. As I began to walk forward towards the bridge a mine hit us in the engine-room just beneath where we were standing. All the engine-room staff were killed. The chief engineer was telescoped (we picked up his body the next day), and the casualty from the Redcar was blown into the water. Rescued by an Able Seaman called Morrison, the poor fellow lived for forty-eight hours and then died of shock.’

‘When the explosion came,’ Thomson writes, ‘I was thrown about twenty feet, and landed in a sitting position on the quarter-deck. Iheard no sound, but felt exactly as if I had been placed in a London fog. Both masts had come down, and the ship’s back was broken. The officer of the watch was blown from the upper bridge to the lower, and his trousers were split from clew to earring. I gave the order to abandon ship, and in company with the officer of the watch, Lieutenant Eric Richardson, R.N.V.R., went below to inspect the after stokehold bulkhead, and then down forward to examine the after mess-deck bulkhead. Both seemed to be holding out, but the ship was steadily settling amidships, with the bow and stern rising out of the water.

‘As we were drifting towards the barrage, I decided to let go the anchor, so Richardson and myself went forward to the forecastle and cleared away the port anchor. Just as I was knocking off the slip, I remember Richardson remarking, “What happens if we drop the killick on another bloody mine?” Luckily we didn’t. By this time everyone was out of the ship except four A.B.’s - (I heard afterwards that the first person over the side was my Chow dog “Bruin”) - and as she had taken a heavy list to port, Richardson and I went to my cabin to save what we could. On the way I remembered I still had a destroyer’s allowance of confidential books on board - relics of the days when the Kempton had been sweeping the approaches to the Firth of Forth - so knotted the neck of a cricket shirt and used it as a sack. By the time we had got then all it was time to leave, so grabbing a tin of cigarettes and the remains of a bottle of whisky, we made a hasty exit for the boat. We were on our way over to the Gatwick when the old Kempton turned over and sank, her forefoot remaining above the water for some time. I felt very sad. She was the best built of all the paddle minesweepers, and during her year of service had never let me down.’

Lieutenant Thompson ended the war with the Harwich minesweeping force in H.M.S. Tring, and continued in her in post-war mine clearance. In late 1919 he was in H.M.S. Oakley, twin-screw minesweeper, at Revel and Bjorko Sound in the Eastern Baltic.