Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Engine Room Artificer 4th Class E. G. Hunt, Royal Navy, who was killed in action in the Mediterranean during Operation Principle- the underwater chariot attack on the Italian Fleet- when H.M. Submarine P311 hit a mine, 2 January 1943

1939-45 Star; Africa Star, 1 clasp, North Africa 1942-43; War Medal 1939-45, with named Admiralty enclosure, in card box of issue, addressed to ‘Mrs. G. J. [sic] M. Thompson, The Sundial, Liverpool Road, Kingston Hill, Surrey’, extremely fine (3) £160-200

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Medals to Second World War Casualties.

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Edmund George Hunt served during the Second World War in H.M. Submarine P311, a T Class submarine, and the only ship of her class never to be given a name. She was to have been christened H.M.S. Tutankhamen but was lost before this could be formally done. She was one of only two T Class submarines that were fitted with an Oerlikon 20 mm anti-aircraft gun, and in addition to this and prior to her departure from Scotland in November 1942 she was fitted with two deck mounted water tight containers which housed human chariots. On 28 December 1942 she left her base in Malta to take part in Operation Principle, the planned chariot attack on the Italian fleet anchored at La Maddalena. She sent her last signal on 31 December 1942, and was never heard from again. The general theory was that she had hit a mine on her approach to the anchorage, scheduled for 2 January 1943. Subsequently it was thought that the watertight containers may have affected her manoeuvrability and increased her surface profile. The complete crew, including Hunt, and ten charioteers were lost. Hunt was aged 28 at the time of his death, and is commemorated on the Chatham Naval Memorial. The date of his death given on the C.W.G.C. Roll, 8 January, was the date of P311‘s scheduled return, and the date on which she was officially reported as overdue.

In 2016, 76 years after her loss, the wreck of P311 was discovered by divers on the sea bed off of the Northeastern corner of Sardinia. The wreck is at 260 feet and was recognised through her deck mounted Oerlikon gun. The divers reported that the bow had been damaged by an explosion but that the hull was intact; this suggests that some of her crew and the charioteers may have still been alive on the sea bed.

Medals issued to the recipient’s widow, Gertrude Violet Maud Hunt, who had subsequently remarried.