Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A Great War Posthumous ‘Lowestoft Raid’ D.S.M. group of four awarded to Stoker 1st Class E. J. W. Clarke, Royal Navy, for his gallantry when the destroyer H.M.S. Laertes received a direct hit to his boiler room - the fire and explosions of which leading to him suffering fatal burns, on 25 April 1916

Distinguished Service Medal, G.V.R. (288420. E. J. W. Clarke. Sto. 1. Cl. H.M.S. Laertes. 25 Apl. 1916.); 1914-15 Star (288420, E. J. W. Clarke, Sto. 1. R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (288420 E. J. W. Clarke. Sto. 1. R.N.); Memorial Plaque (Ernest John William Clarke) generally good very fine (5) £1,800-£2,200

D.S.M. London Gazette 22 June 1916.

Ernest John William Clarke was born in Newport, Lincolnshire in July 1878. He joined the Royal Navy as a Stoker 2nd Class in April 1898, and advanced to Stoker 1st Class in July 1906. Clarke served during the Great War with H.M.S. Laertes (destroyer), from 4 September 1914.

Clarke was awarded the D.S.M. for his part in the action with the German Battle Cruiser Squadron off Lowestoft on 24-25 April 1916 - the German raid timed to coincide with the Easter Sunday Irish rebellion in Ireland. The Admiralty, as usual, knew the Germans were at sea but did not know at first their objective. The Grand Fleet and Battle Cruiser Fleet were ordered to sea, but their southward journey was slowed by heavy seas. Tyrwhitt’s Harwich Force, comprising three light cruisers and 18 destroyers (including the Laertes), were also approaching from the south.

Four German battle cruisers and six light cruisers encountered the much weaker Harwich Force at about 3.50 a.m. on the morning of the 25th. Scheer and the High Seas Fleet remained off Terschelling, roughly 70 miles away. Tyrwhitt turned south and tried to draw the Germans after him. Boedicker refused to be drawn, and the battle cruisers proceeded to bombard first Lowestoft and then Yarmouth. Tyrwhitt consequently returned to the north and engaged the Germans in an action in which his flagship, the light cruiser Conquest, was hit by five 12-inch shells and badly damaged.

The casualties were heavy - forty officers and men killed and wounded - and her aerials were shot away, but she could still steam twenty knots. Ordering the destroyers to scatter and set up a smoke screen, he held on, but in another five minutes the enemy’s fire ceased and they disappeared to the eastward. For thirteen minutes the Commodore had been under fire, but no further damage had been done except for a hit on the Laertes which wounded five men (including Clarke) and put a boiler out of action. Seeing that the time allowed for the bombardment was half an hour, and that it lasted barely half as long, there can be little doubt that Tyrwhitt’s spirited movement had to some extent achieved its object. The town of Lowestoft had suffered severely but without his intervention the destruction might have been far worse.

Clarke died ‘from extensive burns of face, arms and hands (wounds) sustained in action on the 25th April 1916... with German Squadron off East Coast...’ (service papers refer), 10 May 1916, and is buried in Ruckland (St. Olave) Churchyard, Lincolnshire.