Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Six: Chief Constructor F. J. A. Pound, Royal Corps of Naval Constructors

British War and Victory Medals (Asst. Constr. 2 Cl., R.N.); 1939-45 Star; Africa Star; Defence and War Medals, generally very fine (6) £180-220

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Medals for Services at Sea from the Collection of the Late Oliver Stirling Lee.

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Frank Joseph Alfred Pound was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire in January 1895 and, having won a scholarship to Greenwich Naval College, joined the Royal Corps of Naval Constructors in April 1917. Appointed an Assistant Constructor 2nd Class - and in common with fellow naval architects - he went to sea for a year, joining H.M.S. Renown in June 1918, it then being sensibly held that such personnel could hardly design the layout of the equipment of a ship if they did not know how it would be used by the crew.

Coming ashore in the following year, he was posted to H.M. Dockyard Portsmouth, and thence, in 1923, to the Admiralty in London, where he was promoted to Assistant Constructor 1st Class. But it was with his postings to such companies as Vickers Armstrong and Cammell Laird in the 1930s that he really got to grips with classic ship construction, among his projects being the famous 1939-45 War ships Ajax and Ark Royal.

Pound was appointed a Senior Constructor on the eve of hostilities in 1939, and joined the technical staff of the R.N. Dockyard at Alexandria, where he served until mid-1942, gaining advancement to Chief Constructor. Among his more ingenious projects at this time was the fitting of a massive wooden bow, plated with steel, to the torpedo-damaged cruiser Manchester, an invention that gave her a snub-nosed appearance ‘rather like a Thames barge’, but which enabled her safe passage to San Francisco for rebuilding. Between 1942-44, Pound was employed at H.M. Dockyard, Bermuda, where he got on very well with the Americans, who were often amazed by the originality and success of his work, their kind words of praise often being met by his favoured leg-puller: “Ah, but remember, old boy, we were building ships before you were discovered.”

Post-war Pound held appointments at Devonport and Sheerness dockyards, the latter location providing the setting for one of his final masterpieces, the refloating of the frigate Berkeley Castle following the famous East Coast floods of February 1953 - inevitably, however, the resultant M.B.E. was actually awarded to an Admiralty Salvage Officer. Retiring ‘on the dot of his 60th birthday’, Pound died in January 1976, aged 81 years.