Post by Administrator on Sept 6, 2016 22:20:39 GMT
Hundreds remember the seafarers lost in war at Merchant Navy Day at Tower Hill
Hundreds turned out for the Merchant Navy annual remembrance at the Tower Hill for the civilian seafarers who died in both world wars and those lost at sea—and the plucky ferry captain who rammed a German U-boat rather than be captured on the High Seas.
Sundays remembrance in Trinity Square opposite the Tower of London was the 17th officially recognised annual event, held on the Sunday following Merchant Navy Day which fell on Saturday this year—the day the Second World War broke out in 1939.
The memorial bears the names of 35,842 seafarers from both world wars and the Falklands war for whom there is “no grave but the sea”.
MP Jim Fitzpatrick, whose Poplar & Limehouse constituency includes Tower Hill, brought a message from Prime Minister Theresa May when he addressed the remembrance service.
“The Merchant seafarers risked their lives keeping Britain supplied through two world wars,” he said. “It is important to remember their sacrifice.
“I am delivering a message from the Prime Minister—it’s good that the Merchant Navy is finally being recognised.”
This year was the centenary of the North Sea ferry captain Charles Wyatt being captured on the High Seas by the German navy in 1916 and shot by a firing squad in revenge for the humiliating ramming of a U-boat the year before.
His execution led to worldwide outrage. His body was exhumed after the war and given a hero’s funeral service in St Paul’s Cathedral in 1919, before his coffin was put on a special train at Liverpool Street and taken to his native Harwich for reburial.
Among Capt Wyatt’s relatives at yesterday’s remembrance was his nephew Leslie Wyatt, now 92, who said: “Three or four German destroyers not showing any lights surrounded his ferry at night on the High Seas—that was out of order. He was a marked man to the Germans.
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Hundreds turned out for the Merchant Navy annual remembrance at the Tower Hill for the civilian seafarers who died in both world wars and those lost at sea—and the plucky ferry captain who rammed a German U-boat rather than be captured on the High Seas.
Sundays remembrance in Trinity Square opposite the Tower of London was the 17th officially recognised annual event, held on the Sunday following Merchant Navy Day which fell on Saturday this year—the day the Second World War broke out in 1939.
The memorial bears the names of 35,842 seafarers from both world wars and the Falklands war for whom there is “no grave but the sea”.
MP Jim Fitzpatrick, whose Poplar & Limehouse constituency includes Tower Hill, brought a message from Prime Minister Theresa May when he addressed the remembrance service.
“The Merchant seafarers risked their lives keeping Britain supplied through two world wars,” he said. “It is important to remember their sacrifice.
“I am delivering a message from the Prime Minister—it’s good that the Merchant Navy is finally being recognised.”
This year was the centenary of the North Sea ferry captain Charles Wyatt being captured on the High Seas by the German navy in 1916 and shot by a firing squad in revenge for the humiliating ramming of a U-boat the year before.
His execution led to worldwide outrage. His body was exhumed after the war and given a hero’s funeral service in St Paul’s Cathedral in 1919, before his coffin was put on a special train at Liverpool Street and taken to his native Harwich for reburial.
Among Capt Wyatt’s relatives at yesterday’s remembrance was his nephew Leslie Wyatt, now 92, who said: “Three or four German destroyers not showing any lights surrounded his ferry at night on the High Seas—that was out of order. He was a marked man to the Germans.
LINK