HMS Trinidad
My uncle, Jack Melville, was only 23 when he went down with his ship in the frigid waters of the North Atlantic on 15 May 1942.
An Irishman from Kilrush in Co Clare, he joined the British Navy and served on submarines before joining the Fiji Class cruiser, HMS Trinidad as a Leading Seaman.
The Trinidad was only 12 months old and was on convoy escort duty in March 1942 when she engaged three German destroyers. She managed to sink one and then fired a torpedo at the others but the icy water damaged the gyro on the torpedo and it did a 360 degree arc and came back and hit the Trinidad killing 32 men.
She limped into Murmansk in northern Russia for temporary repairs before she sailed for the UK on 13th May 1942 in convoy with four destroyers as escort. The convoy came under heavy dive bombing and torpedo attacks from a squadron of German bombers and the Trinidad was hit by several bombs and caught fire killing 63 men including my uncle.
When the 800 survivors were rescued, it was decided to scuttle the Trinidad, and so three torpedoes from HMS Matchless sent her to the bottom and a sad end for a proud ship.
This is the first time I’ve really done some research on my uncle although I knew the brief story of the Trinidad’s demise. The internet now provides such a wealth of information that I was able to find out that he is commemorated at the Plymouth Naval Memorial and the full service history of the Trinidad is here.
Somewhat of a change from meter reading stories, eh!
So a Cruiser that sank (with help) one destroyer before being itself damaged and scuttled. Not the best of shining examples of the British Navy.
A great shining example of the British navy,she engaged three german destroyers,sunk one and was hit by her own malfunctioning torpedo.This was not a destroyer it was a cruiser. Just one of many great examples of heroism and guts by all branches in the war.
COMMENT REPLIES
Thomas – A cruiser would have been the focus of any attack no matter how many escorts. I wrote the blog with facts only as research into my uncles death and not to enter into a slanging match over which side was best in this particular conflict.
June – Your last sentence sums it up.
muscat55 – Cain and Abel started it off and a sad fact is that it will never end while humans roam the earth.
Thomas – Thanks to you, June and Muscat55 for your comments. Here I was thinking such a serious post would grab a few more but it proves my theory that more mundane things get all the attention and I must stick to Babble.
MP and I visited the USS North Carolina at Wilmington not far from Gabrielle’s place and were awed by the size of these weapons. No wonder the Tirpitz, Bismark, Prince of Wales and Yamato etc were such targets. If you got posted on one of those beasts, you’d be saying “Uh, oh!” I was reading about the Yamato and she was up against 280 aircraft in the first wave of the final attack and 100 aircraft in the second wave. Those massive ships were sitting ducks.
I’m the same with my family past and should get it all documented but my mind doesn’t wander into history all that much. We only have a very small family so there wouldn’t be too much interest down from me.
That is such a sad story, wouldn’t it be nice if we didn’t ever have any wars.
True they were bomber / destroyer magnets. I still remember visiting the USS Missouri on it’s visit to Sydney about 20 years ago before it was decomissioned. Geeze that was a mighty battleship! Anything that fires slugs that weigh about the same as a VW 20 miles is impressive.
On a thread related note though, my Grandfather was mustard gassed in WW1 and liked as KIA. However it was reported wrong and he survived (albeit with lung issues). His name did however end up on a monument somewhere. I really should get these stories written down by my father shouldn’t I? I’m sure there’s a lot more to it….
err…. liked = listed in the above post.