GROUPS AND SINGLE DECORATIONS FOR GALLANTRY
“After that”, Tom Crisp later told the Court of Inquiry, which Ross also attended, “we were making water fast and had used nearly all
our ammunition, only having five rounds left, and we had to leave the ship because she was sinking. I asked the skipper if we should
take him in the boat with us, but he said: “No, throw me overboard.” This I would not do, and so we had to leave him on board the
smack as he was in too bad condition to be moved. We got into the small boat, the smack sinking by the head about quarter of an hour
afterwards. All the shots were directed on the Nelson until she sank. After our ship sank the submarine directed the fire on the Ethel &
Millie. When we were in the small boat, the skipper of the Ethel & Millie beckoned us to go on board, but we would not go. We kept
rowing in to the south-east and we saw one direct hit on the Ethel & Millie and the crew abandon her. Then the submarine worked
round to the south and came to the southward of us. When the submarine was working round to the south we were working round in
the opposite direction. The submarine left off firing at the Ethel & Millie and picked up her crew. We saw the submarine’s crew line the
Ethel & Millie’s crew up on the submarine’s fore deck. They tied the smack’s boat up astern of the submarine and steamed to the smack.
The wind being from the south south east was blowing the Ethel & Millie into the north north-west until she was nearly out of sight. Just
before the Ethel & Millie got out of sight a haze fell over her and we rowed into the south-east as hard as we could, the opposite
direction in which the smack and the submarine were going. It was drawing in dusk then. After dark came on we kept pulling in to the
south-west. Next morning at day break we saw a buoy ahead of us and the wind freshened and blew us out to the eastward again. We
still kept pulling to the westward. On Thursday we saw the Dryad. It was about three o’clock in the afternoon. He came in sight of us
and then directed his course to the north-west and went out of sight. After the Dryad came a group of minesweepers. They got ahead of
us and turned and went away in a south-westerly direction. All the time we had a large piece of oilskin and a pair of trousers tied on
two oars to attract attention, but they did not see us. As night came the weather became finer, and we kept pulling into westward all
night as hard as we could. At daybreak we saw some smacks straight ahead of us, but there was too much wind from westward, and we
could not get to them, and they went away from us in a south-westerly direction. One of the chaps sighted a buoy which turned out to
be the Jim Howe Bank buoy. We pulled up to it and made fast to it just as the tide turned about 10.30 a.m. on the Friday. The wind
was blowing hard. About 1.45 p.m. the Dryad found us.”
The fate of the crew of the Ethel & Millie, last seen standing on the U-Boat’s casing, has been the subject of numerous conspiracy
theories, a chapter best summarised by Stephen Snelling in his definitive history The Naval V.Cs:
‘Nowhere, however, in any of the accounts was mention made of the involvement of the Ethel & Millie. Her crew’s fate remains
uncertain. The seven men were last seen as prisoners on the submarine’s forward casing. Originally reported ‘missing’, they were
officially given up for dead on 10 March 1918. In the circumspect words of the Admiralty, they were ‘presumed to have lost their lives
on 16 August 1917’ (sic). The suspicion persists that they were murdered, though no evidence exists to support the theory. Perhaps
they were cast off in their small boat after being questioned and were subsequently lost. More than sixty years ago the writer David
Masters suggested that they were taken on board the submarine which was itself sunk before reaching port. To add weight to his theory,
he speculated that the submarine, which was never identified, might have been the UC-41 which was sunk by trawlers off the Scottish
coast six days later. But there was another, more bizarre, theory put forward by the son of Arthur Soanes, a deckhand aboard the Ethel
& Millie. He claimed to have used his powers as a medium to make contact with his father, who told him ‘that they had been very well
looked after by the U-Boat crew who had wrapped them in blankets and given them hot drinks. So, when the U-Boat sank ... they all
died together as friends rather than enemies.’
Following the Court of Inquiry at Lowestoft, Skipper Crisp was awarded a posthumous V.C., Tom Crisp the D.S.M., and Ross a Bar to
his D.S.M.
Ross joined Victory in September 1917 and was pensioned ashore from Courageous in July 1920. From March 1921 he served in the
Royal Fleet Reserve until discharged on reaching the age limit of 50 years in July 1930, his total service at that time amounting to 35
years; sold with his original parchment Certificate of Service and a related newspaper feature.
826
A Great War ‘Minesweeping operations’ D.S.M. group of four awarded to Chief Engine Room Artificer James Handley,
Royal Navy
DISTINGUISHED SERVICE MEDAL, G.V.R. (268553 J. Handley, C.E.R.A. 1Cl., “Marigold” Minesweeping 1918); AFRICA GENERAL
SERVICE 1902-56, 1 clasp, Somaliland 1908-10 (268553 J. Handley, Ch. E.R.A. 2Cl., H.M.S. Fox); NAVAL GENERAL SERVICE 1915
-62, 1 clasp, Persian Gulf 1909-1914 (268553 J. Handley, Ch. E.R.A. 1Cl., H.M.S. Fox); 1914-15 STAR (268553 J. Handley, C.E.
R.A. 1, R.N.) very fine (4) £750-850
Ex Captain Douglas-Morris Collection, D.N.W. 12 February 1997.
D.S.M. London Gazette 5 October 1918 ‘The following awards have been approved for services in minesweeping operations between
1 January and 30 June 1918.’
H.M.S. Marigold (Ex Ivy) was a Flower Class (Acacia Type) Fleet Minesweeping Sloop. Her measurements were length 262 feet, breadth
33 feet, draft 11 feet, speed 16 1/2 knots of 1,200 tons displacement. All of the Flower Class ships were built along merchant ship lines
to facilitate quick production. The 72 vessels of the Acacia, Azalea and Arabis types were similar in appearance and differed only in
their armament. In 1918 the Acacia class Minesweepers, including H.M.S. Marigold, served primarily with the Grand Fleet.
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