RN WWI general

[paulphillips25]

Hi,
Looking at records of my family who served in the RN Before/during and after WWI I am suprised to see how very short some of their 'tours' are. For example HMS Cleopatra 20 Dec 1901-24 Feb 1902, HMS Duke of Wellington 09 Nov 1902 - 12 Jan 1903 whereas others are much longer e.g HMS Prince George 20 Aug 1907 - 21 Dec 1908, HMS Prince of Wales 22 Dec 1908 - 14 Dec 1910 (straight after previous tour), HMS Hercules 31 Jul 1911 - 01 Jul 1913.
Just wondered if time spent at sea was random or subject to destination etc..... The individual in the examples was Owen Phillips who went on to join HMS Bulwark on 18 Dec 1913 until its end 26 Nov 1914.

Many thanks

Paul

[SueNSW]

Hi Paul - this is certainly not a definitive answer but it might be worth looking at what was happening with the vessels on which he only spent a short time for some possible clues

According to the "Naval and Military Intelligence" section of The Times - the cruiser Cleopatra at that time was a training ship for young boys - she is reported as having arrived in Plymouth from Vigo (on the Atlantic coast of Spain) on 17th December 1901 after a "winter cruise" in the Med. She was then reported as leaving Plymouth on 27th February 1902 for her second winter cruise - again into the Med

Some possibilities I guess - if it was his first posting maybe she was used for initial training whilst docked in Plymouth - if not - maybe her usual crew were granted leave and a replacement crew including Owen were posted to her.

If you are able to get to the NA at Kew at any time you can inspect the ship's log for the period - which might throw some more light on what she was doing
https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/c...accessmethod=0

The lists of vessels on the Service Record were I believe used primarily for the purposes of pay - and smaller vessels were "grouped" with a larger one or a land base for paymaster's records. I think at the time he was with Duke of Wellington, she was a depot ship in Portsmouth - so he may have been on board her - or actually on a smaller vessel that had her crews pay administered by the Duke of Wellington. She was broken up in 1904

The fact that the ship's named were there for pay - it is likely the responsibility for his pay would be transferred from one ship to another on a specific date - but he may well have had leave between service on the different ships. If you're interested - it's probably worth a trawl through The Times online if you have library access to get an initial idea of where each vessel was during his service - and then follow it up with going through the logs at Kew

Hope this helps a bit

Cheers
Sue

[Geoffers]

See Sue's reply above........

Paul Benyon's site has a copy of 'Jane's' for WW1 if you want to find out some more about the ships on which your chap served.

It also has King's regs for the period.

The Navy List is anoter interesting source for information on ships/stations. Reference libraries often have a partial run of it. Some pay-per-view sites have odd copies.
The recording of short periods of attachment to a ship/station can indicate being transported from was one place to another or being ashore between ships, training, etc.

It was important for individual sailors to have their service recorded for pay, it was equally important for the RN to track personnel for the purpose of victualling.

[Ed Bradford]

Paul,
I can’t answer your question directly because I’m not an expert on that time frame nor the British Navy. However, speaking from personal experience in the U.S. Navy during the early 1960s time frame, ship deployments varied depending on the task with which the ship was charged. Some cruises were as short as a couple days whereas some lasted several months. A tour aboard a ship, sea duty, was normally 2 years which was followed by a tour of shore duty. However, a tour could be shortened of lengthened depending on the needs of the Navy. While at sea under normal conditions you worked 12 hours on and 12 hours off, 7 days a week for the entire time the ship was at sea. In an emergency or at battle stations, everyone aboard worked. You had a vested interest in keeping the ship afloat unless you knew to walk on water.

The ship could be resupplied at sea. If the ship pulled into a port for resupply, enough crew had to remain aboard to get the ship underway in case of an emergency. If we pulled into a foreign port we would be there for just a few days. If we pulled into our home port we could be there for a week or more depending on what maintenance the ship required. A refitting could last a year at which time the ships crew would be reduced and then restored when the ship was once again ready for sea. Usually the first cruise of a ship, after a new launch or a major refit, was a shakedown cruise to make sure the ship is battle ready. It was usually a short one.

While serving a tour of duty, you could be sent to a school elsewhere to learn a new skill or to get updated on changes that took place. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the Navies of the world underwent significant changes which would have required constant training to maintain readiness. During my time in the service, I would return to the same duty station, ship, after training. However, that may not have been the case back then because it would be difficult to get someone back to a ship that had deployed on a cruise.

I hope that this helps. .........................Ed

[busyglen]

Paul, my father was in the Royal Marines who similarly spent a lot of time at sea, and looking at his service records, his length of service at sea varied as well. During the 14-18 War, his length of trips varied from 2 months to 8 months. Later he spent two years on the same ship, but of course although he was assigned to this ship, there were obviously periods when the ship was in dock and not at sea. It was possible to get a clue by looking at the dates within the two years, as sometime it showed 2 weeks, another time it was 9 months and so on. As was mentioned, this was also a record for pay. He also spent time attached to land-based establishments. ie. Portsmouth, Chatham, Deal etc.

Hope this helps a little with the understanding of the length of time at sea.

Glenys

[paulphillips25]

Thanks everyone your answers and suggestions have been of great help and given 'food for thought'.
Any one else who can add to this please feel free to do so.

Paul

[Dre1]

Hello Paul,
my family and I are also looking for more information on our ancestors, I came across this topic as I typed in Joseph Bullimore Phillips in google.
It turns out you and I are investigating the same family (Phillips of Loughborough), my great gran is Sarah Phillips who was a sister of Harley Phillips your ancestor.
We had a chap in London who investigated our family records at the Pro, he came up with the same info you have found.
The name's you have found are the same as on our records/documents, so I guess some where along the line we are related as we both relate to the Phillips family which came from Loughborough-Leicestershire.
I have tried to contact you via e-mail but with no luck, I was hoping to share some information about our ancestors with you.

Dre Wielink

[postiebear]

The problem with the royal navy is they have ships and shore establishments of the same name. if they served for a short time then it is likely to be a shore establishment.

if a name appears in brackets then this is the ship name for smaller ships who do not have their own pay office so you may see
example only
HMS Vivid (Barmill) 23 feb 1914-26 june 1915
HMS Devonport (Barmill) 27 june 1915-1 dec 1916

this means he actually served in the ship in brackets but was moved to different pay areas.

Hope this helps, if you need a hand deciphering the record please PM me.

Regards

James