Arnold Smith Merchant seaman 1938-1941

[radstockjeff]

Apologies for the length of this one.

My late father in law joined the Merchant Navy in 1938 in South Shields. (R171684)
I am trying to fill a gap in his service history.

His first ship was San Quirino (1938-39). He then signed on Athelprincess (161137) in May 1939 at Birkenhead but his seamans record card (?) shows no discharge date.

In October 1940 with a different number (R226891) he signed on Hindustan (165784) at Immingham and signed off March 1941 at Immingham.

There is a note here to say that the original card was reported lost-enemy action. My wife has a vague recollection about him being torpedoed but no detail. On his death his wife destroyed all his private papers so there is no documented knowledge of his wartime activities other than what we found at Kew.

My current supposition is that he continued with the Athel Line, either in Athelprincess or others until his "torpedo incident". If I have linked the dates correctly then it could follow that he was serving on Athellaird (1161145) in July 1941 when that vessel was sunk to the south west of Ireland(no crew losses) This would give time for repatriation back to England , either via Fenit (Eire) or Greenock and then sign on in October at Immingham with Hindustan.

The other possibility is that he was on Athelcrest (1161291) which was torpedoed off north west Scotland in August 1940.(30 lost)

I realise that I will probably have to go back to Kew and have a look at Crew Registers and another look Discharge papers but can anyone tell me if there are other sources of information into which I could tap.

Any help or guidance on this one would be greatly appreciated. radstockjeff

[LOVAT#]

The first thing to try and obtain is his CRS 10 from BT 382 at Kew. This will contain his service record from Jan, 1941, if it has survived. There can be mistakes and omissions as well though as they were filled in by shoreside scribes.

Failing that you will need to resort to looking at Crew Agreements for the ships you know. Previous ship is usually shown on the Agreement unless the ship was sunk and the shore copy has not survived.

If you need any help with the file ref for the CRS 10 or the Crew Agreements just make another post and I will try to help.

Medal file - https://discovery.nationalarchives.go...ils/r/D4321697

Regards
Hugh

[radstockjeff]

Athellaird sinking should read July 1940 not 1941.

Thanks for responses so far

radstockjeff