The Rescue Ships and the Convoys: Saving Lives During The Second World War

By B.B. Schofield and Victoria Schofield

The Rescue Ships and the Convoys tells the history of one of the least known aspects of Second World War maritime history. Despite the threat of heavy losses of ships and lives, no hospital ships, which had to be lit, could accompany the convoys as they would betray a convoy’s position.

The solution was to create a fleet of 30 small Merchant Navy vessels of about 1,500 gross tons, mostly from coastal trade. These ‘Rescue Ships’, commanded and manned by Merchant Navy personnel, carried medical teams, and life-saving equipment including operating theaters, hospital beds, ‘Carley’ floats, and hoists.

Undeterred either by either enemy action or atrocious weather conditions, these vessels accompanied close to 800 convoys and saved 4,194 lives from ships sunk in the North Atlantic and with the Arctic convoys. During their service, seven Rescue Ships were lost.

This is a story packed with suspense, danger, achievement and tragedy. As the author, Vice Admiral Schofield, who was closely involved in the establishment of the fleet, writes, it is a record ‘of great humanitarian endeavour, of superb acts of courage, of a display of seamanship of the highest order, of a devotion to duty by medical officers under the most arduous conditions imaginable, of great deeds by men of the Merchant Navy in little ships on voyages they were never designed to undertake.’

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pen and Sword
• Release date: Jun 30, 2024
• ISBN: 9781036102678

B.B. Schofield

Brian Bethem Schofield served in the Royal navy for some 36 years rising to the rank of Vice Admiral before retiring in 1950\. This memoir covers his distinguished career in war and peace. In retirement he wrote numerous works of naval history including Operation Neptune and Stringbags in Action (both in print with Pen and Sword Books).

Book preview

Praise for The Rescue Ships (1968)

‘A book packed with stories of heroism, of stoicism, some grim, all exciting, and clearly setting out the debt owed by the nation to the men who manned its ships.’

George Long, South Wales Evening Post, 25 May 1968

‘A tale straightforwardly told, with a matter-of-factness and attention to detail those masters and their men would have approved; an unforgettable tale of a heroism so everyday and taken-for-granted that it almost ceases to astonish…’

Leslie Gardiner, The Scotsman, 1968

‘A story of almost unbelievable devotion to duty under appalling conditions. The crews were not seafaring men in the true sense – they were sea-going civilians.’

Pretoria News, 29 May 1968

‘A unique episode in the history of the sea and of maritime warfare.’

Western Morning News, Plymouth, 21 June 1968

‘A moving factual account of what these little ships accomplished…’

T. S. Eimerl, DSC, VRD, MD, FRCGP, The Lancet, 26 June 1968

‘Written without heroics – for the facts require no embellishment – the book compels admiration for these men who braved so much for humanitarian motives.’

C. H. M., Liverpool Journal of Commerce, 28 June 1968

‘This is a book which literally overflows with excitement because its story is concerned with a long series of extremely hazardous operations, at a time when the main danger was enemy action, during the 1939–45 war.’

Nautical Magazine, July 1968

‘The reading of this book increases one’s faith in human nature.’

Zachary Cope, British Medical Journal, 2 November 1968

‘A most satisfactory tribute to a small but very significant group of men whose mark upon naval history has hitherto, one feels, been less than they deserve.’

George Walker, Mariners Mirror, November 1968

‘As a story it is not glamorous. Just a record of ordinary men with extraordinary courage in a little-known episode of the war.’

Stuart White, Lancashire Evening Telegraph, 1968

‘A vivid description of the origins of the [Rescue] service, the equipping of the first Rescue Ships, their first voyages and experiences which led to improvements in later ships, and above all, their accomplishments with particular convoy operations.’

Jürgen Rohwer, Marine Rundschau, April 1969

The Rescue Ships and the Convoys

By the same author

The Royal Navy Today

The Russian Convoys

British Sea Power

Loss of the Bismarck (republished in Stringbags in Action)

The Attack on Taranto (republished in Stringbags in Action)

Operation Neptune

The Arctic Convoys

The Story of HMS Dryad

With the Royal Navy in War and Peace

The Rescue Ships and the Convoys

Saving lives during the Second World War

Vice Admiral B. B. Schofield CB, CBE

Edited and expanded by Victoria Schofield

First published in Great Britain in 1968 by

William Blackwood & Sons Ltd, Edinburgh and London

This edition published in 2024 by

Pen & Sword Maritime

An imprint of Pen & Sword Books Limited

Yorkshire – Philadelphia

Copyright © The Estate of the Late Vice Admiral B. B. Schofield 2024

ISBN 978 1 03610 266 1

ePub ISBN 978 1 03610 267 8

Mobi ISBN 978 1 03610 267 8

The right of Vice Admiral B. B. Schofield to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted by his executors in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.

Pen & Sword Books Limited incorporates the imprints of After the Battle, Atlas, Archaeology, Aviation, Discovery, Family History, Fiction, History, Maritime, Military, Military Classics, Politics, Select, Transport, True Crime, Air World, Frontline Publishing, Leo Cooper, Remember When, Seaforth Publishing, The Praetorian Press, Wharncliffe Local History, Wharncliffe Transport, Wharncliffe True Crime and White Owl.

For a complete list of Pen & Sword titles please contact

PEN & SWORD BOOKS LIMITED

47 Church Street, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, S70 2AS, England

E-mail: [e-mail]

Website: www.pen-and-sword.co.uk

or

PEN AND SWORD BOOKS

1950 Lawrence Rd, Havertown, PA 19083, USA

E-mail: [e-mail]

Website: www.penandswordbooks.com

To the Memory of the Officers and Men of the Rescue Ships who gave their lives in trying to save others

Contents

List of Illustrations

Map of the Arctic Convoys, Area of Operations

Editor’s Note

Foreword

1War and the Merchant Seaman

2The Growth of the Rescue Fleet 1941

3De Profundis – The North Atlantic 1942

4Arctic Odyssey – PQ 17

5Russian Interlude

6The Comeback – PQ 18 & QP 14

7These Invaluable Ships 1942–43

8Gadflies

9The Turning of the Tide 1944

10 Epilogue

Appendices

I: Rescue Ships, Convoys Escorted and Lives Saved

II: Nationalities of Survivors

III: Convoy Medical Code

Notes

Acknowledgements

Illustrations

1. Rescue Ship Rathlin ( courtesy Captain George N. Glass )

2. A rescue boat alongside her parent ship, Goodwin , showing boom nets ( Oldhams Press )

3. Hauling an injured man in a stretcher up the side of Rescue Ship Goodwin ( courtesy Captain J. Harris )

4. Empire class Rescue Ship Empire Rest ( courtesy Captain George N. Glass )

5. Transferring the medical officer by derrick and basket to visit a sick man ( courtesy Captain J. Harris )

6. First aid to a survivor after rescue on board the Goodwin ( Oldhams Press )

7. A Rescue Ship sick-bay ( courtesy Sir John McNee )

8. An operation in progress in a Rescue Ship’s hospital ( courtesy Sir John McNee )

9. Typical crew member of the Rescue Ships, A.B. Wally (he had all his teeth removed before he sailed so he would not be troubled by toothache!) ( Oldhams Press )

10. Another member of the Rescue Ships – many were Highlanders ( Oldhams Press )

11. Chief Radio Officer Horace Bell of the Copeland and Zamalek ( courtesy Horace Bell )

12. Excerpt from Horace Bell to Brian B. Schofield describing arrival in Archangel with PQ 18, September 1942 ( courtesy Horace Bell )

13. Captain Owen C. Morris, DSO and the officers and crew of the Rescue Ship Zamalek ( courtesy Horace Bell )

14. Captain Laurie E. Brown, OBE ( courtesy Captain Laurie E. Brown )

15. Rescue Ship Bury arriving at Halifax, Nova Scotia with survivors ( source unknown )

16. Testimonial from the survivors of SS Angelina to the captain, officers and crew of the SS Bury ( courtesy Captain Laurie E. Brown )

17. The survivors of SS Angelina . Gustav Alm is in front, wearing a cap ( courtesy Captain Laurie E. Brown )

18. The Rescue Ship Zamalek on arrival at Halifax, February 1943 ( courtesy Horace Bell )

19. Another view of the Zamalek after a winter crossing of the Atlantic ( courtesy Horace Bell )

20. Captain William (Bill) J. Hartley, DSC, master of the Rescue Ships Copeland and Goodwin ( Oldhams Press )

21. Captain J. L. Davidson with members of the Accrington ’s ship’s company ( Oldhams Press )

22. Captain Owen C. Morris, DSO, master of the Rescue Ship Zamalek (courtesy Horace Bell )

23. Captain James M. Hadden, OBE of the Gothland with Surgeon Lieutenant J. Mackenzie, RNVR (courtesy Imperial War Museum )

24. Captain Augustus Banning, DSO, master of the Rescue Ships Beachy, Copeland, Rathlin and Eddystone ( courtesy Mrs Banning )

25. Rescue Ship at sea with a convoy ( courtesy Imperial War Museum )

26. Clyde Shipping Company Limited brochure

27. Rescue Ship Aboyne Badge ( BBS Archives)

28. Rescue Ship Bury Badge ( BBS Archives)

29. Toward memorial, Tower Hill Memorial

30. Rescue Ship Copeland Badge ( BBS Archives)

31. Rescue Ship Dundee Badge ( BBS Archives)

32. Rescue Ship Pinto Badge ( BBS Archives)

33. The Battle of the Atlantic, HMSO 1944 ( Merchantmen at War, 1944 )

34. Route of the Zamalek after the order to ‘scatter’ ( courtesy Paul Lund C Harry Ludlam, PQ 17 Convoy to Hell )

Editor’s Note

Unfathomable Sea! whose waves are years,

Ocean of Time, whose waters of deep woe

Are brackish with the salt of human tears!

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)¹

Vice Admiral B. B. Schofield spent 42 years in the Royal Navy, after which he was fortunate to enjoy a long retirement until his death in 1984 aged 89. This enabled him to develop a second career as a naval historian, focusing not only on the naval and strategic issues of the day but also drawing on his own first-hand experiences, having served in both World Wars. Prior to giving his papers to the Imperial War Museum, I came across three files containing his research material for his fourth book, The Rescue Ships, published in 1968. Chief among his correspondents was Lieutenant Commander Louis F. Martyn, Rescue Ship Officer on the staff of the Principal Sea Transport Officer (PSTO) Clyde, whose duty it was to organize the Rescue Ship Service during the war. Formerly on coastal service, these small Merchant Navy vessels were mainly responsible for picking up survivors from torpedoed ships in the numerous convoys which steamed back and forth across the Atlantic as well as to Murmansk and Archangel in North Russia, including the ill-fated PQ 17. When required, they also provided invaluable medical assistance not only for the rescued men but also for crew members of the ships in convoy.

In 1966, upon the recommendation of Sir John McNee, temporary Surgeon Rear Admiral during the war, Martyn had approached my father to write the history of the ‘Rescue Ships’, since, as Director of the Trade Division in the Admiralty during the critical years, 1941 to 1943, he had been closely connected with the Rescue Ship Service.² To assist his research, Martyn gave my father ‘a suitcase full’ of the original Masters’ Reports which he had retained for 20 years; he also made available a document on the Rescue Ship Service, which he had been requested to write for distribution at the end of the war, and which he anticipated would form the ‘heart’ of the book.³ To personalize the narrative my father contacted many of the merchant seamen and the naval doctors who had served in the ships, since, as he politely said ‘official reports would make rather dull reading without some account of the officers and men who manned the ships.’⁴

Indicative of the strictures still in force in the 1960s, before publication the manuscript was submitted for approval to the Defence Secretariat Division of the Ministry of Defence. The response was that it had been read ‘with interest’ and the Navy Department had no objection to its publication.⁵

As so often happens following the publication of a book, many people contacted my father both extolling the fact that the story had at last been written and also providing fresh material by relating their own experiences; others wrote with minor corrections (which he promised to rectify in the ‘next’ edition, little realizing that it would be 56 years later!). In addition, given that he had just published a book on the Russian convoys, and that the events he was describing were fresher in the memory than they are today, he had taken for granted the reader’s contextual knowledge of the voyages undertaken by the Rescue Ships. In this new edition, without altering the substance of the narrative, I have both corrected the errors and expanded it, using previously unpublished source material, including information relating to the controversial decision to ‘scatter’ the convoy, PQ 17. I have also given the necessary context by drawing on information contained in my father’s other published works. Finally, going through the correspondence I discovered that Martyn was anxious to be given the credit for building up the Rescue Fleet ‘from simply nothing.’ However, because he requested to be listed as co-author it was difficult for him to seem to be ‘blowing his own trumpet’.⁶ This I have now endeavoured to rectify.

The story today is as dramatic as it was over 80 years ago, when the events described took place against the backdrop of world war on land and at sea; the actions of the merchant seamen and the medical officers deputed to travel with the convoys remain as heroic as they were at the time and the losses as tragic. Inasmuch as the men rejoiced at those they saved, they had to endure immense sadness when they saw the lives of others literally ebb away in freezing conditions in an unforgiving ocean. From a twenty-first-century vantage point it is staggering to think that, given the vast number of convoys operating on routes throughout the world, only 30 ships of an average of 1,500 gross registered tons were ever available to pick up survivors. It truly is a record of ‘great deeds’ in ‘little ships’.

Victoria Schofield

Foreword

by Sir John McNee

The saga of the Rescue Ship Service in the Second World War should have been written long ago, because of the great interest and importance of what there is to tell and because some similar situation might arise in the future. Practically nothing was known, or could be written, about the Service during the war years and I believe that the only (much censored) account of the Rescue Ships was written by myself in 1944 and published in the Journal of the Royal Naval Medical Service.¹ This was to inform at least Naval Medical Officers about what the Rescue Ships were, and what they had accomplished.

My interest in the Rescue Ships was naturally concerned mainly with their medical problems and a short account is necessary of how it all came about. In 1935, when at University College Hospital, London, I had been appointed Civil Consultant Physician to the Navy. In 1937, when I became Regius Professor of the Practice of Medicine at Glasgow University my status was changed to Civil Consultant Physician, Royal Navy, Scotland and I was warned that, in the event of war, I should have to don naval uniform. Thus in 1939 I suddenly found myself a temporary Surgeon Rear Admiral with duties including not only Scotland, but the north of England as far south as the Tyne in the east and the Mersey (Liverpool-Western Approaches) in the west.

My first appointment was to HMS Cochrane at Rosyth, but when Norway fell to the Germans in 1940 much of the naval activity in the Forth was quickly transferred to the Clyde. This suited me well and, before long, part of the Gardiner Institute of Medicine of Glasgow University became practically a naval medical office, always in close touch with the main naval office in Glasgow (HMS Spartiate) commanded for most of the war by Vice Admiral Sir James Troup KBE.

I cannot remember how I first heard of the Rescue Ships, but I quickly knew that nearly all the convoys of merchant ships crossing the Atlantic, and later to North Russia, assembled and sailed from Greenock in the Clyde Estuary. I was soon in touch with Lieutenant Commander L. F. Martyn, RNVR who was a member of the staff of the Principal Sea Transport Officer for the Clyde and Scottish ports, and who had been entrusted with the task of organizing the newly-conceived Rescue Ship Service. No better choice could have been made, as his previous record and his accomplishments during the war years fully show.

In his young days Martyn covered much of the world in cargo ships and he had the almost unique experience of serving before the mast in the sailing ship Archibald Russell. Among his varied adventures he was shipwrecked in the Solomon Islands. These experiences enabled him to understand the psychology and needs of the merchant seaman. In addition, Martyn belonged to an old established and well-known family of shipbrokers on the Baltic Exchange, London, and thus had considerable first-hand knowledge of the running of ships from the shore end. This was of great value in cooperating with the ship owners whose vessels were taken up for the Rescue Service. As so often happens in war emergencies, Martyn had the task of building up the Rescue Service from practically nothing, with no precedents to guide him and, what is more, single-handed. The results speak for themselves in this book. Little hope or encouragement of this new Service came from the Medical Department of the Admiralty, and it was only after pressure from above that naval medical officers (generally young newly-joined RNVR officers) were appointed to serve in these small converted merchant vessels.

It is unfortunate that no senior Medical Officer from Headquarters in London ever visited a Rescue Ship to encourage their efforts, although the reports of the young Medical Officers were regularly available after each exciting voyage. In fact the only naval Medical Officers in regular touch with the Rescue Ship Service were Surgeon Commander R. S. Rudland, RNVR of the Glasgow Naval office and myself. It was quite otherwise with the senior naval officers on the Clyde (Vice Admiral Sir James Troup and others at Greenock) and on the Mersey (Admirals Sir Percy Noble, Sir Max Horton and others), who knew all the activities of the Rescue Ships and sent many encouraging signals to their masters, crews, and medical officers.

As stated earlier, not being a sailor I could only hope to help Lieutenant Commander Martyn and the ships with some of the purely medical problems involved in the rescue work. My many visits to Rescue Ships in port and my discussions with the masters, crews, and (not least) the naval medical officers, were – I think – greatly appreciated. Occasionally I was able to hasten the delivery of medical apparatus or equipment which was badly needed.

I have always been proud of my association with the Rescue Ship Service, and it therefore gives me great satisfaction that this book has now been written. The nucleus of the book was a moving factual account compiled by Martyn at the end of the war, of which I was given a copy. Many essential documents and reports were, however (because of secrecy at the time) not available to Martyn, so that he could not write this book by himself. Fortunately he got in touch with Vice Admiral B. B. Schofield, a well-known writer on naval affairs, who was Director of the Trade Division of the Admiralty when the Rescue Service was formed, and who had the knowledge and experience to fill in the details and obtain information not available to Martyn. The result of this collaboration is this splendid, lively and full account of the Rescue Ships and their doings.

Although I was mainly concerned with medical affairs, certain points in connection with the Rescue Ship Service impressed me so deeply at the time that I feel compelled to emphasize them, although they are referred to in the pages of the book.

Firstly, the older type of straight-sided or wall-sided ships were far the best for the efficient working of scrambling nets and boom nets. The frigates provided near the end of the war were much less efficient because of the pronounced flair of their hulls.

Secondly, ships which, when taken up for service, were already divided into many small compartments or cabins, were less suitable than those with simple covered holds. Survivors always preferred to be together in a large space, with easy access to the main deck.

Thirdly, the decision to arm the Rescue Ships – they were quite heavily armed for their size – and to fit them with HF/DF (High Frequency Direction Finding) radio equipment was thoroughly sound. The effect on morale of young active gunners in action against bombing attacks was tremendous, as I so often heard from survivors.

Fourthly, in a few instances the morale of survivors had reached a very low ebb, and the only treatment for the worst cases was an immediate and adequate dose of morphine.

Fifthly, all of us closely associated with the Rescue Service were at times much concerned about the transfer of sick or injured members of convoy crews, especially at night and in stormy weather. Was the transfer really necessary? Was it immediate or could it wait? Was advice sufficient? For this reason, an abbreviated medical code was worked out by Martyn, Rudland and myself; it is referred to in the book, and came into general use in the convoys after a long delay. One point about this code, apt to be forgotten, is that it could be easily and correctly used by masters and Allied merchant ships who had no knowledge of the English language.

John W. McNee

1

War and the Merchant Seaman

Our brethren shield in danger’s hour

From rock and tempest, fire and foe.

William Whiting (1825–78)¹

In the battle between the Austrian and Italian fleets off the island of Lissa (Vis), in the first fleet action between ironclad (as opposed to wooden) ships that took place on 20 July 1866, during the Third Italian War of Independence, 650 officers and men of the opposing fleets lost their lives. Most of those who perished drowned when their ships foundered. This heavy number of casualties – for those days – aroused the public conscience to the need for action to ameliorate the lot of mariners wounded and shipwrecked as a result of naval action, and led to the drawing up of rules for the employment of hospital ships. In 1868 these rules were embodied as Additional Articles to clarify some provisions of the Geneva Convention of 1864, extending the advantages of the Convention to naval forces:

the boats which, at their own risk and peril, during and after an engagement pick up the shipwrecked or wounded, or which, having picked them up, convey them on board a neutral or hospital ship, shall enjoy, until the accomplishment of their mission, the character of neutrality, so far as the circumstances of the engagement and the position of the ships engaged will permit. The appreciation of these circumstances is entrusted to the humanity of all the combatants.²

These principles were later included in the Hague Convention of 1907 for the Adaptation to Maritime Warfare of the Principles of the Geneva Convention, and remained in force during both World Wars, although they were not observed by Germany in either of them.³

The right of a belligerent to capture the merchant shipping of the enemy is well established in international law. At the same time, before applying force to capture a ship, he has a duty to call upon her to stop and submit to a visit. It is also the duty of the captor to take his prize into a port belonging either to his own country or to one of his allies. It is generally accepted that when circumstances make this course impossible of fulfilment, the prize may be destroyed; but – and this is the important point – ‘it is a rule of international law that all persons on board must be removed and placed in safety, and that all relevant ships’ papers must also be removed and preserved.’⁴

When, in 1917, Germany began unrestricted submarine warfare against British and Allied shipping, her leaders knew that it was contrary to the accepted principles of international law, because the small size of a submarine made it impossible for such a ship to put a prize crew on board a captured vessel; nor was it practicable for her to escort the prize into port, let alone provide accommodation for the passengers and crew, before sinking her. It should be noted that ships’ lifeboats were not considered places of safety unless within easy reach of the shore.