A HARD FOUGHT SHIP
The
story of HMS Venomous
Wireless Telegraphy Operator on HMS Venomous, 1939-43
Eric Pountney was born at Harborne in Warwickshire, a few miles south of Birmingham, on the 6 August 1918 and lived there all his life apart from his wartime service in the Royal Navy. He was the youngest of five children and his father abandoned the family shortly before he was born. When he volunteered for the Royal Navy on the 28 September 1938 during the Munich crisis "for the period of hostilities" he gave his trade as apprentice salesman (showroom assistant) and his next of kin as his mother, Dora Mary Pountney. Photographed at Londonderry in 1941 (left) and at HMS St George, Douglas, Isle of Man, in 1944.... Read...
Thank you so much for mentioning my web site about HMS VENOMOUS, the elderly V & W Class destroyer on which my father served. And apologies to French readers for posting this comment in English.
ReplyDeleteIf you are interested in the stories of the British community living in Calais before the war you can read how HMS VENOMOUS broght 200 Britiah subjects from Calais to Folkestone on the 21 May 1940 on this page: http://www.holywellhousepublishing.co.uk/Calais.html
And the next day brought 212 refugees from Boulogne to Dover including 32 orphan children (with their teachers and four nuns) and a young pregnant wsman who gave birth on arrival at Dover: http://www.holywellhousepublishing.co.uk/Boulogne.html
I would love to hear from you via this blog if you have family stories to tell about the evacuation of civilians by VENOMOUS or its sister V & Ws from Calais in the week before it fell to German forces.
Bill Forster
son of
Lt(E) Williamn Redvers Forster RNR (1900-75)