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Dunkirk

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My grandfather survived the First World War and Dunkirk only to be killed on a ship on the way home.

He was on board HMS Lancastria which was sent to evacuate the troops but he is now a statistic in the largest loss of life ever in British maritime history and it has all been hushed up.

The ship was hit by four German bombs which were sent into the ships holds where the men had been told to shelter. The seas were full of oil so there was fire and many men drowned , others choked on burning oil, the rest were picked off by German fighters if there has ever been a hell on earth then surely my grandar endured it.

My dad died thinking his father died at Dunkirk it is only because my brother was researching our family tree that the full horror story of what happened to him has emerged :cry:


I didn't know you grandar but RIP
 
KarenDent said:
My grandfather survived the First World War and Dunkirk only to be killed on a ship on the way home.

He was on board HMS Lancastria which was sent to evacuate the troops but he is now a statistic in the largest loss of life ever in British maritime history and it has all been hushed up.

The ship was hit by four German bombs which were sent into the ships holds where the men had been told to shelter. The seas were full of oil so there was fire and many men drowned , others choked on burning oil, the rest were picked off by German fighters if there has ever been a hell on earth then surely my grandar endured it.

My dad died thinking his father died at Dunkirk it is only because my brother was researching our family tree that the full horror story of what happened to him has emerged :cry:


I didn't know you grandar but RIP
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RIP Grandar Dent
 
KarenDent said:
My grandfather survived the First World War and Dunkirk only to be killed on a ship on the way home.

He was on board HMS Lancastria which was sent to evacuate the troops but he is now a statistic in the largest loss of life ever in British maritime history and it has all been hushed up.

The ship was hit by four German bombs which were sent into the ships holds where the men had been told to shelter. The seas were full of oil so there was fire and many men drowned , others choked on burning oil, the rest were picked off by German fighters if there has ever been a hell on earth then surely my grandar endured it.

My dad died thinking his father died at Dunkirk it is only because my brother was researching our family tree that the full horror story of what happened to him has emerged :cry:


I didn't know you grandar but RIP
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If he was killed coming home from Dunkirk, owing to the nature of the battle and the 'mission', wouldn't he still be classed as being killed at Dunkirk or during the battle for Dunkirk? So your dad may be right.

RIP to the brave fella
 
JohnAin said:
Firstly decent nations realised early on that the Nazies planned on world domination, racial brutality and those nations acted as their humanity demanded. The brutality demonstrated in Europe by the Nazies in their initial domination and invasions, together with their appalling behavior in Checoslovakia, the Sudetenland, Poland, Belgium, France and Spain, Guernica for example, made their intentions and brutality perfectly obvious to the world. The Americans did nothing, except for money.

Secondly, the "undeclared war"? You no doubt refer to the admirable but unrepresentative effort by a tiny minority of decent people. Their neutrality patrols were most largely for their own protection and their own economy. As for lease lend? First World War destroyers, corvette and even one "monitor" under a different name. We actually finished paying them back at the beginning of this century. No discounts there.

Thirdly, you make my point for me. Even the vile activities of the Nazies failed to stir their consciences. It took a German declaration of war to make them "venture over the Atlantic". So no danger of them following the example of us and our allies in going to the aid of countries in lead. Which we did without "lease lend".

Fourthly, my point was that that they really should have thought about the disgusting way they treated their own non-Non-Caucasians at that time and for decades afterwards before criticising a film maker for not popping a few darker skins into a film. Your comment about segregation is incorrect as well, at the time I described. As it happens I have very considerable respect for the coloured Americans who answered the call of a nation who enslaved and then brutalised them right up to the end of the 1960-70s because the bigger cause was just, or because they were called up.

All in all you could learn more about the decades just before and during which I was born into and lived through before making comments like those.


Oh boy. Thank you very, very much for the War in the Air link. I was born in '44 and my brother was eight tears older than me. He carved in Balsa wood really good models of about 40 or 50 British, German, American, Russian and Japanese fighters and Bombers. I grabbed them when he married and kept them for years until my lads came along when they got the survivors. They still have a few.

I cannot thank you enough.
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By appeasing Hitler?
 
Big Sharp Teeth said:
By appeasing Hitler?
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I agree with you to an extent. They tried every approach other than face to face confrontation for far too long. In the first and second wars.

However, in the end they did step up to the plate. In the English way it was hastily and badly planned. But the BEF went. The French never really faced up to the Belgian gap in the Maginot line, but they too stood and fought. Until overpowered.
 
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KarenDent said:
My grandfather survived the First World War and Dunkirk only to be killed on a ship on the way home.

He was on board HMS Lancastria which was sent to evacuate the troops but he is now a statistic in the largest loss of life ever in British maritime history and it has all been hushed up.

The ship was hit by four German bombs which were sent into the ships holds where the men had been told to shelter. The seas were full of oil so there was fire and many men drowned , others choked on burning oil, the rest were picked off by German fighters if there has ever been a hell on earth then surely my grandar endured it.

My dad died thinking his father died at Dunkirk it is only because my brother was researching our family tree that the full horror story of what happened to him has emerged :cry:


I didn't know you grandar but RIP
Click to expand...

KarenDent said:
My grandfather survived the First World War and Dunkirk only to be killed on a ship on the way home.

He was on board HMS Lancastria which was sent to evacuate the troops but he is now a statistic in the largest loss of life ever in British maritime history and it has all been hushed up.

The ship was hit by four German bombs which were sent into the ships holds where the men had been told to shelter. The seas were full of oil so there was fire and many men drowned , others choked on burning oil, the rest were picked off by German fighters if there has ever been a hell on earth then surely my grandar endured it.

My dad died thinking his father died at Dunkirk it is only because my brother was researching our family tree that the full horror story of what happened to him has emerged :cry:


I didn't know you grandar but RIP
Click to expand...
Very sad that. I think I saw a documentary or something about that ship earlier this year.
 
My grandfather was a ground worker....funny as fu k and died in the 90's of that bassa cancer.......

Would love to have an hour in the pub with him.
 
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