101474fe4d6ca452419c3d895cc447d35c29bba46fb4ae
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Descriptionincludes two photos of Skipper Smith provided by his grandson Robbie Thompson
email 2024 04 16 (early)
Hello Harley,
What a delight to hear from you and glad that my email got through. I'm not the most competent with IT - it's great when it works I find, and a nightmare when it doesn't!
I'll give you just a quick run-down for the moment on where I am at with my research regarding my grandfather William Smith, then tomorrow I'll send you a longer email with more details. My grandfather was born in a small fishing village on the Moray Firth called Findochty, in Banffshire, Scotland in 1881. He served in both WW1 and WW2, he was a Skipper (No: 1683 SA) in WW1 and apparently a Chief Skipper in WW2 when he went to Normandy with the invasion forces. He was awarded the DSC in August 1917 for 'action with enemy submarines' and this appeared in the London Gazette on 28th Aug 1917 (Supplement 30258, page 8987.) He was in the Merchant Navy between the wars then volunteered again in the Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) for WW2. He was invalided out of the navy in 1945 and subsequently returned to Scotland where he returned to fishing and was the cook on the Findochty fishing boat 'Springfield' BCK (Buckie) 323. On 20th Aug 1947 the Springfield was run down by the Hull trawler 'Tobruk' in thick fog about 6 miles off Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire and the Springfield sank within a couple of minutes. All the crew were saved with the exception of my Grandfather who was lost at sea. I was just weeks old at the time so never met my Grandfather.
There are only 3 people called 'Skipper William Smith' who received awards during this time by King George V, and only my Grandfather for actions with enemy submarines. I knew from newspaper cuttings following his death that he had served on 'Q'-ships so followed that line of enquiry and came across E. Keble Chatterton's book mentioning Skipper Smith. I then found your article about Capt Blair also mentioning Skipper Smith so I am pretty certain that this is my Grandfather. In due course I will contact navy records to see if I can have a complete breakdown of his naval service in both wars. I am also trying to discover if there was a Fatal Accident Enquiry held following the collision/sinking/death in 1947 so I have a long road of research to follow. Sadly, all 8 of Skipper Smith's family have now passed, including my mother who was one of his daughter, so family research is based on unreliable long-term memory!
I don't believe that the man standing next to Capt Blair in the photograph is Skipper Smith - unfortunately!
It's now 1100pm here near Inverness so I'm going to 'hit the hay' but I will send you some more information tomorrow, Harley. Thank you for taking the time to respond and I look forward to being in contact with you and exchanging some info. Take care for now.
Kind regards.
Robbie
Email 2024 04 16 (later)
Hello Harley,
I hope you are well. I thought I'd send you 3 photos, the quality is not great because they are old and are 'copies of copies!' The first one is a newspaper (Banffshire Advertiser) article showing my Grandfather on the left and another seaman, both from the village of Findochty. He would have looked like this at the time he served on the Helgoland I think. The second photo of him is undated but probably taken during WW2 as he looks much older. The third photo is of the fishing boat 'Springfield' on which he was sailing when it sank after a collision.
The Moray Firth area of Scotland has many fishing villages along it's coastline e.g. Findochty where my Grandfather lived before moving with his family to nearby Portessie which is where I was born and brought up. The main fishing town in the area is Buckie, just a couple of miles from Portessie. The majority of men in these villages were fishermen and well used to sailing older vessels and working in very rough conditions so they were ideal volunteers for the Naval service during the wars. My father and several uncles were all in the RNR during WW2. Skipper Smith actually started his seafaring days at the age of 12, working and earning money to keep the wider family fed was clearly more important to many than schooling! The surname 'Smith' is very common in the fishing villages and many men had 'by-names' which identified them from other Smiths - my Grandfather's by-name was 'Doug' but I'm not sure if he was referred to by that name in the Navy. My Grandmother was Annie (Legge) Smith also from Findochty and she and Skipper Smith had 8 children, 4 daughters and 4 sons - the sons went to sea or were associated with sea work. So you will see that William Smith's background and work experience made him a Skipper and I have no doubt that he would have been an essential part of the Helgoland's crew. His experience seems to have earned him the 'Chief Skipper' rank in WW2.
Sadly, our family has no written evidence about our Grandfather, over the years generations have changed, people have died and their belongings dispersed so picking up pieces of information from those past years is difficult - you will appreciate that from your work and research! I've only really been doing my research for a couple of months but looking forward I hope that I can uncover more of William Smith's two world wars experience. I'll keep my eye open for Helgoland articles but I suspect you've probably 'trawled' all the websites etc and know a lot about the ship. Once I get service details for my Grandfather then that might open up more research channels about 'Q' ships etc.
Hope this is of interest Harley. Take care and hope to hear from you at some point.
Kind regards.
Robbie
email 2024 04 16 (early)
Hello Harley,
What a delight to hear from you and glad that my email got through. I'm not the most competent with IT - it's great when it works I find, and a nightmare when it doesn't!
I'll give you just a quick run-down for the moment on where I am at with my research regarding my grandfather William Smith, then tomorrow I'll send you a longer email with more details. My grandfather was born in a small fishing village on the Moray Firth called Findochty, in Banffshire, Scotland in 1881. He served in both WW1 and WW2, he was a Skipper (No: 1683 SA) in WW1 and apparently a Chief Skipper in WW2 when he went to Normandy with the invasion forces. He was awarded the DSC in August 1917 for 'action with enemy submarines' and this appeared in the London Gazette on 28th Aug 1917 (Supplement 30258, page 8987.) He was in the Merchant Navy between the wars then volunteered again in the Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) for WW2. He was invalided out of the navy in 1945 and subsequently returned to Scotland where he returned to fishing and was the cook on the Findochty fishing boat 'Springfield' BCK (Buckie) 323. On 20th Aug 1947 the Springfield was run down by the Hull trawler 'Tobruk' in thick fog about 6 miles off Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire and the Springfield sank within a couple of minutes. All the crew were saved with the exception of my Grandfather who was lost at sea. I was just weeks old at the time so never met my Grandfather.
There are only 3 people called 'Skipper William Smith' who received awards during this time by King George V, and only my Grandfather for actions with enemy submarines. I knew from newspaper cuttings following his death that he had served on 'Q'-ships so followed that line of enquiry and came across E. Keble Chatterton's book mentioning Skipper Smith. I then found your article about Capt Blair also mentioning Skipper Smith so I am pretty certain that this is my Grandfather. In due course I will contact navy records to see if I can have a complete breakdown of his naval service in both wars. I am also trying to discover if there was a Fatal Accident Enquiry held following the collision/sinking/death in 1947 so I have a long road of research to follow. Sadly, all 8 of Skipper Smith's family have now passed, including my mother who was one of his daughter, so family research is based on unreliable long-term memory!
I don't believe that the man standing next to Capt Blair in the photograph is Skipper Smith - unfortunately!
It's now 1100pm here near Inverness so I'm going to 'hit the hay' but I will send you some more information tomorrow, Harley. Thank you for taking the time to respond and I look forward to being in contact with you and exchanging some info. Take care for now.
Kind regards.
Robbie
Email 2024 04 16 (later)
Hello Harley,
I hope you are well. I thought I'd send you 3 photos, the quality is not great because they are old and are 'copies of copies!' The first one is a newspaper (Banffshire Advertiser) article showing my Grandfather on the left and another seaman, both from the village of Findochty. He would have looked like this at the time he served on the Helgoland I think. The second photo of him is undated but probably taken during WW2 as he looks much older. The third photo is of the fishing boat 'Springfield' on which he was sailing when it sank after a collision.
The Moray Firth area of Scotland has many fishing villages along it's coastline e.g. Findochty where my Grandfather lived before moving with his family to nearby Portessie which is where I was born and brought up. The main fishing town in the area is Buckie, just a couple of miles from Portessie. The majority of men in these villages were fishermen and well used to sailing older vessels and working in very rough conditions so they were ideal volunteers for the Naval service during the wars. My father and several uncles were all in the RNR during WW2. Skipper Smith actually started his seafaring days at the age of 12, working and earning money to keep the wider family fed was clearly more important to many than schooling! The surname 'Smith' is very common in the fishing villages and many men had 'by-names' which identified them from other Smiths - my Grandfather's by-name was 'Doug' but I'm not sure if he was referred to by that name in the Navy. My Grandmother was Annie (Legge) Smith also from Findochty and she and Skipper Smith had 8 children, 4 daughters and 4 sons - the sons went to sea or were associated with sea work. So you will see that William Smith's background and work experience made him a Skipper and I have no doubt that he would have been an essential part of the Helgoland's crew. His experience seems to have earned him the 'Chief Skipper' rank in WW2.
Sadly, our family has no written evidence about our Grandfather, over the years generations have changed, people have died and their belongings dispersed so picking up pieces of information from those past years is difficult - you will appreciate that from your work and research! I've only really been doing my research for a couple of months but looking forward I hope that I can uncover more of William Smith's two world wars experience. I'll keep my eye open for Helgoland articles but I suspect you've probably 'trawled' all the websites etc and know a lot about the ship. Once I get service details for my Grandfather then that might open up more research channels about 'Q' ships etc.
Hope this is of interest Harley. Take care and hope to hear from you at some point.
Kind regards.
Robbie
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Images in support of node 101473. Pae Korokī, accessed 27/07/2026, https://paekoroki.tauranga.govt.nz/nodes/view/101474
