Notes on Lowry and War: A Walk in Liverpool July 2014 Part 3

HMS Hyderabad at Bristol 1918

This is the final set of notes following a recent walk I led around Liverpool's Business Quarter and Riverfront organised by The Bluecoat, Liverpool.

Read Part 1
Read Part 2

Stop 5 Canning Dock

The character Geoffrey Firmin, the Consul in Lowry's Under The Volcano was a Lieutenant-Commander of the Q-Ship S.S. Samaritan during WW 1. In the novel, Firmin is haunted by his involvement in the deaths of a captured German U-Boat crew by placing them in the furnace of the Samaritan.

HMS  Baralong

Is the above based on fact? Possible sources:

Ronald Binns [MLN 8, 6] has tracked down the probable historical source of the Samaritan incident: the so-called "Baralong incident" of 19 August 1915, after the capture of the British ship, the SS Nicosian, by the German submarine U-27. A British Q-ship, the Baralong, appeared flying the American flag, let fall its false sides, and sank the submarine. The master, Lieutenant-Commander Godfrey Herbert (whose name and rank is similar to Geoffrey's), ordered his crew to give no quarter, and twelve German sailors were shot. See Baralong Incident for further details

The above was suppressed by British Government during and after war so how could Lowry know the details?

Source 1: Coles, Alan (1986). Slaughter at Sea: The Truth Behind a Naval War Crime - discusses the myth of German sailors being burnt in the furnaces of the SS Nicosian. See Pg 167 - Cole states several sources from Liverpool that this story was common in the docklands of Liverpool - could Lowry have heard these during 1927/28 when he sailed to the Far east and later haunted the dockland pubs?

Source 2: Lowry's brother Wilfrid was then a member of the Royal Naval Reserve based on H.M.S. Eagle (Eaglet) in Canning Dock during and shortly after WW1 - Some of the Q-ship commanders were in the RNR. e.g. Ronald Niel Stuart - he survived the war and was a local hero returning to service with the Canadian Pacific based in Liverpool. Stuart had been a member of the Royal Naval Reserve before the war and became a leading member when he returned.

It isn't impossible that Wilfrid may have heard stories/yarns or quite conceivably unpalatable truths of the Q-ship war, due to his access to sailors who had fought in the war. He may have related these stories to Lowry or Lowry may have heard them first hand and adapted them later from memories of an impressionable child in 1918/19.

S.S. Nicosian

Source 3: The SS Nicosian was owned by the Liverpool based Leyland line - crewed by local sailors - could one of them told Lowry what had happened? Lowry also sailed to the USA in 1928 aboard a Leyland ship SS Dorelian

Source 4: The Baralong Incident was widely reported outside the UK during the war including USA - many varied accounts were written including the furnace story - could Lowry have heard about this from a US source e.g. Conrad Aiken on Lowry's visit to Boston in 1928?

Bowker notes that Lowry wa taken by his bother Wilfrid to see a Q-ship in Liverpool in either late 1918 or 1919 (Bowker Pursued by Furies P16). The Lowry brothers saw a dummy run of the Q-ship drill, dropping the false bulkheads, exposing a gun, and firing a blank round.

The above visit was to see HMS Hyderabad - the ship was docked at Canning Dock in mid December 1918 (Liverpool Echo 27/11/18) as part of a nationwide tour to demonstrate how the ships operated against submarines. The photos below are part of a set made by Tierney's Studios of 6 Lord Street. Liverpool to record the event:

An unidentified U-Boat visited Canning Dock Liverpool around the same time as Hyderabad but full details are yet to be discovered. There is no evidence that Lowry visited the Uboat. Again the submarine was photographed by Tierney's - see photo below with caption "To the victors the spoils":

Lowry must have retained an interest in Q-ships as they appear in the short story 'Goya The Obscure' when Lowry notes an advert; "Mystery Ship VC Visits Wallasey" (Pg. 273). This relates to a lecture given by Vice Admiral Gordon Campbell at Wallasey Town Hall on Friday, January 10th 1930. The advert noted by Lowry appeared twice in the Wallasey News on December 21st 1929 and again on December 28th 1929. A short reminder also appeared inside the paper on December 28th as seen below:

Read more about the above lecture here

Leonard Campbell Taylor  Dazzle-painted ships, including Aquitania, in the Mersey off the Liverpool waterfront

See Edmund Gardner painted as a "dazzle ship"

Lowry refers to dazzle ships in Under The Volcano:

Hugh too was scrutinizing the Gothic writing beneath the photograph: Der englische Dampfer tragt Schutzfarben gegen deutsche U-boote. 'Only on the next page, I recall, was a picture of the Emden', the Consul went on, 'with "So verliess ich den Weltteil unserer Antipoden", something of that nature, under it...' – UTV, 184.

Chris Ackerley has discovered source:

Ger. "The English steamer carries camouflage against German U-boats." The American text corrects Lowry's error, ‘tragt’, which is perpetuated in the British text. In a letter to Albert Erskine [16 July 1946; CL 1, 611], Lowry says that he has lost the original, but that it depicted two photographs, the first a British Q-ship, and the second the Emden, as shown to him in a German restaurant in Mexico City, the captions in Gothic print. Despite this camouflage, his actual source was Felix Graf von Luckner's Seeteufel: Abenteuer aus meinem Leben [Sea Devil: adventures from my life] (K. F. Koehler, 1921), which, however, makes no mention of the Emden (von Luckner was in the South Pacific, the Emden in the Indian Ocean). The Malcolm Lowry Project

Chris Ackerely also notes:

In the Texas manuscript [TM VI, 45], Lowry is explicit about the connection between “Everything about the Samaritan was a fake” and Hugh’s like sense of himself; but in a marginal note wondered if it were not better to abandon the idea of fake altogether.

Lowry sailed back from USA in 1928 aboard the RMS Cedric which was painted in dazzle colours during WW1:

Sholto Johnstone Douglas SS 'Cedric', White Star Liner, Lying in the Mersey

Q-Ship: H.M.S. Tamarisk

In a recent post on Q-ships, I mentioned H.M.S. Tamarisk as a possible source for the S. S. Samaritan in Under The Volcano.

H.M.S. Tamarisk was a Aubretia class sloop — built by Lobnitz & Company, Renfrew, launched 2 June 1916. Sold for breaking up 17 October 1922.

The Aubretia class sloops were a class of twelve sloops built under the Emergency War Programme for the Royal Navy in World War I as part of the larger "Flower" class. They were also referred to as the "cabbage class", or "herbaceous borders". The Flowers were the first ships designed as minesweepers.

Like all the Flowers, the Aubretia class were originally designed as single-screw Fleet Sweeping Vessels, with triple hulls at the bows and an above-water magazine located aft, to give extra protection against loss from mine damage when working. However, the utility of the design was found to be as a convoy escort, and as such other classes took over the minesweeping role. The Aubretias were re-classified as Convoy Sloops.

Unlike the preceding "Flower"s of the Acacia, Azalea and Arabis classes, with their unmistakable warship appearance, the Aubretias were designed to look like small merchantmen, in the hope of deceiving U-boat commanders, a tactic known as the Q-ship. These vessels were built by commercial shipbuilders to Lloyd's Register standards, to make use of vacant capacity, and the individual builders were asked to use their existing designs for merchantmen, based on the standard Flower-type hull.

Q-Ship 1928 @ 2011 British Silent Film Festival

Q Ships
15.04.2010 11.00
Screen 2 Phoenix Sq - Leicester UK

I have learnt that the movie Q-Ships 1928 which I have recently posted about is to be shown at the above event. More details here:

Music and sound in silent film will be our key themes during the four days of the 2011 British Silent Film Festival. A packed programme of rare silent films will explore how filmmakers communicated sound to cinema audiences through music and visual clues, what it was like to be in the audience of the ‘silent movies’ and how the British industry geared up for the talkies. Accompanied by the world’s best silent film musicians the programme will feature special events, presentations by special guests and unique archive film from the BFI and other collections.

The Festival is organised in partnership with the British Film Institute and the Cinema and Television History Centre at De Montfort University. The conference is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council as part of its ‘Beyond Text’ programme, and organised in conjunction with Royal Holloway, University of London and the University of Edinburgh. More info

Q-Ships and Ronald Niel Stuart VC DSO RD RNR

The character Geoffrey Firmin, the Consul in Lowry's Under The Volcano was a Lieutenant-Commander of the Q-Ship S.S. Samaritan during WW 1. In the novel, Firmin is haunted by his involvement in the deaths of a captured German U-Boat crew by placing them in the furnace of the Samaritan. There is no documentary evidence that this event occurred in the war. I have already discussed a few sources in a previous post centred around the movie Dark Journey 1937.

I have been exploring the possibility that the source for Lowry's naval background for the Consul may have been from his own contacts in Liverpool. Bowker notes that Malc was taken by his bother Wilfrid to see a Q-ship in Liverpool in either late 1918 or 1919 (Bowker Pursued by Furies P16). Wilfrid was then a member of the Royal Naval Reserve based on H.M.S. Eagle (Eaglet) in Canning Dock. Could the ship have been H.M.S. Tamarisk based in Liverpool and commanded by Ronald Niel Stuart? The intriguing possibility that Neil was the basis for the Consul's wartime exploits is that he was the same rank, he was involved in the sinking of UC-29 in which German detailed below, he survived the war and was a local hero returning to service with the Canadian Pacific based in Liverpool. Stuart had been a member of the Royal Naval Reserve before the war and became a leading member when he returned.

Following the action Stuart remained with Campbell and Loveless as Inspectors of Shipping, choosing those vessels they believed to be best suited to Q-ship work for naval service. After some time ashore all three returned to sea in a vessel they had personally chosen, an old, battered tramp steamer named SS Vittoria. Renaming it HMS Pargust, they armed their vessel with a 4" gun, two twelve pounders, two machine guns, torpedo tubes and depth charges. Thus armed the Pargust departed on her first patrol to the same grounds where U-83 had been sunk, in the waters south of Ireland. For the first few days her duties consisted only of rescuing survivors from sunken cargo ships but with increasing German activity, an attack was expected at any moment. On the 7 June 1917, Pargust was suddenly struck by a torpedo fired at very close range from an unseen German submarine. Unlike the Farnborough action, the damage done to the Pargust was immense. The ship was holed close to the waterline, and its cover was almost blown when one of the twelve pounder gun ports was blasted free from its mounting; it was only the quick thinking of sailor William Williams, who took the full weight of the gun port on himself, that prevented the gun being exposed. One petty officer was killed and a number wounded.

By this stage in the war, the German submarine authorities had become aware of the existence of Q-ships and Captain Ernst Rosenow of the UC-29 was taking no risks with his target, remaining at 400 yards (366m) distance watching the staged panicked evacuation of the ship. While the hidden gun crews watched the enemy approach the lifeboats, the officer in charge of the boats, Lieutenant Francis Hereford, realised that the submarine would follow his movements, as its commander assumed him to be the captain. Hereford therefore ordered his men to row back towards the ship, thus luring the enemy into range. This made the submarine commander believe that the ship’s crew were planning to regain their vessel and he immediately closed to just 50 yards (46m), surfaced and began angrily semaphoring to the "survivors" in the boats. This was exactly what the gun crews had been waiting for and a volley of fire was directed at the U-boat. Numerous holes were blown in the conning tower and the submarine desperately attempted to flee on the surface before slowing down and heeling over, trailing oil. The gun crews then stopped firing only for the submarine to suddenly restart its engines and attempt to escape. In a final barrage of fire the submarine was hit fatally, a large explosion blowing the vessel in two. Rosenow and 22 of his crew were killed, whilst two survivors were rescued by the panic party. Wikipedia

It isn't impossible that Wilfrid may have heard stories/yarns or quite conceivably unpalatable truths of the Q-ship war, due to his access to sailors who had fought in the war. He may have related these stories to Malcolm or Malc may have heard them first hand and adapted them later from memories of an impressionable child in 1918/19.

I also came across another mention of H.M.S. Eagle (Eaglet) and Q-ships which involving a Liverpool sailor which again demonstrates the strong local links and the possibility of Lowry getting first-hand accounts of the Q-ship action.

One other coincidence in tracing this story is that the original H.M.S. Eagle was destroyed in a fire in 1926 and was replaced by a former Q-ship Sir Bevis - could this have been another possible source?

The photograph below was taken in the 1970's when I recall seeing her myself many times:



Here is the Sir Bevis in her guise as a Q-ship:

Q-Ships: Review New York Times September 17, 1928

I have not been able to unearth any clips of the movie Q-Ships. However, I discovered this review of the film:

Thrilling and wonderfully realistic episodes in the campaign against the German U-boats during the World War, reproduced by the New Era Films, Ltd., of London, are to be seen at the Cameo Theatre in a picture called "Q Ships." This production is presented in this country by Captain Harold Auten, who won the Victoria Cross as the commander of the Stockforce, one of the Q ships, and he and several members of the original crew of that vessel re-enact in this film their roles of those eventful days of strife.

"Q Ships" is an expertly sketched drama of sea fighting, and although Britain emerges victorious, the courage of the rival forces is depicted with fairness. The welcome arrival of the United States destroyers is emphasized as one of the prime factors in defeating the hitherto successful efforts of the submarines by convoying ships through the danger zones.

This picture begins by dealing with the ravages of the submersibles before America entered the war, and there is a glimpse at the British Admiralty of officers discussing the sinking of food ships and another flash wherein Admiral Jellicoe himself appears, greeting an actor made up to resemble Admiral Sims. Thereafter is shown the gradual weakening of the U-boats and a daring attempt of one of the German commanders to enter Scapa Flow.

The U-boat's manoeuvring is watched by British officers on an electrical contrivance which permits them to follow the craft as she is steering through the mine-field.

Another incident in this production depicts the success of the listening devices aboard destroyers and a U-boat resting far below the surface to keep away from the dreaded depth bombs. The stifling atmosphere aboard the submersible causes the officers and men to have difficulty in breathing, and one perceives, a little later, their relief, when they come to the surface, after the destroyer has sped on its way and they are able to breathe deeply of fresh air.

The most dramatic feature of this film is when the Q ships are introduced. Call the vessel the Stockforce, as it was a vessel resembling that masquerader. The panic crew and the working crew are seen, and during the time that no submarine is in the offing the officers and men play cards, write letters, read books. Suddenly comes the report of a periscope being sighted off the port bow. The producer then turns to the submarine, with the commander declaring that the Stockforce looks just about the size for a torpedo. He watches the Stockforce through the periscope and finally gives the order to fire the torpedo, and the only too familiar white line of those days is seen in the water as the engine of destruction speeds on its mission toward the steamer. Auten turns the engine room telegraph and the torpedo strikes his ship under No. 1 batch.

Not long afterward, when smoke is seen coming out of the Stockforce's bows, Auten gives the order for the panic crew to act their best and take to the boat. There is the negro, his face whitened with paint on which he had been busy at the time of the explosion; the black cat, the seaman who was left and who has to take a dive into the sea.

The working crew, hidden cleverly, go about the decks of the Stockforce on hands and knees, and officers are watching the submarine through craftily concealed periscopes. The U-boat Commander is chary about coming to the surface, but eventually he concludes that the Stockforce is harmless. Auten bides his time until he is sure that he can reckon with the submersible, and the manner in which this is done is most interesting, but it is better to leave it here, untold.

Captain Auten is the author of the script of this production and also the technical adviser. The German details were supplied by a former U-boat Commander, Kapitan-Lieutenant H. Roehn. NY Times

You can view a photo on Getty Images of the filming of the movie outside the American Embassy in London in 1928.

Just found out that you can buy a DVD of the film here

Q-Ship on Fox-Movietone

In my last post on Dark Journey 1937 which features Q-ships, I mentioned another movie featuring Q-ships made in 1928. There used to ba clip of this movie on You Tube but it has disappeared. Hoever, I did find this clip of film:

FOX-MOVIETONE NEWSREEL EXCERPTS 5 - National Archives and Records Administration - ARC Identifier 89123 / Local Identifier CBS-CBS-WWI-5 - Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. Fox-Movietone - Balloon observers. Balloons attacked. Intercuts of ground crew seen from balloon, looking down. Balloons shot down in flames; Zeppelin in flight, falling in flames; Exploits of the U-35. Sub making attacks on various ships; British armed merchantman (Q ship.) Crewmen pull back deck housing, reveal gun. Sub surrenders to Q ship when guns aimed.; Headline, Wilson Breaks With Germany; U.S. fleet steams out to sea

Dark Journey 1937

The character Geoffrey Firmin, the Consul in Lowry's Under The Volcano was a Lieutenant-Commander of the Q-Ship S.S. Samaritan during WW 1. In the novel, Firmin is haunted by his involvement in the deaths of a captured German U-Boat crew by placing them in the furnace of the Samaritan. There is no documentary evidence that this event occurred in the war.

I have been researching the possible source of Lowry's fictional event. Ronald Binns and Chris Ackerley suggest:

Ronald Binns [MLN 8, 6] has tracked down the probable historical source of the Samaritan incident: the so-called "Baralong incident" of 19 August 1915, after the capture of the British ship, the Nicosian, by the German submarine U-27. A British Q-ship, the Baralong, appeared flying the American flag, let fall its false sides, and sank the submarine. The master, Lieutenant-Commander Godfrey Herbert (whose name and rank is similar to Geoffrey's), ordered his crew to give no quarter, and twelve German sailors were shot. There was no court-martial, nor any suggestion of officers being put in the furnace, but the incident aroused great resentment among the Germans. As well as tracing the historical source of Lowry’s Q-ship episode, Binns has suggested [MLN 7, 20] a cinematic source, the movie Dark Journey (1937), produced by Alexander Korda and starring Conrad Veidt with Vivien Leigh. Russell Lowry [MLN 8, 7] dates Lowry's visit to a Q-ship in Liverpool docks as 1919 or 1920; the Lowry brothers saw a dummy run of the Q-ship drill, dropping the false bulkheads, exposing a gun, and firing a blank round. Chris Ackerley's Companion to Under The Volcano



You can view the film Dark Journey on the Internet Archive or here:



Cast & Crew
Victor Saville: Director
Conrad Veidt as [Baron Karl] Von Marwitz
Vivien Leigh as Madeleine [Goddard]
Joan Gardner as Lupita
Anthony Bushell as Bob Carter
Ursula Jeans as Gertrude
Margery Pickard as Colette
Eliot Makeham as Anatole [Bergen]
Austin Trevor as Dr. Muller
Sam Livesay as Schaffer
Edmund Willard as Chief of German intelligence
Charles Carson as Head of fifth bureau



Synopsis

In the spring of 1918, Swiss modiste Madeleine Goddard returns to Stockholm after an excursion to Paris to buy dresses. Madeleine, who is a spy for the Nazis, then visits her German contacts and gives them the information she has gathered on Allied troop movements. Madeleine's information is cleverly sewn into the gowns she transports, and the Germans believe that she is one of their top spies. Unknown to them, Madeleine is actually a French double agent, and so she resolves to learn the identity of the new German secret service section leader who is being stationed in Stockholm. While Madeleine confers with her confederates, two German citizens cross the border into Switzerland. One is Dr. Muller, who is to reorganize the spy network of which Madeleine is a part, and the other is Baron Karl Von Marwitz, a deserter from the German Navy. While at a nightclub with her frequent escort, English secret service agent Bob Carter, Madeleine exposes the trick behind Von Marwitz's game of predicting what a girl will say after he kisses her. Intrigued by Madeleine's beauty and cool demeanor, Von Marwitz visits her shop the next day in the company of Lupita, a Brazilian socialite. Von Marwitz quickly tires of the temperamental Lupita and begins asking Madeleine to go out with him. When she continually refuses his requests, he begins to buy all of the stock in her shop until finally she gives in. Madeleine gives her German contacts information about an Allied counter-offensive, then begins seeing Von Marwitz. Despite their different nationalities, the couple quickly fall in love, much to the dismay of Bob, who returns to Stockholm after a brief journey to London to investigate Madeleine's trustworthiness. On the night Von Marwitz proposes to her, Madeleine's faithful porter and co-conspirator, Anatole Bergen, is murdered. Shaken by Anatole's death, Madeleine confers with Muller and the others, who tell her that the information she provided proved disastrous for the German Army. Muller orders her to go to Paris immediately and determine whether her French contacts are to be trusted. After a difficult journey, Madeleine reaches Paris, where she is secretly greeted by a French official and given the medal militaire for her service to her country. Upon her return to Stockholm, Madeleine deduces that Von Marwitz is the German secret service leader, and he reveals his knowledge that she is actually a French spy. The lovers are glad to be rid of the lies between them, but acknowledge with heavy hearts that their dream of a life together can never be realized. Madeleine rushes to Bob, who promises to help her escape from Stockholm and the Germans, while Von Marwitz is simultaneously planning her capture. The next day, Bob engineers Madeleine's arrest by the Swedish police, thereby foiling Von Marwitz's plan to apprehend her quietly. Madeleine is deported, but once the boat she is on has sailed out of Swedish jurisdiction, it is stopped by a German submarine. Von Marwitz boards and arrests Madeleine for being a French spy, but his plans are once again foiled by Bob's cunning plans. Disguised as a tramp steamer, a British destroyer enters the scene and engages the submarine in battle. The Germans are defeated, Madeleine is rescued and Von Marwitz is captured. Madeleine is assured that Von Marwitz will not be shot, but will instead be detained until the end of the war, and with the hope of a future together, the lovers wave goodbye as Von Marwitz is taken aboard the destroyer. TCM



The above movie is a feasible source but Lowry read considerably during his youth devouring sea stories. After WW1, there was a considerable literature around Q-Ships which I have been researching hoping to turn up the source of the fictional S.S. Samaritan. There was also a movie called Q-Ships made in in 1928 by Geoffrey Barkas and Michael Barringer. I will return to the subject in subsequent posts.