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713 messages posted to the guestbook Page: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47] [48] [49] [50] [51] [52] [53] [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] [59] [60] [61] [62] [63] [64] [65] [66] [67] [68] ( 69 ) [70] [71] [72] Add a message Search the guestbook for crew names   Joanna Harriet Thomas nee Pitts from London, U.K said... 15/09/2000  NULL  George Stanley Pitts daughter of Captain George Stanley Pitts RM My father went down in the Barham when I was two years old. My mother was so shocked about his death and the violence of war she only went to the Survivors' Association service once when I was very young; I don't know if I went as well. (She came from a pacifist family). I always knew there was a Book of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey but I could not face asking to see it, though I worked as a tour guide for British Tours and visited Westminster Abbey at least once a week over a year. It is thanks to Joan Dove (the widow of Surgeon Commander Sorley and Sarah O'Donnoghue's grandfather) who lived with us in North Wales before November 1941 and remained in contact and a friend of my mother that I heard of "A Midshipman's War". She sent us a copy. On reading the chapter on the "Barham" it laid some ghosts, I ceased to think of him floating deep in the water, but more at peace. For me it seemed that the torpedoing was random and therefore more acceptable. For the past three years I have attended the Survivors' Association Service at Westminster Abbey, my mother came two years ago. At the Union Jack Club with Sarah O'Donnoghue we met Commander Grogan and George Parker who has written about the "Barham". As a child I remember visiting Connie Cook, Captain Cook's widow she lived in a Mansion flat off Baker Street. She provided me as well as many other people with amongst other things American shoes, brogue lace ups which I can still see. She, I understand, worked tirelessly helping widows and their families. It is her energy which resulted in the collection to provide the candlesticks by the altar in the nave in Westminster Abbey which were carved by Robert Thompson whose symbol was a mouse carved in most of his work. I recently learnt that my mother and a friend Mary Vincent Smith whose husband John was a Doctor in the Navy, spent the evening together with Connie Cook on the day peace was declared. My second cousin Dr Tom Pitts, my father's contemporary, recently told me that once after he retired when he was hospital visiting, a sailor who was on the Barham asked if he was related to my father. He then said that he was the last person to be let through the hatches by my father, before he closed them and the ship exploded. brian e horner from 1061 utsalady,camano,wa,usa said... 02/09/2000  NULL  ERIC HORNER MY FATHER ERIC HORNER DIED ON THE BARHAM WHEN I WAS ELLEVEN MONTHS OLD.HE WAS A STOKER,I BEIIEVE HE SERVED ON THE SHIP FOR ABOUT THREE YEARS.ITS AMAZING TO KNOW THAT FOR THE PAST THIRTY YEARS CAPTAIN TIESENHAUSEN WAS LIVING SO CLOSE.I WISH I HAD KNOWN.THANK YOU SARA FOR THIS WEB SIGHT. Mike Barham from Mississauga, Ontario, Canada said... 31/08/2000  NULL  NULL I was looking for family tree information when i happened across this page. My immediate family originated in Coventry, and i am tracing ancestory back. I am glad to know this piece of history and will look for any links between its name and my background. Thank you. My condolences to any remaining survivors and their families. Diana O'Neill from Eastbourne , East Sussex said... 27/08/2000  NULL  David.N.MATTHEWS Hello, my father Lieut.David.N.MATTHEWS.RNR.was a survivor of H.M.S.BARHAM.Thankyou for setting up the guestlist.I have a casualty list sent to me when my father died in November 1987 with Wilfred Burton,ROYAL MARINE listed on it .This message is for Yvonne Simcock,Kidsgrove Staffs . I will keep looking at the site now that I have found it. Ron Nicholson from Portsmouth said... 18/08/2000  NULL  Charles Nicholson My father,Charles Nicholson, was a stoker P.O. lost in H.M.S Barham. Thank you Sara for developing this website in the memory of such a tragic loss of so many lives.I hope to visit Westminster Abbey in the near future now that I am aware of the book and candles there.My fathers name is on the Portsmouth War Memorial and also on the Memorial in Scarborough N.Yorkshire where he was born. Marc Tiley from London said... 14/08/2000  NULL  NULL The Barham's story is fascinating history and it is good to see it is kept alive. (I am researching a documentary for the BBC which includes teh attacke at Dakar in 1940) Bob ingram from Portsmouth said... 09/08/2000  NULL  Ernest "Tich" Edds My grandfather, AB Ernest "Tich" Edds now deceased was a survivor of the sinking. He served on Barham, 1925- 1928 and from 1938 till the end.I still have his copy of the roll of honour and a card from Constance Cooke, the captains wife in remberance dated 1944.I also have a photo which shows my Granfather with messmates P.Martin, Bill Elsey,and G Parker in Durban in 1941 after Barham was docked for repairs following bomb damage.He never went to sea again after the sinking and had great difficulty even talking about it right to the end of his life. Tim Honnor from Inverness said... 06/08/2000  NULL  Dick Edwards, Charlie Styles, Arthur Erskine Sherw How strange that HMS BARHAM seems suddernly to have cropped up in my life. In the lasy ten days I have had two print orders with the name BARHAM in them and on Saturday night was staying with a Commander Dick Edwards, RN (aged 92) in Cornwood Devon. He told me he had been Flag Lieutenant To Admiral Laycock in BARHAM in 1939. Then I passed Charlie Styles old house, also in Cornwood and went to harford Church. There I saw a brass plaque on the wall in memory of Surgeon Lieutenant Arthur Erskine Sherwell, lost in Action HMS BARHAM 25 November. Harford Church is our old family church and Sherwell must have been a local man. Does anyone know where his address might have been in the area in those days. And it was good to hear of Charlie Style again. I am writing to him! Tim Honnor thomas e harding from portsmouth england said... 01/08/2000  NULL  alan james harding thank you for an excellent website.my brother died on the barham,only 19 years old.his name was alan james harding,and he joined the navy as a boy seaman at st. vincent,gosport.I would be grateful for any news from anybody who knew him.his previous ship was h.m.s effingham,which he survived when it was sunk off norway. Frank Wade from West Vancouver, Canada said... 31/07/2000  http://www3.telus.net/FrankWade  Frank Wade I congratulate Sara O'Donohue for starting this web page to remember those brave sailors who died on the Barham. I served on the staff of C-in-C, Admiral Cunningham, as a cypher officer. I saw the whole of the sinking from the Admiral's flag bridge in HMS Queen Elizabeth, the flagship. I wrote a book about my Mediterranean experiences called "A Midshipman's War. See my home pages and read about sinking. 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last updated:  21 September 2021

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