MrJpig
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IN MEMORY - HMS NIGERIAOn behalf of 2nd Clarinet
12th August 1942.
On the 12th August 1942, the following members of the Royal Marines Band Service lost their lives while serving onboard HMS Nigeria.
Bandmaster: A.E. Ridout.
Band Corporal: E. Powell.
Musicians: J.A. Phillips, W.D.G. Ray, F.W.J. Conn, J.A. Clarke, W.C. Morey, A. Rope and A.V. Walter.
I have posted below, with a bit of the ships history, the circumstances of that day.
HMS Nigeria was a Crown Colony-class light cruiser of the Royal Navy, was completed early in World War II and served throughout that conflict. She was named for the (then) British territory of Nigeria.
She served in Home waters and off the Scandinavian coast for the early part of the war.
On 28 June 1941, HMS Nigeria, in company with HMS Bedouin, HMS Tarfar and HMS Jupiter, intercepted the German weather ship Lauenburg in thick fog north-east of Jan Mayen Island.
The German ship was detected through the use of HF/DF.
The crew of the Lauenburg abandoned ship after they were fired upon, allowing the British to board her.
Valuable codebooks and parts of the Enigma machine were found aboard and recovered from the German weather ship.
This was one of the earliest captures of Enigma material of the war, and came a few weeks after HMS Bulldog had captured the first complete Enigma machine from the German submarine U110 on 9th May 1941.
HMS Nigeria was then assigned to operate in the Mediterranean.
On 12 August 1942 she was participating in Operation Pedestal, escorting a convoy bound for Malta. She was the flagship of the close escort group, commanded by Admiral Harold Burrough.
HMS Nigeria was torpedoed and damaged by the Italian submarine Axum but managed to make it back to Gibraltar escorted by three destroyers.
To those named above and the ships crew who also died…..R.I.P.
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