Sunk HMS Cornwallis WW1 1914 Royal Naval Division medals Waller Drake Battalion for Sale

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Sunk HMS Cornwallis WW1 1914 Royal Naval Division medals Waller Drake Battalion For Sale

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Sunk HMS Cornwallis WW1 1914 Royal Naval Division medals Waller Drake Battalion:
$639.73

Royal Naval Division group of medals and original photo relating to Stoker 1st Class A. Waller, Royal Naval Division, who took part in the disastrousDefence ofAntwerp, the bombardment of the Gallipoli Peninsula, as well as surviving the sinking of H.M.S. Cornwallis at the hands of the German submarine U-32 in 19171914 Star, impressed named SS.102153. 1.WALLER, STO. 1CL. DRABE BTTN RND, with AUG – NOV clasp. British War and Victory Medals (1914 – 18), impressed named SS.102153 A. WALLIS. STO. 1 R.N. Court mounted style for display. The 1914 Star and clasp have been lacquered. Medals come with an original period photograph of Waller and copies of service record, medal roll and 1939 census.Albert Wallerwas born on 4/11/1887 in Kensington London, a ‘machine man’ by trade he enlisted into the Royal Navy on 3/1/19106 under ‘Special enlistment’ for a period of 5 years + 7 on the reserve (Hence the SS on his service number - SS 102153).He served on several H.M. Ship and shore bases including: Acheron (Base ship), Pembroke I (accounts base), Andromeda (Diadem-class protected cruiser), Achilles (Warrior-class armoured cruiser), Pembroke II, Albion (pre-dreadnought battleship), Shannon (Minotaur-class armoured cruiser). He transferred to the Royal Fleet Reserve 7/1/1911 as a Stoker 1st Class.On the outbreak of the Great War, he was recalled on 2/8/1914. Due to the excess of Naval Reservists, he was transferred to the Royal Naval Division (R.N.D.) Drake Battalion serving with them from 17/9/1914 – 31/12/1916.On 4/10/1914, the two newly formed naval brigades received orders to embark at the Port of Dover for a move to France. They arrived the next day in Dunkirk. They travelled via troop trains, to Antwerp, Belgium on 6 October. During the afternoon, the brigade was detached to the right flank of the Royal Marine Brigade. This position, however, was seen as untenable and during the night of 6-7 the Royal Naval Division withdrew and occupied the 2nd line of trenches. The 1st Naval Brigade was dug in around the positions of Forts No. 1-8, with brigade holding the far-left flank.It was decided that if forts 1 and 2 were lost, the Royal Naval Division would withdraw at dusk. News arrived that the forts had fallen at 5:00 p.m. and orders were sent to the 2nd Division and the British for a retirement, which began at 7:00 p.m. but the orders failed to reach all the 1st Naval Brigade, only one battalion of which withdrew. At 9:30 p.m. the mistake was realised as the rest of the division began to cross the river. The 1st Naval Brigade reached the Scheldt at midnight, only to find that the bridges were being demolished and under a German shrapnel bombardment. The troops crossed using barges and boats and set out for a rendezvous at Zwijndrecht, which was reached at 4:00 a.m. on 9 October. The British moved on to Sint-Gillis-Waas, where information arrived that the Germans had cut the railway at Moerbeke. The commander, Commodore Henderson, decided to head for the Dutch border to the north and at 10:00 p.m. about 1,500 men, half the original complement, were interned and about forty stragglers managed to sneak along the border and escape. The men were to spend the rest of the war at Groningen, where they were held in a camp.Waller was one of the lucky ones who made it to England. He was transferred back to the Royal Navy, serving on the Cornwallis (Duncan-class pre-dreadnought battleship) 27/7/1915 – 16/6/1917. At the time the R.N.D. was fighting in the Gallipoli campaign and the Cornwallis was one of the capital ships providing fire support. It is probable that he was serving ashore and recalled to the Cornwallis to replace a sick crewman etc. He was now an Acting leading Stoker.After the Suvla Bay evacuation was complete, Cornwallis was transferred to the Suez Canal Patrol which operated on the East Indies Station until March 1916, including convoy duty in the Indian Ocean. She returned to the eastern Mediterranean in March 1916, and underwent a refit at Malta in May and June 1916. On 9 /1/1917, Cornwallis was hit on her starboard side by a torpedo from German U-boat U-32, commanded by Kurt Hartwig, in the eastern Mediterranean, 60 nautical miles east of Malta. Some of her stokeholds flooded, causing her to list about ten degrees to starboard, but counter-flooding corrected the list. She was also rendered immobilised, which made her an easy target for a second attack from U-32, which was able to evade the depth charge attack from Cornwallis\'s escorting destroyers. By this time, the British had begun preparations to take her under tow, but Hartwig launched another torpedo at long range. About 75 minutes after the first torpedo hit, another struck Cornwallis, also on the starboard side, and the ship rolled quickly to starboard. Fifteen men were killed in the torpedo explosions, but she stayed afloat long enough to get the rest of the crew off. She sank about 30 minutes after the second torpedo hit.He was assigned to Pembroke II (shore base) 17/1/1917 – 6/3/1917 and then H.M.S. Wildfire (Shore base) 7/3/1917 – 20/2/1919 then shore for demobilizing.A lucky man to survive the Antwerp debacle, Gallipoli, and the sinking of the Cornwallis, he also spent 28 days in the cells at various times during his service. He survived the war and the 1939 census records him as married and working in Fulham as a ‘foreman pipe fitter’.

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