Tuesday 31 May marked the centenary of the bloodiest naval battle of the First World War – The Battle of Jutland.
Salford sailors saw heavy casualties as the British Royal Navy’s Grand Fleet traded blows with Vice-Admiral Scheer’s German Navy on 31 May 1916.
Over the course of 36 hours thousands would be killed by drowning, shooting or relentless enemy shelling.
While most news reports focused on the untold death and destruction of thousands of sailors in this Danish sea skirmish, SalfordOnline.com has uncovered the stories of three men from Eccles who actually survived.
More: Salford remembers WW1 naval catastrophe at The Battle of Jutland
Pictured: Damage done to huge ships at Battle of Jutland.
The Eccles and Patricroft Journal of June 1916 told the story of 28-year-old Wilfred Bower, who lived at Vicarage Grove, Eccles with his aunt and uncle.
Bower was an orphan, having lost both parents when he was just a toddler.
He was serving on the HMS Indefagitable – one of the Royal Navy’s battlecruisers and the lead of its fleet – off the coast of Denmark.
Its opposite number, the German battlecruiser Von der Tann, locked Bower’s vessel in a gun battle.
German armoured shells were much more advanced than British armour plating and after 25 minutes a shell caught the fore turret of the HMS Indefagitable, penetrating the ship’s ammunition storage area.
The resulting explosion ripped a hole in the hull and threw debris 200ft (60m) into the air. HMS Indefatigable sank.
Bower was lucky – by degrees. One can only imagine the guilt as only he and a second man out of a crew of 1,017 survived.
Gun crew of the HMS Colossus © Eddie Palmer/Naval-history.net
A Swinton man, Robert Berry Clarke, 22, who lived at Harrowby Street, was serving on the HMS Defence which was also sunk by enemy action.
The newspapers reported that his death hadn’t been announced but back at home his parents were fearing the worst.
They had good reason to be concerned.
The HMS Defence was sunk while escorting the main body of the Grand Fleet, fired upon by one German battlecruiser and four dreadnoughts as she attempted to engage a disabled German light cruiser.
She was struck by two salvoes from the German ships that detonated her rear magazine.
Damage to the superstructure of HMS COLOSSUS, the flagship of the 1st Battle Squadron. © IWM (Q 55600)
The fire from that explosion spread to the ship’s secondary magazines, which exploded in turn. There were no survivors from a crew of 780.
The British Navy suffered terrible losses. HMS Queen Mary was sunk, killing all but nine of 1,285 men while HMS Invincible exploded with 1,020 of 1,026 crew dead.
Stoker, James Yates from Eccles was serving on the HMS Duke of Edinburgh and he was lucky enough to survive.
He wrote to the Eccles and Patricroft Journal to say: “I thank my Maker for being able to write to you for I was in the engagement with the German fleet.
“We were in the thick of it, what with shells dropping all around, it made us study a bit.
“We wondered if we would ever see home again as there are no back doors here and its a one in a thousand chance if you get picked up or peg out in the freezing waters.
“I’m glad to say the Duke of Edinburgh came out of it safe and well, we consider that a miracle.”
HMS Malaya was hit eight times and took major damage and heavy crew casualties, a total of 65 men died, in the battle or later of their injuries.
Among the wounded was Able Seaman Willie Vicarage, notable as one of the first men to receive facial reconstruction using plastic surgery.
The newspaper also carried an article about a young lad called William Parker, 18 who was a gunner on the HMS Malaya, he is listed as living at 185 Worsley Road, Winton.
With typical patriotic zeal the paper declared that Parker had seen the effect of his ship’s guns on the German fleet and was convinced that they came off second best.
His only concern was that his crew would not be able to catch the retreating German fleet “before they could inflict further damage on them”.
The bravery of these young men is still amazing today: at such an early age they must have experienced more in one day of naval warfare than most people had in a lifetime.
Main image: William Bowers; Gunner Parker; Seaman Clarke
