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From the author:
When I was a small boy my Grandmother told me how her husband, David Henry Flett, lost his life at sea in the First World War. He was serving in the British Merchant Navy, sailing as Chief Engineer on the steamship Warnow when it was sunk off Land’s End. I subsequently discovered, as you shall read, that the ship was torpedoed in the Bristol Channel off Trevose Head on the coast of Cornwall.

Some long time later, while waiting to be served in a scuba diving shop in 1995, I picked up a book on British merchant ships sunk by U-boats in that war. The book contained a short entry for my Grandfather’s ship which stirred me to find out as much as I could of the ship, the people and the events surrounding them.

I suppose it should come as no surprise that there is more information available on the German U-boats and their crews than the British; belonging to the military they would produce many more records and their exploits be more likely to be published in books.

The main part of my research stretched over about five years, and then having collated all that current information, I published a webpage which attracted the interest of a Spanish author researching a book on German U-boats interned in Spain. Jose Angel del Rio sent photographs and information which added to my knowledge.

Date: 25-Feb-2021

Author: Jim Milligan

Contributed by Jim M