Naval Affairs

[poliphilo]

Thanks to Percy Hook a lot of photographs and postcards with a nautical flavour have found their way into the archive. They have their own interest...

HMS Fisgard was a shore-based training facility for naval engineers and artificers based in Portsmouth. It was housed in an ever-changing array of old hulks. We have several Fisgard related items in the collection. Here are two of them.





I think I've spotted a young Percy in the second one, right at the back, just to the left of the bus. He and his messmates are celebrating Trafalgar Day 1922

This next one has a certain historical interest.



On the back Percy has written, "The prisoners of war on board HMS Wild Swan". Wild Swan was a modified W-Class destroyer, built at the end of the Great War- and known to her crew as The Infuriated Chicken.  She was dispatched East in 1926 to protect British interests during the Chinese Civil War and the picture must relate to one of several incidents that took place over the next two or three years. The prisoners of war are members of Chang Kai Shek's Nationalist army.

Here's "The Infuriated Chicken in Chinese waters"



And here's Percy sitting on a gun.

Comments

[sweetperiwinkle.livejournal.com]

Old pix like that are amazing. =D I love genealogy. =D

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I have a cupboard full of old photographs. The more I dig the more stories I find.

[sweetperiwinkle.livejournal.com]

Sifting through old photos is an ideal way to spend a yucky day (like freezing rain.

The house I am living in right now is over 200 years old.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

This house- my mother's- is about 200 years old. Or, at least, the core of it is; there have been several bits added on.

[sweetperiwinkle.livejournal.com]

There are homes that are legacy homes -- meaning that someone who was of importance like a doctor (our home) or lawyers, stuff like that. There is a plaque in a place where people like me who wants to research you know?

I should go for a walk in the spring and show you some of the plaques. =)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

That'd be fun.

This house was a small farmhouse, early 19th century in date.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah. BTW did you know that I'm on Dreamwidth now?https://www.dreamwidth.org/create?from=hauntedbynightmares

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

Fisgard's clearly a pre dreadnought but the one on the right is old and intrigues me.

Do you know anything about it at all?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's confusing.

The navy kept replacing the hulks that constituted Fisgard. The history is here- http://www.gosportheritage.co.uk/hms-fisgard-gosport-1904-1932/

Wikipedia also has an article containing much the same information.

My best guess is the ship we're talking about is the former HMS Hindostan- ordered in 1819 and launched in 1841. All the other ships that briefly served as Fisgard I, 2, 3 or 4. were Victorian ironclads.

[resonant.livejournal.com]

You got me reading up on W-Class destroyers; interestingly, some were sold for scrap in early 1945, before the war ended. I suppose the conclusion was obvious by then.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

They'd have been ancient technology by then.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Your old family photos are far more interesting than mine are!

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

That's kind.

But are you sure? It's only when I started sifting through them that the stories started to emerge.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

They're almost entirely snaps of people at the seaside. My family are all working class and so only had photos at weddings, christenings and on holiday. I do need to start working through them though and scanning the most interesting ones.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

You never know what you may find...:)