An extremely rare Great War Zeebrugge raid C.G.M., Q-Ship operations D.S.M. group of nine awarded to Petty Officer D. P. Smith, Royal Navy: having participated in five classic Q-Ship actions in the Cullist and survived her sinking, he steered the Iris II through point blank fire at Zeebrugge in April 1918, this time surviving a direct 11-inch hit on the ex-Liverpool ferry’s bridge: 200 or 300 hundred aboard her were not so lucky, prompting the famous signal, ‘For God’s sake, send some doctors, I have a shipload of dead and dying

Conspicuous Gallantry Medal, G.V.R. (225904 D. P. Smith, P.O., “Iris II”, Zeebrugge-Ostend 22-3 Apl. 1918); Distinguished Service Medal, G.V.R. (225904 D. P. Smith, P.O., Atlantic Ocean, 13 July 1917); 1914-15 Star (225904 D. P. Smith, P.O., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals, M.I.D. oakleaf (225904 D. P. Smith, P.O., R.N.); Defence and War Medals 1939-45; Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., 1st issue (225904 David P. Smith, P.O., H.M.S. Victory); France, Croix de Guerre 1914-1917, with bronze palm, the eighth with minor official correction to christian name, edge bruising and contact marks, otherwise generally very fine (9) £8000-10000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The collection of Medals formed by the Late Clive Nowell.

View
Collection

Approximately 12 such gallantry award combinations were issued in the Great War.

C.G.M. London Gazette 23 July 1918. The original recommendation states.

Lieutenant Henderson reports that this Petty Officer was acting as Quarter-Master of Iris II on the night of 22-23 April 1918. He carried out his duties with great coolness throughout. On leaving the mole, the bridge of Iris II was partially shot away, the captain and navigator both being severely wounded. Petty Officer Smith, however, was untouched and showed great bravery in remaining at his exposed post under heavy fire, steering the ship to safety with one hand while lighting the compass with a torch held in the other.

D.S.M. London Gazette 29 August 1917.

For services against enemy submarines.

French Croix de Guerre London Gazette 28 March 1918.



David Percy Smith was born in Dorchester, Dorset in April 1887 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class in April 1903. A Leading Seaman aboard the cruiser H.M.S. Cochrane by the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, he remained similarly employed until coming ashore to an appointment in Victory I in the rank of Petty Officer in May 1917, a period encompassing Cochrane’s part in the battle of Jutland. A few days later, he was transferred to Queenstown Command for service in Q-Ships - in Smith’s case the Cullist.

Q-Ships.

The Cullist (ex-Westphalia), commanded by Lieutenant-Commander S. H. Simpson, R.N. - who would shortly win a brace of D.S.Os - was armed with one 4-inch gun, two 12-pounders and two torpedo tubes. And in the period Smith served in her she fought no less than five classic Q-Ship actions, the last of them resulting in her demise.

The action which resulted in the award of his D.S.M. was fought on 13 July 1917, when the Cullist was operating between the French and Irish coasts. An enemy submarine was sighted on the surface at 11,000 yards range, from which distance it began shelling the Q-Ship. After firing 38 rounds without recording a hit, the enemy was enticed by Simpson’s tactics to close the range to 5,000 yards, and fired a further 30 rounds, some of which straddled their target. At 1407 hours Cullist returned fire, her gunners getting the range after their second salvo was fired and numerous hits were recorded on the enemy’s conning tower, gun and deck. Then an explosion was seen followed by bright red flames, and three minutes after engaging the submarine it was seen to go down by the bows leaving oil and debris on the surface - the latter included ‘a corpse dressed in blue dungarees, floating face upwards.

On 20 August 1917, in the English Channel, an enemy submarine was sighted on the surface and opened fire on the Cullist at 9,000 yards range. After 82 rounds had been fired by the submarine, just one of them scored with a hit on the waterline of the stokehold, the shell injuring both the firemen on watch and causing a large rush of water into the stoke hold, which was overcome by plugging the hole and shoring it up. Several time-fuzed shrapnel projectiles were also fired at the Cullist but without effect. The submarine then closed the range to 4,500 yards at which time the Cullist returned fire and scored two hits in the area of the conning tower, upon which the submarine was seen to dive and contact was lost.

On 28 September 1917, in another hotly contested action, Simpson gave the order to open fire at 5,000 yards range - ‘thirteen rounds were fired of which eight were direct hits, causing him to settle down by the bowstill while about 30 feet of his stern was standing out of the water at an angle of about 30 degrees to the horizon. He remained in this position for about ten to fifteen seconds before disappearing at 12.43 hours.’ Soon afterwards Simpson spotted another enemy submarine and set off in pursuit, on this occasion to no avail.

Yet another brush with the enemy took place on 17 November 1917, when the Cullist was sighted by an enemy submarine which opened fire at 8,000 yards range. Within five minutes the enemy had the range and a shell glanced off the Cullist’s side, damaging one of three officers’ cabins before bursting on the water-line. After disappearing in a bank of fog the submarine re-appeared and continued to shell the Cullist with such accuracy that for 50 minutes the decks and bridge were continually sprayed with shell splinters and drenched with water from near misses. In all, the enemy fired 92 rounds, while the Cullist returned fire from 4,500 yards, 14 rounds being fired at the submarine of which six were seen to be direct hits. The submarine, although badly damaged, was able to turn away, dive and escape.

On 11 February 1918, however, the Cullist’s luck ran out and she was torpedoed without warning in the Irish Sea and sank in two minutes. The enemy submarine then surfaced and asked for the Captain, but was told that he had been killed. The Germans picked up two men and after verbally abusing the remaining survivors, made off. Simpson, who had been wounded, was pulled into one of the rafts, and the survivors were subsequently rescued by a patrol trawler - but not before being forced to sing “Tipperary” to convince the trawlermen of their true identity. So ended Smith’s time in Q-Ships.

Zeebrugge.

In March 1918, he was sent to Victory X, from which establishment he volunteered for the Zeebrugge, in which operation he was assigned to Iris II, one of two Liverpool ferryboats which had been requisitioned for use in the raid. And in his capacity as her Quarter-Master, Smith once more found himself under heavy enemy fire, the Iris II having been charged with delivering storming parties to the port’s heavily defended Mole.

Notwithstanding the ferocity of the enemy’s fire, Smith managed to bring the vessel into position alongside the Mole, but it was found that the scaling ladders were either too short or could not be made fast. It was at this juncture that Lieutenant-Commander G. N. Bradford climbed up the derrick which carried a large parapet anchor and managed to place it in position - he was, however, immediately riddled with bullets and fell to his death into the sea between the Mole and the ship, an act of courage which won for him a posthumous Victoria Cross. Still under heavy machine-gun fire, and having failed to secure herself to the Mole, Iris II dropped back with some difficulty onto the starboard quarter of the Vindictive and tried to land her seamen across her decks - a number of men in this fashion managed to reach the Mole but were met with a withering fire, many dying the moment their heads came above the parapet.

Shortly afterwards, the order to retire was received, Smith having no choice but to steer a course that ran right across the front of the Mole batteries. Here then the moment when her decks became buried under heaps of casualties, the enemy gunners raking her from bow to stern with machine-gun fire and 5.9-inch and 11-inch shells from the Goeben battery - one of the latter rounds smashed into the bridge, only yards from Smith, and the other burst on the main deck, killing around 100 men. Yet amidst the carnage and wreckage on the bridge - where Commander Valentine Gibbs, R.N., her captain, and Major Eagles, R.M., lay mortally wounded, and the Navigating Officer seriously wounded - Smith maintained his position, ‘steering the ship to safety with one hand while lighting the compass with a torch held in the other’. Finally, M.L. 558 arrived on the scene and laid a smoke screen, thereby allowing the ferry to make her escape. And in the 13 hours it took her to get back to Dover, Captain Frank Pocock of the R.A.M.C., the only medical officer aboard, had his work cut out for him for, in addition to the hundred or so who already lay dead on her main deck, another 200 or so lay wounded or dying - thus the famous signal sent by Lieutenant Oscar Henderson, the ship’s senior surviving officer: ‘For God’s sake, send some doctors, I have a shipload of dead and dying.

Smith, who is verified on his service record as having participated in the raid’s V.C. ballot, was awarded the C.G.M., and ended the War in the Mediterranean with appointments in Europa I & II. Advanced to Chief Petty Officer at the gunnery establishment Excellent in November 1924, he was finally pensioned ashore in April 1927.