Orders, Decorations and Medals

An exceptional ‘St. Nazaire’ D.S.M. group of seven awarded to Chief Engine Room Artificer H. Howard, R.N., H.M.S. “Campbeltown”
Distinguished Service Medal, G.VI.R. (M.31976 C.E.R.A.); British War Medal (M.31976 Act.E.R.A.4, R.N.); 1939-45 Star; Africa Star; Italy Star; War Medal; Naval L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., Coinage Head (M.31976 E.R.A.1, H.M.S. Cairo) together with: ‘War Heroes Day’ gold medal, 10 carat, “Presented to Harry Howard by the people of Boston, June 10, 1942, Maurice J. Tobin, Mayor”; Silver Key inscribed “Chief Artificer Harry Howard. Presented by the Mayor of Salt Lake City, June 23, 1942”; and a group of three awarded to his brother Sergeant J. A. Howard, R.A.O.C., comprising: 1939-45 Star; War Medal; Efficiency Medal, Territorial, G.VI.R. (7599542 Sjt., R.A.O.C.), very fine or better (12)

D.S.M. London Gazette 21 May, 1942, ‘For great gallantry, daring and skill in the attack on the German Naval Base at St. Nazaire.’
Howard was in charge of the Campbeltown’s engine room and was responsible, once the ship had rammed the lock gates at St. Nazaire, for scuttling the ship by opening the valves that would let in the sea and removing the condenser doors. This task he successfully completed by torchlight with the help of E.R.A. Reay. To make assurance doubly sure, scuttling charges were fired under the direction of the Torpedo Gunner. About half the ship’s company, according to plan, made their way forward to the fo’c’sle, which they found enveloped in the acrid smoke that was pouring from the hole made by a mysterious incendiary. Led by Howard, they scrambled down the scaling ladders left by the Commandos, and, suffering sharp casualties from the heavy machine-gun fire that was riddling the quayside, made their way to Curtis’s gunboat in the Old Entrance. Full of wounds, silent, empty and deserted by all except her faithful dead, Campbeltown lay patiently on her altar, waiting for the determined hour of her sacrifice.
MGB.314, commanded by Lieut. D.M.C. Curtis, R.N.V.R., with Commander Ryder on board, was full of dead and wounded, and having been witness to the desperate fighting, both on and off shore, was forced to withdraw, the sole surviving vessel. Below decks Howard was kept busy attending to the wounded men, applying tourniquets and bandages. Because of the innumerable holes in the ship’s hull, no lights could be allowed below deck, so this work had to be carried out by torchlight. Howard was aided in this work by Gordon Holman, a journalist, whose touching description of the fortitude of the young sailor’s glows warmly in his book Commando Attack.
In June 1942, Howard was selected as one of a small group of Britain’s war heroes to tour the United States. His own story of the raid, titled “Stand by to Ram”, was published in From Hell to Breakfast by Carl Olsson in August 1943. His brother, Sergeant J. A. Howard was taken prisoner at Dunkirk and imprisoned in Stalag 20B at Marienburg.