Naval Medals from the Collection of the Late Jason Pilalas (Part I)

The Second War G.M. group of four awarded to Able Seaman M. H. Woods, Royal Navy, who served as a diver in ‘P’ Party 1571 during many weeks of extremely hazardous mine clearance operations in the ‘liberated ports’

George Medal, G.VI.R., 1st issue (A.B. Maurice H. Woods, P/JX. 519951 R.N.); 1939-45 Star; France and Germany Star; War Medal 1939-45, light contact marks, otherwise good very fine (4) £3,000-£4,000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Naval Medals from the Collection of the Late Jason Pilalas.

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Collection

Sotheby’s, December 1990; Ron Penhall Collection, Dix Noonan Webb, September 2006.

G.M. London Gazette 15 May 1945:

‘For exceptional gallantry, skill and great devotion to duty, often in close proximity to the enemy, during mine-searching and clearance operations in the ports of Normandy and of the Low countries.’

The original recommendation states:

‘For gallantry and devotion to duty during mine-searching and clearance operations in the liberated ports of Cherbourg, Dieppe, Le Havre, Rouen and Antwerp. And particularly for carrying out the removal of very dangerous mines from the quayside at Rouen where the risk of accident was higher than usual.’

For the record, it would also be appropriate to include the following covering statement submitted to the Admiralty’s Honours and Awards Committee:

‘The time factor was always pressing and, consequently, large risks were run continuously, and willingly, so that clearance should be quick. Much diving of arduous and dangerous kinds has always been involved, first to discover mines, booby traps and other devices left by the enemy, and then to render them safe. That the ports were cleared with such speed and that supplies to the Army were, at no point in the swift advance from Normandy, in serious danger of outrunning supply until the fight had ranged far inland, is to the credit of the ‘P’ Parties and their sustained courage.’

Maurice Henry Woods was born in Birmingham in January 1925 and joined the Royal Navy as an Ordinary Seaman in June 1943. Having then completed a divers’ course, he was posted to the appropriately titled bomb and mine clearance unit Firework in April 1944, and thence to Odyssey, at which establishments he completed his training for ‘P’ Party 1571, commanded by Lieutenant-Commander J. L. Harries, G.M., R.C.N.V.R., in readiness for the coming operations off Normandy. Ron Penhall takes up the story in his associated article published in N.H.C. & R.A. Review (Autumn, 2002):

‘Very early in July 1944, Woods ‘struck pay dirt’. Alongside the Quai Hornet was a large flooded drydock which the Germans had deliberately jammed and in consequence the U.S. authorities were unable to pump it dry. Woods, now a very experienced diver, was ‘first up to bat’ to solve the problem. As the ‘P’ Parties experience increased they had abandoned life lines attached to the diver and were using a buoyant rubber float tied to the diver to mark his position below. Woods position was closely monitored by his mates on the surface, a series of jerks on the line keeping them informed of what was going on down below. Suddenly the rubber float stopped moving. They gave one jerk which meant ‘Are you O.K.?’ No reply. Twice more they gave single jerks and now presumed Woods had blacked out and were therefore astonished some minutes later when he popped up some yards away. Woods explained to them that he was sure he had found their first mine and to make sure it would not get lost, he had with his practical determination, cast off his float line and attached it to the mine. The contraption was later identified as a K- type mine known to the mine sweeping service as a “Katy”. It consisted of an explosive charge set in a concrete block surmounted by a tripod of steel tubing. A greenish coloured snag line floated just below the surface. Vessels passing overhead would foul the line with their propellers and trigger the mine. Lieutenant-Commander Harries dived on the mine, rendered it safe and it was brought ashore.’

As stated in the above recommendation, however, Woods displayed further acts of bravery in the clearance of other ports, and by way of illustrating the scale of the task facing the ‘P’ Parties, the following statistics from the Cherbourg operation are quoted from Ron Penhall’s article:

‘On 14 August 1944, the port of Cherbourg was officially declared free of mines and obstacles and safe to receive ships. During the six weeks that ‘P’ Parties 1570 and 1571 had spent clearing the docks, they had searched 1,708,150 square feet of seabed. To achieve this feat they had spent 299 hours and 46 minutes underwater, a tremendous effort for such a small body of men. The following is a non-exhaustive list of mines and other ordances recovered and rendered safe by Woods’ ‘P’ Party 1571:

1 C-type mine rendered safe underwater.
4 K-type mines rendered safe underwater.
Rendered safe - large numbers of C and E-type mines found in the dock area and in railway trucks.
Rendered safe - large numbers of unexploded bombs, shells, gas cylinders, mortar bombs and grenades, dumped in the dock area.
Recovered and rendered safe - large quantities of munitions, including rifles and guns that had been dumped in the various docks.

On 20 July 1944 Winston Churchill visited Cherbourg and was taken round the harbour to see the extent of the devastation caused by the retreating enemy. In the course of his tour of the docks he noticed ‘P’ Party members hard at work in their quiet, unspectacular way. Writing of this tour of Cherbourg in volume six of his History of the Second World War, Churchill did not forget his brief encounter with the “human minesweepers”. He wrote: ‘A handful of devoted British divers were hard at work day and night clearing the mines and other underwater obstacles. They richly deserved the warm tributes paid to them by their American comrades.’

Woods received the G.M. at a Buckingham Palace investiture held on 4 November 1945. He was demobilised in November 1946, but enrolled in the Royal Fleet Reserve as an Able Seaman in late 1948, on the strength of which service he served until March 1957.

Sold with the recipient’s original certificate of service, ‘Gunnery History Sheet’ and H.M.S. Vernon certificate of proficiency for diving to depths of 120 feet, together with a copy of Open The Ports - The Exciting Story of Human Minesweepers, by Grosvenor and Bates.