A Collection of Awards to Merchant Seamen and D.E.M.S. Gunners

Six: Chief Steward E. W. Hayter, Merchant Navy, late Royal Navy, who lost his life on the occasion of the sinking of the S.S. Gloucester Castle by the German raider Michel in July 1942
1914-15 Star (L. 6103 E. Hayter, O.S. 1, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (L. 6103 E. Hayter, O.S. 1, R.N.); 1939-45 Star; Atlantic Star; War Medal 1939-45, the last three in their original addressed card forwarding box, together with the recipient’s Buckingham Palace Memorial Scroll in the name of ‘E. W. Hayter, Chief Steward, Merchant Navy’, his Minister of Transport condolence slip, in the name of ‘Ernest W. Hayter’, and further original documentation (see below) , good very fine and better (6) £250-300

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Awards to Merchant Seamen and D.E.M.S. Gunners.

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Ernest William Hayter was born in Southampton in July 1889 and entered the Royal Navy as a Steward in January 1915, his service record stating that he was allowed to count two years in the Merchant Service towards his first Good Conduct Badge. And he served thereafter, up until the summer of 1918, in the cruiser H.M.S, Amethyst, a ship of the 1st Light Cruiser Squadron which was ordered to the Mediterranean in 1915, and thence to the South American Station. His final wartime appointment was in another light cruiser, the Danae, a ship of the 5th Light Cruiser Squadron based at Harwich. Given future events, it seems likely he served as a Steward in the Union-Castle Line between the Wars. Be that as it may, he was certainly serving in that capacity aboard the S.S. Gloucester Castle in June 1942, in which month the liner departed Birkenhead, bound for South Africa, with 12 passengers, 142 crew and some D.E.M.S. gunners. But she never reached her destination, and it was two or three years before news of her suspected fate reached home. She had in fact been stalked and sunk by the German raider Michel on 15 July, off the coast of Portuguese Angola, the latter’s 5.9-inch armament causing devastation in the old liner’s saloon, where Hayter would have been on duty that evening. The Michel’s shelling also ignited petrol cans stored on the foredeck, as well as holing the Gloucester Castle’s hull and, after a few minutes, she plunged beneath the waves, taking 93 of her passengers and crew with her, including Hayter. The survivors, who included a woman passenger, an 18 year old girl, and two young boys, were picked up by the Michel, and later transferred to a German tanker. Finally, that October, they were handed over to the Japanese at Yokohama, a tale of misery matched by the suffering caused the next of kin of those lost, owing to the length of time it took to establish their fate.

Also sold with the recipient’s original parchment R.N. Certificate of Service, and letters from The Union-Castle Mail Steamship Co., and British Red Cross Society and Order of St. John of Jerusalem, regarding his loss.