Naval Medals from the Collection of the Late Jason Pilalas

The Second War D.S.M. and Bar group of six awarded to Able Seaman S. D. Bennett, Royal Navy, who, having been originally decorated for his part in the famous boarding of the Altmark off Norway in February 1940, went on to win a Bar to his D.S.M. for services in H.M. Submarine Saracen in the Mediterranean: taken P.O.W. following her loss off Bastia in July 1943, he made at least two bids for freedom, one of them leading to him enjoying a period of several months at large, when he worked with the Italian partisans

Distinguished Service Medal, G.VI.R., with Second Award Bar (JX. 136296 S. D. Bennett, A.B, H.M.S. Aurora.); 1939-45 Star; Atlantic Star; Africa Star; Italy Star; War Medal 1939-45, mounted as worn, extremely fine (6) £5,000-£7,000

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, May 1989; Ron Penhall Collection, Dix Noonan Webb, September 2006.

Eight D.S.Ms were awarded for the ‘Altmark Incident’, which with the addition of a Bar for services in submarines probably makes Bennett’s award unique; approximately 150 Bars to the D.S.M. were issued in the 1939-45 War.

D.S.M. London Gazette 12 April 1940: ‘For gallantry and devotion to duty in the boarding of the Altmark.’

D.S.M. Second Award Bar London Gazette 20 July 1943. The original recommendation states:

‘During her one patrol at home, and eight in the Mediterranean, Saracen has sunk by torpedo two enemy supply ships and one transport, totalling 20,000 tons, two U-Boats and one destroyer; and by gunfire two large tugs and one anti-submarine schooner, and bombarded one shipyard; and damaged one large tanker by torpedo and carried out one successful special operation. Except in the case of the U-Boat, the attacks have been carried out against escorted ships and the Saracen has been depth-charged in consequence. Able Seaman Bennett is recommended for outstanding skill and devotion to duty as gunlayer during the above successful patrols in Saracen.’

Stanley Douglas Bennett was born in November 1915 and entered the Royal Navy in October 1931. Appointed an Able Seaman in 1934, he commenced his wartime career aboard the cruiser H.M.S. Aurora and, in common with a few other crew members, was transferred to the destroyer Cossack off Norway in early 1940.

The Altmark Incident

On the night of 16 February 1940, in an episode that would be widely reported in the home press, Captain Philip Vian, R.N., C.O. of the Cossack, commanded a brilliant enterprise in neutral waters in Josing Fjord, Norway, when 300 British merchant seamen were rescued from appalling conditions in the holds of the German auxiliary ship Altmark, all of them victims of earlier sinkings in the South Atlantic by the Graf Spee prior to her demise in the River Plate; their rescue was effected by a boarding party from Cossack, armed with revolvers, rifles and bayonets, one of whom was Able Seaman Stanley Douglas Bennett.

As a result of the unfortunate delays caused by the implications of the Altmark being in neutral waters, and the presence of two Norwegian torpedo-boats ordered to prevent British intervention, Vian had patiently awaited Admiralty orders before embarking on his desperate mission, but when they arrived, with all the hallmarks of the First Sea Lord, Winston Churchill’s hand upon it, he moved swiftly. Vian’s account takes up the story:

‘Having placed Cossack in a position from which our pom-poms could play upon Norwegian decks, whilst their torpedo tubes were no instant menace to us, I said we could parley no longer, and must board and search the Altmark forthwith, whether we fought them or not. Kjell’s captain decided that honour was served by submitting to superior force, and withdrew. On rounding the bend in the fjord, Altmark at last came into view. She lay bows inshore, encased in ice, her great bulk standing black against the snow-clad mountains.

Thoughts of the six-inch guns with which the Altmark was said to be armed were naturally in our minds. Though our own guns were manned we were obviously an easy target, and the enemy’s first shots might well immobilise us at once. There was nothing for it, however, but to go ahead and get to grips as quickly as possible.

The Altmark’s Captain was determined to resist being boarded. On sighting Cossack, he trained his searchlight on our bridge to blind the command, and came astern at full power through the channel which his entry into the ice had made. His idea was to ram us. Unless something was done very quickly the great mass of the tanker’s counter was going to crash heavily into Cossack’s port bow.

There followed a period of manoeuvring in which disaster, as serious collision must have entailed, was avoided by the skill of my imperturbable navigator, McLean, and by the speed with which the main engine manoeuvring valves were operated by their artificers.

Lieutenant Bradwell Turner, the leader of the boarding party, anticipated Cossack’s arrival alongside Altmark with a leap which became famous. Petty Officer Atkins, who followed him, fell short, and hung by his hands until Turner heaved him on deck. The two quickly made fast a hemp hawser from Cossack’s fo’c’s’le, and the rest of the party scrambled across.

When Turner arrived on Altmark’s bridge he found the engine telegraphs set to full speed in an endeavour to force Cossack ashore. On Turner’s appearance, the captain and others surrendered, except the third officer, who interfered with the telegraphs, which Turner had set to stop. Turner forbore to shoot him.

It was now clear that as a result of her manoeuvres Altmark would ground by the stern, which she did, but not before Cossack, the boarding party all being transferred, had cast off, to avoid the same fate.

It was expected, with the surrender of the German captain, that the release of our prisoners would be a drawing-room affair. That this was not so was due to the action of a member of the armed guard which Graf Spee had put aboard. He gratuitously shot Gunner Smith, of the boarding party, in an alleyway. This invoked retaliation, upon which the armed guard decamped; they fled across the ice, and began to snipe the boarding party from an eminence on shore. Silhouetted against the snow they made easy targets, and their fire was quickly silenced by Turner and his men.

In the end German casualties were few, six killed and six badly wounded. The boarding party had none, save unlucky Gunner Smith, and even he was not fatally wounded.

Resistance overcome, Turner was able to turn to the business of the day. The prisoners were under locked hatches in the holds; when these had been broken open Turner hailed the men below with the words: “Any British down there?” He was greeted with a tremendous yell of “Yes! We’re all British!” “Come on up then,” said Turner, “The Navy’s here!”

I received many letters from the public after this affair: a number wrote to say that, as I had failed to shoot, or hang, the captain of Altmark, I ought to be shot myself.’

In point of fact Vian and his men were hailed as heroes the land over, Winston Churchill setting the pace with mention of their exploits in an address to veterans of the Battle of the River Plate at the Guildhall just four days after the Altmark had been boarded:

“To the glorious action of the Plate there has recently been added an epilogue - the rescue last week by the Cossack and her flotilla - under the noses of the enemy, and amid the tangles of one-sided neutrality - the rescue of British captives from the sunken German raider - your friend, the one you sunk. Their rescue at the very moment when these unhappy men were about to be delivered over to indefinite German bondage, proves that the long arm of British sea power can be stretched out, not only to foes, but also to faithful friends. And to Nelson’s immortal signal of 135 years ago: ‘England expects that every man will do his duty’ - there may now be added last week’s not less proud reply: ‘The Navy is here!’ ”

Vian and Turner were awarded the D.S.O., two officers the D.S.C., and eight ratings the D.S.M., including Bennett, who, in common with four of those decorated, had been removed to the Cossack from Aurora to assist at the boarding of the Altmark.

In November 1941, Bennett transferred to the Submarine Branch and, following an appointment aboard the P. 247 in the period June to August 1942, joined the Saracen.

H.M. Submarine Saracen

Bennett was awarded a Bar to his D.S.M. for his services as gunlayer in Saracen during several war patrols in the Mediterranean in 1943, and was in fact still aboard her when she was sunk by the Italian corvette Minerva off Corsica on 14 August 1943. He would earlier have been present in her successful encounter with the Italian submarine Granito off Cape San Vito on 9 November 1942, when three of Saracen’s torpedoes found their mark from a range of 800 yards. But, as stated, it was for his work in the following year, when the Saracen formed part of the 8th Submarine Flotilla, and was commanded by Lieutenant M. G. R. Lumby, D.S.O., D.S.C., that he won his D.S.M., a well-merited award judging by the events of one of her patrols in July 1943.

On 6 July 1943, Saracen was patrolling to the west of the island of Monte Cristo when she attacked and sunk the Italian steamer Tripoli, as a result of which the enemy corvettes Danaide and Cormorano set off in pursuit of her. Five days later, after numerous A/S sweeps, the pair of them finally caught up with their quarry off Bastia, and the Danaide delivered a devastating depth-charge attack. Lumby saw her through his periscope approaching at speed but managed to get the Saracen down to 300 feet by the time the depth-charges had started to detonate. Luckily for everyone aboard, aircraft appeared on the scene and drove the Italians away, allowing Lumby to carry out emergency repairs and to continue the patrol, and add the German steamer Tell to his mounting tally of victims. Yet again, however, the enemy responded in kind, and Saracen sustained further damage, so much so that it was a very relieved crew that crept into Algiers on the 20th.

Saracen departed on her final patrol on 6 August 1943, arriving off Bastia on the 13th, where Lumby stalked what appeared to be a large merchant ship but was in fact the deceptive silhouette of a factory and chimney in the harbour; during that period an Italian seaplane landed with its floats astride the Saracen’s periscope ‘but no-one seemed to suspect our presence’. Compelled to surface that evening to charge batteries, under a full moon and in a glassy still sea, Saracen was spotted by two Italian Corvettes, the Minerva and the Euterpe. Lumby takes up the story:

‘After a short time one of the vessels came in to attack and dropped its carpet of 36 depth-charges. All seemed close, but the last one made the boat whip alarmingly, a lamp bulb landed in my coffee and the steering wheel sheared off. Then a report came that the after ends had been evacuated (the watchkeeper in the after ends left so quickly that he could not give a description of the damage). Attempts to get back into the after ends were unavailing, they being full of water; otherwise all systems appeared to be functioning correctly. The boat of course assumed a considerable bow-up angle. We attempted to correct this with main ballast trimming but it was not very successful. We porpoised up and down and used up a lot of air ... I was quite determined not to be sunk on Friday 13th. Once it was past midnight I began to wonder how long we could continue porpoising up and down. I was kept informed of the HP air situation. Fairly soon, I have no idea how long as it seemed ages, I decided we were on a losing game. Hands were ordered to muster in the control room with D.S.E.A. Sadly many of the D.S.E.A. burst on being inflated. I suppose twelve months in the Mediterranean had caused them to perish. Those without D.S.E.A. were told to hold on to men with D.S.E.A. when they got into the sea. Everyone was told to gather on the casing and jump into the sea together when the main vents were opened. The order to surface was given at 400 feet. It seemed to take a very long time and a lot of HP air before the depth-guages started moving in the right direction. Once started the gauges moved very fast ... My Italian captors told me afterwards that we cleared the sea like a salmon leaping. A marvellous sight in the full moonlight. I came up the tower last, having opened the main vents, and was relieved to see that the boat was diving. Everyone had jumped off the casing but there were still three figures on the bridge. Then we four jumped. The sea was very warm ... ’

As related by another crew member, Stoker E. Metcalfe, Saracen came under heavy fire from the Minerva’s 5-inch guns and machine-guns, until such stage the Italian captain was convinced that the British crew was abandoning ship:

‘On getting into the conning tower I experienced a tremendous blast of air. Looking over the top I saw it was as colourful as Blackpool. Tracer coming from all over the place. I jumped on top of the conning tower and, seeing people lying on the saddle tanks, I decided to dive off the top of the conning tower and get away from the saddle tanks. The next thing I knew there were crew all over me. Eventually I was picked up by a boat ... I had climbed aboard [the Italian ship] and was walking along a passage when I caught myself in a mirror. I was covered head to foot in blood. I looked like a Red Indian. I hadn’t realised I’d been hit. They sat me down and gave me a cigarette; then they began pulling bits of 20mm. shrapnel out of me all over the place.’

Escaper

In addition to those wounded, two of Saracen’s crew were lost without trace, but Bennett would appear to have survived the ordeal unscathed, and in common with his fellow crew members, was interned at Campo No. 1 Marina at Manziana, where all were routinely interrogated and had their heads shaved. And in common with fellow Saracen hands at the time of the Italian capitulation, he made a bid for freedom in September 1943, a gallant and protracted effort that witnessed him being at large until re-captured in Rome in April 1944. In the interim, in co-operation with Italian partisans, he assisted in setting fire to a German A.A. crew’s billet and in blowing up a German petrol wagon (his P.O.W’s debrief refers). Removed to a new camp at Laterino, near Florence, Bennett made another bid for freedom in June 1944, when he jumped from a German transport vehicle in the company of a British Army Sergeant, but they were re-captured three days later. Finally, in April 1945, and having been transferred to Marlag und Milag Nord, Tarnstedt, he ‘hid’ for ten days to prevent yet further transfer by the Germans. He was liberated later that month. Interestingly, four of Saracen’s crew were subsequently mentioned in despatches for just gallant escape work, one of them posthumously after being shot by a German guard. For his own part, Bennett returned to the Submarine Service in July 1945 and was discharged ashore at the end of the same year.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation and photographs, the former including Buckingham Palace forwarding letter for the recipient’s D.S.M. and an Admiralty letter informing his wife of the award of the Bar, and three wartime photographs.