Researching a WW2 era Merchant Navy ancestor
QI share here a photo of my maternal grandfather George Lacey being presented to King George VI and I am hoping for some help in identifying the occasion. George Lacey is the tall man in the pin striped suit second from the left of the group of civilians. I posted the photo on Facebook last year and someone advised that the location is the Stonehouse Barracks of The Royal Marines in Plymouth but I don’t have any more information. The photo was given to me by my mother but she was unable to tell me any more about it.
George was born in 1890 in Southampton and lived there until his death in 1960. For most of his working life he was a Merchant Seaman, working for the London & South Western Railway, later Southern Railway as a Fireman on their cross channel mail steamers from Southampton Docks.
I am sharing a photo of sepia portrait of George as a young man in his uniform, and a copy of one of his early Merchant Seaman’s documents. You will see that his cap tally shows the RMS Caesarea which was one of the original L&SWR steamers. I think that he may have lied about his age when joining the company as all documents relating to his time at sea state that his date of birth is 1887!
One of the family stories that my mother told me about George is that he was a crewman on one of the last mail steamers to leave the Channel Islands before the Nazi invasion of the islands in 1940. My mother also thought that he may have taken part in the evacuation of the troops from France at that time. I am wondering if this is related to the occasion of meeting the King, but I am not sure why it would be in Plymouth if that is the correct location.
I have tried contacting various museums to no avail and tried to find any archive material from the L&SWR or Southern Railway. This has proved to be difficult as there is very little historical information relating to the RM steamships and their crew. Having subscribed to your magazine for some time I wondered if one of your team of experts may be able to point me in the right direction. It is not every day that your grandad meets the King and it would be lovely to be able to tell my grandchildren about it! Christine Richards
AThe Royal Navy coordinated the evacuation of people by sea and I agree that the location for the photo of the King does look like Stonehouse Barracks, Plymouth. It was probably chosen because the building was owned by the Admiralty, and was seen as an impressive ‘official’ location to receive royalty so that the king could thank seafaring representatives. I think the most likely reason for the photo is that the king was visiting Plymouth when your ancestor happened to be there and was rounded up to attend upon him. The monarchs in both world wars were deeply impressed by the courage of the Merchant Navy and praised its personnel.
Where to look for bravery medals
I can’t find any evidence that George, say, received a bravery medal from the king via TNA series such as HO45 and T335. However, you could download and explore the unindexed series BT261 via the TNA website where certain other awards are documented.
How to track down a crew list
Many Merchant Navy employees did not have a long-term career with the same shipowner and were dismissed each time their vessel reached its final destination. However, ferry companies were an exception because these vessels had such a fast turnaround time in port. As you say, the London & South Western Railway merged with other companies to form Southern Railway in the early 1920s. The last vessel to take civilians off the Channel Islands before the Nazis arrived is usually cited as the SS Isle of Sark which, interestingly, was a Southern Railway ship. You could get the crew list for that ship and it should reveal if George was on board. The official number for the ship was 161741 (see www.crewlist.org.uk) and surviving crew lists for WW2 are kept at TNA. Unfortunately, the crew list for 1940 is missing but that for 1941 is in BT381/1494.
Search for WW2 career details at The National Archives
Finally, you could potentially extend your knowledge of the ships that George served upon by investigating whether TNA holds his WW2 career details. Not all of these records survive, but if George’s exists it should tell you the name of many of his ships and any awards he received. You must visit TNA to see these documents. There are two series of
records. George is not in the first series, BT372, which is indexed by surname on the TNA website, but he may be in series BT382 in particular BT382/967 which includes the Laceys.
Remember to find the ship’s official number
Ships are often only referred to by their official number in these records so you’ll need the CLIP website to identify them by name www.crewlist.org.uk. You can then look them up one at a time via Lloyd’s Register of Shipping to find out more detail about them, including whether they were owned by Southern Railway https://hec.lrfoundation.org. uk/archive-library/lloyds-register-of-ships-online. You could also follow up the history of individual vessels to determine if any were involved with evacuating troops from France in 1940.
A note about shipowner business records
Business records for major shipowners rarely include information about individual members of staff, they tend to be administrative. So, the fact that you can’t find any Southern Railway company records is a pity but they probably would not have helped you. SW