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Age-48

41, Camborne Road, Southfields

Q ships were designed to look like defenceless merchant ships which would lure enemy submarines to attack them on the surface. They would then reveal their hidden guns and engage the submarine. They were called Q ships after their home port of Queenstown in Ireland. There has been a long running debate as to their effectiveness in sinking German submarines with some maintaining that they were a waste of resources, pointing to the fact that minefields destroyed more U-boats. Nevertheless they accounted for 10% of U-boat sinkings.

HMS Redbreast, which started life as passenger/cargo ship before being requisitioned by the Royal Navy, was one of these Q ships. On 15th July 1917, while sailing between Skyros and the Doro (Kafireus) Channel, in the Aegean Sea, she was torpedoed and sunk by German submarine UC-38. Forty four members of her crew, including George McCleave, were killed.