Can anyone out there read Icelandic?.....

[Thrall]

Hi Ian, sorry to be so long. A pleasant walk in the sun.

The MI reads:

G.Anderson

Petty Officer R.N. D/JX 165769

H.M.S. "Rooke"

1st. June 1941 Age 45

Dearly Loved Always

Now Sadly Mourned

Quite a few discrepancies here, perhaps the ID no. the only way to be sure, plus any DC I can dig up here.

If you reckon this is your man, send me a PM with your email and I´ll send you a photograph of the stone.

Thrall

[Ian F]

Thanks for your efforts, Thrall, but I really don't think this can be my relative. There's too big a discrepancy in the age.

I'm wondering if the information I've got from someone else's tree is all that reliable. They don't give any references to their sources.

Maybe I'd better do some independant checking myself before I go looking for Icelandic graves!

Regards,

Ian

[Thrall]

Hi Ian, I´ve sent off an "contact form" to the national registry, to see whether a DC can be found to remove all doubt. Will let you know of any results.

Regards,

Thrall

[Ian F]

Hi, Thrall

I've found a record of George Anderson on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website, which gives exactly the details you've given. It also gives the names of his parents, including the mother's maiden name, which correspond exactly with the birth record that I have.

This makes it look highly likely that it is the same man. I've contacted the CWGC regarding the discrepancy in the age, but I've yet to hear back from them.

It's possible that someone made a mistake, I suppose, but I wonder if he might have lied about his age in order to enlist, when he would otherwise have been turned down as too old. I've certainly heard of teenagers in WW1 claiming to be older than they really were in order to join the Army, but this would be the first case I've heard of of an older man claiming to be younger than he was.

All the best,

Ian

[AndrewP]

Hi Ian,

He also appears on the Scottish National War Memorial website.

http://www.snwm.org/ jsp
Surname ANDERSON
Firstname George
Service number D/JX165769
Date of death 01/06/1941
Decoration
Place of birth Glasgow
Other
SNWM roll ROYAL NAVY AND ROYAL MARINES
Rank A/P O
Theatre of death R.N. H.M.S. Barrington, Iceland.

All the best,

Andrew Paterson

[Thrall]

Hi Ian, sorry to be so long in posting, but ten days away in Seattle and Vancouver did not expedite matters. Anyway, today, I found at last a most helpful historian working at the national registry who was interested enough to do a "hands on" search in dusty files and came up with a possibility. There is no filed DC under name, but a DC unnamed from about the right period. PM me if you would like the particulars, roughly translated and photograph of the gravestone. I undertook to send them only to yourself. The next step is, I think, to ask the embassy here to initiate a search of the consular records from 1941, which I´ve been told were moved to London a decade or so ago. I can supply addresses etc..

There was no legal necessity to file a DC in Iceland until 1950, but apparently it was the custom from 1930 or so. OPRs did up till then. Interestingly, the DC was signed by one of Iceland's greatest composers of songs, Sigvaldi Kaldalóns, who was also a GP.

Best wishes,

Thrall

[StewL]

Ian

Dont discount the possibility that he lied about his age, and knocked off a few years or more. I vaguely recall in my navy days some sailors talking about some of their relatives who served in WWI knocking off a few years to serve in WWII. Remember records werent computerised back then and if they flitted to a different area eg from Scotland to England it was more than possible given the urgent need for manpower.

[colywoly]

Ian,
This is a long shot in view of the time passed since you posted this but no harm in trying. George son of George Anderson b.23/3/1853 and Jane Wilkinson b.24/12/1859 would have been a brother of my wife's grandmother, Margaret who married James MacPherson.
We are aware of the story of him being killed in WW11 in Iceland and it was indeed whilst on board HMS Barrington which was a boom defence vessel. Unfortunately I do not know the circumstances surrounding his death, ie did the ship sink or was it an accident.
With regard to his age, as far as I am aware George had three siblings, Margaret, Isabella and Samuel, all born in Coatbridge. However I cannot find an exact DOB for George. There is a George (aged 4) born in 1897 listed with his father, sibling Isabella and grandmother, (Jane, his mother died in Feb 1901, before the census) in the 1901 census living at Club Park, Foyers. This is probably the same George we are talking about and I surmise that there may have been a previous George born in 1882 but died in infancy. It was not uncommon for a later sibling to adopt the same name.
George senior at this time was a Foreman Furnaceman in the BA at Foyers. He subsequently remarried a widow with three children and had two of their own.

Hope this finds you and is helpful.

DF

[Currie]

Hello Colywoly, and Welcome to TalkingScot.

Ian doesn’t appear to have visited the forum since April 2006 and may not see what you’ve posted. If you wish to contact him you could try sending a Personal Message by clicking on the PM button in the area of one of his posts.

This page has only one casualty for H.M.S. Barrington, and says died rather than killed etc, so perhaps it was natural causes. http://www.naval-history.net/xDKCas1941-06JUN.htm

H.M.S. Barrington wasn’t sunk and had a long life. http://www.clydesite.co.uk/clydebuilt/v ... sp?id=9943

The H.M.S. Rooke mentioned earlier was the Boom Defence Central Depot at Rosyth. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Rooke

You can read about Iceland during WW2 on this Wiki page. Apart from invasion and occupation by the British and Americans there doesn’t appear from that to have been much in the way of attacks on the Island and its harbours during 1941. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceland_du ... rld_War_II

All the best,
Alan

[colywoly]

Alan,
Thank you for all the information. As soon as I looked at the picture of HMS Barrington I knew I had been on that site previously, but old age does not come easy!!!!
I have sent a message to Ian as you suggested and will keep my fingers crossed.

As an aside, I can recall HMS Reclaim, also a boom defence vessel visiting Fort William, Scotland on many occasions during the 1960s' and possibly early seventies.

Thanks again.

D Fraser