Peterborough & The Great War

Biography

Bertis Waters was born in North Walsham, Norfolk on 28 November 1902, to parents Bertie and Anna.  In 1911, his father was a horseman on a farm and the family (five children) lived in School Road, Ludham near Great Yarmouth.  Bertie joined the Metropolitan Asylums Board training ship Exmouth aged 12 on 22 July 1914.  He completed training on 8 March 1917, showing proficiency in signals and joined the Royal Navy as a Boy Signaller at Grantown on 9 March.  His address was given as Slippers Cottage, Ludham.

On 22 May 1917, he joined the HMT (His Majesty’s Trawler) Thomas Stratton, a 309 ton Trawler operated by the Royal Navy during the war operating off the west coast of Scotland.  He travelled through Peterborough East Station and signed the visitors’ book on 12 June 1917.  Four months later HMT Thomas Stratton was sunk by German submarine U-71 (Walter Gude), off Butt of Lewis on 20 October 1917, losing eight crew members.  One of which was Charles Parish RNVR the Ordinary Telegraphist who had just replaced Bertie the previous week.  Bertie had left the ship to undergo further signals proficiency training, achieving his ‘Q’ in Signals on 15 November 1917.  Bertie was awarded the British War and Allied Victory medals.

He was demobilised on 10 May 1919, and appears to have settled in Grimsby, living at Hainton Avenue (1921) and Wellington Street (1924).  He married Jane McGovern in Grimsby in 1927 and they had two children, Terrence (1930)  and Irene (1931).  Sadly Jane died aged 35 in 1935.  Bertie then married Ivy Blake in 1936, still in Grimsby.  The 1939 Register lists him as a steam trawler skipper in Fleetwood but by 1941 he was resident at 322 Grimsby Road, Cleethorpes.

During World War 2, Bertie was wounded in enemy action aboard the Grimsby based trawler SS Volesus  and died at Grimsby and District Hospital on 9 September 1941, he was the ship’s Skipper.

Do you recognise the name – could Bertie have been a relative.  If so please get in touch.