On the Portsmouth Naval Memorial is the name of P/JX 130467 Able Seaman Thomas Simpson serving on HMS Barham with the Royal Navy who died 25/11/1941.
He was the son of Thomas and Hannah Simpson and the husband of Gladys Simpson, of West Auckland, Co. Durham.
Jean Longstaff has submitted the following:-
Thomas (Tom) Simpson was born on 20th September 1911, the son of coal miner Thomas and Hannah (nee Heaviside) Simpson and brother to Alice (b.1905) and Hannah (b.1908) who were living at High Denery Street, Eldon Lane. Ten years later they had moved to live at 3 High Street, Eldon Lane with additions to the family of Arthur (b.1916), Ivy (b.1919) and Harold (b.1921).
In 1935, Tom married his cousin Gladys Heaviside, and as Tom was away at sea Gladys lived with her parents Ralph and Elizabeth Heaviside at Irene Terrace, West Auckland and her son Tony Simpson born 13th January 1937.
Kevin Richardson has provided the following information:
The service records of Able Seaman Thomas Simpson have not been researched.
Aged 16, and straight after leaving school, Tom joined the Navy as a Boy Sailor, 2nd Class on 29th July 1927 with a posting to HMS Ganges, where by February 1928 he became Boy Sailor, 1st Class. On his 18th birthday, 20th September 1929, he signed on to serve for a period of 12 years.
Built for the Royal Navy in 1910 HMS Barham was a Queen Elizabeth class battleship and was in the Mediterranean when the Second World War began. She participated in the Battle of Dakar in mid-1940, where she damaged a Vichy French battleship and was slightly damaged in return. She covered many Malta convoys and during the Battle of Cape Matapan in March 1941 helped sink an Italian heavy cruiser. Two months later during the evacuation of Crete, HMS Barham was damaged by German aircraft.
HMS Barham was sunk off the Egyptian coast by the German submarine U-331 on 25 November 1941 with the loss of approximately two thirds of her crew. On the afternoon, 1st Battle Squadron, consisting of HMS Barham, HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Valiant, with an escort of 8 destroyers departed Alexandria to cover the 7th and 15th Cruiser Squadrons as they hunted for Italian convoys in the central Mediterranean. U-331 detected the British ships and fired all 4 torpedo tubes at a range of 375 metres. 3 struck amidships, Barham capsized to port and was lying on her side when a massive explosion occurred about 4 minutes after she’d been hit as the magazines exploded. There was no time for evacuation and due to the speed at which she sank, 862 officers and ratings were killed. The destroyer Hotspur and HMAS Nizam rescued some 487 men.
The sinking was captured on film by a cameraman from Pathé News aboard HMS Valiant. [see link below].
Thomas Simpson is remembered at St. Helen Auckland on S145.05, at West Auckland on W105.03 and on our List of Ships’ Crews.
