On Chatham Naval Memorial is the name of 1469EA Chief Engine Room Artificer Frank Charles Le Touze, serving on H.M.S. Bergamot with Royal Naval Reserve who died 13/08/1917.
The son of John Philip and Margaret Annie Letouze, of 7, St. John’s Terrace, South Shields, Co. Durham. He served on H.M. S/M. “No.32” in the Dardanelles.
W. Bro. Revd. David T. Youngson, PPAG Chaplain, Northumberland offers the following:
The information given below in respect of some of the brethren is the best possible conclusions from Lodge records, Grand Lodge records, Commonwealth War Graves Commission and data in respect of merchant ship losses during the First World War
2935 Lord Barnard Lodge
1469EA Ch. Er. Artificer LE TOUZE Francis Charles
Royal Naval Reserve HMS Bergamot
A Marine Engineer residing at South Shields he was Initiated on the 19th June 1917. There is no record of any further Advancement.
He died on the 13th August 1917 aged 24 and is remembered on the Chatham Naval Memorial, Kent, 26. HMS Bergamot was an Anchusa class sloop built in 1917. She was attacked and sunk by the German U-Boat U-84, commanded by Kapitnleutnant Walter Roehr west of Killybegs, Ireland in the Atlantic ocean. She was operating as a Q Ship.
The War Diary reads :- His war diary describes how he sighted a lone merchant ship, with no defensive armament (an unusual sight by 1917). HMS Bergamot evidently sighted the U-boat’s periscope, as she began to zig-zag at high speed. U-84 fired one torpedo which hit on the port side and HMS Bergamot broke in half and sank in 4 minutes. Surfacing, U-84 sighted an unusually large number of crew (70) and pieces of wood floating. The U-boat’s log identifies the possibility of the Bergamot being a “trap ship”. One of the indicators being the narrow beam in relation to the length of the ship, a sure sign of a warship.
Frank Charles Le Touze is remembered in the Masonic Roll of Honour 1914-18 (London), in the Masonic Roll of Honour 1914-18 Rev. Youngson Part 3 and in our List of Ships’ Crews.
