On Tower Hill Memorial is the name of Pilot First Class Thomas Heron, serving on Pilot Cutter Protector (South Shields) with the Lighthouse and Pilotage Authorities who died 31/12/1916.
The son of Benjamin and Esther Heron, of 114, Baring Street, South Shields.
On New Year’s Eve, 31st December 1916, the Tyne pilot cutter Protector was destroyed by a German mine at the mouth of the River Tyne, killing all 19 men on board. The 200-ton steamer was serving the port of Tyne, guiding vessels through hazardous, mined waters during WWI. The loss was a devastating blow to the tight-knit Tyneside maritime community, leaving 33 children fatherless.
The Protector was waiting to transfer pilots to ships entering the Tyne when it hit a mine, likely laid by German submarine UC-31, commanded by Kapitänleutnant Otto von Schrader.
All 19 men on board perished, including 10 pilots, four pilot assistants, and five crew members.
The crew was mostly from North and South Shields. Victims included 70-year-old pilot Robert Phillips and his grandson Ralph Phillips, representing the interlinked nature of the families involved. The youngest was 16-year-old cabin boy Benjamin Rumney.
Aftermath: The explosion was so severe that only one body, that of Robert Phillips, was ever recovered, found in March 1917.
“There was a noise as if it was a volcano and all they saw was a column of water and smoke and the pilot cutter was no more,” says Bill Watson, whose uncle Ralph Phillips and great-grandfather Robert Phillips were on board.
Sources; The James Hoy Archive; Northumbrian WW1 Project; Bill Watson 2012; BBC; The British Newspaper Archive; The Pilots Log: Find A Grave; BBC;
Thomas Heron is remembered at South Shields on S86.030 S86.062 and in our List of Ships‘ Crews.
