|
|
This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this site you agree to accept cookies.
If you enjoy this site please consider making a donation.
Site Home
Help & FAQs
Features
Submissions
Information
Advertisements
World War 1 One ww1 wwII greatwar great 1914 1918 first battalion regiment
Surg.Prob. Robert Sydney Steele Smith AM.
Royal Navy HMS Bergamot
Robert S.S.Smith, R.N.V.R., was Surgeon Probationer on the Q-ship Bergamot when she was torpedoed by the U-84 on the 13th August 1917, due west of Killybegs, Ireland. When the torpedo hit, Smith and the 1st Lieutenant, Frederick William Siddall, were in the wardroom aft. All of the exits were blocked by the explosion, and Siddall was knocked out, so Smith piled high the wrecked wardroom furniture under the skylight and pulled him through this onto the deck. Siddall began to regain consciousness. Leaving him briefly, Smith attended a Petty Officer, lying on the deck with a broken arm and leg. Blowing up his life preserver and lowering him into the water, he then did the same for the 1st Lieutenant as by this time Bergamot was foundering.
Lieutenant Siddall was rendered unconscious again by a secondary explosion as the ship sank, and by the time he was pulled on board lifeboat no. 2, was to all intents, dead. Smith worked on him for 25 minutes, using artificial respiration and CPR until he regained consciousness. He then continued working, as best he could in the conditions, on all of Bergamot's injured personnel until they were picked up 43 hours later. The King awarded Smith the Albert Medal for lifesaving, and he was mentioned in despatches.
Related Content:
Can you help us to add to our records?
The names and stories on this website have been submitted by their relatives and friends. If your relations are not listed please add their names so that others can read about them
Did your relative live through the Great War? Do you have any photos, newspaper clippings, postcards or letters from that period? Have you researched the names on your local or war memorial?
If so please let us know.
Do you know the location of a Great War "Roll of Honour?"We are very keen to track down these often forgotten documents and obtain photographs and transcriptions of the names recorded so that they will be available for all to remember.
Help us to build a database of information on those who served both at home and abroad so that future generations may learn of their sacrifice.
Celebrate your own Family History
Celebrate by honouring members of your family who served in the Great War both in the forces and at home. We love to hear about the soldiers, but also remember the many who served in support roles, nurses, doctors, land army, muntions workers etc.
Please use our Family History resources to find out more about your relatives. Then please send in a short article, with a photo if possible, so that they can be remembered on these pages.
The free section of The Wartime Memories Project is run by volunteers.
This website is paid for out of our own pockets, library subscriptions and from donations made by visitors. The popularity of the site means that it is far exceeding available resources and we currently have a huge backlog of submissions.
If you are enjoying the site, please consider making a donation, however small to help with the costs of keeping the site running.
Hosted by:
The Wartime Memories Project Website
is archived for preservation by the British Library
Copyright MCMXCIX - MMXXIV
- All Rights Reserved -We do not permit the use of any content from this website for the training of LLMs or for use in Generative AI, it also may not be scraped for the purpose of creating other websites.
