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205588
Able Sea. Maurice Edgar Garland
Royal Navy HMS Aurora
from:Long Street, Croscombe, Wells, Somerset
We have recently been researching the family tree and my mother has been talking about the time my father added on a year to his age so that he was able to join the Navy. It must have been when the Aurora was serving in the Med as apparently my father and his fellow sailors spent some of their leave in Italy attending the opera amongst other things!!
We knew that my father had been involved in the (what we thought was the sinking)hit on the boat and he and several other seamen were picked up by the boat belonging to the King of Saudi. They were all given medals, money or something by the then King of Saudi. My father often mentioned that he could not get the terrible screams of the men trapped in the boiler/engine room out of his head.
For many years, my grandparents had a huge picture of HMS Aurora on their sitting room wall but I do not know what happened to it. My father sadly died 18 years ago but if there is anyone out there that still remembers what happended I would love to hear their stories.