Ref Number: 00172
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Ref Number: 00172
A group of 18 commercial ships and six destroyers were making their way to London in the early hours of March 24, 1918, when they passed by the Isle of Wight. The 125-meter long, 8,000-ton armed freight ship War Knight was one of them, along with its crew of 47. The shipping controller, a government agency established to oversee shipping during the war, acquired the ship after it was constructed at the Union Ironworks in San Francisco in 1917.
Every single cargo ship was loaded down with vital supplies for the war effort. The stores of the War Knight were stacked high with provisions including bacon, fat, and bread.
The tanker OB Jennings was also a part of the convoy; it was built in 1917 by the American shipyard Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock and had a crew of 72. She was 151 metres long and weighed 10,289 tonnes, making her one of the biggest tankers ever built. Naptha, a highly combustible substance, was stored in her hold.
After seeing distant bursts of light and hearing distant explosions, the convoy went on U-boat alert. In these conditions, it was standard practise to turn down all lights and set a zigzagging route to reduce visibility to enemy torpedoes. The HMS Syringa, the lead ship, issued orders to change course at varying intervals.
A convoy of this size makes it challenging to achieve a coordinated response from all the ships, and the fleet accidentally broke up into two factions. Naptha flooded over the decks and onto the surface of the water as the War Knight and OB Jennings collided while trying to reunite the groups.
Meanwhile, apprentice Reginald Clayton opened a valve to fill the magazine, averting an even worse explosion that would have killed even more of the crew than the 34 who were already burned to death. Eleven were able to escape, but two eventually succumbed to their wounds.
War Knight was still flaming when it was dragged into shallower water, where it promptly hit a mine and exploded. At last, the smouldering wreck found a home in Freshwater Bay.
The OB Jennings crew was saved, with only one person losing their life. After the fire was put out, the ship was scuttled on purpose and re-floated after being repaired a few months later.
After their deaths, Falconer and Clayton were honoured with the Albert Medal for bravery. The War Office never publicly acknowledged the loss of the War Knight or the crew’s efforts because of bureaucratic delays.
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