arnold hargreaves

Arnold Hargreaves Profile

Arnold on his 99th
birthday 2016

Arnold at Goldings 1935.

Arnold came to his 1st re-union with his Grandson in 2013

Arnold’s 1st re-union with
old boy Arthur Deamer

Mr. Arnold Hargreaves attended the Russell Cotes Nautical School, Poole between 1929-1932 as he
had been orphaned in 1929 when he was 12 years old. He later went to join his brother at William
Baker Technical School, a 'Print' Training school run by Dr. Banardo's in Hertfordshire,
Mr. Hargreaves came to Bedford to work initially for the Castle Press. Mr. Hargreave's was
called up early in WW2 when he was 22. After a medical in Northampton, which he passed A1,
he reported to H.M.S. Royal Arthur in Skegness. After further training at Shotley, Harwich
Mr. Hargreaves was posted to Portsmouth and was assigned as Gunner to the destroyer H.M.S,
Bulldog.
They undertook night Invasion Patrols along the English Channel, engaging German 'E' boats.
In 1941 the H.M.S. Bulldog and crew sailed up to Scapa Flow as an escort on the North Atlantic
convoys.
During an attack on Convoy OB.318 by the German U110 submarine on 9th May 1941 it was
damaged by depth charges from the Aubrietia and had to surface, Mr. Hargreaves and the other able
seamen of 1X' gun crew were ordered to board the German U110 submarine after the German
submariners had abandoned ship, The nine men were on board for some hours in rough seas and
they stripped equipment, charts, etc, out of the submarine and loaded it onto a waiting whaler. The
German prisoners and the captured material were taken on board H.M.S, Bulldog. The U110 was
towed but sank just before they reached Iceland. Mr. Hargreaves and the boarding party were
mentioned in Despatches for Distinguished Service on 5th August 1941 for their part in the operation.

Mr. Hargreaves was posted to Algiers (c.1942 - 1944) to the shore based H.Q.
Hasdrubal from there they secured the coastal ports of Bone and Binzerte.

Mr. Hargreaves was posted to Malta from North Africa, then to Naples
and back again to Malta.
Mr. Hargreaves was subsequently posted to HMS Brecon and they patrolled
around the Greek Islands in the Aegean Sea..

In 1945 Mr. Hargreaves was posted to the German port of Kiel where he
was An Assistant Harbourmaster.
Mr. Hargreaves was demobilised in Portsmouth.

*For more information about Convoy OB.318 -Roskill, S.W. 'The Secret Capture'
Collins, London, 1959.

"When you go on the whaler, you had to put on your life belt and have to clear all the deck with all the men that was available to
lower the whaler because it wasn't automatic, Where the whaler is there'd be about eight ropes hanging down and as it was
lowering you'd be hanging on to that in case you finished up in the drink! Then you get so far from the water and the bloke
would knock a pin out and it would just drop down into the water.
We landed on here and along the top and we got all the stuff off here. But as we were on here (the submarine) and as the
whaler was getting broken up, it was tied on there, we tried to keep it away from here, from banging up. We had a look
to see where we could get a boat hook from. There was a hatch and it had about six boat hooks in it and they tried to
lever it away from the (submarine). Somebody else sent another boat along side and we could chuck the stuff into it.
We got a lot of stuff like maps and things like that, got put on here after a while. We towed it with a tow rope
for three days but the weather got rough and it sunk before we reached Iceland. A lot of the stuff we took from here to
Scapa Flow then on a plane to London and then likely to Bletchley Park."

Photograph taken from the Aubretia of the U1 10 and HMS Bulldog.
The whaler is being lowered from HMS Bulldog containing
the boarding party including Mr. Hargreaves.

Left: Able Seaman Arnold Hargreaves (left)
Assistant Harbourmaster at Kiel,
Germany in 1945.

Able Seaman Arnold
Hargreaves in special party
shore base uniform.

Miss Dorothy Bone married Mr Arnold
Hargreaves at All Saints Church, Queens
Park in 1942.
The couple outside the Co-Partners Hall
where they held their reception

Mr Arnold Hargreaves
Naval Rating- H M S
Arthur Skegness in 1939

We only met Arnold at the Reunions 4 times 2013-14-15-16, as he was a little bit late returning to our reunions, he was a very
interesting young man.
Arnold had become a firm Favourite “Goldings Old Boy” and we shall all miss him

Page Compiled October 2017

Arnold reached his 100th birthday 8th October 2017