www.tinyurl.com/hmsfiji www.tinyurl.com/hmsfijiassociation _____________________________________________________________________________ \\\\\___H.M.S. FIJI ASSOCIATION___\"-._ /////~~~ we will remember them ~~~/.-' _____________________________________________________________________________ PADRE C. C. TANNER BY: A. Stanistreet _____________________________________________________________________________ *Note: Please scroll down to read an email from Padre Tanner's Daughter _____________________________________________________________________________ The Life Saving Awards Research Society Journal No.47 At length, only one man remained to be brought across. Despite his exhaustion Mr Tanner made a last effort to save him. He brought him across and saw him safely on board. But when hauled up himself he died within a few minutes. That would, in most circumstances, have concluded this article, save to say that Reverend Kit Tanner is now commemorated on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial, Panel 60, Column 3, also near the chapel of Cheltenham College and that he was the only England Rugby player to win the Albert Medal during World War Two. However, I have been sent some remarkable papers from the Archives of Cheltenham College, without whose kind assistance very little of this article would have been possible. One of the papers is a fairly lengthy fourteen pages, handwritten by an unknown person but who plainly had access to other sources of information. It is quite rare to secure accounts of this kind and at the risk of tedium; the latter part of this remarkable document (possibly a sermon to the College from the early 1980s) is here reproduced. - On the outbreak of war 'Kit' Tanner volunteered for service as a Naval Chaplain and was posted to the Cruiser Fiji - Some clergymen found the transition from peaceful vicarage life to the Service hard to take but Tanner took the Royal Navy in his stride - 'For all the world,' said Stoker Bert Newman, one of his staunchest advisers, As if he had signed on for a 12 year stretch.' Tanner was aboard the Fiji in 1941 when she joined the Mediterranean Fleet which had the task of preventing a German seaborne landing on Crete. - It was an assignment fulfilled at grievous cost. - The whole force was under constant air attack, high level bombing by Junkers, dive bombing by Stukas. - The destroyer Juno was hit by a whole stick of bombs and sank within two minutes. The destroyer Greyhound was sunk by six dive bombers which swooped upon her like vultures. The cruiser Gloucester ablaze from end to end, went down with her anti aircraft guns still firing. - Then it was Fiji's turn. An on no ship of the Mediterranean fleet was the fury of the Luftwaffe more furiously concentrated. - Midshipman Blockley was Captain's secretary and was at his elbow on the bridge during the bombing. A conscientious young man of a statistical turn of mind, he kept an accurate record of the number of bombs aimed at FU]. He counted in the course of the day 370. 2cdr W.R. Marshall-A'Deane 050, DSC, RN of HMS Greyhound, was also awarded a posthumous AM for attempting to save survivors from HMS Fiji. _____________________________________________________________________________ Note from HMSFA Web Admin: Copy and paste the following URL into your browser's location box to read casualty details about Commander MARSHALL-A'DEANE DSO, DSC, AM. http://www.angelfire.com/ri/georgev/marshall.txt _____________________________________________________________________________ The duties of a Ship's Chaplain during a naval action are not easily defined. Captain Peverill William Powlett gave no orders to Kit Tanner. He entrusted the Padre with a roving commission to make himself useful in every way possible. - Wherever danger was most acute, Tanner was there. - His cheerful influence infected the bridge and 'By God, I needed cheering up,' said the Captain grimly, and the galley where the cooks toiled to provide hot cocoa and the inevitable bully beef sandwiches. - It permeated to the engine room where sweating stokers laboured in a foul atmosphere which could at any moment become a shambles of death. And the crews of the anti aircraft guns, who were firing their guns red hot knew that Kit Tanner would be along with the sweets, cigarettes, cups of cocoa and the type of inconsequential humour to be found in Portsmouth music halls. - There was scarcely a minute's let-up in the bombing. 'It almost seemed,' said Lieutenant Peter Norton, the Navigating Officer, 'That Stukas were breeding in the sky.' - Great holes were torn in F decks. - Anti-aircraft ammunition was all but exhausted. Fiji, in the words of a member of the ship's company, 'Threw everything except her anchor at the swarming dive bombers.' - Such a one-sided contest could only have one end. A bomb wiped out the port side watch in the after engine room, with the exception of Stoker Tubby Strange, who counts himself the luckiest sailor alive. - Other bombs destroyed every gun except one pom-pom. - Then three bombs hit Fiji amidships and astern. Now she was listing at an angle of 30 degrees and her speed dropped. It could only be a matter of time. - A single Me109 dealt the final blow. The aircraft appeared alone and dropped one bomb. - Fiji flopped over on her side like a stricken whale, her only pom-pom still firing. - Now there was only one order left to give: 'Abandon ship.' - At that point, Kit Tanner knew he had one duty which took precedence above all others. In the sick bay were some 60 wounded men. Tanner personally supervised their removal to the one whaler left in service. 'He was untiring in his ministrations,' said Captain William Powlett, 'And forgot nobody.' - When the time came for him to jump into the sea he found that he had a new parish, approximately half a square mile of choppy Mediterranean. - Some of Fiji's men, glad to be free of the bombing, took to the sea immediately, almost gratefully. A handful of strong swimmers, led by the water polo team, struck out for the destroyers Kandahar and Kingston, which had closed in to see Fiji's last moments afloat. - There were a number of vintage seamen aboard who had been in the 'drink before. They made wry jokes about compulsory bathing and exhorted their comrades to 'come in, it's lovely and warm'. - Philosophical and fatalistic, they lay in their lifejackets and waited to be rescued. - When the men in the sea saw the two destroyers withdraw into the gathering darkness, some of them lost heart and drowned. These were stokers, many stripped to the waist and glad to be quit of the stifling heat of the boiler-rooms, who succumbed to the cold as night wore on. - There were teenage boys who saw no hope of rescue. There were men who could barely swim and men who could not swim at all. - It was these less resilient souls who became Kit Tanner's special concern. - Fiji's serviceable life-saving equipment had been reduced to one whaler and two Carly floats; the rest had been jettisoned for HMS Gloucester's survivors. - Now the survivors of 9 were in a desperate plight. The whaler was crammed with wounded and the Carly floats were designed to take only 20 men each. - In the water, Kit Tanner was a constant tower of strength. He helped men too far gone to help themselves to the floats. He administered the life saver's shock treatment - a shrewdly delivered right hook to the jaw to a young seaman in the grip of terrible panic. He successfully dissuaded a Marine from swimming to Crete (there were Marines still fighting on the island and this man was determined to join them). He assisted a seaman with his arm blown off, who subsequently survived. - He led men in singing and soon the strains of 'Roll out the barrel' smote the night. There were other songs, too, which he had heard sung in the Gloucester Rugby Football Club bar. Some of the words had then caused his hand to stray dubiously to his clerical collar but they seemed appropriate to the occasion now. - After four hours in the water, most of the time in darkness, only the more determined singers, Kit Tanner amongst them, were still in full voice. Then, shortly after midnight, cheering started and torches were frantically flashed. A dark shape looming out of the blackness, closely followed by another, told the men in the water that Kandahar and Kingston had come back for them. - Aboard the Kandahar, there were blankets, hot drinks and cigarettes for Fiji's survivors. In the warmth of the wardroom and mess-decks the rescued men began to talk of survivors' leave. - Kit Tanner was brought aboard Kandahar. But for him, rescue did not mean comfort and cheerful anticipations. - There were still men in the sea; men too far gone in exhaustion to grasp the ropes lowered to them from the destroyer. Tanner made these men his special responsibility. Thirty-four officers and 500 men were saved out of Fiji's total complement of 700. Nearly 30 of these men owed their lives to Tanner. - No accurate count was possible of the number of times he dived from Kandahar bring in yet another man. He would not listen to anyone who attempted to dissuade him from further attempts. And shortly after his last rescue, he died from exhaustion. - The Albert Medal, instituted by Queen Victoria in 1866 for saving life at sea, was one of the rarer rewards of the war. It has been worn by officers and men of the Royal and Merchant Navies; by lifeboat men and policemen. - And by one Minister of God - The Reverend Kit Tanner.- There is a curious sequel to the story of this gallant Chaplain. About ten years ago, I was telephoned by a dealer friend who said, 'What do you know about Tanner?' Not unnaturally, I asked why and was told that he had been offered an Albert Medal with his name on it, Of course, I told him what I knew, which in those days was considerably less than is contained above. It seemed that the Albert Medal had been stolen in a burglary and was being touted round the dealers. Happily, it was eventually recovered and restored to its rightful owner. I did attempt to contact the owner for information but so far have been unsuccessful. Acknowledgement: I am deeply grateful to Mrs Christine Leighton of Cheltenham College Archives and Mrs Janet Johnstone, Librarian and Archivist of Cheltenham Ladies' College, without whose generous assistance almost none of the above would have been possible. 45 Albert Medals were awarded during WW2. This article written by: Mr A. Stanistreet 12 Normandy Ave Watchet Somerset TA 23 UK _____________________________________________________________________________ Please read also: BBC "People's War" Article by John Cookson about Padre Tanner's Bravery: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/94/a2082494.shtml _____________________________________________________________________________ Submitted by Gerard Myles, President, H.M.S. Fiji Association _____________________________________________________________________________ *HMSFA CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE DAUGHTER OF REVEREND TANNER _____________________________________________________________________________ Dear Angela, Many thanks for your e-mail - it was especially nice to hear from the daughter of Rev. Kit Tanner given his heroic conduct in saving other crew members at the cost of his own life. Such bravery being duly acknowledged by the award of the George Medal. I am copying this e-mail to the other Fiji executives as I am sure that they will want to read your comments. Possibly, our webmaster, Tom Lipscombe, would like to place your message on the web-site. Thank you again for your message - you and your family have every right to be proud of such a brave man prepared to lay down his own life for others. If there is anything we can do for you please do not hesitate to ask. With very kind regards Ronald Bennett ----- Original Message ----- From: "Angela Allen" To: Sent: Sunday, March 11, 2007 4:44 PM Subject: Rev "Kit" Tanner I have been reading the HMSFA web site and I am so touched by the wonderful things that have been said about my father. My mother died in 2000 and so I'm now the proud guardian of my father's Albert Medal. I know that I could exchange it for a George Cross but I feel that the original is very special, to be held in trust for "Kit's"grandson also Kit and his greatgrandsons, so that the story of HMS Fiji and all the brave men who served on her will never be forgotten. Yours sincerely. Angela Allen (Mrs) nee Tanner ____________________________________________________________________________ Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html Doctrine of International Copyright Law ____________________________________________________________________________