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Wishing you goodbye - the mystery VC
Manage episode 298324400 series 2806298
In the dark waters of the Atlantic, the German U-Boat fleet was taking a monstrous toll on Allied merchant shipping, to the extent that Admiral Jellicoe feared Britain would cease to exist as a fighting force unless something was done to stop the U-boat menace.
Spurred on by the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915 the Royal Navy introduced a new weapon to fight against German submarines - the decoy boat or Q Ship as they were known.
In a game of cat and mouse, merchant shipping losses began to fall thanks to the ingenuity of the Q Ship fleet. We hear about so-called "panic parties" held onboard merchant ships, why sailors wore women's clothes whilst on deck, the reason why the Royal Navy commandeered a lorry full of dead parrots, and how a three-legged dead dog and a rolling pin combined to hoodwink the commander of a German submarine.
We also look at one of the great controversies of WW1, the Baralong incident in 1915, and hear the story of a heroic Naval officer whose clandestine activities lead him to become known as The Mystery VC.
160 episodes
Manage episode 298324400 series 2806298
In the dark waters of the Atlantic, the German U-Boat fleet was taking a monstrous toll on Allied merchant shipping, to the extent that Admiral Jellicoe feared Britain would cease to exist as a fighting force unless something was done to stop the U-boat menace.
Spurred on by the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915 the Royal Navy introduced a new weapon to fight against German submarines - the decoy boat or Q Ship as they were known.
In a game of cat and mouse, merchant shipping losses began to fall thanks to the ingenuity of the Q Ship fleet. We hear about so-called "panic parties" held onboard merchant ships, why sailors wore women's clothes whilst on deck, the reason why the Royal Navy commandeered a lorry full of dead parrots, and how a three-legged dead dog and a rolling pin combined to hoodwink the commander of a German submarine.
We also look at one of the great controversies of WW1, the Baralong incident in 1915, and hear the story of a heroic Naval officer whose clandestine activities lead him to become known as The Mystery VC.
160 episodes
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