On this day in 1941 Samuel Albert Greenham (1906-1941) was among more than 800 officers and men who died when two British warships were attacked and destroyed by 86 Japanese aircraft off Malaysia in the Second World War.
The devastating losses came just three days after Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbour, the US naval base near Honolulu, destroying or damaging eight battleships and hundreds of airplanes, and killing more than 2,400 American servicemen and civilians.
Samuel was a stoker (1st class) in HMS Repulse when the battlecruiser – and the battleship HMS Prince of Wales – were sunk 50 miles off the coast of Kuantan.
The Repulse survived a bomb hit and dodged 19 torpedoes before being hit five times by torpedoes in a wave of attacks.
She sank in just over 20 minutes with the loss of 508 officers and men.
Hundreds of survivors from the ship were rescued by the destroyers HMS Electra and HMAS Vampire.
The Prince of Wales was hit by four torpedoes, causing uncontrollable flooding, before a bomb explosion in the main deck led to an order for crew to abandon ship.
The ship capsized and sank with the loss of 327 officers and men less than an hour after the Repulse went down.
Samuel joined Repulse on January 17, 1939. At the beginning of the war, she patrolled the North Sea for German ships before being sent to Nova Scotia to protect convoys.
Samuel joined the Navy on September 16, 1924 when he was 18.
He had completed 17 years of service in the Navy when he died, aged 35.
He is remembered on the Plymouth Naval Memorial. Overlooking Plymouth Sound, the memorial commemorates more than 7,200 naval personnel of the First World War and nearly 16,000 of the Second World War who were lost or buried at sea.
Paul Roberts
NOTES
Born on July 20, 1906 in Exeter, Samuel was the son of Samuel Greenham (1884-1946) and Ellen Maud Green Cawley (1882-1949). He was educated at Cowick Street School, St Thomas.
Samuel married Dorothy May Beer (1907-1999) in 1931 in St Thomas. Dorothy was the daughter of William Henry Beer (1881-1968) and Mary Jane Roberts (1884-1976). Mary Jane was the daughter of Henry Roberts (1959-1924) and Sarah Jane Sowden (1867- 1946). Henry was the eldest son of James Roberts (1832-1898), a brother of John Roberts (1829-1919), my great-great grandfather who had 30 grandsons serving in the Great War.
Picture below
HMS Repulse and HMS Prince of Wales with a destroyer – pictured on December 10, 1941 when both vessels were destroyed. Photograph by Underwood & Underwood (Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons). https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HMS_Prince_of_Wales_and_HMS_Repulse_underway_with_a_destroyer_on_10_December_1941_(HU_2762).jpg
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