Ch/X William O'Sullivan RM

I'm reading and re-reading sections of Ladds book and I'm wondering if what I have on the service record is basically two service records.

Service 1
Signs on as General Service in March 1940 and is trained as such in the traditional manner. Spending time at Deal and then further training at Chatham Division for sea service.

Decision is made to reform and make all post 1939 recruits war time only 'H.Os'.

Service 2
Sent off to Exton and is retrained in the new style moving on to become Signaller and MNBDO2.

Opinions? Does anyone have any reference to WHEN the decision was made to switch recruits to a H.O. category?

 

Again another little nugget from Mr Ladd ...

"In the summer of 1940 Marines in the depots and camps were formed into ad hoc rifle companies, for local defence in the event of invasion,20
and from time to time orders were detailed for each formation's part in the defence of the
localities in which it was training."

So I'm thinking that Bill passed out about middle May and then the units were kept at Deal as emergency man power or infantry units if the need arose. I definitely need to get back to Kew!

 

Alan's weekly round up

Amazon turned up a couple of cheap books, one about the war in Deal, Kent which gives a few lovely anecdotes to help add colour to the story.

The other - "Hostilities Only - Training the wartime Royal Navy" by Brian Lavery is turning up some great details.

One such...
There were specialisms within the Seaman Branch of which the Gunnery Branch was also dominant. A regular officer would undergo a ‘short course’ in gunnery followed by a ‘long course’ of more than a year at HMS Excellent in Portsmouth. After that he would have the capital letter ‘G’ attached to his name on the Navy List, and would join the elite of the officer corps.

Intriguing and may answer the "g" that appears next to Bills original service number on his entrance form.

 

Hostilities Only is a great book and devotes a whole chapter to the Royal Marines.

He wasn't an officer so that wont apply here.

Regards
Hugh

 

Stonker.

Today I hit the mother load! I had the service papers sent over again as one complete piece so I could give them a proper look over.

Deal 1940
Bill was 17 when he joined as a CS and his record has him down as underage until his 18 Birthday! (12 September).

The record also has his officers signature for every unit. I have some checking to do.

 

Unit dates and Officers by AlanOb posted Mar 18, 2025 at 10:40 AM

Anyone any good at old signatures?! It's giving me a headache.
1. G Wright?
2. R I A Murricke?
3. W H Watts
4. J M Lillie?
5. A T Smith
6. J Muirskuil?
7. J Abrahms

Interesting game this! Answers on a postcard please.

 

Interesting note on the 8th Bn RM.

In October 1942 the 8th RM Battalion was disbanded to form Royal Marine Commando (B) which was very quickly redesignated as 41RM Commando. They were to be the only RM Commando units consisting entirely of 'volunteers' as in the Army Commandos.

 

Does anyone know if there is a (complete) list of RM Officers for WW2?

 

RM officers are listed in the Navy List. You may view or download these for free from the National Library of Scotland : Navy lists - British Military lists - National Library of Scotland

Steve

 

Superb, thank you.

For anyone interested. In the up to 1943 list, Royal Marines information starts at page 925

 

After searching through the Navy Lists (exasperating) I can find no RM officer named S.H Watts! This is getting a bit silly. I took a gamble and searched up S.H.Watts on the National Archives website which pulled up a result for Royal Artillery posted to 320/98 AA - the 98th being a heavy battery.

Is there a way to track British Artillery officers does anyone know? I fear I'm at the clutching at straws stage!

One of the later officers J Abrams turns out was in charge of RM Engineers so that's interesting and something to look up.

The search goes on!

 

Try The British Army Lists at the same archive site as the Navy Lists

 

Applied and received back Bills Navy record. A mountain of fresh details which I need to pick through and collate. One thing stands out but online isn't very helpful.

Does anyone know anything about 605th Flotilla - not DDay - aug to Dec '44.

 

Hi,
In August 1944 605 Build Up Flotilla was part of the Ferry Service in Normandy working in the Arromanches area.

They were operating Landing Craft Mechanised Mark III.

Around the end of September 1944 they returned to the UK and came under Portsmouth Command.

They were still in Portsmouth Command in December 1944.

Do you have a location for the Flotilla when they came back to the UK ?

Regards

Danny

 

No on the record it just shows that Bill was transferred out to HMS West cliff 18.1.45 then on to 33Bn for retraining

Edit. Should have said that's a great help, thank you

 

Thanks Danny, do you know where I might dig around for more info on the 605?

 

Thanks Danny, do you know where I might dig around for more info on the 605?

Hi,
No, cannot recall seeing anything but there might be the odd signal or diary entry where they are mentioned in one of the documents at Kew.

When the Flotilla returned to the UK their landing craft went into the “Operational Pooled Reserve”. One went to Shoreham, HMS Lizard, and the other seven went to Poole, HMS Turtle.

From the end of September 1944 until January 1945, when they were probably disbanded, they are just listed as “Formed Units, Portsmouth Command” with no landing craft allocated to them.

I think the personnel would have been sent to HMS Cricket or HMS Westcliff after they returned from Normandy.

Regards

Danny