Star Sign Filey Heading Towd Ship

A Filey Story

THE SINKING OF THE "EDITH CAVELL".
A FILEY HERRING COBLE, ON MAY 5TH 1917.

"Edith Cavell", a Filey herring coble, owned by three local men, George W.Hunter, Richard F.Scotter and Thomas Ross, was built in Filey in 1915 - 16 and registered, as SH216, in Scarborough in June 1916. She was around 40 feet long, had two masts, was equipped with an inboard engine and carried two smaller boats.
She was named after the Norwich born nurse Edith Cavell who remained with the Red Cross in Belgium when the country was overrun by the Germans in 1914 and was executed by the Germans in 1915 for helping allied soldiers to escape.
In the early hours of the Saturday morning of 5th May 1917 the coble with its crew of five, the skipper George W. Hunter, Richard A. Johnson, William Cammish, 17 year old John H, Cammish and the skipper's 14 year old son George, making his first trip, was fishing off Robin Hood's Bay. It was a foggy morning when around five o'clock out of the fog came a German submarine. The coble's crew were instructed to move on to the deck of the submarine, and a boarding party from the submarine placed explosives on the coble.
It is now known that after blowing up the coble the submarine commander had intended to set the fishermen free in their small boat. A British naval patrol, however, came out of the fog. The submarine crash-dived taking with it the Filey men.
Other fishing boats in the area heard the explosion and beat a hasty retreat back to Scarborough Harbour. The process of elimination identified the victim as the "Edith Cavell".
Meanwhile the submarine was heading northwards, and on and off during the rest of the day the crew were questioned about the military installations around Scarborough and Flamborough Head. Young George's turn to be questioned was to be the next morning.
The submarine was the UB21, which the Filey men identified from the inscriptions on the undersides of the plates they were given with their food. The commander was a Lt.Franz Walther and it was he who early the next morning, Sunday 6th May 1917, questioned young George. Like his colleagues George said he knew nothing of any military installations. When asked by the commander where would he have been had he been at home, young George gave the answer that has gone down in Filey folklore and believed to have been the reason that saved the lives of the Filey men: "at Sunday School, sir". The commander was impressed and replied "I will see that you are there next Sunday".
Later that morning the submarine came across a Swedish steamer, the Harold, returning to Norway from England and bombarded it. The crew took to the lifeboats. The vessel was sunk. Only four of the crew of nine survived and they took to the two lifeboats. The five Filey men were then put aboard the lifeboats, joining the four surviving members of the Harold's crew of nine. They were given provisions and a course to steer for land. They were approx 75 miles east north east of the River Tyne. It took them 22 hours to reach land and late the next morning, Monday 7th May 1917, the boats were beached on the Northumberland coast. The men were fed and watered after being taken to the local police station, and then transported to Newcastle. A telegraphic message was sent to Filey informing that the crew were safe and on their way home. A large crowd was waiting for them at Filey station when they arrived back.

There is an interesting footnote to that incredible story. The then vicar of Filey, Canon A.N. Cooper, known as the walking vicar for his walking tours was on one of his tours on the continent after the war when he visited a church in Germany. He struck up a conversation with the lay pastor at the church. When Canon Cooper mentioned that he came from Filey the lay pastor asked after the crew of the Edith Cavell. Yes, you have guessed it the lay pastor was the submarine's commander. He particularly asked after "young" George and sent messages of goodwill to the crew.

What happened to young George? You may well ask. Well he fished for many years, out of Filey and then Bridlington, but left the sea to work for many years as a council workman in Filey. What would have happened to the crew of the "Edith Cavell" if he had not given that particular answer on that particular Sunday morning? Where would they have finished up? We shall never know but the correct answer he definitely gave. Imagine in his later years, away from Filey, George telling a story that as a 14 year old boy going to sea for the first time, he saw his boat sunk by a German submarine, was taken capture, experienced a submarines crash dive to escape a British patrol boat, was on board the submarine when it sunk a Swedish vessel, was put into the lifeboat of the sunken vessel and helped to row that boat back to land. Yes! Tell me another might have been a reply.
But the story is true. The story has been passed down by successive generations of Filey folk. But in the 1990s the story was put into print and anyone who can get hold of the excellent booklet "The Story of the Sinking of the Edith Cavell" (revised 1996) will find that the author Jean Johnson, a granddaughter of skipper George William Hunter, gives a fascinating account of the story, as well as the recollections of some of the surviving family members. She has also been able to access the log of the German submarine and to give an interesting insight into the character of its commander.