Memories of a Merchant Navy Officer's Wife

This is an account dictated by Mrs Harvey, whose hands are too arthritic for her to use a computer keyboard.

World War 2 Memories
From Mrs Rowena Harvey

Mrs Harvey, then Rowena Owens, met her husband at the Mission for Seaman in Barry. She married Chief Officer Donald Orr Harvey of the Merchant Navy in 1940, an officer who always took his violin with him on voyages. He travelled from his ship in Edinburgh the day before the wedding in time to buy a wedding ring. There was an extended air-raid so the Owens family and Donald spent the evening in the shelter. When it reached midnight, even though the raid wasn’t over, Donald left for his accommodation with a friend so that he would not see his bride in the morning before the wedding!

The couple honeymooned briefly in Windsor and then Rowena accompanied Donald on his return to his ship in Leith Docks. By chance repairs were not complete so they had a little more time together. For the next few years, Rowena took every opportunity to spend time with her husband, travelling from Barry to ports in Scotland and the north of England, and sometimes taking her entitlement as the Chief Officer’s wife of staying on board, even taking their infant son Sandy with her on occasion. Rowena also remembers clearly the time that she had to find her way through the Liverpool blackout across the river to Birkenhead to find the ship in dry dock in some danger of stumbling into the dock.

Once Rowena and the third engineer’s wife (Mrs Elder) made their farewells to their husbands and went to Lime Street Station to catch the train back to Barry. As they were about to step aboard, Rowena head someone running up the platform behind her. It was Donald, shouting “Don’t get aboard!”. The ‘Dalhanna’, his ship had been sold to the Henderson Line (British & Burmese Steam Navigation Co.) and was diverted to Barrow. The two women had to find their way to Barrow, arriving two days before the ship. It was on the subsequent trip, his last in the ‘Dalhanna’, that Donald managed to buy an Indian carpet and bring it home safely.

When war broke out, Donald, employed by Campbells of Glasgow, had been with SS Dalhanna in Vancouver. After a period of sick leave, he transferred to the SS Albert le Borne for one trip. By 1942 Donald was serving on SS Daldorch on the dreadful Arctic Convoys. The first six ships to go were sunk and the remaining six returned to port in Iceland, when the Daldorch had to return to the Clyde to sign off Maltese firemen, who refused to remain on the convoys. At one point, because of the lack of escort ships, Mr Churchill authorised a bonus to volunteers who would take the merchant ships without escorts. On a later trip to Murmansk, Donald’s ship took barges to Russia.

In 1943 Donald’s ship was sent to Oran, North Africa, at the end of May. His son Sandy was born on 14 June that year, and Donald first saw him when he was almost four months old. Then Donald was back on the Arctic convoys. For the first time on these daunting convoys, they had soldiers to man their guns. He witnessed the sinking of the famous German battleship Scharnhorst; and Donald claimed that Capt. Sherbrook of HMS Onslow, played an important part in this encounter, which was not sufficiently acknowledged, even though he was awarded the VC.

Liberty Ship SS Samneagh

Later Donald travelled as a passenger on the Queen Mary to New York to pick up the Liberty Ship SS Samneagh which was brought back to London. From there he sailed with the Samneagh to Caen carrying stores to support troops after the invasion of France. While on two days’ leave, Donald received a telegram ordering him to return to ship which was being fitted up for the invasion of Japan. The dropping of H-bombs on Japan stopped this expedition but the ship continued to sail the world, dumping goods and equipment on war-related missions, until well into1947. In this time the couple would go months without any contact. Although both wrote regularly (for letters were then the only means of contact), there was no certainty that mail would be delivered. On an earlier trip Donald found all his letters undelivered in London, after a trip of eight months.

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