Soldier Record

James Goddard a distant relative never married or had any children and had it not been for a chance discovery of his naval service records from the National Archives, his story and the sacrifice he made during World War 1 may have never have been told.

HMS Cressy "lost at sea"

James enrolled into the Royal Navy as a boy cadet on the 2nd January 1890 at the age of 15, signing up for a further 12 years service on his 18th birthday as an Ordinary Seaman, becoming a Petty Officer 2nd class. He only completed eight of his twelve years service and paid £12 to purchase his discharge in January 1901. Due to his love of the sea it wasn’t long before James was back in the navy, he joined again in April 1902 for five years and re-enrolled twice more and the end of each five year period.

With the onset of war James boarded the HMS Cressy on the 2nd August 1914 as Petty Officer 2nd class and by September 22nd the Cressy and two other ships forming cruiser force “C” were sailing a patrol in the North Sea. The old cruisers HMS Aboukir, Hogue and Cressy were patrolling when the U-Boat, U-9, commanded by Otto Weddigen located them some eighteen miles off the Hook of Holland.

The first torpedo fired from the U-9 struck the HMS Aboukir at 06:25 on her port side. Capt. Drummond ordered the ship abandoned. The other two cruisers, closed in, Capt. Johnson of the Cressy lowered his boats to pick up survivors .The U-9 now chose her second target, the HMS Hogue. While the sinking Aboukir was going under a torpedo slammed into the Hogue.

The Cressy got up steam to run the U-boat down, the U-9 fired another torpedo and this time the Cressy was hit. This was not fatal but a second hit at 07:30 did finish off the Cressy. By 07:40 all three cruisers were gone and along with them 1,439 men mostly reserves and boy cadets, James Goddard was one of them and lost in the North Sea.