One of our convoy lost a propellor.

Heroes Remember

One of our convoy lost a propellor.

Transcript

Yeah, we were in a convoy there. There were six vessels on our convoys, you know. Didn’t go separately. Nobody went over singularly; there was always five or six went over there at the same time, you know. Chasing submarines so they’d be able to rescue people if they got submarined because they got blown up by a torpedo. So we had six in our convoy and on of them lost a propeller, so they had to stay there three days to get a new one put on. And they got all the men to get in the bow of the boat so it tipped back going this way, see, to get it up in the air so they could work on the propeller, on the back end here. Finally, took them three days to do that and Liverpool was full of submarines waiting for us to come. They knew we were coming, you know Yeah, well, they were in the harbour, all these submarines. Three or four of them waiting for us to get in there. Big vessels. We didn’t come there, so they went back out again. So the next week we arrived, safe as we could be. We just missed them by about three days.

Description

Mr. Perdue describes being convoyed to England and outwaiting a German submarine ambush at Liverpool.

Percy George Perdue

Percy Perdue was born in London, England on March 28, 1900. He moved to Canada at the age of five, when his father took a job as a miner in Coleman, Alberta. Prior to the war, Percy was apprenticing to become both a tinsmith and a shoemaker. He was 16 when he joined the army. After training in Calgary, Alberta, Mr. Purdue eventually crossed the Atlantic (he recalls experiencing dreadful seasickness) and in the fall of 1916, he landed in Liverpool, England, where he was stationed at a camp in Shorncliffe. Despite his accurate aim as a marksman, Mr. Purdue saw limited action during his service in the army. Three times he was kept behind when his cohorts were sent to France. His ability as a shoemaker was of greater value to the Allies. He was very good at repairing boots and designing special footwear for the troops. He remembers with pride the boots that he made for himself: "I wore them for seven years and couldn't wear them out!" In 1917, Percy was discovered to be underage and was sent home. Mr. Perdue has some grim memories of the war. "I remember people coming back all shot to heck." His own father, who had enlisted just before he did, was a victim of a mustard gas attack and was sent home very ill. He states that, while his father lived to the age of 89, he never fully recovered and "always had trouble keeping food down". When the Second World War broke out, Percy again wanted to enlist, but was turned down because by that time he had five children. Mr. Perdue died on September 29, 2000.

Meta Data