I have been engaging my dim intellect on a search for this ship today, 'HMS Invincible.' I was actually not really looking for the ship, I know where she lies, but for information regarding Acting Leading Stoker Henry Samuel Goodchild. The centenary of the beginning of the Great War arrives in August 2014 and I am trawling around for one or two local men named on the war memorial for the museum. Goodchild is one of them, as his parents lived in 72 Manor Street, just around the corner from me.
There is little concerning him online as far as I can see although the Commonwealth War Graves Commission site does tell us his parents address and that he was a native of Gorleston on Sea, up in Norfolk near Great Yarmouth. A quick glance informs me this was a poor little town that survived on fishing in the 19th century as far as I can see, life appears to have been very hard and the inhabitants poor. I presume that this brought them all the way to this area, I suppose at the turn of the century, in search of a better life. Quite what that employment would be I can only guess at. Henry Samuel's employment was as a stoker on his Majesty's Battlecruiser 'HMS Invincible!' This ship was built in 1909 yet by the war she was far from being the most modern amongst the fleet. Newer ships were faster and had updated equipment. However she saw service at the Battle of the Heligoland Bight and a major part in the 'Battle of the Falkland Islands' where, along with the 'Inflexible,' she sank both the 'Scharnhorst' and the 'Gneisenau.' However after playing her part during the 'Battle of Jutland' she herself received a barrage of shells courtesy of the German Navy, from both the 'Lutzow' and the 'Derfflinger.' German gunnery was accurate and several shells from each hit the ship. One pierced the 'Q' Funnel and the resultant explosion made its way to the middle of the ship. 'HMS Invincible' was rent asunder and withing 90 seconds all that remained were the front and rear ends of the ship sticking out of the water. Six men in the Control Top firing the guns, were flung clear and were found clinging to a raft cheering on the other ships in the chase, they were the only survivors.
So this morning I attempted to develop my limited knowledge of both the battle itself and Acting Leading Stoker Goodchild. I found out that he was only 'acting,' and this shows not only that he was capable and trusted by his superiors, but also the cheapskate way the services promote. 'Acting' means you possess the rank but not the salary, and many men, even of quite high rank, find that later the rank may be withdrawn and you revert to a previous position. Not all accept this with good grace! A stoker is usually considered but nothing other than shoveling coal into a boiler, an extremely hard job, however there was skill involved as the coal had oil sprayed onto it to increase the burn rate, and stokers had to attend to the engines as well as the boilers. He may well have had some technical skill therefore. Somehow I must discover when he enlisted, was it before the war? He was 29 when the ship went down so maybe the enthusiasm of 1914 called him to enlist. Gorleston was by the sea and possibly he had always hankered for the sea again, and pride in the Royal Navy was high, far too many men volunteered for the Navy in the end. It is always possible that he had already tried the fishing at Gorleston, maybe that made the family move! So all morning I searched the web, being sidetracked here and there, until I discovered nothing other than it was afternoon and I was getting nowhere. My eyes had begun to shrink into black dots by then and now I find I'm still writing about it now for goodness sake! Enough!
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