Bert 'Curly' Harris was a  20 year old Stoker on the Glowworm that fateful day.  His brother Edwin was killed in the action.  He now lives in retirement near Weymouth with his wife Joyce. She tells me that he still has nightmares where he throws himself out of bed swimming for his life. Many of the photos that you see on this website were given to me by Bert who got them from a German sailor who photographed the action. Bert kept them hidden all through his years as a prisoner of war. This is his story....

y Brother and I joined the Navy in Portsmouth on 14^th February 1938.  I was eighteen years old, my Brother was twenty.  We did six months training there and then, commissioned to HMS Glowworm in Portsmouth. 

From there we went out to the Mediterranean at the time of the Spanish Civil War.  I was there at the start of the Second World War in 1939.  In November 1939 we were ordered back to England where we started patrols in the Channel, bringing contraband ships back and also convoy duties.  We were based at Harwich for a time when the magnetic mine scare first started.  We saw many a ship sunk by this method.  Things stayed like this until March 1940 when we went to Scapa Flow.  After a short spell there we were ordered to proceed to Sea.

It was on  5^th April 1940 that the Glowworm with three other destroyers made up the escort for HMS Renown and steamed across the North Sea, although we never had any idea what the operation was for at that time.  It was a rough and very cold journey.  All that day rumours kept going around about the German Navy being at sea,  and we were hoping it was true so  we would get the chance to meet them, as we felt pretty sure of ourselves being with the Renown. 

My Brother and I were both young Stokers on the Glowworm.  I was twenty and he was two years older.  We both lived on the same mess deck and of course we thought a great deal about each other, as we had joined the Navy together and had been together all the time.  As we rolled and pitched our way across the North Sea he told me to be very careful whenever I had to go on watch and hang on tight as the sea was washing over us.  And so it went on until the morning of 6^th April when the alarm went out that a man was washed overboard, he was a torpedo man.  A signal was made to Renown.  We were told to turn and search for him, it was hopeless in such weather but our skipper turned the Glowworm and began the search.  That left us all alone as the rest of the group carried on course.  We never saw them again.  Needless to say the man was never found.  We steamed around all that day hoping to make a rendezvous with the Renown again, but no luck. 

The following morning on  7^th April our luck seemed to be right out when another man was reported over the side.  A search found him tangled in ropes which were trailing over the side.  When they pulled him in he was badly injured and there was no hope for him.  Well, that was a bad omen indeed.  For two consecutive mornings,  something nasty had happened and we were all asking what the third morning would bring. We were still on our own in the great North Sea, or at least it seemed that way.