Able Seaman John Redmond
27 May 2008
From the log of Sir Heath Harrison, Port St Mary lifeboat, Isle of ManA curious record of a standby call for the lifeboat exists in the Station records for the 7th December 1944. At 8:15pm the Coxswain George Kelly, received a call from the Coastguards at Ramsey requesting the crew immediately assemble and standby. A little over an hour later a second phone call stating that the crew could stand down as the 'position of the destroyer was OK'. The destroyer involved and the nature of its difficulties is not recorded.
However, A Corkill’s Dictionary of Shipwrecks off the IoM records that on the night of 7th December 1944, the 190 foot long, steamship Glenmaroon, of Belfast, was bound from Larne for Ellesmere Port, with a cargo of empty petrol cans.
She was about 22 miles east-southeast of Douglas Head when through the darkness and snow squalls came the noise of an aircraft engine, approaching closer and closer. Incredibly the unknown aircraft attacked the Glenmaroon, causing damage to the starboard side of the vessel and started a fierce fire as well as holing the ship. The Glenmaroon began to settle. The lamp trimmer was cut off on the foredeck by the fire, so climbed the port rigging of the foremast and slid down the preventer wire from near the masthead, and managed to get past the fire. Three crewmen were lost when the ship foundered. The destroyer HMS Clare picked up Captain Adair and the survivors.
It has been subsequently discovered that the attacking aircraft was British and had attacked the Glenmaroon by mistake.
benjidog.co.uk says:
She was a 716 grt steam cargo ship that was sunk on 7 December 1944 after being hit by a falling aircraft at position 54° 05’ N 03° 53’ W.
CWGC says that he was the son of Michael and Sarah Redmond; husband of Elizabeth Redmond, of Arklow, Co. Wicklow, Irish Republic. Mr Redmond is not mentioned on the Tower Hill Memorial to Merchant Navy dead. (See photo at top of page).
