MARTIN James Hamilton

Willamette Valley was requisitioned by the Royal Navy in September 1939 and converted to a decoy ship which was then commissioned as special service vessel with the cover name HMS Edgehill.  The idea of such vessels was to lure enemy submarines into a trap as the ships carried concealed armaments.

On 29th June 1940 HMS Edgehill was in the South West approaches of the English Channel when she was hit by a torpedo at 00.12, fired by U-51.  Due to her buoyant cargo the ship did not sink whereby the U-boat surfaced and at 01.06 it fired another torpedo that again struck the ship.  However, the ship remained afloat and only finally sunk slowly by the stern after a third torpedo fired by U-51 hit the ship at 01.06.  Sixty seven men lost their lives in the attack.

The following report appears in Berrow’s Worcester Journal, Saturday 21st September 1940:
Lieutenant James Martin, who was reported missing and is now presumed killed on active service with the Royal Navy, was the only son of Mrs and the late Mr Hugo Martin, of “Oakwood,” West Malvern – a member of the well-known banking firm of that name.
Lieutenant Martin obtained a Commission in the Grenadier Guards on leaving Harrow in 1917, and served with them until 1919.  He then went into business for a short period, but found a life of adventure more suited to him, and joined the crew of the windjammer Garthpool – the last of the British four-masted vessels on the Australian route.
After further experience, he sailed with Mawson’s expedition to the Antarctic in 1929 on the Discovery, and was eventually promoted boatswain.
During the spring of 1932, Lieutenant Martin studied Scandinavian methods of ice navigation on a Norwegian sealing vessel in the White Sea, while in 1933 he assisted the Oxford University Expedition to Spitzbergen in an organising capacity, having been prevented from leading the expedition owing to hardships encountered on a journey to North West Canada in the autumn of the previous year.
Lieutenant Martin was again on a Norwegian sealing ship in 1934, and later in the same year served as Second Officer in the Penola, which took part Rymil’s British Grahamland Expedition, returning to England in 1937.  He was awarded the George V. Polar Medal, and the Polar Medal (silver, 1935 to 1937) by King George VI.
His eagerness to serve in the present war resulted in his release from the grenadier Guards for duty with the R.N.V.R. at a dangerous post.
Lieutenant Martin was recently married, and the loss to his friends is great when they remember the force of his personality, his courtesy and his charm.  He held the firm opinion that a man’s life is not his own, but that he owes it to his country at any risk.
Lieutenant Martin was a member of a City Guild – the Company of Carpenters.
The report includes a photograph of Lieutenant James Martin.

James Martin has no known grave, the photograph available shows his name on Chatham Naval Memorial.