On this day in Yorkshire 1940

Crews of two former Hull trawlers Pyrope and Tamarisk, announced by the Admiralty as having been sunk through enemy action, were machine gunned in the water by German bombers. A member of the crew of the Pyrope said yesterday.

“While the trawler was heeling over, they continued to drop their bombs around her. All of us were wearing lifebelts, and grabbed hold of what wreckage we could to give more support.

The Germans kept on machine-gunning us as floated in the water, and our ship sank in less than two minutes.

“You should have heard the cheering when our Spitfires turned up and brought a raider down close to us. It dived into the sea and exploded, and nothing more was seen of it or of the crew.

No-one was more cheery than Seaman Anderson, a little ‘Geordie’ who was badly injured and died about two hours after we got ashore.”

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