Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Petty Officer J. D. Towliss, Royal Navy, who was killed on 6 August 1914, when H.M.S. Amphion struck a mine off the Thames estuary and sank with the loss of 132 men killed; she was the first ship of the Royal Navy to be sunk in the Great War

1914-15 Star (200627, J. D. Towliss, P.O., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (200627. J. D. Towliss. P.O. R.N.); Memorial Plaque (John Drewer Towliss) nearly extremely fine (4) £300-£400

John Drewer Towillis was born in Ashburton, Devon, on 20 January 1883 and joined the Royal Navy as a Boy Second Class on 27 August 1898. Advanced Petty Officer First Class on 19 June 1907, he joined H.M.S. Amphion on 2 April 1913, when the ship was first commissioned.

At the start of the Great War, H.M.S. Amphion was leader of the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla in the 1st Light Cruiser Squadron, assigned to the Harwich Force, defending the eastern approaches to the English Channel, under the command of Captain Cecil H. Fox. In the morning of 5 August, Amphion and the 3rd Flotilla sortied into the North Sea to patrol the area between Harwich and the Dutch island of Terschelling for German activity. At 10:15 a ship in the black, buff, and yellow colours of the Great Eastern Railway’s steamers that plied between Harwich and the Hook of Holland was spotted. Fox sent the destroyers H.M.S. Lance and H.M.S. Landrail to investigate and shortly afterwards another destroyer reported that a trawler had seen a suspicious ship, ‘throwing things overboard, presumably mines’ H.M.S. Amphion led the flotilla to investigate and observed that the fleeing ship was deploying mines even then. At 10:45, Lance opened fire at a range of 4,400 yards.

The target was S.M.S. Königin Luise, a former Hamburg-Heligoland excursion boat that had been converted to an auxiliary minelayer by the Germans. They had planned to mount a pair of 8.8-centimetre (3.5 in) guns on board, but they did not have the time to do so; her only armament was a pair of lighter guns and 180 mines. On the night of 4 August, she had departed Emden and headed into the North Sea to lay mines off the Thames Estuary, which she began to do at dawn.

The fire from the destroyers was ineffective until Amphion closed to a range of 7,000 yards and began hitting the German ship at about 11:15. By noon, Königin Luise was sinking and the three British ships rescued 5 officers and 70 ratings. The flotilla proceeded onwards with their patrol until they reached the Dutch coast around 21:00 and turned for home. Fox was uncertain as to the locations of the mines laid by Königin Luise and laid a course that was seven nautical miles west of where he thought the mines were. He guessed wrongly and led his flotilla over the danger area.

At 06:35, Amphion struck a mine that detonated underneath her bridge. The explosion set her forecastle on fire and broke the ship’s keel. The destroyer H.M.S. Linnet attempted to tow the cruiser, but a deep crack across her upper deck showed that she was hogging badly and Fox ordered his crew to abandon ship. Shortly afterwards, her forward magazine exploded, throwing one 4-inch gun into the air that narrowly missed Linnet. One of Amphion’s shells burst on the deck of the destroyer Lark, killing two of her men and the only German prisoner rescued from the cruiser. Amphion then rapidly sank within 15 minutes of the explosion losing 1 officer and 131 ratings killed in the sinking, including Towillis, plus an unknown number of the crew rescued from Königin Luise. She was the first ship of the Royal Navy to be sunk in the Great War.

Towillis is commemorated on the Plymouth Naval Memorial.