A Fine Collection of Medals to Officers Who Died During The Two World Wars

Three: Sub-Lieutenant Henry Clutterbuck, Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, killed when H.M.S. Bedfordshire was torpedoed by the U-558 off the east coast of America in May 1942

1939-45 Star; Atlantic Star; War Medal, with named Admiralty condolence slip (Temporary Sub-Lieutenant Henry Clutterbuck, R.N.V.R.) and in card box of issue addressed to his mother, extremely fine (3) £250-350

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Fine Collection of Medals to Officers Who Died During The Two World Wars.

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Henry Clutterbuck was the son of William and Mabel Gertrude Clutterbuck, of Edgbaston, Birmingham, and the nephew of Captain Clutterbuck, King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment, who was killed in 1914 (See Lot 1129). He was serving as Sub-Lieutenant of H.M.S. Bedfordshire, an anti-submarine corvette on loan to the U.S. Navy to combat the increasing successes of German U-boats operating along the eastern seaboard of the United States. The Bedfordshire was one of twenty-four such vessels that left England in early March 1942, travelling across the North Atlantic to Newfoundland, then Halifax, and on to New York. The Bedfordshire spent April and part of May patrolling off the North Carolina coast between Morehead City and Norfok. On the night of 11/12 May she was detected by the U-558, captained by Gunther Krech who, visibility being very limited, decided to make a surface attack. The first torpedo fired missed but the second torpedo hit the Bedfordshire squarely amidships, catapulting the ship into the air and sinking it almost immediately. No one survived the sinking and only four bodies were subsequently recovered, two of which were unidentifiable. These four were buried with full honours in a small plot next to a local cemetery at Ocracoke Village, N.C. This small plot was subsequently deeded to the British government and is now an official Commonwealth War Grave. Sub-Lieutenant Henry Clutterbuck is commemorated by name on the Lowestoft Naval Memorial in Suffolk.