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Glenstrae/Research deadend
Hi all,
I've looked into my dad's MN career and it threw up some interesting info but sadly it didn't list which ships he was on. From anecdotes, he said 'Glenstrae' and I have the Crew List & Agreements link from 1939 to 1949 yet to look through.
Is it commonplace for research to hit deadends like this? The impression I get is that sailors often just went from ship to ship, vocation to vocation or role and very little paperwork was done.
Dad's stories place him in Hong Kong, Trincomolee, Singapore (even Japan), South America, India, South Africa, the US - everywhere, but not much trace of paperwork.
He was an electrician and also did a lot of work on land restoring rail networks in Hong Kong after the Japanese left.
Dad used words like 'Wavy Navy' to describe who he worked for and there's a lot of stories that say he was in the MN, MN Reserve, RNR, the latter where he filled in when RN ships had shortages of specific skilled sailors.
There was no record of dad on the Glenstrae crew lists 1943-1945 but when I look at the ship logs there's a lot of ports that match a lot of his stories including the death of a crewmate from a gun malfunction in early 1940's.
If anyone can help with info about the uniform, badges or backdrops to these photos, please do, also any research tips and so forth.
Below is what a researcher from Forces War Records could find.
Name: David Glen Watson
DOB: 28 August 1921
Identity Card: BS 206966 (new)
Identity Card: BS 148761 (lost)
No. of DIS. A Issued: R339679
Junior Electrician
N.R. No. SGGB/73/3
Central Register of Seamen (aka Fifth Register of Seamen), 1941-1972
BT 382/1891 Nothing survives.
BT 382/3020 Nothing survives.
BT 372 Pouch survives.
BT 390 Nothing survives.
BT 391 Nothing survives.
BT 377/7 Record (if it exists) not open to public inspection but can be requested under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
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