HAROLD JOHNSON FERNS
There must be many reasons for joining the Royal Navy, but having a father who is already serving at sea must have been a powerful factor when Harold Johnson Ferns was choosing a career.
In Harold's case, his father, also named Harold, was a Leading Seaman aboard HMS Philomel around the time that Harold jnr. was born in 1881. At the time the new born Harold was living with his mother Elizabeth at 2 Chapel Lane, Gosport, almost next to Holy Trinity Church. The householder at Chapel Lane was Elizabeth's father William Leaf.
By the time of the 1891 census Harold snr. had left the Royal Navy, joined the Coast Guard Service and moved his family to Falmouth in Cornwall. By then, two more boys had been born - William in 1885 and Arthur the following year. A few years later Harold snr. left the Coast Guard and returned to Gosport as a naval pensioner and Petty Officer in the Fleet Reserve.
Towards the end of the 1890s, Harold jnr. followed his father into the Royal Navy and in 1901 was serving aboard HMS Terrible. During this period the crews from the Terrible and her sister ship HMS Powerful took part in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion and the Siege of Ladysmith during the Boer War.
In 1909 Harold married Alice Louisa Lummis who gave birth to a daughter, also named Alice, the following year. In 1911 the family were living at 21 Fifth Avenue, Buckland whilst Harold had joined the battleship HMS Jupiter. At the outbreak of World War 1 Harold was serving aboard HMS Aboukir in the North Sea. On the 22nd September 1914 she was hit by a torpedo from the German submarine U-9 which broke her back, sinking her within 20 minutes. Aboukir had been accompanied by HMS Hogue and HMS Cressy, both ships coming to her rescue, but tragically U-9 managed to sink both of them as well with a combined loss of 62 officers and 1,397 ratings.
FURTHER INFORMATION
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) website lists Able Seaman Harold Johnson Ferns, (196242), Royal Navy, HMS Aboukir, date of death, 22/09/1914. Remembered on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial (Panel 2). Son of Harold and Elizabeth Ferns, of Gosport; husband of Alice Louisa Ferns, of 25, Fifth St., St. Mary's Rd., Kingston, Portsmouth. Native of Gosport.
Harold Ferns is also remembered on the St. Wilfrid's Church WW1 Memorial and on the Cenotaph. He is also listed in 'The National Roll of the Great War', Section X, p297. There is no mention of his death, but this may be because the entry mistakenly conflates the details from two persons - Harold Ferns and his father of the same name. The father survived the war. The address given is that for the son.