- The Dawson Brothers - left to right, Sydney, Gilbert and Cecil.
The work of our Navy is so apt to be forgotten amid the stories of dauntless heroism of soldiers in the trenches, but Mr and Mrs Dawson, of 30 Lea Road, Luton, may indeed be proud of the fact that they have three sons serving in the Navy.
The eldest, Chief Engine Room Artificer Sydney Charles Dawson, served his apprenticeship at Hayward Tyler & Co, after which he went to Grafton's, Bedford.
Enlisting in the Royal Navy in August 1899, he escorted the German Emperor on 'Flying Fish,' T.D.B. (torpedo boat destroyer) into Portsmouth. He was engaged on two commissions in the Mediterranean, and on the second occasion he was on HMS Duke of Edinburgh which, with HMS Black Prince, was a patrol ship during the Balkans War. He was the recipient of a long service medal presented to him on HMS Drake during the present war.
From Easter to July in 1914 he was on the trial Record Staff, and was mobilised in July 1914 on HMS Drake, a cruiser and sister ship of HMS Good Hope. He was within two days sail of New York when England declared war with Germany, and he accompanied the RMS Carmania into Plymouth.
In October 1914 he went to Archangel [Russia] on a special mission on board HMS Drake, and he also participated in the Cuxhaven Raid of Christmas 1914. He stood by HMS ------ from Easter to November 1915 at Messrs Thorneycroft's Works at Southampton. He also took part in the Jutland Battle in the North Sea, and made five raids during one night.
Since the outbreak of war to February 1917 he has logged 17,000 miles in the North Sea.
After his apprenticeship at Hayward Tyler and Co, Engineering Room Artificer Gilbert Stuart Dawson proceeded to Grafton's, Bedford, from where he joined the Royal Navy in September 1910. His first commission was in the Mediterranean on HMS Exmouth, a flagship. The ship's company represented the British Navy at the funeral of the victims of the [French battleship] Liberté, which was blown up in harbour [1911]. When Lord Kitchener, Mr Asquith and Mr Winston Churchill made an inspection at Malta, he was on board the Exmouth.
From July 1914 to Easter 1915 he served on HMS Drake, after which he was engaged on HMS Daphne in mine-sweeping. He is now on the West Coast standing by.
Engine Room Artificer Cecil Victor Dawson also proceeded to Bedford after his apprenticeship at Hayward Tyler & Co, and joined the Navy in May 1913. He served on HMS Bulwark within four months of it being blown up at Sheerness Harbour.
He joined HMS Albermarle at the commencement of the war, and left that boat after the bombardment which took place off the Belgian coast. He then went through a course of diving at Whale Island, and is now fully qualified.
Joining HMS Cochrane, he went through the Jutland Battle. He has now just returned from a special mission to Halifax, United States.
[The Luton News: Thursday, April 19th, 1917]