The Russell Cawthorn Collection
The Great War 1914-1918, and Associated Conflicts Personal Accounts Diaries and Journals. Etc.
Sailor in The Desert. The Adventures of Philip Gunn, DSM, RN, in the Mesopotamian Campaign, 1915.
by David Gunn
ISBN
9781783462308
Purchase Price
£2.99 (new)
Date Purchased
February 27, 2018
Publisher
Pen & Sword Maritime (2013, Barnsley South Yorks)
Notes
This is the story of a young RN rating's experiences as commander of a Calcutta River Police launch towing two barges, each with a large gun of Boer War vintage. He survived his experiences in Mesopotamia to become a Captain RN - it was he who advised Churchill that the seriously bad weather in the English Channel had sufficiently improved to enable the D-Day Landings to be launched. Gunn was eventually overcome during the Battle of Ctesiphon, partly from wounds but mainly from severe malarial fever; after some time in various stages of transit, he was invalided out of theatre to Ceylon, and so escaped incarceration following the engagement at Kut-el-Amara. This is a "ripping" sort of story written by his son, also in the Royal Navy. At times this "amateur" (in the best sense of the word) writing shows, but it is a great tale of a very brave young lad. It is unclear where the author got his information from, verbal information from father to son later in life seems a little bit unlikely, diaries are apparently not mentioned at all but the story is clearly based completely on what Gunn Senr left behind him, and the story is too complicated for there not to have been some sort of original record.
9781783462308
Purchase Price
£2.99 (new)
Date Purchased
February 27, 2018
Publisher
Pen & Sword Maritime (2013, Barnsley South Yorks)
Notes
This is the story of a young RN rating's experiences as commander of a Calcutta River Police launch towing two barges, each with a large gun of Boer War vintage. He survived his experiences in Mesopotamia to become a Captain RN - it was he who advised Churchill that the seriously bad weather in the English Channel had sufficiently improved to enable the D-Day Landings to be launched. Gunn was eventually overcome during the Battle of Ctesiphon, partly from wounds but mainly from severe malarial fever; after some time in various stages of transit, he was invalided out of theatre to Ceylon, and so escaped incarceration following the engagement at Kut-el-Amara. This is a "ripping" sort of story written by his son, also in the Royal Navy. At times this "amateur" (in the best sense of the word) writing shows, but it is a great tale of a very brave young lad. It is unclear where the author got his information from, verbal information from father to son later in life seems a little bit unlikely, diaries are apparently not mentioned at all but the story is clearly based completely on what Gunn Senr left behind him, and the story is too complicated for there not to have been some sort of original record.