A later H.M.S. Hogue casualty Queen’s South Africa Medal 1899-1902, no clasp, awarded to Stoker A. Begg, H.M.S. Philomel, who having been one of 230 men of the ship to be issued the medal, and one of 152 to be issued it without clasp for his service during the Boer War would go on to re-join upon the outbreak of the Great War being killed in action when the German Submarine U-9 sunk H.M.S. Hogue in the North Sea on 22nd September 1914.
Queen’s South Africa Medal 1899-1902, no clasp; (A. BEGG. STO. H.M.S PHILOMEL)
Condition: edge-bruise at 3 o’clock to the reverse rim, otherwise Good Very Fine
Alexander Begg was born in North Berwick, East Lothian and giving his trade as a Labourer joined for 12 years service on 22nd April 1896, initially as a Stoker 2nd Class with Victory II, before serving on Prince George from 27th November 1896 until 10th January 1899, being appointed Stoker on 12th June 1898.
He would spend a short time aboard Duke of Wellington before transferring to Philomel where he would take part in the Boer War in South Africa, being one of 230 men of the ship to be issued the medal and one of 152 to be issued the medal without a clasp.
Begg would later be promoted to Stoker 1st Class on 1st July 1906 whilst serving aboard H.M.S. Berwick and later to Leading Stoker on 10th August 1906.
He would be transferred to the Royal Fleet Reserve on 24th April 1908, but would subsequently be recalled to service upon the outbreak after the Great War being posted to H.M.S. Hogue on 14th August 1914 and being killed on 22nd September 1914 when that ship was sunk by a German submarine in the North Sea. Having no known grave he is remembered on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial.
On the morning of 22 September, Hogue and her sisters, Aboukir and Cressy, were on patrol without any escorting destroyers as they had been forced to seek shelter from bad weather. The three sisters were in line abreast, about 2,000 yards (1,800 m) apart, at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). They were not expecting submarine attack, but they had lookouts posted and had one gun manned on each side to attack any submarines sighted. The weather had moderated earlier that morning and Tyrwhitt was en route to reinforce the cruisers with eight destroyers.
U-9, commanded by Kapitänleutnant Otto Weddigen, had been ordered to attack British transports at Ostend, but had been forced to dive and take shelter from the storm. On surfacing, she spotted the British ships and moved to attack. She fired one torpedo at 06:20 at Aboukir that struck her on the starboard side; the ship's captain thought he had struck a mine and ordered the other two ships to close to transfer his wounded men. Aboukir quickly began listing and capsized around 06:55. As Hogue approached her sinking sister, Captain Wilmot Nicholson realized that it had been a submarine attack and signalled Cressy to look for a periscope although his ship continued to close on Aboukir as her crew threw overboard anything that would float to aid the survivors in the water. Having stopped and lowered all her boats, Hogue was struck by two torpedoes around 06:55. The sudden weight loss of the two torpedoes caused U-9 to broach the surface and Hogue's gunners opened fire without effect before the submarine could submerge again. The cruiser capsized about ten minutes after being torpedoed as all of her watertight doors had been open and sank at 07:15.
Cressy attempted to ram the submarine, but did not hit anything and resumed her rescue efforts until she too was torpedoed at 07:20. She too took on a heavy list and then capsized before sinking at 07:55. Several Dutch ships began rescuing survivors at 08:30 and were joined by British fishing trawlers before Tyrwhitt and his ships arrived at 10:45. The combined total from all three ships was 837 men rescued and 62 officers and 1,397 ratings lost. Hogue lost 377 men.
