A truly exceptional and extremely rare April 1951 H.M. Dockyard Gibraltar ammunition explosion Commander of the Order of the British Empire, and Second World War 1940 Combined Minesweeping and Operation Dynamo Dunkirk Evacuation Distinguished Service Order and Mention in Despatches group awarded to Captain St. John Cronyn , C.B.E., D.S.O., Royal Navy. The son of a medical doctor from Dublin, Ireland, Cronyn saw service as a Midshipman aboard the battleship Orion with the Grand Fleet in the North Sea towards the end of the Great War. Inter-war he was in China with the Yangtze River gunboats, and became commander of the famed Halcyon class minesweeper H.M.S Niger shortly after the outbreak of the Second World War during October 1939, holding command for the next 11 months. This was a most active period of command, with his vessel coming under regular air attack in the North Sea during which damage was sustained, crew became casualties and fires were fought. With the evacuation of Dunkirk, he however came to the fore, and whilst in command of his ship, between 26 May and 4 June 1940, he evacuated some 1,515 Allied troops from the beaches at La Panne, St Malo and Dunkirk’s east pier, and not without incident, but in this case owing to a slight wavering of the Entente Cordial. On 3 June, whilst evacuating 700 French troops from Dunkirk, and with the embarking successfully complete, Niger cast off and in turning, encountered an unknown French craft crossing her bows, which was then rammed. The French skipper came on board to remonstrate. Some minutes later, and presumably after the French skipper had returned to his ship, the same French craft came back and intentionally rammed Niger! The French skipper was brought back onboard and arrested and together with the 700 French troops, was then taken across to Folkestone, where on the disembarkation of the French troops, the irritable French skipper was handed over to the military authorities. We can only imagine what words he had exchanged! Cronyn himself came a-cropper when involved in a collision with a trawler on 30 July 1940, and relinquished command of Niger in later September 1940, and did not see any further active service until 1942. Nevertheless, having quite possibly as a form of reprimand, only been awarded a Mention in Despatches in the Dunkirk Awards Gazette of 16 August 1940, he went on to be awarded the Distinguished Service Order in the New Years Honour List of January 1941. During 1943 he briefly held command of the battleship Revenge, before ending the war with the Tactical Division at the Admiralty, and later commanded the heavy cruiser Devonshire. Cronyn was the Chief Staff Officer to H.M. Dockyard at Gibraltar between 1951 to 1952, and it was in this period that he had the extremely rare distinction of being appointed a Commander of the Military Division of The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for an act of gallantry, as gazetted to him on 20 November 1951. This occurred when he displayed great courage and devotion to duty in the face of extreme danger when an explosion occurred in a lighter which was being loaded with ammunition from the Naval Auxiliary Vessel Bedenham whilst in the dockyard at Gibraltar on 27 April 1951. The first explosion was followed by an intense ammunition fire and a second large explosion, and Captain Cronyn, as the Senior Naval Officer present in the Dockyard at the time, took immediate and effective measures to control the situation. Only a very small number of C.B.E’s have ever been awarded for gallantry, and quite possibly no more than 5 since the end of the Second World War! Cronyn’s last role would be as A.D.C. to Her Majesty the Queen. He lately resided in Malta.
Group of 7: The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Commander, C.B.E., 2nd Type, Military Division, this with shortened length of neck ribbon with ties for wearing; Distinguished Service Order, GVI GRI 1st type cypher, the suspension bar dated ‘1941’, complete with top bar, the brooch fittings amended to a slider to facilitate the mounting; British War Medal and Victory Medal; (MID ST. J. CRONYN. R.N.); 1939-1945 Star; Atlantic Star; War Medal with Mention in Despatches Oak Leaf emblem. Mounted court style for wear on original ribbons.
Condition: some minor chipping to enamel work to the obverse of the DSO, some wear to WW2 medals, overall Good Very Fine
St. John Cronyn was born on 20 May 1901 in Dublin, Ireland, the son of Dr. J.G. Cronyn of Dublin. Having been educated at the Royal Naval Colleges of Osborne and Dartmouth, and later at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, it was owing to the on-going Great War that he joined the Royal Navy, and saw service as a Midshipman from 1917, being aboard the battleship H.M.S. Orion when operating with the Grand Fleet in the North Sea.
Remaining in service post-war, he was advanced to Acting Sub Lieutenant and then later later confirmed in the rank of Sub Lieutenant on 15 May 1921, before being promoted to Lieutenant on 15 May 1923. Cronyn would go on to serve in gunboats on the Yangtze River in China. Posted to the Royal Navy Staff College during 1934, and promoted Commander on 30 June 1937, he married in this same year, Lilias Marion, the daughter of P.W. Wake, though they would have no children.
It was shortly after the outbreak of the Second World War that he was appointed the commanding officer of the Halcyon class minesweeper H.M.S. Niger on 12 October 1939. In this period she was employed minesweeping off the Swarte Bank in the North Sea.
Cronyn would have a most active time aboard Niger. He was in command when she was attacked again by enemy aircraft on 30 Jan 1940 off Invergordon; 20 bombs were dropped causing negligible damage to the ship but wounding three men. Further to this, on 20 May, when off Gravelines, she was once again attacked from the air, being dive bombed and set on fire. The damage was fortunately minimal.
Immediately afterwards, Cronyn and Niger witnessed a period which would encompass the entirety of Operation Dynamo, the codename for the evacuation from Dunkirk, for which he was awarded a Mention in Despatches ‘for good services in the withdrawal of the Allied Armies from the beaches at Dunkirk’, the award being published in the London Gazette of 16 August 1940.
Niger was particularly active during the evacuation at Dunkirk. On 30 May 1940, in company with the minesweeper Dundalk in the area of the North Goodwin Light Vessel, she received a signal to carry out ‘ferry duties’ between Sheerness and La Panne. As such, on the morning of 31 May 1940 Niger anchored 5 cables off La Panne, and sent in whalers and the motor boat, owing to a considerable surf running. There was no one in charge on shore, and as soon as the boats arrived, they were seized by the soldiers. One was swamped, the other overloaded and capsized, nevertheless, Niger managed to embark troops from yachts. Some three hours after anchoring, at 1045, she sailed for Dover with 205 troops aboard. These troops were disembarked at Dover at 1445, and she then sailed for Dunkirk at 1715 that same day, anchoring off Braye-Dunes at 2240.
That night, after an initial pickup of some 30 troops who had rowed out, confusion reigned for the remainder of that evening up until midnight and despite reports of troops waiting for evacuation, none could be found. It was only at 0100 on 1st June that more arrived, in the form of some 40 soldiers including Brigadiers Robb and Towel, and after this, Niger’s boats continued a regular ferry service from the shore, this operation being conducted ‘regularly but slowly’. As dawn came, large numbers of troops were seen on the beach, and Niger’s carley floats were pressed into service, and lifebelts were also sent in to assist troops who wished to swim off. It may be added that the area of the beach from which Niger was evacuating troops was being shelled continuously throughout the night from the direction of Nieuport. At 0350, and owing to it being nearly low water, and with some 330 troops aboard, Niger, now in company with the minesweeper Sutton, slipped her anchor, but a message was then received from Major General Bernard Montgomery on shore, stating that all troop were to be evacuated from Dunkirk, and to proceed to there, this owing to the evacuation perimeter being tightened. Niger proceeded to Dover where at 0610 on 1st June she disembarked some 310 of the troops she had taken off from Braye-Dunes. At 1800 that night she sailed for Dunkirk, when still in company with Sutton.
At 2215 she anchored off St Malo, whilst the Sutton proceeded to Dunkirk. Niger than took some 50 French troops off the beaches at St Malo at 2230, and at midnight on 2nd June, embarked some 250 British troops who had been found a bit further along the coast, and sailed for Ramsgate where she disembarked about 300 troops at 0255 hours. At 2255 on 2 June she sailed once again for Dunkirk and this time arrived there, being secured alongside Dunkirk east pier at 0030 on 3 June, when she embarked out 700 French troops.
It was at this moment that a break down in the entente cordial occurred. At 0120 Niger slipped her moorings from Dunkirk’s east pier, and whilst turning, an unknown French craft crossed Niger’s bows and was rammed. The French skipper came on board to remonstrate. Some minutes later, and presumably after the French skipper had returned to his ship, the same French craft came back and intentionally rammed Niger! The French skipper was brought back onboard and arrested and together with the 700 French troops, was then taken across to Folkestone, where on the disembarkation of the French troops, the irritable French skipper was handed over to the military authorities. We can only imagine what words he had exchanged with Cronyn!
The incident taken care of, Niger then sailed from Folkestone for Dunkirk at 2100 on 3rd June, but had to reduce speed owing to dense fog at 2230. By 0030 on 4th June, and with the visibility unimproved, the passage was abandoned, and she eventually returned to Dover. The Dunkirk Evacuation had come to an end, with Niger having placed a significant part in evacuating 1,515 of the 338,000 Allied troops who were evacuated from the French shore between 26 May and 4 June 1940.
As noted, Cronyn received a very well-earned Mention in Despatches, but it seems a higher award was initially forfeited owing to an incident which occurred on 30 July 1940. From the 6th June to 12th August, Niger was stationed on the Humber, and during that first month was refitting at Grimsby, being provisionally ready for sea on 9th July. However on 30th July, a collision occurred between Niger and the trawler Laurel, as a result of which, Niger was holed above the waterline on the port quarter, further to which the degaussing gear was damaged. Niger was taken in for repair, with these being completed on 10th August. From two days later she was stationed at Harwich and on 15th August, when in company with the patrol sloop Pintail, she provided Anti-Aircraft protection for several minesweeping trawlers.
Cronyn most probably avoided a court martial for the collision of 30th July only owing to wartime circumstances, but his initial award of a Mention in Despatches was probably the overall effect. He handed over command of Niger on 24th September 1940 and was not employed actively again until 1942, therefore the announcement of his award of the Distinguished Service Order “for outstanding zeal, patience and cheerfulness, and for never failing to set an example of wholehearted devotion to duty, which which the high tradition of the Royal Navy could have been upheld”, as announced in the New Years Honours List and published in the London Gazette for 1 January 1941, whilst technically a minesweeping award, could only really have primarily been for the Dunkirk Evacuation, whilst also accounting for the incidents of air attack prior to that momentous event.
Cronyn returned to active wartime service with the Eastern (Mediterranean) Fleet during 1942 to 1943, being promoted to Captain on 30 June 1943, he was then given command of the battleship H.M.S Revenge from July 1943, a brief appointment that saw him then transfer to shore from October 1943 for service with the base H.M.S. Nile as Chief Staff Officer to the Rear Admiral commanding at Alexandria. He was on home service with the Tactical Division at the Admiralty in London during 1944 and 1945 and with the end of hostilities was then appointed as Director to the Tactical School at Portsmouth between 1945 to 1948.
Cronyn was appointed commanding officer of heavy cruiser H.M.S. Devonshire between 1948 and 1950, and was the Chief Staff Officer to H.M. Dockyard at Gibraltar between 1951 to 1952, and it was in this period that he was appointed a Commander of the Military Division of The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in the London Gazette of 20 November 1951, this being an extremely rare example of this award for gallantry.
The London Gazette announcement reads as follows: ‘Captain St. John Cronyn, D.S.O. Royal Navy, for great courage and devotion to duty in the face of extreme danger when an explosion occurred in a lighter which was being loaded with ammunition from the Naval Auxiliary Vessel Bedenham, in His Majesty’s Dockyard, Gibraltar, on 27 April 1951. The first explosion was followed by an intense ammunition fire and a second large explosion, and Captain Cronyn, as the Senior Naval Officer present in the Dockyard at the time, took immediate and effective measures to control the situation.’
Only a very small number of C.B.E’s have ever been awarded for gallantry, and quite possibly no more than 5 since the end of the Second World War! According to ‘British Gallantry Awards’ by Abbott and Tamplin, and is well recorded, it was only in 1957 that a Gallantry Emblem was added to denote awards of the Order of the British Empire for acts of bravery. This emblem, which existed between 1958 and 1974, after which the institution of the Queen’s Gallantry Medal superseded any such awards, was only made sparingly. Whilst M.B.E.s and B.E.M.’s were most commonplace, in this period, only 5 Military Division and 5 Civiil Division O.B.E.’s were awarded, and one, just 1 C.B.E., in this case a Military Division one. The creation of an emblem to denote an award for gallantry came about owing to an issue that had been ongoing since 1917 and the creation of the emblem in 1957, there being no differing distinction between awards for gallantry and or, meritorious service. This was very marked during the Second World War, and especially so where awards to the Merchant Navy and Civil Defence were concerned. Sadly when the Gallantry emblem was eventually introduced, it was not retrospective.
Cronyn would later serve as Naval ADC to Her Majesty The Queen from 8 July 1952 until 8 January 1953 when he retired and he later died in Malta on 16 March 1973.
