The well documented Great War Battle of Coronal Loss of the Good Hope Casualty and Victorian naval long service group awarded to Chief Yeoman of Signals W. Jones, Royal Navy. From Hammersmith, London, Jones saw continuous service of some 27 years between March 1881 and April 1908, during which period he was in the Pacific aboard the corvette Cleopatra during the 1880’s. and steadily rose through the ranks, being a Yeoman of Signals aboard the battleship Edinburgh when he was awarded the Royal Navy Long Service and Good Conduct Medal in June 1893, he then became a Chief Yeoman of Signals in February 1898. As a Royal Fleet Reservist he was recalled with the outbreak of the Great War, and was appointed to the armoured cruiser Good Hope. This vessel was with the 4th Cruiser Squadron and the flagship of Rear Admiral Christopher Cradock and as such took part in the search for the German East Asia Squadron under the command of Vice Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee, in the vicinity of Cape Horn and the Strait of Magellan. Off the coast of Chile on 1 November 1914 the forces came together with disastrous consequences. Good Hope charged directly at the German ships, although they dodged out of her way. Spee ordered his armoured cruisers to concentrate their fire on the British flagship and she soon drifted to a halt with her topsides all aflame. At 19:50 her forward magazine exploded, severing the bow from the rest of the ship, and she later sank in the darkness. Spee estimated that his flagship had made 35 hits on Good Hope, which sank was the loss of all hands, a total of 926 officers and ratings, one of whom was Jones.
Group of 4: 1914-1915 Star; (115951. W. JONES. CH. Y.S. R.N.); British War Medal and Victory Medal; (115951 W. JONES. C.Y.S. R.N.); Royal Navy Long Service and Good Conduct Medal, Victoria narrow suspender; (WM. JONES, YEO. SIGS., H.M.S. EDINBURGH.), first three with original lengths of folded ribbons and remnants of the named card boxes of issue.
Condition: Nearly Extremely Fine.
Together with the following original documentation and ephemera:
Original studio photograph of the recipient when in naval uniform, and when a 2nd Yeoman of Signals aboard the troopship Malabar, the cap tally being visible, hence circa February 1889 through to May 1890. This inscribed in the corner in ink ‘Will..’ As taken by a Hammersmith based photographer.
A later studio photograph of the recipient when a Chief Yeoman of Signals, this taken by the photographer Thomas Fenech at Malta.
Admiralty Letter of Notification of the death of Chief Yeoman of Signals William Jons, who was aboard H.M.S Good Hope when she was sunk on 1 November 1914. As sent to the recipient’s widow, Mrs A. Jones, Blendwurth, 49 Fearn Road, North End, Portsmouth. Dated 21 November 1914.
Admiralty Certificate of the Inspector of Seamen’s Wills, as issued to recipient’s widow, Alice Jones, of 83 Penhale Road, Fratton, Portsmouth, owing to the death of her husband whilst in service on 1 November 1914, dated 21 June 1915.
William Jones was born on 26 April 1865 in Hammersmith, London, and joined the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class (Portsmouth No.115951) with Impregnable from 25 March 1881, being advanced to Boy 1st Class on 26 April 1882, and then rated as a Signals Boy on his joining Warrior on 23 May 1882, being still with this vessel when rated as a Signaller 3rd Class on 26 April 1883. Jones was advanced to Signaller 2nd Class whilst her was aboard the corvette Cleopatra on 1 April 1884, and saw service with her on the Pacific Station, being with he was he was confirmed as a training Signalman on 25 October 1885. He was with Asia when he was rated as a 2nd Yeoman of Signals on 10 August 1888, and between February 1889 and May 1890 was aboard the troopship Malabar, during which period he was photographed.
Jones was with Duke of Wellington when he was appointed a 1st Yeoman of Signals on 11 September 1890, and he was then with the battleship Edinburgh when he was awarded the Royal Navy Long Service and Good Conduct Medal on 21 June 1893. Jones was with Victory III when he was appointed to Acting Chief Yeoman of Signals on 26 February 1897, and was then confirmed in his promotion to Chief Yeoman of Signals on 26 February 1898. He was ultimately pensioned ashore from Victory I on 30 April 1908, having served some 27 years.
Having enrolled into the Royal Fleet Reserve at Portsmouth on 1 May 1908, Jones found himself recalled on the outbreak of the Great War, and had the misfortune to be appointed to the armoured cruiser Good Hope from 2 August 1914. When war was declared in August 1914, Good Hope was ordered to reinforce the 4th Cruiser Squadron and became the flagship of Rear Admiral Christopher Cradock. Cradock moved the available ships of his squadron later that month to the coast of South America to search for German commerce raiders who were preying upon British merchant ships. His ships were generally unsuccessful in this and he moved his squadron further south in late September to search for the East Asia Squadron, under the command of Vice Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee, in the vicinity of Cape Horn and the Strait of Magellan in accordance to his orders from the Admiralty.
At the end of September, Cradock made his first fruitless search of the Tierra del Fuego area and later detached three of his ships to search up the Chilean coast, reaching Valparaiso on 15 October, while Good Hope returned to Port Stanley, in the Falkland Islands, to recoal and to reestablish communications with the Admiralty. He received word on 7 October that Spee's ships were definitely bound for the Cape Horn region and waited for the elderly battleship Canopus to reinforce his squadron. She was in poor mechanical condition when she arrived at Port Stanley and required time to make repairs. Good Hope sailed on 22 October without her, going around Cape Horn, while Canopus and three colliers departed the following day, taking the shorter route through the Strait of Magellan.
Good Hope rendezvoused with the rest of the squadron at Vallenar Roads in the remote Chonos Archipelago of Chile on 27 October to recoal. They departed two days later, just as Canopus arrived, Cradock ordering the battleship to follow as soon as possible. He sent the light cruiser Glasgow to scout ahead and to enter Coronel. Chile, to pick up any messages from the Admiralty and acquire intelligence regarding German activities. The cruiser began to pick up German radio signals from the light cruiser SMS Leipzig on the afternoon of 29 October, and delayed entering Coronel for two days with Cradock's permission to avoid being trapped by the fast German ships. A German supply ship was already there and radioed Spee that Glasgow had entered the harbour around twilight. The cruiser departed on the morning of 1 November, but Spee had already made plans to catch her when informed of her presence the previous evening.
Glasgow departed Coronel at 09:15 after having picked up the squadron's mail and rendezvoused with the rest of the squadron four hours later. Cradock ordered his ships to form line abreast with an interval of 15 nautical miles between ships to maximise visibility at 13:50, and steered north at a speed of 10 knots. At 16:17 Leipzig spotted Glasgow, the easternmost British ship, to its west and she spotted Leipzig's funnel smoke three minutes later. At 17:10 Cradock ordered his ships to head for Glasgow, the closest ship to the Germans. Once gathered together, he formed them into line astern, with Good Hope in the lead, steering southeasterly at 16 knots at 18:18. As the sixteen 21-centimetre (8.3in) guns aboard the armoured cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were only matched by the two 9.2-inch guns on his flagship, he needed to close the range to bring his more numerous 6-inch guns to bear. The Force 7 winds and high seas, however, prevented the use of half of those guns as they were too close to the water. He also wanted to use the setting sun to his advantage so that its light would blind the German gunners. Spee was well aware of the British advantages and refused to allow Cradock to close the range. His ships were faster than the British, slowed by the 16-knot maximum speed of the armed merchant cruiser Otranto and he opened up the range to 18,000 yards (16,000m) until conditions changed to suit him. The sun set at 18:50, which silhouetted the British ships against the light sky while the German ships became indistinguishable from the shoreline behind them.
Spee immediately turned to close and signalled his ships to open fire at 19:04 when the range closed to 12,300 yards (11,200m). Spee's flagship, Scharnhorst, engaged Good Hope while Gneisenau fired at Monmouth. Cradock's flagship was hit on the Scharnhorst's third salvo, when shells knocked out her forward 9.2-inch turret and set her forecastle on fire. Cradock, knowing his only chance was to close the range, continued to do so despite the battering that Spee's ships inflicted. By 19:23 the range was almost half of that when the battle began and the British ships bore onwards. Spee tried to open the range, fearing a torpedo attack, but the British were only 5,500 yards (5,000m) away at 19:35. Seven minutes later, Good Hope charged directly at the German ships, although they dodged out of her way. Spee ordered his armoured cruisers to concentrate their fire on the British flagship and she soon drifted to a halt with her topsides all aflame. At 19:50 her forward magazine exploded, severing the bow from the rest of the ship, and she later sank in the darkness. Spee estimated that his flagship had made 35 hits on Good Hope, suffering only two hits in return that did no significant damage and failed even to wound one crewman. Good Hope was sunk with all hands, a total of 926 officers and ratings.
One of those 926 officers and ratings to lose their lives off the Chilean Coast during the Battle of Coronel on 1 November 1914 was Chief Yeoman of Signals William Jones, who went down with his ship, and on 21 November 1914 the Admiralty informed his widow that he was presumed to have been killed aboard Good Hope. His wife was then residing at North End, Portsmouth, and had moved to nearby Hatton when she began receiving a pension in June 1915. Having no known grave, Jones is commemorated by name on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial.
