WW2 100 - 1 March 1942 - A golfing ‘name’ with a royal connection: Lieutenant Cyril Hamilton Palairet (1915-42), Royal Navy, HMAS Perth
Continued from 12 February 1942:
Above: Lt Cyril Hamilton Palairet
I recently learnt that the Palairet Memorial Trophy is the major knock-out play competition of the year for over 40 Devon clubs.
Surely, I thought, Devon golfers would imagine that the Trophy had been offered by members of his family as a tribute to the young naval officer in the above photo. He died when his ship HMAS Perth went down in the Java Sea in 1942 during WW2.
East Devon
Golf Club. Members of the Palairet family would surely have played here
His parents and his aunt
were Budleigh residents – you can find their graves in St Peter’s Burial Ground
– and our East Devon Golf Club is one of the best in the country.
And then I reflected, rather
negatively I’m afraid, that the chances are that nobody would know anything
about Cyril Hamilton Palairet, apart from the fact that his name appears on
Budleigh Salterton’s War Memorial.
Unless, perhaps you’re a cricket historian. Both Cyril’s father, Richard Cameron North Palairet, and especially, Lionel, his uncle, were keen cricketers. And their father, Henry Hamilton Palairet, was a keen cricketer who made two first-class appearances for the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in the late 1860s, as well as being five times archery champion of England.
Lionel
Palairet (1870-1933) Image credit: Wikipedia
In fact the Palairet Trophy was
donated by Cyril’s Uncle Lionel who died in Exmouth in 1933. Described by The
Times as ‘the most beautiful batsman of all time’ he was praised for having
one of the most attractive batting styles of the period. Foxhunting, and especially
golf, became his main sporting interests after his retirement from cricket. He
was the first chairman of the Devon County Golf Union upon its formation in
1911, captained Devon at golf either side of the First World War, from 1914
through until 1926, and was also president of the Union from 1923 until 1932.
He developed the idea of an inter-club team championship within Devon, and the
prize remains named the Palairet Trophy.
Cyril's father, Richard Cameron North Palairet (1871-1955) Photo by E Hawkins, Brighton, from a book Famous Cricketers (1896) Image credit: Wikipedia
Cyril’s father, Richard Cameron North Palairet, shared the same sporting interest as his brother Lionel, playing first-class cricket for Oxford University and Somerset. After his playing days, he became a prominent cricket administrator, acting as secretary at Surrey County Cricket Club and being joint manager, with Pelham Warner, of the English cricket team in Australia in 1932-33 which became embroiled in the Bodyline controversy.
More interesting for some Budleigh readers is the fact that he was also Secretary of the East Devon Golf Club, which notes on its website that Mr R.C. N. Palairet, and Herbert Fowler of Westward Ho! were responsible for making changes to the course during the first 25 years of its existence.
The Palairet family name is of French Huguenot origin. Cartographer and author Jean Palairet, born in 1697 at Montauban, near Toulouse, was forced into exile with his family and settled in The Hague before moving to England.
Mary Ann Hamilton:
a self-portrait in the collection of The Morgan Library and Museum www.themorgan.org
The West Country roots of Cyril’s
branch of the family go back to the 19th century when
Ancestors and connections (L-r clockwise from top): Diplomat Sir Michael Palairet KCMG, Major General Sir Sanford John Palairet KBE, CB, CMG, DSO, Dame Barbara Cartland, Diana, Princess of Wales Images credit: Wikipedia
The family of Cyril’s mother was equally well connected. Emily Katherine Scobell, born in 1875, was the daughter of Sanford George Treweeke Scobell, who, coincidentally had married an Edith Palairet! The marriage would produce a son, Major General Sir Sanford John Palairet KBE, CB, CMG, DSO, and another daughter, Mary Hamilton Scobell, who would in her turn marry Bertram Cartland. And from that union would come the novelist Dame Barbara Cartland, better known perhaps as the step-grandmother of Diana, Princess of Wales!
Cyril Hamilton Palairet was the youngest in a family of three boys and one girl. His eldest brother Edward John had been born in Taunton, in 1901, possibly because of the father’s connections with Somerset County Cricket Club. A second son, born in 1903, would follow a naval career as Commander Richard Scobell Palairet, and a daughter, Elizabeth, was born in 1908.
Min-Y-Don on Westbourne Terrace, Budleigh
When Cyril was born in 1915, the parents were living in Budleigh Salterton. Kelly’s Directory has them listed in 1919 as living on Westbourne Terrace, in a house named variously as Min-y-Don or Min-y-Dan. Later, they would move to Knowle Croft, in Knowle Village about a mile away, where they were living at the time of Cyril’s death.
Like many members of his family, Cyril was sent away to
boarding school for his education. He attended Parkfield School near Haywards Heath in Sussex. By
coincidence, this was the prep school attended by George Mills, an author who later
settled in Budleigh with his unmarried croquet-playing sisters. You can read more
about this former Budleigh resident thanks to my American friend Sam Williams,
who developed a remarkable obsession with George Mills, his life and literary
achievements and has put together a detailed online portrait in words at http://www.whoisgeorgemills.com
Abbey House, Sherborne
Image credit: https://britishlistedbuildings.co.uk
Along with his elder brother Edward John Palairet, Cyril went on to complete his education at Sherborne School in Dorset, where he was a boarder for five years at Abbey House from September 1928 to July 1933. He is listed as a member of the 6th form and as a House Prefect. Another, younger, Shirburnian member of Abbey House with links to Budleigh was David Spencer Cox, who died in 1940 while serving in the RAF.
Records of former pupils kept by school archivists or enthusiastic teachers are so useful for historians and biographers! Here in Budleigh, Fairlynch Museum has a good collection of photos of children going back to the early days of the town's St Peter's School, though not all of the individuals are identified by name.
‘Shirburnians have a long tradition of remembering their own,’ reads the School’s website. ‘At the east end of the School chapel is a memorial recording the names of the twelve Old Shirburnians who lost their lives in the South African War of 1899-1902. The names of those Old Shirburnians who fell in the First (approx. 221) and Second World Wars (approx. 242) are incised into the walls of the ante-chapel, designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield, and are also recorded in the Books of Remembrance.’
Rather than go to University, Cyril followed the example of members of his family who had embarked on a military career. There was his cousin the Major General, better known as John Palairet; and then another cousin, Commander Henry Edward Hamilton Palairet, who was a naval officer. Not forgetting his own elder brother Richard Scobell Palairet who would gain the rank of Commander in the Royal Navy, survive WW2 but sadly die at the early age of 53.
It would be good to have some information about Cyril’s early career in the Royal Navy. Perhaps a family member may read this and be kind enough to help with photos and documents.
HMAS Perth underway in 1942 after her refit of the previous year,
We do know that Cyril was serving on HMAS Perth when he was killed. The ship was originally commissioned as HMS Amphion, a Leander-class light cruiser for the Royal Navy in 1936, she was transferred to the Royal Australian Navy in 1939 and renamed after the Australian city. After various missions in the Mediterranean, she was transferred to the Pacific region in February 1942 to help defend the Dutch East Indies against the Japanese.
Perth was one of the ships involved in the Battle of the Java Sea on 27 February, when the Allied navies suffered a disastrous defeat at the hand of the Imperial Japanese Navy. 2,300 Allied sailors were killed, including the American-British-Dutch-Australian Command (ABDACOM) Strike Force commander — Dutch Rear-Admiral Karel Doorman. On the Allied side two light cruisers and three destroyers were sunk, and one heavy cruiser was damaged. The Japanese lost no ships and only 36 sailors in the battle.
Perth and the American heavy cruiser USS Houston were the only large Allied ships to survive the battle, and they withdrew to the port of Tanjong Priok in Jakarta afterwards on the morning of 28 February. The two ships attempted to resupply, but fuel shortages meant that Perth could only load half her normal fuel capacity, and a lack of ammunition left her with only the 160 six-inch shells remaining after the previous day. The cruisers and the Dutch destroyer Evertsen were ordered to sail that night for Tjilatjap, a port on the south coast of Java. The route took them via the Sunda Strait between Sumatra and Java, an area which the Allies believed to be free of enemy vessels.
Sunda Strait, where HMAS Perth lies.
Photograph: Google
Maps/Commonwealth of Australia 2017, Department of Defence
The order had disastrous consequences, taking the three Allied ships into a confrontation with the Japanese Western Invasion Force which had assembled without their knowledge at Bantam Bay on the north western tip of Java. In what has become known as the Battle of Sunda Street, the result was inevitable. Perth, Houston and Evertsen were massively outnumbered by the Japanese fleet, which consisted of twelve destroyers, five cruisers and 58 troopships among other vessels. The three Allied ships succeeded in inflicting some damage on the enemy during a fierce battle, but eventually were sunk and 1,071 of their crews were lost, including the captains of Perth and Houston. Over half of Perth’s crew was killed in the battle, among them Cyril Palairet who was listed as ‘missing presumed killed’ (MPK). Only about two-thirds of the survivors survived captivity to return home after the war. In total, 675 from the three Allied ships were taken prisoner by the Japanese, many being sent to work on the notorious Burma-Thailand railway.
As in the case of the Royal Navy’s battlecruiser HMS Repulse, sunk in the South China Sea in December 1941, the wrecks of the ships involved in the Battle of Sunda Strait have been targeted by scrap metal businesses. In late 2013, divers found that the wreck of Perth was being stripped by Indonesian marine salvagers. Crane-equipped barges had stripped off most of the wreck's superstructure, forward turrets, and forward decking, and explosives had been used to break the ship up for easier recovery.
Mike Carlton’s book Cruiser:
The Life and Loss of HMAS Perth and her Crew was published in 2011
But the story of HMAS Perth and the Battle of
Sunda Strait is well remembered, especially in Australia. A Royal Australian
Navy submarine was named after Perth’s Captain Hector Waller, DSO. And this
memorial booklet can be read online at
https://www.hmasperth1memorial.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/HMAS-Perth-booklet-info.pdf
Image credit: Partonez, Wikimedia
Cyril Hamilton Palairet’s name is included in the
list of war dead on the Plymouth Naval Memorial, situated on Plymouth Hoe in Devon, pictured above. And perhaps some of Devon’s golfers will read this story about the young naval
officer whose life was cut short in 1942, and will spare him a thought when
they play in the Memorial Trophy competition named after his family.
The next post is for SQUADRON LEADER PETER JAMES ROBERT KITCHIN DFC (1917-1942), killed while flying with RAF Bomber Command's 75 (NZ) Squadron.
You can read more at
https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2021/01/ww2-75-12-march-1942-flying-with-kiwis.html
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