Chief Petty Officer WILLIAM HENRY NYE

Author

Editorial Staff

Subjects

Biographies and personal histories, History - pre-Federation

Tags

Naval Brigade of NSW, HMS Calliope (Aust. Station), HMS Calliope

RAN Ships

None noted.

Publication

June 2016 edition of the Naval Historical Review (all rights reserved)

As related by his grandson William Douglas Nye

 We were recently contacted by William Douglas (Doug) Nye regarding some family papers which his grandmother had kept but were no longer of interest to a future generation. This resulted in a visit to the home of Doug and his wife Anne where we were presented with a scrapbook and letters concerning his grandfather, Chief Petty Officer William Henry Nye, and his father, Able Seaman William Arthur Nye. Both men had very different but eminently interesting and remarkable naval stories which we shall discover in two parts of this family history. Rekindling Doug’s interest he has now become a member of our Society. 

 Following in Nelson’s wake

William Henry Nye was born in Warburton, Sussex on 25 May 1869. His service record tells us that as an adult he was well built at 5 foot 10 inches (177 cm) tall, had brown hair and grey eyes with a small circular tattoo on his left forearm. He entered the Royal Navy on 17 September 1884 as a 15 year old Boy Seaman in the training ship HMS St Vincent. Never was there a more apt start for seamen of the Nelson tradition as St Vincentwas a classically built 120-gun first rate ship of the line launched in 1815, which saw action during the Crimean War. In 1862, she became a training ship permanently moored at Haslar off Portsmouth and continued in this role until 1905 when she was sold and broken up.

Following initial training William was posted to the gunboat HMS Coquette serving in the Mediterranean; she saw service during disturbances in Egypt in which William, in December 1886, suffered unspecified injuries. He was awarded the Egyptian Medal and the Khedives Egyptian Medal. Upon recovery he was next posted to HMS Duke of Wellington. When completed in 1853 the 131-gun Dukewas the most powerful warship in the world; with a displacement of 5,892 tons she was almost twice the size of Nelson’s Victory, unfortunately designed for a bygone age, she quickly became obsolete. William was to serve in her again as a Petty Officer.

On 25 January 1887, William was posted to HMS Calliope and in her progressed to Ordinary Seaman, and then Able Seaman. Calliopewas one of the last fully rigged ships built for the RN but sail was supplemented by a powerful engine which could provide the ship with a maximum speed of 15 kts. However, owing to the scarcity of coaling stations and the cost of fuel, the use of sail was preferred. Her remarkable hull was built of steel but was encased in timber and coppered below the waterline.  Calliope was originally classed as a corvette, but this was later changed to 3rd rate cruiser which served with the RN from 1887 to 1951. For many years, until decommissioning, she was a training ship on the Tyne.

Under command of Captain Henry Coey Kane Calliope sailed from Portsmouth around the Cape of Good Hope to the China Station where she visited ports in China, Japan, Korea and Russia. Later she was ordered to the Australia Station arriving at Sydney in November 1887. She was much admired, being painted white with red ribbons around her nettings while her guns were painted black. Being long guns, they could not be secured fully inboard with one half of the muzzle always outboard, and trimmed off neatly alongside the ship as possible. This led to a Sydney newspaper saying that the guns stuck out like porcupine quills.

In the New Year the cruiser was sent to New Zealand. On 16 February 1888 she was the first ship to enter the new Auckland dry dock, at this time the largest dry dock in the Southern Hemisphere; which still operates today as testimony to its builders. It would be nice to think Calliope Dock was named in her honour but this is not so. The name comes from Calliope Point from which it was excavated, and the point takes its name from an earlier HMS Calliope,which came here in 1846 and was involved in the Maori Wars.

Calliope then proceeded to Wellington where she filled her bunkers with Westport steaming coal, after which she set sail for Samoa. Here she provided a British presence in the looming international crises amongst the competing interests of Britain, Germany and the United States in gaining access to the strategically important Samoan Islands.

On 14 March 1888 the anchorage off the principal settlement of Apia held seven warships and six merchantmen when the barometer began to fall rapidly with the onset of a tropical cyclone. For the next two days rain fell in sheets, cutting visibility, and the winds increased in ferocity to more than 100 kts (185 km/h) blowing directly into the harbour.

With both anchors down Calliope steamed into the wind to reduce the strain on her cables, but was hampered by the close proximity of other vessels. Ten men manned the wheel and tackles rigged to assist the rudder. One cable parted leaving only the starboard bower holding. Calliopet angled with two other ships but eventually swung clear. Early in the forenoon Captain Kane decided to steam for the open sea. The bower cable was slipped and, with all boilers at full pressure, she inched forward at a speed of less than one knot. At one point she was within a few feet of the reef but gradually made headway through the mountainous seas and screaming wind.

Calliope re-entered the harbour on 19 March to see what assistance could be provided. She found utter devastation with all ships, including three German and three American warships, amongst which was the flagship USS Trenton, driven ashore or sunk with over 100 men lost.

Our beloved poet, Banjo Patterson, was moved to write upon this epic struggle against the forces of nature in his only ballad of the sea; only two verses are quoted of this lengthy tribute:

By the far Samoan shore  

Where the league long rollers pour

All the wash of the Pacific on the coral-guarded bay,

Riding proudly at their ease,

In the calm of tropic seas

The three great nations’ warships at their anchors proudly lay.

Like a foam flake tossed and thrown,

She could barely hold her own,

While the other ships all helpless were drifting to the lee,

Through the smother and the rout,

The Calliope steamed out

And they cheered her from the Trenton that was foundering in the sea.

 Calliope returned to Sydney to a hero’s welcome. The engineer,Mr Henry George Bourke, was especially promoted from Staff Engineer to Fleet Engineer. He attributed his success to the superior properties of New Zealand West Coast coal. From that time it became the preferred source of fuel for the Admiralty in these waters.

On return to England Calliope was diverted from Aden to Zanzibar and Mombasa to provide assistance during the aftermath of the Sudan Wars. William was next posted to HMS Excellentfor gunnery training courses and later became a Leading Hand in HMS Iron Duke. His service records, at a time when Britain controlled one of the world’s greatest empires and looking after this vast enterprise needed the world’s largest navy, is a veritable lexicon of famous ships.

The Australia Station

We might think productivity saving measures such as ship rotations is something new but the Admiralty had acted upon this more than a century past. Using sister ships, as was prevalent on the Australia Station, it became cost effective to leave the ships on station, docking them at Cockatoo Island, and rotating the crews. Over time, home crews effectively reduced, as local recruits were gradually taken into naval service.  With the ships remaining on station, only men and supplies had to be rotated with other surplus naval ships being called upon as transports.

The most important part of William’s career was yet to come with another posting to the Australia Station. It is assumed that a plentiful supply of volunteers was available for service in the Great South Land and in early 1901 the cruiser HMS Blake was temporary converted into a transport, taking aboard Captain Thomas Philip Walker and officers and crew as working passengers to relieve the crew of HMS Royal Arthur, flagship of the Australia Station. Petty Officer William Nye was amongst this contingent. It would be a long time before he would again see the shores of Old Blighty.

Captain Walker with his ship’s company was appointed to Royal Arthur in April 1901. They were just in time to escort some very important guests. On 3 May the Royal Yacht HMS Ophir carrying the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York (the future King George V and Queen Mary) arrived at Albany. They then progressed throughout the country before departing for New Zealand on 6 June. Their most important function was the opening of the new Federal Parliament in Melbourne on 9 May 1901.

Over the next few years of his remarkable career William would serve on nearly every cruiser of the Australia Squadron including HMS Katoomba where he was awarded his Long Service & Good Conduct Medal and was promoted to Chief Petty Officer. He was in HMS Wallaroo where he received the accolade of becoming a CPO Gunnery Instructor. He was in her when she suffered a boiler explosion off Montague Island killing four and wounding three. He served in HM Ships Psyche and Encounterboth of which later transferred to the RAN. His final posting was to HMS Challenger from which ship he paid off in Sydney on 31 May 1907.

Farewell old England forever and signing on for a new life Down Under

After a period of leave William joined the Permanent Staff of the NSW Public Service on 29 April 1908 on the naval staff based at Garden Island. This was during those early days when local assets and administration of the Royal Navy and State Governments were gradually transferred to control of the new Commonwealth Government; this process was not smooth, with considerable disagreements, especially between the two levels of Government. On 18 July 1911 he was appointed as Warder of the Powder Magazine at Port Hunter and Instructor to the Newcastle Naval Depot. His annual salary on this appointment was a respectable £156 (about $100,000 in today’s terms).

While we are unsure of the detail, during one of William’s early trips across the Tasman he met a pretty young girl from Dunedin, Miss Daisy Gertrude Moore, who was born on 19 July 1885. They married in her homeland on 3 March 1903 when Daisy was just short of her 18th birthday and William was sixteen years her senior. They returned to Australia where the newlyweds established a home at Pyrmont. A year later a son, William Arthur Alfred Nye, was born on 16 April 1904. After moving to Newcastle a daughter Daisy was born on 31 May 1912.

In all his later endeavours William was ably supported by Daisy, a remarkable and industrious woman, intelligent and well read. She could set a wonderful table and be a gracious hostess but equally turn her hand to bushcraft and sink a water bore in a paddock. She was an early adopter of the motor car and enjoyed this novel form of transport. She also loved a sensible discussion and regularly wrote Letters to the Editor under the nom-de-plume ‘Nautical’. Not that Daisy was forever virtuous as with her husband’s many long absences she developed a liking for a tipple or two.

Warder of a Powder Magazine seems a strange occupation. In 1886, Soudan, the largest non-ocean going vessel built in the colonies, was launched from her building yard at Raymond Terrace. To improve safety she was a floating magazine built of local hardwood fastened with copper. Soudan was 140 ft (42.7 m) long, with a beam of 31 ft 6 ins (9.6 m) and a depth of hold of 14 ft 6 ins (4.2 m); divided into ten compartments she could hold 300 tons of explosives needed to satisfy local mining enterprises. She was moored on the upper reaches of the Hunter River at Fullerton Cove. This was to become William’s command with a steam tug engaged to tow barges to and from the vessel.

By far the most prominent of his roles was a part-time duty as an instructor to the Newcastle Company of the NSW Naval Brigade. The Brigade was founded in May 1863 with four companies each of 40 men based in Sydney. In September of the same year a fifth company was established at Newcastle. The company, without ships, trained on a battery of 32-pounder smooth bore guns mounted on Signal Hill and two 6-pounder smooth bore guns located in Barrack Square. Some members of the Newcastle Company accompanied the RAN Squadron which sailed to China in 1900 helping suppress the Boxer Rebellion. By 1907, the Naval Brigade companies had risen to complements of 4 officers and 60 men. By the time of WWI the Brigade was mainly absorbed into the Naval Reserve Forces of the RAN and some found themselves on their way to capture German New Guinea.

During William’s service the Sub District Naval Officer at Newcastle was Lieutenant L. S. Bracegirdle who was to win fame in New Guinea and with the RAN Bridging Train at the Dardanelles. He is better known as Rear Admiral Sir Leighton Seymour Bracegirdle. ‘Braces’ as he was affectionately known became one of our most distinguished early officers. There is no doubt that the two men knew one another as an undated cutting from the Newcastle Herald reads:

The Newcastle Naval Reserve whalers’ crew, who pulled such a fine race and were winners of the naval race at the Newcastle Regatta, by permission of Lieutenant Bracegirdle, will leave by the Newcastle boat tonight in charge of CPO Nye, coxswain, to take part in the Anniversary Regatta at Sydney.

William remained in his dual posts at Newcastle until retirement, being discharged ashore at his own request on 12 June 1922 after over 22 years service with the Royal Navy followed by a further 14 years with the Royal Australian Navy. He was granted payment of £91/14/- (in today’s value about $40,000) in lieu of extended leave and with this largess the Nyes holidayed in England in 1924 taking passage in the TSS Jervis Bay –to receive much fame during WWII – and returned in TSS Esperance Bay.  This voyage was all the more exciting as it was William’s first return in 23 years and Daisy’s first ever visit to the mother country; they were also accompanied by their young daughter Daisy. A highlight of their visit was an invitation to a garden party at Buckingham Palace.

William was an active member and President of the Newcastle branch of the Naval and Military Veterans’ Association and for a time he entered local politics as an Alderman for the Stockton Ward of Newcastle Council. After a short illness, he died in hospital at Newcastle on 6 April 1944, just short of his 75th birthday. Large numbers attended his funeral with representatives from naval and military veterans and the various service associations and charities with which he was associated. Finding a new lease of life in 1950, Daisy purchased a property at Shoal Bay where she lived contentedly for a number of years. She died in the Newcastle suburb of Hamilton in about 1968 in her mid 80s.

Never forgetting being saved from that fateful Apia hurricane, the Nyes called their Newcastle home in Nobbys Road (later given the more refined title of Military Road) ‘Calliope’. This theme is continued in an interesting cutting (undated but almost certainly about November 1914) of a letter from William to the local paper which reads:

Sir, On the account of the action and destruction of the Emden, and that Captain Glossop was in command, it occurred to me (as no doubt it has to many of my old shipmates of HMS Calliope) what an extraordinary coincidence it is that in nearly all the naval actions which have so far taken place the midshipmen of HMS Calliope who were aboard at the time of the great hurricane at Samoa have taken so notable and gallant part. Among them are Captain Fox, of HMS Amphion, which was our first casualty (sunk by a mine); Captain Nicholson, of the Hogue (sunk by torpedo); Captain Brandt of the Monmouth (sunk in action off the coast of Chile;   Captain Drury Lowe of the Chatham (who bottled up the Konigsberg); Admiral the Hon. A. Hood, in command of the fleet which has been bombarding the enemy on the French coast. These were all midshipmen in HMS Calliope during the same commission, under the late Admiral Kane (who was at that time captain), when I was serving in the Royal Navy in the same ship. I think as there were only eight midshipmen on board at that time this must constitute a record in naval history. – I am, etc. W.H. Nye, Chief Petty Officer, Naval Depot, Newcastle.

 As the sun dips over the horizon

This is a remarkable life story of a young man brought up in the true traditions of the service. It was a time of greatness when the Royal Navy was at its zenith and everything was done to perfection. Officers and men were trained to remarkably high standards and none more so than the Gunnery Instructor. It was indeed fortunate that such a man as CPOGI William Henry Nye came to the Australia Station and helped instil some of these high standards into the newly formed Royal Australian Navy. For this we are indeed truly grateful.