Pegasus Post: April 30, 2019

4 Tuesday April 30 2019
Latest Christchurch news at www.star.kiwi
News
PEGASUS POST
The tragic fate of young Geoffrey
• By Sophie Cornish
“TORPEDO SIR! The stern’s
blown off, sir! Oh Lord – the poor
boys!”
It was 12.52am, November 19,
1917.
A torpedo from the German
submarine UB-40 had just struck
the stern of the S.S Aparima near
the Isle of Wright, off the south
English coast.
In command was Captain
Gerald F Doorly, who was
thrown into the door of the chart
room, listening to the shout from
his second that they’d been hit.
Below deck in the stern, young
cadets, many of them just out of
high school, had been sleeping.
Of the 30 cadets on board,
17 were killed, including three
from Christchurch – Geoffrey
Bargrove, 16, Donovan O’Bryen
Hoare, 18, John Frederick
Proudfoot, 16, and Ernest
Sutherland (age unknown).
There was a roar of rushing
water and the stern sunk, sending
the bow of the ship upwards.
In a matter of minutes, the
Aparima slipped below the
surface.
Bargrove had been on the
vessel for less than three months.
The Aparima was a New Zealand
slow steamer used by the English
admiralty to ferry cargo around
Geoffrey Bargrove
the British coast.
A year earlier, the Germans
had started targeting merchant
vessels, and parents of cadets
were told they could take their
sons off the ships. Many families
didn’t; they did not want to be
seen as letting their country
down.
The cadets were unpaid,
instead gaining seagoing
experience on the cargo steamer,
as part of training for their threeyear
cadetship.
Captain Doorly had set the
Aparima on a zig-zag course, as
close to the coast as he dared,
after being warned there had
been a sighting of an enemy
submarine near the French coast
TRAGIC LOSS: The S.S. Aparima (above) was hit by a torpedo
from the UB-40, a German submarine similar to the UB-45
(below). The tragedy, which killed 56, happened on November
19, 1917.
– and within striking distance.
Submarine warfare was
relatively new and the UB-40 was
one of the best in the business.
After the war, it would be
revealed the submarine had sunk
100 ships.
The slow Aparima was easy
pickings. Steaming at 12 knots,
she had moved slowly from
London to Barry in South Wales
for coaling. She had no chance.
Fifty-five were killed in
the attack, including 24 New
Zealanders. The crew also
included men from Britain, India
and Australia.
Fifty-four – including Captain
Doorly – survived, clinging to
row boats and wreckage in the
icy waters. There were 26 on one
lifeboat and 17 on a gig boat.
They rowed looking for other
survivors, a bright blue flare went
up and soon they found a raft.
Clinging to it was Thomas
Ewart Bevan, 15, of Wellington,
the youngest cadet on the
Aparima.
Later he would describe being
flung off this bunk when the
torpedo hit.
“Something hurled me out of
my bunk into the sea, I thought.
But in a moment I knew I was
still in what was left of our cabin,
because as I swirled round and
round in water, I bumped against
bunks.”
Bevan survived by being
sucked up a 3m ventilator in the
centre of the cabin deckhead. He
was shot up out of a cowl and
landed on top of a life raft in the
ocean. “It seems a wonderful
thing, but it was on that raft; it
must have slid off the boat deck
and hit against the ventilator just
as the stern began to sink.”
An evening of great music with the
UC Christchurch Youth Orchestra
The UC Christchurch Youth Orchestra presents
Worlds Apart
Saturday 11 May
Christchurch Boys’ High School Hall,
Straven Rd, 7.30pm
Featuring music by:
Lilburn, Gershwin, Greig, Tichelli
and Prokofiev
Tickets from Eventfinda
$20 adults
$15 Seniors
$5 Students
ARTC8330
There’s something very special about hearing
a full orchestra of young people perform
some of the great classics.
So come and join our young musicians,
conducted by Helen Renaud, in a concert
of wonderful music from around the world.
From the beautiful lakes and mountains
of New Zealand with Lilburn’s Aotearoa
Overture to the noisy and bustling streets of
Paris in Gershwin’s American in Paris this
will be a concert of wonderful melodies and
great contrasts.
Our talented strings will perform Holberg
Suite by Greig, a five-movement work based
on 18th century dances before the wind,
brass and percussion of the concert band will
entertain with a rollicking and humorous
jazz inspired Blue Shades by Tichelli. Finally
from Russia, one of Prokofiev’s most wellknown
works and his first foray into film
music, the Lieutenant Kijé Suite. A concert
not to be missed.
The UC Christchurch Youth Orchestra
was founded in the 1970s and is the senior
orchestra of the Christchurch School of
Music. The orchestra is a musically and
technically advanced orchestra for the city’s
musical youth to widen and develop their
musical and performing experience.
Each year the orchestra performs 3-4
concerts and can often be called on to
perform at corporate and community events.
Professional players from the Christchurch
Symphony Orchestra and the New Zealand
Symphony Orchestra regularly work with
students at sectionals to coach them in the
nuances of orchestral playing.
In 2015 the CSM signed a sponsorship
agreement with the University of Canterbury
for the youth orchestra which is an exciting
development in the orchestra’s history. This
sponsorship gives naming rights to the
university and ensures the players can have
access to interesting repertoire and essential
equipment.
The musicians of the UC Christchurch
Youth Orchestra under their conductor have
worked hard to bring this concert to life so
come along and enjoy a wonderful evening
of great music.