My grandfather, as a 21 year old lieutenant was the captain of CMB1 ( a 45 ft coastal motorboat) in the 1st world war. On 7th April 1917 he took part in a divisional CMB attack on a line of German destroyers off Zebrugge, which he engaged with his torpedo before himself being sunk by the enemy's guns. He was captured and imprisoned for the rest of the war, during which time he made several escape attempts. He was recommended for the VC by his divisional commander but got nothing as in WWI getting yourself captured precluded any kind of gallantry award. Once liberated he spent most of 1919 in Germany dealing with the welfare of British prisoners being returned home before returning himself. He was the scrum half for the Navy rugby team for a number of years. In WWII he was the deputy director of Naval Ordnance at the admiralty, responsible for procuring the navy's munitions. He lost two brothers in the trenches in WWI, and I remember him telling me that as a naval officer, even if you're going to die, at least you live in relative comfort until you do, rather than up to your ears in mud and rats. He too felt no personal animosity to most Germans;
There used to be a 55ft CMB at the British Military Powerboat trust at Marchwood, and earlier this year I was thinking about visiting it and taking along my father (also an retired RN officer), and my 106 year old grandmother. Unfortunately the collection ran out of funds and was dispersed, but whilst googling I did discover that contrary to my belief that no 45ft CMB's had survived, they have CMB 4 at Duxford. A trip up there is planned for next year.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/shmr/7435196282/in/photostream//http://www.flickr.com/photos/shmr/7435185874/in/photostream/http://www.flickr.com/photos/shmr/7435232076/in/photostream/http://www.flickr.com/photos/shmr/7435243790/in/photostream/http://www.flickr.com/photos/shmr/7435255002/in/photostreamYou can see in the photos that this design was one of the first boats to have a seaplane style stepped hull, to promote planing.
Lt Augustus Agar, the captain of CMB4 won the VC for a cloak and dagger operation against the bolsheviks in the Baltic in 1919, in which he attacked and sank a destroyer in an action not unlike the one in which my grandfather got sunk and captured.
It's quite topical really as what we were up to in WW1 with these craft is not unlike what the Iranian Navy seem to be developing at the moment - sticking massive weapons on tiny very fast speedboats. On the CMB the single torpedo was placed in the trough at the stern & then fired backwards; when the torpedo reached the end of it's leash it armed it & then scooted off under the hull.
After my grandfather's death in 1971 a copy of his report of the action and the loss of his vessel along with his account of his experiences as a POW were deposited with the Imperial War museum. In 1995 I was behind the bar in The Cricketer (the first pub I set up in Paris) when a very dignified gent in a Crombie came in and asked in a booming voice "Are you Giles ? Your grandfather and my father were in prison together." As you can imagine, this made everyone in the pub turn and stare. The man in question was a high court judge whose father had been in the same prison camp as my gramps.
