PUNS - Permanently Unfit for Naval Service to Retired List
Service Period
1919-1937
Active Service (War service)
WW2
Service Record
Yes
Ship
Refer Service Record see Sources
Service 3
RN - Royal Navy
Service Period
1911-1921
Cemetery Details
Cemetery Name
Springvale Botanical Cemetery
Cemetery Address
Springvale, VIC
Demonination/Area
Cassia
Section
Wall U
Grave Number
39
Grave Type
Cremation - Niche
Notes
Defensively Armed Merchant Ship (DEMS)
01 Jul 1927 promoted to Gunner, other promotions while on retired.
LIEUTENANT SPECIAL DUTIES GEORGE HOLWELL SPRINGALL O/N 9225 RN/RAN.
George Springall was born in Gillingham Kent, UK, on the 15th of November 1893. His father George Springall was a marine serving in the Royal Marine Light Infantry. In 1898 George Senior passed away whilst serving in Hong Kong and was buried in the Happy Valley Cemetery. His widow Minnie was left to raise George Junior and his two sisters, however within a year she had remarried, this time to Warrant Officer Engineer Robert Wilson Whyte, Royal Navy, to whom she would have another six children, two of whom would die in infancy.
In 1911, George enlisted in the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class on the training ship HMS Impregnable. At the time he was employed as a Coach Painter and he was living with his family in Portsmouth. He served on the cruiser HMS Essex and the battleship HMS St Vincent. He was advanced to Ordinary Seaman in 1911 and to Able Seaman in June 1913. In late 1913 he volunteered for submarines and after training at HMS Vernon in Portsmouth he joined HMS Maidstone the depot ship and tender of the 8th Submarine Flotilla based in Harwich. In 1914 he had married his wife Vera.
In January 1916, George was serving on the E Class submarine E17 when it struck an uncharted bank and was damaged off the Dutch Island of Texel, when it dived to avoid a Dutch cruiser. Whilst the submarine managed to surface, the crew had to abandon the boat and they were interned in neutral Holland until the end of the war. Two weeks after being interned George was advanced to Leading Seaman.
On his return from being interned, George Volunteered to serve in the RAN for three years, unaccompanied, from the 23rd of March 1919 as a Leading Seaman Torpedo rating. He was posted to HMAS Platypus, however he was most probably a member of one of the J Class submarines. He was promoted to Petty Officer in April 1920 before returning to the UK for nine months for specialist Torpedo training at HMS Vernon in 1922. In 1921 he had been approved to permanently transfer to the RAN, and in lieu of his return fare to the UK, the Australian Government had paid for his wife Vera to travel to Australia. On returning to Australia George served in HMAS Cerberus until February 1926, and in 1925 passed the examinations for promotion to Warrant Officer.
In 1926 he returned to the UK to undertake professional training, on completion of which he was promoted to Gunner in July 1927. Over the next five years he served on the depot ship HMAS Penguin (Ex-Platypus) and then the destroyer HMAS Anzac, however, whilst he passed the navigation exams for warrant officer, he was found to be unfit to keep bridge watches because of poor eyesight. He was posted to HMAS Cerberus where he served until 1932.
As part of the economy measures in the Great Depression he transferred to the Auxiliary Services in 1932 with the rank of Warrant Officer Instructor. He was commissioned as an Instructor Officer in 1937 serving in Cerberus and from 1940 at HMAS Lonsdale as a DEMS instructor. He remained in Lonsdale until he was discharged Permanently Unfit for Naval Service on the 1st of October 1945, with bilateral deafness on a pension. With the introduction of the new naval officer rank system in the mid-1950s, his rank was changed from Commissioned Instructor to Lieutenant (SD).
Post George’s discharge, the couple lived in Albert Park in Melbourne, Vera working as a nurse but George unemployed.
Lieutenant George Springall passed away in the Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital Melbourne on the 19 January 1959 aged 68. His body was cremated, and his ashes interred in the Springvale Botanical Cemetery Cassia Wall U, Niche 39.
Sources
UK Archives ADM 188/659/6161
Service Record - Australian National Archives
Service Record - Australian National Archives
Nominal Roll - Department of Veterans Affairs
DVA Commemoration Details
