Interesting Stories and Notes

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William George Francis Burgar (1911-1988) - Ships served on

The details are shown in the attached Royal Navy forms.  Only the parts of the forms with information on are shown.

The above sections of his service record show that he was on HMS Glendower for the early part of his training.

HMS Glendower was not a floating ship but was a a land based training camp.  It was in fact the pre-war Butlin's holiday camp, at Pwhelli , North Wales.

After completing his basic training he was transferred to HMS President III. This was a training ship on the embankment on the Thames.  Sometime after this he must have been seconded to the SS Hartington.  

After being torpedoed and spending a considerable time in a Canadian hospital, he return to England and rejoined HMS President III.

However, he was also present on the HMS Chrysanthemum, a training ship which was also moored on the north embankment of the River Thames until the end of the war.  When we visited it in the later years of his life, we were amazed at the colour scheme of the interior pipe work and walls.  Dad said that during his time on board, he was appointed to be in charge of painting the ship. Because there was a very limited supply of paint he had to make do with odd tins of paint.  These he blended into the most outlandish colours, purple-pink, yellow-green, blue-black etc.  and lavishly painted the interior of the ship.  It seems that after the war all redecoration was done in the same colours, so he thought that he had really left his mark on the ship.

The HMS President is now a floating restaurant on the Thames.

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