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At least three of the towns and districts on the east bank of the River Severn as it flows south through Worcestershire held successful Warships Weeks. Kidderminster, midway between Birmingham and Worcester, held one of the first in the country, from 6 - 13 December 1941, and raised £407,002 (£9 6s 1d per head) to adopt HMS Vansittart. Regular reports on the amounts raised appeared in the Birmingham newspapers:

Bewdley, "next door" to Kidderminster, but on the bank of the Severn and prone to flooding with a population of less than 10,000 raised £63,000 to adopt the naval trawler, HMS Horatio, during its Warships Week from 21 - 28 March 1942. HMS Horatio was sunk with heavy loss of life off the coast of Algeria by a German MTB on 7 January 1943. Stourport-on-Severn raised £98,928 to adopt the Sir Galahad, a Knight Class Trawler, during its Warship week from 7-14 Mar 1942. The County town of Worcester 15 miles south of Bewdley with a magnificent cathedral and Guildhall, held its Warships Week from 7 - 14 March 1942, and adopted HMS Worcester. Brierley Hill in Staffordshire but only nine miles north of Kidderminster, raised £227,950 during its Warship Week from 22 - 29 November 1941 to adopt HMS Watchman, a sister ship of Vansittart.

Wyre Forest District Council

Local government reorganisation led to the three towns of Kidderminster, Bewdley and Stourport forming the Wyre Forest District Council in 1976. Kidderminster, the largest of the three town with a population of over 55,000, is located 17 miles south-west of Birmingham city centre and 15 miles north of Worcester. Stourport-on-Severn is located on the confluence of the rivers Severn and Stour and has a population of around 20,000.

The plate on the shield with the Admiralty anchor (right) recording the adoption by Kidderminster Rural District Council of HMS Vansittart in December 1941 and the naval trawler HMS Horatio in March 1942. HMS Horatio was sunk on 7 Jan 1943.

The commemorative plate attached to the Admiralty Shield (on left) bearing the crest of HMS Vansittart presented to Kidderminster Rural District. A second shield bearing the crest of HMS Vansittart was presented to Kidderminster Urban District.

The Mayor of Kidderminster, Alderman Osman W. Davies presents the plaque to  Lt Cdr Thomas Johnston, DSC, the CO of HMS Vansittart on 13 June 1942 Courtesy of his Grandson, Andrew Johnston

The plaque was presented by Kidderminster to the Sea Cadet Unit in July 1948 Courtesy of Liz Hampton, Grand daughter of Lt H.W.B. Maund RNVR

She found a large ship's flag plus a bell incribed TS Vansittart engraved with the name Lt H.W.B. Maund dated 13 August 1945 which may have been presented to TS Vansittart when the Sea Cadet Unit was founded two days before VJ Day. She is unable to tell me if her Grandfather served in the Navy but things will become clearer as she and her sister sort through the contents of their parents house at Bulkington, nar Coventry.

The flag can be seen on the table in the photograph (above) taken on HMS Vansittart when the Mayor presented the plaque to her CO, Lt Cdr Thomas Johnston RN at a "West Country port" on 13 June 1942. The photograph was sent to me by his grandson, Andrew Jackson in Canada. Liz Hampton, the grand daughter of Lt H.W.B. Maund RNVR, the Commanding Officer of Training Ship (TS) VANSITTART, sent me the photograph of the plaque found in her father's garage.  It was returned by the ship to the town before Vansittart went to the breaker's yard.



Harry Maund was born on 9 February 1903 at Rochford, two miles east of Tenbury Wells, a market town in the Malvern Hills eighteen miles north west of Worcester and eighteen miles from Kidderminster. He was married and living in Kidderminster when his son Brian was born there in 1936. Liz thinks her grandfather was an engineer but there is no record of him having served in the war. He is may have been in a reserved occupation. The town’s carpet factories made munitions and aircraft parts during the war and the Royal Ordnance had a factory at Summerfield. The medal on the left in the photograph of Henry Maund saluting could be the 1945 Defence Medal: "A campaign medal instituted by the UK in May 1945 to be awarded to citizens of the British Commonwealth for both non operational military and certain types of civilian war service during WW2". He could have been employed as a civilian in defence related work for which he was awarded the 1945 Defence Medal.

The Kidderminster Sea Cadet Unit was formed in 1945 and he was appointed its first CO when he was 42. He seemed rather elderly and stout to the cadets who referred to him as "Ticker" Maund, "he had a brace on his leg and when he walked he sounded like an old clock". He lived in Hurcott Road with a tall flag pole in front of his house but “my dad always said that the closest he ever got to the sea was Stourport” (to quote the son of a sea cadet) but he was very proud of his work with the Kidderminster Sea Cadets as demonstrated by the photographs below sent to me by his grand daughter.

The Kidderminster Shuttle occasionally published news about the Sea Cadet Unit. On 25 July 1955 the Shuttle published a story about two cadets of Kidderminster No 430 Unit being amongst the 360 cadets of the Sea Cadet Corps (SCC) which attended the National Swimming and Diving Championship on Jersey on 20 July. The cadets embarked at Portsmouth on the Battle Class destroyer HMS Vigo which had the same name as a former V & W Class destroyer, and HMS Murray, a frigate. They were taken on a coach tour of the island and spent a night in London at TS Neptune before redturning home. The significance of the article about the "Sea Cadets' Champion" from Kidderminster is that the lifebuoy identifies the Sea Cadet Unit as Number 340, the last sea cadet unit to be founded during the war.

Life changed dramatically for Lt Cdr Harry Maund when his wife died towards the end of the 1960ies. He left Kidderminster and moved to Wolverhampton, seventeen miles north. Harry remarried and bought a yacht. He spent most of his time at the Lupins Hotel on the promenade at Weymouth where he sailed. The hotel was his correspondence address for mail. His grand daughter remembered the mast of his yacht was higher than his house in Wolverhampton and had built in cabins for cruising so by then he had far more experience of the sea than the sea cadets of Kidderminster thought! He died at Weymouth on 15 May 1979 and was buried there.

The Kidderminster Sea Cadet Unit no longer exists; it may have been Harry Maund's move to Wolverhampton after the death of his wife which led to its closure on 14 December 1966. I am hoping that the Sea Cadets in the photographs from his albums will provide further details. A Stourport and Kidderminster Sea Cadet Unit existed for many years but is thought to have closed through lack of funds more than ten years ago.

To find out how follow this link: http://www.holywellhousepublishing.co.uk/servicerecords.html