252596 PO. Percival Thomas Price Royal Navy HMS Pozarica from:Lambeth, London Percy Price was my godfather and served on Pozarica for two years, including Convoy PQ17. His Naval career has also been documented in his IWM Sound Archive interviews.
He sadly passed away in 2007 and we miss him still. We remember him as a gentleman who had a long marriage to Margaret; a long career with London Transport after his RN service and as proud foster parents to several Barnados'children.
Percy's own recollections of Pozarica still make us think, especially his time serving on the Arctic Convoys, a quiet man sent with his crew into a form of Hades. He taught our family to sail, mainly at Wimbledon Park Lake and Lancing Sailing Club in Sussex, complete with RN terminology and colourful language as part of the whole experience. Percy's long-lost secret was that he possessed (and could play too) an old-fashioned One-man Band, with Bass drum, cymbals on his knees, harmonica and several other instruments. A Price family gathering was never a dull affair.
Percy helped his fellow Pozarica ship-mate Godfrey Winn with his post-War account of the whole situation, entitled PQ17 (written in the 1950s). We have a copy somewhere at home, with a haunting photo of Percy in the midst of a raging sea and sheets of ice on the heaving deck with icicles hanging from every part of the ship. God only knows how these brave men survived these situations, with the proverbial Swords of Damocles of the Luftwaffe and U-Boats to contend with as well as the savage weather.
He also served on HMS Hood between 1936-38, before his draft to other ships. My parents became Hood Association members for over 20 years. We admire the bravery of these men and the seeming mad sacrifice of over 3,000 sailors on both Hood and Bismarck during the Battle of the Denmark Strait in May 1942.
My father, Michael, read the eulogy for Percy at his funeral and was the most nervous man in the chapel. Everyone laughed at my father's recollections and I know that Mike wanted to give his old friend a proper send-off. He did just that! Thank you, Percy. You won't be forgotten easily, my friend.
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