Audrey Roche - Telegraph Audrey Roche, who died on January 13 aged 90, is thought to have been the only woman decorated for bravery at sea during the Second World War; as a Wren whose ship had been torpedoed, she saved the life of a drowning seaman by giving him her lifebelt, and she was mentioned in despatches. As Third Officer Audrey Coningham, she was one of 1,135 passengers in the 15,000-ton submarine depot ship Medway, which, shortly after 8am on June 30 1942, was torpedoed by Kapitanleutnant Heinz-Joachim Neumann's U-372 while being escorted by a cruiser and several destroyers from Alexandria to Haifa. Hundreds of men were thrown into the water along with 47 torpedoes which had broken from their stowage (and were later salvaged and used against the enemy). Audrey Coningham, who had been one of three Wrens on board, swam towards the destroyer Hero, but so many people were crowded around the scrambling nets that she turned and swam towards another ship further off. She had been swimming for between 15 and 30 minutes when she saw two men clinging together. Only one had a lifebelt, and he was supporting the other, whose head kept disappearing beneath the waves. Even though she did not know how long she would be in the water, Audrey Coningham, who had learned lifesaving at her convent school, managed to pull off her own lifebelt and put it on the drowning man. Leading Seaman Leslie Crossman, who had injured his legs sliding across the barnacles on Medway's upturned hull, always remembered her words: "Lie still. You'll be all right. Trust me." Audrey Coningham's selfless act enabled Crossman to stay afloat until he was rescued by a boat. while she swam to the destroyer Zulu, where, after another 20 minutes adrift, she was plucked from the water. The smallest man on board gave up his spare shirt and shorts to dress her. Despite a recommendation from senior officers on the spot, and the strong, personal support of Admiral Sir Henry Harwood, Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean, for the immediate award of the Albert Medal (since replaced by the George Cross), it took the Honours and Awards Committee in London six months to deliberate. Eventually it was held that – as a strong swimmer – Coningham had not put her own life at risk, and that the witness to her bravery had helped in the rescue. Instead Coningham was awarded a mention in despatches, and the committee recommended "some publicity". This blithely stated that she had been swimming in the sea when she came across a drowning seaman. It did not admit that there had been Wrens in Medway or even that the ship had been lost. There were 30 dead from Medway. U-372 was sunk five weeks later by Zulu, and Crossman went on to earn the DSM later in the war and the BEM afterwards, and eventually became a grandfather. Despite the grudging nature of the award, Audrey Coningham wore her Oak Leaf decoration with pride – to the outrage of at least one male officer, who could not believe that she was entitled to it. Audrey Sylvia Coningham was born on July 12 1918 into a farming family in Sussex. After convent school she went to New South Wales to work as a ranchhand, where she heard that war had been declared. She returned home and joined the WRNS in 1940, becoming a cipher officer. She worked on the staff of the captain of the 1st Submarine Squadron in Alexandria and in Portsmouth, where she rose to second officer. In 1946 she married David Roche, an officer in the Army in India, where they lived until Partition in 1947. The couple then emigrated to Kenya, packing their two small children and family possessions into an Austin A40 Countryman. They drove through war-ravaged France and Italy, then across the Egyptian desert, and through Sudan and Uganda before arriving in Nairobi in 1951. As a keen golfer, she represented Kenya in international competitions and continued to play into her seventies. The Roches returned to England in 1975, travelling solely by sea, and settled in Wiltshire. When a reunion was arranged between her and Crossman in 1987, she told him: "I can't pretend I would have picked you out. You weren't smiling when we last met." In 2003 Audrey Roche opened an exhibition at the RN Submarine Museum, Gosport. On being asked if being in the Wrens was the most important part of her life, she replied: "Good heavens, no. My family is the best time of my life." She is survived by her five children.
What a woman ... God love her !! RIP Audrey ( I won't say the rest of what I want to say !!!!!!!!!!!!!! :mmph: )
A lady of determination and strength. RIP. It would seem the men on the "front line" knew bravery when they saw it...but not the admin types.
