Commander Douglas Hunt

Kyt · Aug 25, 2008

Commander Douglas Hunt - Telegraph

Commander Douglas Hunt, who has died aged 91, won two DSCs while serving with Coastal Forces during the Second World War.

In April 1943 Hunt took command of MTB 245 in 22nd MTB Flotilla, operating in the English Channel. Over the next few months he undertook 33 minelaying operations, with the aim of curtailing the enemy's ability to counter the planned Normandy landings. He was often so close to the Dutch shore that he could see the tulip fields.

On one occasion he spent several hours searching the North Sea before picking up the entire crew of a USAAF Flying Fortress. One of the men he rescued was Lt-Col Louis G Thorup, who had just led a 1,000-bomber raid on Germany; Hunt and Thorup became lifelong friends.

Hunt was also involved in two fierce, if inconclusive, battles with small enemy craft close inshore; on both occasions his boat suffered damage and had to be sent to be repaired by Brooke Marine at Oulton Broad.

In the New Year of 1944 he repelled an attack by a Messerschmitt fighter, which eventually flew off with smoke trailing from a wing. Hunt did not notice until after the engagement that there were bullet holes around him on the bridge and in one of his boat's torpedoes.

After receiving instructions to land agents on the Dutch coast, in early April 1944 Hunt engaged with an enemy convoy off Terschelling, pressing home his attack to close range, only to be frustrated when both his torpedoes misfired.

On the night of September 8/9, Hunt was the senior officer of four MTBs involved in a fierce fight with a superior force of armed trawlers off Scheveningen. Two of his flotilla had already scored torpedo hits, and Hunt's MTB 245 was planing at speed towards its target when its thin wooden hull was smashed by a 3in shell.

The inrush of water through the hole in the hull doused the flames, but Hunt lost his rudder. He nonetheless insisted on co-ordinating the attack while steering by his engines; at 0315 he succeeded in torpedoing an armed trawler at 1,500 yards.

Then, although unwilling to abandon the action, Hunt transferred his ammunition to another MTB before being towed in his own boat to Felixstowe – stern first, in order to reduce the amount of flooding. By the time he entered harbour, only MTB 245's superstructure and a few inches of the hull were showing above water.

Hunt was awarded a DSC and Bar, receiving both at the same investiture.

Douglas Eric James Hunt was born on July 14 1916 and educated at St Paul's School. He went on to Christ's College, Cambridge, but came down after only two years because his services were required in the family's printing business, based at Ealing.

In 1939 he joined the Mounted Local Defence Volunteers, and his first instinct was to join the cavalry; but when he approached the Secretary of State for War, Leslie Hore Belisha, who was a neighbour near his home at Wimbledon, he learned that the cavalry was about to be mechanised. Instead, attracted by the daredevil image enjoyed by Coastal Forces, Hunt opted to join the RNVR.

He was supposed to join the battle cruiser Hood, but was prevented from doing so by a bout of measles. He was thus recuperating at home when, in May 1941, Hood was sunk in the North Atlantic by Bismarck with the loss of all but three of her 1,421 crew.

On recovery Hunt found himself in the battleship Renown, part of Force H. Although he hated the food, he thought Admiral Sir James Somerville and his flag captain, Rhoderick "Wee Mac" McGrigor, "marvellous men".

After being commissioned in November 1941, Hunt served in a variety of small craft until he got his first taste of action on November 9/10 1942 as a sub-lieutenant and second-in-command of MTB 83 in a night action off Terschelling. In the next few months he took part in several bloody skirmishes.

Twice there were attempts to send him to the Far East, but Hunt preferred to remain at home, where he was certain of action and there was the prospect of command of MTB 245.

In September 1945 he took command of MTB 392, which was still under test by John Rix and Peter du Cane, of Vosper. After becoming senior officer of 31st MTB Flotilla, he retired in January 1946 to found the MTB/MGB Officers' Association. For the next 60 years he ran its reunions, displaying an encyclopaedic knowledge of names, faces and events. In 1999 he was appointed MBE in recognition of this work.

After the war Hunt's energy was directed into sport.

He had been the Old Pauline squash champion in 1939, and regained his title in 1947, holding it again from 1951 to 1957; he was the Old Pauline squash club's honorary secretary from 1938 to 1973. He also played at championship level in the Wimbledon and Surrey leagues.

When the family firm was bought by Wiggins Teape in 1973, Hunt managed the Ealing office of Guide Dogs for the Blind before retiring to Polsted Manor, near Guildford. He then devoted himself to playing real tennis at Hampton Court and riding to hounds on his favourite horse, Monty, with the Chiddingfold and Leconfield.

A diminutive man with a zest for life, Hunt always enjoyed a party. In his days in command of MTB 245, he liked to relax by going up to London where he would dine on oysters, visit the Coconut Club and enjoy the music of the bandleader Edmundo Ross.

For his 80th birthday he held a party at Loseley Park, Surrey, an event which he reprised every year subsequently; and at which each year the girls seemed to get younger, prettier and more numerous. The wake that followed his death on July 8 was held on what would have been his 92nd birthday.

His voluminous correspondence has been donated to the Coastal Forces' Association and his extensive library to St Paul's School.

Duggie Hunt never married; but while some foxes got away from him in the field, few pretty riders escaped his clutches.
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Antipodean Andy · Aug 25, 2008

What a character. These small boats men really knew how to press on.

Duggie Hunt never married; but while some foxes got away from him in the field, few pretty riders escaped his clutches.
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Very good obituary. Written by someone who knew him well, I reckon. RIP.

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