ALBERT Edward Finch Young, who has died aged 96, was a survivor of the Arctic Convoys, which ferried vital arms and supplies to Britain’s Soviet allies during the Second World War. The convoys were once characterised by Sir Winston Churchill as “the worst journey in the world” and none was worse than the ill-fated PQ17.
When Renfrew-born Albert Young and his fellow crewmen on board the destroyer HMS Windsor were ordered to Loch Ewe in September 1942 to accompany convoy PQ18, they already knew the terrible fate of its predecessor. Ordered to scatter because of a perceived threat from German surface vessels, the merchant ships of PQ17 had been mercilessly picked off one at a time by the Luftwaffe. Less than a third of the vessels reached Russia and 153 seamen lost their lives. “We knew lots of men had drowned but we didn’t have time to be scared,” said Mr Young later.
At the last minute the Windsor was switched from the main convoy and ordered to accompany two oil tankers to Spitzbergen, only re-joining the convoy on its return from Archangel. Though most of PQ18 got through, 13 ships were lost, including HMS Somali, a damaged destroyer that broke in half and sank before Mr Young's eyes, along with many of its skeleton crew.
In fact, Mr Young's war service turned out to be a series of lucky escapes. Part of his job on the Windsor was to captain a Y gun crew. One night a shell hit his gun and set it ablaze. His team managed to douse the flames before the Germans got a chance to use the fire for a spot of target practice. On another, the Windsor sunk a German cruiser off the French coast. “You didn’t want to see seamen getting killed but during the War it was a question of them or us,” said Mr Young.
His luck was sometimes ascribed to the fact that he was his father’s seventh son. And as well as six older brothers (four of whom fought in the War) he had three sisters. He had been born in in 1919 in Bell St, Renfrew, where his father worked as a master joiner for Lord Blythswood. The aristocrat sometimes visited the Young family, once memorably describing Albert as “the beautiful baby”.
Home was a three-roomed tenement flat, with two double bed recesses in the kitchen, and summer holidays were spent in Tighnabruaich, which became a home from home. Nearly a century later, he could still name the streets there. Understandably, Albert spent much of his youth outdoors and developed a taste for tramping the hills. (He remained a keen runner well into his retirement and continued hill walking up to his mid-80s.)
As the son of a well-known lay preacher, he was fortified by his Christian faith throughout his life, continuing to sing hymns with gusto right up to his death.
Having begun his working life at 14 as an apprentice welder at Babcock & Wilcox, he joined the Royal Navy three years later and could not wait to play his part when war with Germany was declared in 1939. “War didn’t frighten me one bit.” Though strongly tempted to stay on in the Royal Navy after the war, he eventually opted to return to his welder’s job and marry Mattie, the sweetheart he had met at his local church. His career would take him all over the UK and Northern Ireland.
Though Albert and Mattie did not have children, Mr Young remained very close to his wider family. His humility and cheerfulness made him a favourite uncle. For many years his fine bass voice graced the Rolls Royce male voice choir in East Kilbride and he was a lifelong supporter of his local football team, Renfrew Juniors.
Some years after his wife’s death, he took up residence at Orchard Court sheltered housing complex in Renfrew but moved to Erskine in 2014 following diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease. The move gave him a new lease of life and he was soon welcoming friends and family to his immaculately shipshape room. His life story features in Century of Care, the book published last month to celebrate the centenary of Scotland’s leading veterans’ charity.
Though he had seven medals, in 2014 Russian Consul General Andrey Pritsepov travelled to Erskine to present Mr Young with a coveted Ushakov Medal in recognition of his role in the Arctic convoys. Recently asked how he viewed the convoys in an era when Germany feels more like an ally than Russia, his reply was unequivocal: “Hitler had to be stopped. He wanted to rule the world and he got half way there too. We were only a small nation. We needed the Russians and they needed us.”
Mr Young's nine siblings all predeceased him but he is survived by ten nephews and nieces and their families.
ANNE JOHNSTONE
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