Painting depicting astonishing sea drama vessel is up for auction
A painting of the Edwardian Humber steamship, SS Wrexham(Image: johntaylors.com)
A painting of the Edwardian Humber passenger steamship involved in one of the most astonishing sea dramas of the First World War is to go under the hammer in an auction on Tuesday (September 1), after turning up in a house clearance. The SS Wrexham was a Russian-built passenger ship that was bought by the Great Central Railway in 1905 and brought to the Humber for its Hull and Grimsby ferry services to the continent.
Four months into the First World War, the Wrexham was moved south to help out with Eastern Railways’ Harwich to Rotterdam service and it was on a run to the continent on March 2, 1915 when the German submarine U-12 surfaced and ordered the ship to stop. The Wrexham’s captain James Fryatt declined the invitation and there then followed an astonishing chase in which Fryatt pushed the Wrexham – official top speed of 14 knots – 40 miles across the North Sea at 18 knots, reaching Rotterdam just a few hundred yards ahead of the pursuing submarine.
The Wrexham and her crew received a heroes’ welcome but Captain Fryatt had become a marked man. The Germans got him just three months later.
With the Wrexham out of action getting its burnt-out funnels and thrashed engines sorted out Fryatt was given the larger and faster SS Brussels but it was that ship that a flotilla of German torpedo boats managed to corner and take in to Zeebrugge. The Germans then did something that caused international shock and outrage.
Despite Captain Fryatt’s civilian and non-combatant status he was put on trial in a brief court martial, condemned to death and shot the same day. The painting of the Wrexham in Tuesday’s auction – the work of the Dutch marine artist Alfred Jansen (1859-1935) – has come from the home of a Grimsby trawler skipper who picked it up for a song at a car boot sale.
James Laverack, of Louth auctioneers John Taylors, said: ”The painting is signed A.J. Jansen and is inscribed Antwerpen ‘06, so it was done very shortly after the Great Central Railway bought the ship and began using it on the North Sea crossings. It has been entered into the auction by members of the family of John Dacombe, one of the leading Grimsby trawler skippers of the 1960s and 70s, who after retirement became a fan of car boot sales.
“The Wrexham was one of his finds and it joined the mass of trawler and shipping paintings and photographs with which he adorned the walls of his home. Skipper Dacombe died some years ago but his collection of pictures remained in place until members of the family had to clear the house following the death of his wife last year.
“The family were unaware of the exploits of the ship depicted in their painting and they were quite astonished when we briefed them on the story.” Meanwhile Skipper Dacombe’s collection yielded another railway company steamship painting that is believed to be the work of Alfred Jansen – a portrait of the SS Dewsbury, a vessel built on the Humber, at Earle’s Shipyard in Hull, in 1910.
She was one of four ships ordered for the Great Central Railways Grimsby-Hamburg and Hull-Zeebrugge services. James said: “Like the Wrexham the Dewsbury also had a close shave during the First World War.
“She was actually berthed in Hamburg when the war broke out but managed to escape and get safely home to the Humber. Unlike the Wrexham, which was wrecked in the White Sea in 1918 while on the way from Grimsby to Murmansk with a cargo of ammunition, the Dewsbury survived that war and the next – in which she served a convoy escort vessel – achieving the ripe old age of 50 before being scrapped.
“Her bell is preserved in the collection of the Science Museum.” James said: “Jansen’s ship paintings have sold for well over £1,000 pounds but these two 120-year-old paintings are in need of a clean – and in the case of the Wrexham, some restoration work – and for that reason they are being sold together as pair and have been given a modest pre-sale estimate of just a couple of hundred pounds.”
The auction catalogue is available on the firm’s website, johntaylors.com and the viewing sessions are on Sunday and Monday, August 30 and 31, 1pm-3pm. The auction starts at 10am on Tuesday.
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