AUDREY Mansell from the Isle of Man has contacted Looking Back with this incredible story of wartime bravery and humanity.

Taking place exactly 70 years ago, it concerns her naval officer father, Harry Kinley, who was second officer on a ship that brought hundreds of evacuee children into Weymouth from Guernsey.

Mrs Mansell is sharing his memories with us in the hope that some of the evacuees, or someone who knows them, will come forward and help fill in the complete story of their voyage to safety.

She writes: “I do recall my father telling me that the local people turned out to welcome the children and that soldiers, recently evacuated themselves, cheered their arrival.

“What I hope is, that somewhere, in the archives or in the attics and cupboards of Weymouth, there are snaps or even written records of that day.”

And here is Harry’s story: MY name is Harry Kinley and in 1940, aged 30, I was second officer on board the SS Viking, an Isle of Man Steam Packet Company passenger ship, commissioned by the navy as a troopship. We were evacuating troops from the French Channel ports to Southampton when we were ordered to proceed to Guernsey and to evacuate as many of the schoolchildren and their teachers as possible.

“Navigating the waters around the Channel Islands was difficult but fortunately I had kept all the charts up to date and we had a very good ship’s master, Captain James Brisdon. We docked without trouble at number one berth in St Peter Port at 4am on June 21, 1940.

“By 9am, the children were arriving in great numbers and I will never forget the sight of those thousands of children lined up on the pier with their gas mask cases over their shoulders and carrying small cases. Aged from four to seventeen they came aboard, many of them in tears. It was hard to keep back our own tears, I can tell you. We stopped counting the children after 1,800 and with the teachers and helpers, there must have been well over 2,000 on board.

“The ship was packed – every cabin, corner and space was filled. Going around talking to the children, I found that they had been waiting so long, that most of them had eaten the food their parents had packed for them.

“They were hungry, poor mites. I went to Captain Bridson to report and he told me to strip the lifeboats of the provisions and distribute them among the children.

Together with the crew, I went round with sweets, cake, biscuits and even condensed milk, which we dished out in spoonfuls.

In my own cabin there were at least a dozen little ones with their sunday school teacher. This lady gave me her prayer book and I gave her my Merchant Navy badge. Another lady gave her front door key to Ned Gelling, our chief officer, and asked him to lock her front door if the ship went back to Guernsey because she had forgotten to do so.

“We finally set sail at 11am. Because we were a coal-burning ship we were very conspicuous and a passing warship signalled a message saying: ‘You are a pillar of smoke by day and a ball of fire by night and can be seen for 20 miles’. We signalled back: ‘Thank you, we know’.

“There were mines in the Channel and enemy aircraft overhead and we had one old gun and no escort. A plane did swoop down over us, which caused a bit of panic but it was one of ours, and this made the children cheer.

We said our prayers and zigzagged across to England with our precious cargo, eventually landing safely at Weymouth, where crowds on the quayside sent up a cheer.

As the children disembarked, I was standing with Captain Bridson at the gangway saying goodbye and I said to him: “I wonder what will become of them all?”

“So do I, Harry,” he said.

“I wish we could sail on to the Isle of Man with them, they would be safe there.”

From Weymouth, the children were put on to trains and taken, with their school teachers, to many parts of England and Scotland, where they were to remain for the next five years, as it transpired. But for many of the children the separation from Guernsey was to be much longer. They never went back and the island lost a significant part of a generation.

Curiously enough, some years later, my niece married a young man from Glasgow, who turned out to be one of the very same Guernsey children who had been evacuated on the Viking. He had not returned to Guernsey after the war.

A Manxman, born and raised on a small island, and a father, I could well imagine the feelings of the parents.

Fearful of the German invasion and not knowing what lay ahead, they made that heartbreaking decision to send the children away for their own safety. I had many memorable experience during the war years and a lifetime at sea – but I shall never forget is the evacuation of the children from Guernsey.”

If anyone can help fill in the gaps, please get in touch.