Humphrey Davies served in HMS Glen Avon during 1941. A paddle steamer built in 1912 it had rescued 888 troops from Dunkirk and in 1941 was again being used as a minesweeper, a role she had already fulfilled in WW1. The end came when she sank at her moorings in 1944 off Seine Bay, Normandy, during a storm.
Humphrey Davies, Born 1904
RNVR OFFICER IN WORLD WAR II
Thomas Humphrey Davies was the third child of the Reverend Thomas Henry Davies and Winifred Mary Ainsworth. He was christened in his father’s church of St.Catherine’s, Barton upon Irwell, near Salford. After attending local schools, part of his education was at Manchester Grammar School. Humphrey was a founder member of the Urmston Motor Racing Club and particularly enjoyed races in which a passenger had to be carried. This was long before the days of seat-belts. Before the second World War he joined forces for a while with a motor engineer and the firm of Tumblety and Davies came into being. Shortly before the outbreak of war he joined forces with some friends to buy a Brixham trawler with the intention of plying between the UK and South America, bringing back cargoes of a rare mineral. He joined the RNVR in 1940, and served in the Royal Navy throughout the Second World War. After the war he worked for a textile firm in East Manchester. He then embarked a variety of his own enterprises, including selling his own brand of furniture polish, buying and selling collectables at auctions, and running laundrettes.
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Source: Contributed by the author, Gwyneth Wilkie, the niece of Humphrey Davies.