Very Rare Great War Royal Navy / Royal Naval Air Service, Airship NS.3 Casualty 1914-15 Star Medal Trio and Memorial Plaque, One of Only 48 Airship Crew Casualties of WW1, consisting of 1914-15 star “M2687 G W PRINTER C.P.O MECH R.N” (official replacement), British War and Victory medals “M 2687 C W PRINTER C.P.O 3 RN” and bronze memorial plaque “CHARLES WILLIAM PRINTER”. Town of Gloucester memorial scroll named, “313869 Chief Mechanic Charles W Printer RAF”. The medals come with a large quantity of research. Charles William Printer served as a Chief Mechanic in the Royal Navy, Royal Naval Air Service and later Royal Air Force. He was the only son of Mrs I M Printer of Cherlyn, Linden Road, Gloucester. He drowned in the North Sea on the 22nd June 1918 whilst flying off East Fortune, RAF Air Station, aged 23. He is commemorated on the Hollybrook Memorial. The Gloucester Journal on Saturday July 6th 1918, “A Keen and Clever Engineer, Mrs Printer, Cherlyn, Linden Road, Gloucester, has received official information that her son, Charles Printer, Chief Engineer, Royal Naval Air Force, lost his life on 22nd June. In a letter of sympathy to Mrs Printer in her bereavement, an officer writes, He was a very keen and clever engineer and a very hard worker, never complaining even under the most trying circumstances. It was typical of him that he carried out the orders for the engines up to the last moment with extraordinary promptness, although in imminent danger, and thus probably reduced the loss of life which would otherwise of occurred. It may be some consolation for you in your sorrow to know that your son made the great sacrifice splendidly, which is the best a man can do in this war. His loss will be felt not only by those that knew him, but also by the service to which he belonged. Men such as he are rare, and I know that I for one do not expect to serve with a better engineer. Deceased was an old Sir T Rich’s Boy. On leaving school he entered the Royal Navy as a boy Artificier. After completing his training as an engineer he passed into the Royal Naval Air Service, where he did such good service that he was recommended for a commission as a Technical Officer in the Royal Air Force.” Charles William Printer was serving on Airship NS.3 on the evening of 21st June 1918, an account of the incident in which he was killed is detailed in the book, The British Airship at War, page 77, “On the evening of 21st June 1918, NS.3 left East Fortune on convoy duty, but she encountered very strong winds and was compelled to turn back to seek safety at her base. All through the night she forced her way south, but by daybreak the wind had increased to about 40 knots and NS.3 was still some way from home and crawling along over the Firth of Forth. The ship was being heavily buffeted, making it increasingly difficult to maintain the envelope in its correct shape, and the co-pilot, Flight Lieutenant P E Maitland, had alternately to lower the airscoops and to pull on the valves as the pressure varied wildly from one minute to the next. At the same time the pilot was struggling with the elevator wheel, trying to keep the ship level and at a safe height above the waves. Suddenly, not far from Dunbar and about three miles from shore, the ship began to fall, driven down by the force of the gale in spite of full engine power. Her bows pointing steeply upward, she struck the sea with an impact that tore off the engine car, which sank immediately. The loss of this considerable weight aft caused the ship to soar again into the air, with her nose now tilted sharply downwards. All those members of the crew left in the control car clung on desperately, knowing there was no hope left for the airship and little for themselves. Commander Wheelwright shook hands with the coxswain, and as the W/T operator attempted to signal for help with the Aldis lamp, the ship dipped to the vertical, gas poured out through rents in her envelope and she hovered momentarily before plunging into the water. The two engineers had already gone down with the engines; now the coxswain, a gunner and one of the W/T operators also drowned, caught up in the tangle of wreckage. The other five men struggled clear and were able to scramble onto a flat part of the envelope, where they held on grimly as it slowly sank beneath them. Mercifully a Destroyer arrived in time to pick up the survivors. What was left of the airship was sunk by gunfire.” Only 48 men serving in airships during WW1 were casualties, which is extremely low and as such very rare to find.
