WW2 submariner's flag with Dorset link sells for £13,000
The World War Two relic went under the hammer at Bovington Tank Museum this weekend.
A World War Two Relic with a Dorset connection has sold for £13,000 in an auction at Bovington Tank Museum.
The unique Jolly Roger flag was made by sumbariners on the legendary HMS Unborken during World War Two.
The sailors added stars, canons and bars relating to the number of ships they’d sunk, and daggers showing how many ‘cloak and dagger’ operations they had completed.
The rare flag was consigned by the family of Petty Officer Fred Sharp DSM, who served on the boat and later ran The Mermaid in Wyke Regis.
The tradition of creating Jolly Roger flags on submarines began in WWI after First Sea Lord Admiral Sir Arthur Wilson claimed the vessels were ‘underhanded, unfair and damned un-English’.
He added that the crews ought to be hanged as pirates.
The tradition continued in WWII and now these flags are incredibly rare.
The flag that sold in Bovington went for a hammer price of £10,000 plus £3,000 in additional fees. Fred Sharp handed it down to his family, who say they felt the time was right to pass the items on to a museum.
Gordon Sharp, Fred’s grandson, said: “My grandfather didn’t really talk about the war and it was only around 15 years ago after he died that we found out what he had done.
“He was the one who actually made the Jolly Roger flag, which was the reason he got to keep it. He just used bits of material on board to create it.
“After the war he ran a pub in the Wyke Regis area of Weymouth, which was fittingly called The Mermaid.
“He was a man who enjoyed socialising, loved a whisky and his family was extremely important to him.
“We now feel the time is right to sell these items and hope perhaps it might be bought by a museum.”