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THE SON of a Malton war veteran, who survived what has been labelled as Britain's worst maritime disaster of the Second World War, will be joining families of other survivors on a pilgrimage next month in a bid to find out what happened.
But Clive Inman believes their hopes are slim of ascertaining the true facts about the loss of His Majesty's Troop Ship Lancastria, which was sunk by a German plane while anchored outside the French port of St Nazaire with the loss of as many as 6,000 lives.
The scale of the catastrophe was such that Prime Minister Winston Churchill forbade any publicity about the incident, because of the impact it would have had on British morale, says Mr Inman, of Leat Close, Norton, whose father was Bill Inman, who spent much of his working life at Malton's General Post Office.
It was on June 17, 1940, that the Lancastria, a former Cunard liner, was lost.
"While the evacuation of British and French forces from Dunkirk that same year had been a great success story, not all British service personnel were evacuated," said Mr Inman.
"A further evacuation took place of St Nazaire, where thousands of British and French and other nationalities sought escape from the unstoppable German advance across Europe," he said.
Lancastria took on board as many people as possible, said Mr Inman. "It was built as a liner for 3,000 people, but it had as many as 9,000 troops on board when it was sunk. But only about 2,500 were rescued. More people died than lost their lives on the Titanic and Lusitania put together."
The official documents relating to the sinking of the Lancastria were put under wraps for 100 years, he said.
"To this day, no official Government documents relating to the sinking have been released, and will not be until 2040. Only then will the real horror of the tragedy be revealed."
He said: "Bodies were being washed up on the French beaches for weeks after the sinking."
Mr Inman will be joining relatives of some of the lost, and the estimated 19 survivors still alive, on a trip to St Nazaire organised by the Lancastria Association.
Bill Inman, who died in 1992 at the age of 88, was a prominent member of Norton Garden Holders' Association and was one of the leaders of a big campaign to save allotments in Beverley Road, when land was earmarked for housing.
Eventually, they moved to Hyde Park and established new gardens.
During his wartime career, Mr Inman, who was a sergeant in the 2nd East Yorkshire Regiment, received the Dunkirk Medal and other medals and stars for his service in France and Germany, and later the Imperial Service Medal for his service to the Post Office.
He served in the postal section of the Royal Engineers, serving in France and Belgium, but despite being taken prisoner managed to escape with others to St Nazaire.
He had been a regular in the East Yorkshire Regiment in the 1920s, then volunteered to go into the Royal Engineers in the 1939-45 war when he became part of the British Expeditionary Force.
The Lancastria Association held a similar pilgrimage three years ago, but this year's, in the second week of June, is expected to be the last, says Mr Inman, who spent his career in the Post Office, starting as a telegraph boy in Malton. He became a postman in the town, before moving to Harrogate and Leeds as a manager.
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