A PENSIONER who served his country as a submariner during the second world war was given the chance to relive his past thanks to the detective work of a historian.

Great-grandfather Tommy York, aged 80, now lives in Borron Road, Earlestown, near St Helens, with his wife Margaret. However, during the war he served as a stoker on HMS Thrasher, a 273 foot T-class submarine, which was sent to help the Allied Forces in the Mediterranean and the Far East.

The submarine survived the war but Tommy described how an incident in 1942 almost sunk it.

"It was in July and as we were running along the surface, a German Swordfish plane dropped four bombs which we later found out were about 250Ibs each. Three of them dropped on target and exploded on the ship and it was in a bit of difficulty for a while. The battery was on fire and severely damaged and none of the lights were working."

Fortunately for Tommy and the rest of the 61-strong crew, the bombs had failed to put any of the craft's essential motors out of action and they eventually managed to get the engines up and running again before making their way to the nearest harbour at Port Said in Egypt.

Tommy added: "It was a very frightening experience but we couldn't afford to worry because we had to get the ship up and running again."

After leaving HMS Thrasher, Tommy went on to serve on another submarine, HMS Spark before finally retiring from the navy in 1946.

However, he recently got the chance to relive his old memories when a historian contacted him after reading about the adventures of Thrasher. Tommy was then delighted to receive a copy of a painting of the submarine during its heyday which had been signed by all the surviving crew members.

"It was nice to be reminded of those times and see that so many crew members who I had lost touch with are still living after all this time."

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