Edwin Hunt (23 March 1920 – 9 July 2022) was a British waterman who served as a

sapper A sapper, also called a pioneer (military), pioneer or combat engineer, is a combatant or soldier who performs a variety of military engineering duties, such as breaching fortifications, demolitions, bridge-building, laying or clearing minefie ...

waterman in World War II, and was in 1978, appointed the Queen's Bargemaster.

Biography

Hunt was born in 1920 in the

London Borough of Camden The London Borough of Camden () is a London borough in Inner London. Camden Town Hall, on Euston Road, lies north of Charing Cross. The borough was established on 1 April 1965 from the area of the former boroughs of Hampstead, Holborn, and St ...

, and was bound apprentice to his father as a waterman (

lighterman A lighterman is a worker who operates a lighter, a type of flat-bottomed barge, which may be powered or unpowered. In the latter case, today it is usually moved by a powered tug. The term is particularly associated with the highly skilled men ...

) in 1935 on the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, se ...

where he learned to tow

Thames barge A Thames sailing barge is a type of commercial sailing boat once common on the River Thames in London. The flat-bottomed barges with a shallow draught and leeboards, were perfectly adapted to the Thames Estuary, with its shallow waters and narr ...

s with a rowing-boat. At the time, Hunt recalled in 1993, there were 7000 barges on the river and hundreds of tugs. Following the outbreak of the Second World War, Hunt volunteered as a

waterman in the

Royal Engineers The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually called the Royal Engineers (RE), and commonly known as the ''Sappers'', is a corps of the British Army. It provides military engineering and other technical support to the British Armed Forces and is heade ...

, and served in the

Battles of Narvik The Battles of Narvik were fought from 9 April to 8 June 1940, as a naval battle in the Ofotfjord and as a land battle in the mountains surrounding the north Norwegian town of Narvik, as part of the Norwegian Campaign of the Second World War. ...

(– part of the Norwegian campaign) – in April–May 1940. By 1944, he was commissioned, and as a captain commanded fifteen of the Rhino ferries on

Gold Beach Gold, commonly known as Gold Beach, was the code name for one of the five areas of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during the Second World War. Gold, the central of the five areas, was lo ...

on D-Day. In four months, all sixty-four of these landing craft put ashore 93,000 units (tanks, guns and vehicles) and 440,000 tons of military stores. During the last six months of the war in Europe, together with the Dutch hydraulics engineer Lt. C. L. M. Lambrechtsen van Ritthem, he advised the Chief Engineer Second Army, Brigadier "Ginger" Campbell, on the "opposed crossing of water obstacles", so that the longest floating Bailey bridge of the Second World War could be constructed at

Gennep Gennep () is a municipality and a city in upper southeastern Netherlands. It lies in the very northern part of the province of Limburg, 18 km south of Nijmegen. Furthermore, it lies on the right bank of the Meuse river, and south of the forest o ...

in the Netherlands. This bridge over the river Maas (Meuse) was long, and was opened on 19 February 1945. Demobilized as a major, he returned to civilian life as a college lecturer in navigation and watermanship at the City & East London College in London, from 1948 until 1985. As a Royal Waterman, he was appointed Queen's Bargemaster in 1978 and retired from royal service as a Member of the

Royal Victoria Order The Royal Victorian Order (french: Ordre royal de Victoria) is a dynastic order of knighthood established in 1896 by Queen Victoria. It recognises distinguished personal service to the British monarch, Canadian monarch, Australian monarch, or ...

in 1990. In March 2019, he was photographed for a World War II project. He died on 9 July 2022, at the age of 102.

References

External links

"Edwin Hunt – D-Day & Life on the Thames"Interview, December 2013. Sixth photograph from the left.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hunt, Ted 1920 births 2022 deaths British Army personnel of World War II English centenarians English male rowers Members of the Royal Victorian Order Men centenarians People from the London Borough of Camden Royal Engineers officers Royal Engineers soldiers