'Supposed Killed or Drowned': The Lost Women of the Merchant Navy in WW1 and WW2
The Mariner's Mirror PodcastShow Notes
In this episode we explore a part of maritime history that has too often drifted beneath the surface: women who served at sea in the First and Second World Wars, and who died for their service. To find out more, Dr Sam Willis spoke with Nina Baker, author of a fabulous new book exploring the lives of those women. Nina has created the first complete list of all of these women and has written detailed profiles for those who were Scottish, bringing their stories to light for the first time. These are women who travelled and worked to survive, but disappeared doing so. By tracing those lives, Nina's work says a great deal about what their absences reveal about all sorts of things: danger, memory, class, migration, and of course, the human cost of maritime life. We hear about the research behind the book, the voices history chose to preserve, and of course, the ones it allowed to sink beneath the waves. We also explore why those stories matter now, and how recovering them changes the way we understand both the sea and the societies built around it. And just to make this episode even more interesting, if it's in any way possible, Nina herself has a great story: She became one of the first women navigation officers in the British Merchant Navy, a pioneer in opening up access to seafaring careers for women. She rose through the ranks of an industry that for centuries had been male dominated. She also shares some of her early maritime experiences. Her book is called “Supposed Killed or Drowned by Enemy Action at Sea” Scottish Merchant Navy women who died as a result of enemy action in the First and Second World Wars.
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