William Edward Sanders

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William Sanders VC.
Photo submitted by Simon Manchee.

William Edward Sanders VC, DSO, (7 February 1883 - 14 August 1917) was a New Zealander recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.

Born in Auckland on 7 February 1883, Sanders was a highly experienced and intelligent sailor, having worked on steam and sailing ships since 1897. The outbreak of World War I found him in Britain, having just survived the wrecking of his sailing barque in the North Sea and he spent the next year as a Merchant Navy officer on the troopships Moeraki and Willochra. He rapidly became bored with this service, and in June 1915 Sanders was gazetted an acting lieutenant in the Royal Naval Reserve. It was in this rank and position that he served until 1916, when he was granted a position on a Q ship operating against German submarines in the Western Approaches. He was first given the Helgoland, but in February 1917, when he was 34 years old, he was put in command of the Prize, a German sailing barque seized in 1914 and now employed as a lure against submarines.

On 30 April 1917 about 180 miles south of Ireland, in the Atlantic, Lieutenant Sanders was in command of HMS Prize, a three-masted topsail schooner (one of the Q ships) when she was attacked by German U-boat U-93 and badly damaged by shellfire. After the 'panic party' had taken to the boats and the ship appeared to be sinking, the U-boat approached to within 80 yards of her port quarter, whereupon the White Ensign was hoisted and the Prize opened fire. Within a few minutes the submarine was on fire and her bows rose in the air, whilst the Prize was further damaged. The U-boat disappeared from sight, and was believed to have been sunk by the crew of the Prize and by several of the German crew (including her captain) who had been blown or jumped into the sea.

Amazingly, neither of the crippled ships had sunk, with the Prize being towed in flames back to Kinsale, while the U-93 struggled back to the Sylt nine days later after a dramatic escape effort through the British mine and destroyer barrages off Dover. Four months later the Prize was lost, when patrolling with the British submarine D-9 in the same area. In this instance, the U-43 spotted the ships and was attacked in a very similar manner to her compatriot. Her captain had been warned by the survivors of U-93, and so did not engage too closely, instead, firing two torpeodes into the fragile Prize, blowing her to pieces. Rescue craft were unable to find a trace of her crew when they arrived in the area, long after the U-boat had escaped.

Thus was Lieutenant (later Lieutenant-Commander) Sanders killed in action, at sea in the Atlantic near southern Ireland, on 14 August 1917, along with his entire crew. In June 1918, Sanders' father received his son's V.C. and DSO from the Governor-General of New Zealand at Auckland Town Hall, and in his honour, a sailing trophy, the Sanders Cup was instituted, and is still contested to this day.