St Cleer farmer Roger Tamblin has shared a family link he has to the Battle of Jutland, the centenary of which was being marked yesterday (May 31).

Fought during the First World War off Denmark’s Jutland peninsula, the great naval battle between the British and German fleets raged over the two days of May 31 and June 1, 1916. The total loss of life was 9,823 men, of which British losses were 6,784, and German losses 3,039.

The British lost 15 ships and the Germans 11, but Germany failed in its aim of destroying a substantial portion of the larger British fleet.

Roger says his maternal grandfather, George Block, born in 1883, was in the Royal Navy and aged 33 when he went into the battle aboard The Mystic, sailing from Devonport. His ship survived a hit but George lost an eye to shrapnel.

‘He seemed to be quite lucky,’ said Roger, ‘because in 1932 he was sailing with Ixia in the Merchant Navy from Swansea to New York. The ship ran into a terrible storm during which my grandfather was washed overboard. However, the next wave washed him back onto the ship. Although one of his legs was badly injured, leading to him being an invalid, he had again survived.’ Roger’s mother was Muriel Block, who married Gordon Tamblin, of Dobwalls.