Dr Nina Baker OBE, and engineering historian and former seafarer, will tell us some of the stories of the courageous women seafarers who made the ultimate sacrifice in wartime. These and other stories are from her recent book, “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.
Most names on public war memorials are military men’s names, with a very few for Merchant Navy seafarers. Among the Merchant Navy seafarers who sailed voyage after voyage, knowing that each one might be their last as so many ships were sunk by enemy action, were a few women.
Her book is the first complete list of the female professional seafarers in the United Kingdom’s Merchant Navy who lost their lives due to enemy action. Detailed profiles have been researched for those women who were Scottish, bringing their stories to light for the first time.
Nina researched this book because she started to wonder who the women might be whose names are in the National Merchant Navy Roll of Honour. At the annual Merchant Navy Memorial Day events, some of these names are read out but she knew nothing about the women and their lives. It turned out that the National Roll was itself incomplete. Now, for the first time, complete lists of all known Merchant Navy women lost in the two world wars are provided and are enhanced by biographies of the Scottish women who made the final sacrifice. Nearly all have no grave but the sea.
Our Speaker
Dr Nina Baker has had a varied career, having sailed for seven years as a merchant navy deck officer on leaving school, and later taken an engineering design degree in her 30s, from the University of Warwick. She then gained a PhD in concrete durability from the University of Liverpool. She has lived with her family in Glasgow since 1989, working variously as a materials lecturer in further education and as a university research administrator and, until 2017, as an elected city councillor. Now retired from all that, her interest in promoting STEM careers for girls has led her to become an independent engineering historian, mainly specialising in the history of women in engineering. She was Deacon of the Incorporation of Hammermen of Glasgow for 2022-2023. She has been a Deputy Lieutenant in the Glasgow Lieutenancy since 2017 and was appointed an OBE in the 2023 New Year’s Honours’ list, for services to the history of women in engineering.
Her books:
Sisters Behind the Wheel: A global history of women’s motoring clubs, driving schools and garages.
“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
Beneath the Radar. An illustrated account of an ordinary radar operator’s life in RAF radar stations 1942-6
Adventures in Aeronautical Design: The Life of Hilda M. Lyon