Harold Auten

The Q-Ship Commander Who Turned Disaster Into a Victoria Cross

A torpedo had ripped open the forward part of his ship. Men were wounded, the bridge was wrecked, and the vessel was slowly dying beneath him. Somewhere nearby, a German U-boat waited for the crippled ship to reveal its weakness. Lieutenant Harold Auten did exactly the opposite. He kept his hidden guns silent, allowed the enemy submarine to approach, and waited until the moment when escape would be almost impossible. What followed on 30 July 1918 became one of the most remarkable Q-ship actions of the First World War and earned Harold Auten of the Royal Naval Reserve the Victoria Cross.

Harold Auten VC, DSC, RD was born at Leatherhead, Surrey, on 22 August 1891. The son of retired Royal Navy Paymaster William Blee Auten and Edith Fanny Auten, he was educated at Wilson's Grammar School before going to sea as an apprentice with the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. His connection with the Royal Naval Reserve began in 1910, when he became a probationary midshipman. By the outbreak of the First World War, Auten was already developing the combination of merchant-seamanship experience and naval discipline that would later make him ideally suited to one of the war's most dangerous assignments.

That assignment was service in Q-ships, merchant vessels secretly armed to lure German submarines into exposing themselves. In September 1915 Auten joined the Q-ship HMS Zylpha, beginning a form of warfare in which deception, patience and extraordinary nerve were as important as gunnery. By 1917 he had command experience of his own, including service in Q16, also known as Heather. His work during the year brought his first major decoration. The Distinguished Service Cross was announced in the London Gazette on 6 April 1918 for service in Royal Navy vessels employed on patrol and escort duty during 1917. The official list specifically names Lieutenant Harold Auten, RNR, among those appointed to receive the DSC.

Yet the action that would define Harold Auten's place in naval history was still ahead.

On the afternoon of 30 July 1918, Auten commanded the 360-ton Q-ship HMS Stock Force in the English Channel. At about 5 p.m., a German submarine torpedoed the vessel. The explosion devastated the forward part of Stock Force, wrecked the bridge, wounded members of the crew and caused serious flooding. To the submarine watching from nearby, the British vessel appeared fatally damaged. That appearance was exactly what the Q-ship needed.

A specially organised "panic party" abandoned ship as part of the deception while Auten, the gun crews and essential engine-room personnel remained concealed at their posts. The submarine surfaced and watched. Auten still refused to expose his weapons. As the U-boat came closer, the boat carrying the panic party began rowing back toward Stock Force, helping draw the submarine into the killing zone. Only when the enemy vessel was approximately 300 yards away and positioned so that both hidden guns could bear did Auten give the order to fire.

The effect was devastating. The opening fire damaged a periscope and struck the conning tower. Another round hit near the waterline, and the Q-ship's guns continued firing until the submarine disappeared beneath the sea. Stock Force, herself mortally damaged, survived for several more hours through the efforts of her crew before sinking at approximately 9:25 p.m. with her colours still flying. The Admiralty's later official account described the engagement as "one of the finest examples of coolness" in the history of Q-ships.

For his leadership, Auten received Britain's highest decoration for gallantry in the presence of the enemy. The award was announced in the London Gazette on 14 September 1918 under honours for service in action with enemy submarines: "To receive the Victoria Cross. Lieut. Harold Auten, D.S.C., R.N.R." The secrecy surrounding Q-ship operations meant that the full story could not initially be published. Only after the danger of revealing their methods had passed did the Admiralty release the detailed account of the Stock Force action, published on 20 November 1918. Auten was invested with his Victoria Cross by King George V at Buckingham Palace on 18 September 1918.

The end of the First World War did not end Auten's connection with the sea or the Royal Naval Reserve. In 1919 he published Q Boat Adventures, preserving an important first-hand account of the secret war against German submarines. He later entered the film industry, but continued his association with the RNR. When another world war approached, Auten returned to active responsibility. He was promoted Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War and served in New York, helping organise and route trans-Atlantic convoy shipping bound for Europe.

His long reserve service was formally recognised in 1941. The London Gazette recorded that King George VI had approved the award of the Royal Naval Reserve Officers' Decoration to Commander Harold Auten, VC, DSC, RNR. His wartime work also earned significant recognition from Britain's allies. In 1946 the United States awarded Auten the Legion of Merit, Degree of Officer, the London Gazette placing him among those honoured "for distinguished service to the Allied cause throughout the war." Two years later, the Netherlands appointed him a Commander of the Order of Orange-Nassau for service to the Royal Netherlands Navy during the war. The British government formally announced unrestricted permission for him to wear the Dutch honour in January 1948.

Across two world wars, Auten's complete known medal entitlement reflected far more than the dramatic few hours aboard Stock Force. His medal group included the Victoria Cross, Distinguished Service Cross, 1914-15 Star, British War Medal 1914-1920, Victory Medal 1914-1919, Defence Medal, War Medal 1939-45, King George VI Coronation Medal 1937, Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal 1953, Royal Naval Reserve Officers' Decoration, Commander of the Order of Orange-Nassau, and the United States Legion of Merit in the Degree of Officer. The Victoria Cross and George Cross Association records this complete group and notes that Auten's Victoria Cross is held at the Royal Navy Museum in Portsmouth.

After the Second World War, Auten worked in the United States as a senior figure in the J. Arthur Rank Organisation and settled at Bushkill, Pennsylvania, where he also owned and operated the Bushkill Manor Hotel and Playhouse. It was a remarkably different life from the cramped, hidden gun positions and submarine duels of 1918, but the sea remained central to how history remembered him. Auten died at Monroe County Hospital in Pennsylvania on 3 October 1964, aged 73, and was buried at Sand Hill Cemetery in Bushkill.

Harold Auten's Victoria Cross story endures because it was not simply an episode of aggressive action. It was a test of restraint. With his ship shattered beneath him and an enemy submarine close enough to destroy what remained, Auten understood that firing too early could mean failure. He waited. His crew waited with him. Then, at the moment when their concealed weapons could achieve maximum effect, Stock Force revealed what she really was.

The Admiralty called the action an exceptional example of coolness, discipline and organisation. More than a century later, those words still explain why Commander Harold Auten VC, DSC, RD remains one of the most compelling Royal Naval Reserve Victoria Cross recipients of the First World War, and why the final battle of HMS Stock Force continues to hold a distinctive place in the history of Britain's Q-ships.