Frederick Ledger
- Family History
- Military History
- Extra Information
- Photographs
Frederick was born on 28th January 1887 in Nottingham and was the eldest son of Arthur Richmond Ledger of 34 Loscoe Road, Carlton, Nottingham and the late Emma Ledger. In the 1901 cenuses, Arthur at only 37 years is already shown as a widower, he is a joiner and is living on Hucknall Road, Carrington, with his children Fred 14 years, John 12 years and Arthur 6 years. He also had a daughter, Dora 4 years, but she is not at the address on the night of the census. By the following census Arthur has remarried and he and his children and new wife Mary are living at 175 Gladstone Road, New Basford; he now has two more children, James 8 years and Sidney 2 years, by his second wife. Frederick is not shown as being with the family on the 1911 census as he was already serving in the Royal Navy.
(RFR/PO/B/4248). Frederick joined the Royal Navy on 2nd April 1902 as a boy sailor. After initial training at HMS Ganges he saw service in a number of ships. On 28th January 1905 when he was 18 years of age he signed up for a term of 12 years. He joined HMS Good Hope on 31st July 1914 and was killed when the ship was sunk on 1st November 1914. His body was not recovered for burial and he is commemorated on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial. HMS Good Hope was a Drake Class armoured cruiser built in 1901. By 1914 she was Rear Admiral Sir Christopher George Cradock’s flag ship which, along with HMS Monmouth and other British vessels of 4th Cruiser Squadron, encountered Vice Admiral Von Spee’s Scharnhorst and Gneisenau forty five miles off the Chilean port of Coronel. The German ships were faster and more heavily armed than Cradock’s fleet. The sun set at 18:50 on November 1st 1914, which silhouetted the British ships against the light sky while the German ships became indistinguishable from the shoreline behind them. Spee immediately turned to close and signalled his ships to open fire at 19:04 when the range closed to 12,300 yards. Spee's flagship, Scharnhorst, engaged Good Hope while Gneisenau fired at Monmouth. Cradock's flagship was hit on the Scharnhorst's third salvo, when shells knocked out her forward 9.2-inch turret and set her forecastle on fire. Cradock, knowing his only chance was to close the range, continued to do so despite the battering that Spee's ships inflicted. By 19:23 the range was almost half of that when the battle began and the British ships bore onwards. Spee tried to open the range, fearing a torpedo attack, but the British were only 5,500 yards away at 19:35. Seven minutes later, Good Hope charged directly at the German ships, although they dodged out of her way. Spee ordered his armoured cruisers to concentrate their fire on the British flagship which had drifted to a halt with her topsides ablaze. At 19:50 her forward magazine exploded, severing the bow from the rest of the ship, and she later sank in the darkness. Spee estimated that his flagship had made 35 hits on Good Hope, suffering only two hits in return that did no significant damage and failed even to wound one crewman. Good Hope was sunk with all hands, more than 919 men.
Nottingham Post 'in memoriam' notice (abridged), 1 November 1915: 'Ledger. Fred, eldest son of AR Ledger, Carrington, HMS Good Hope. Father, stepmother, brothers, sisters.'
