This week, German forces closed in on Smolensk in central Russia. On 31 July SS General Reinhard Heydrich was ordered by Goering to prepare a detailed plan for the “final solution of the Jewish question”, a euphemism for the annihilation of Europe’s Jewish population. In southern Indochina, Vichy France handed over its territory to Japan and on 1 August Japanese troops occupied Saigon in Vietnam. On 2 August President Roosevelt of the United States extended the lend-lease programme to the Soviet Union.
The John O’Groat Journal reported this week the sad news of the first Wick-born pilot to lose his life in the war, Sergeant Pilot Alexander Gordon of Newton, Wick. Sergeant Gordon was also the first Caithness airman to receive the Distinguished Flying Medal, received posthumously for his action in the Battle of Cape Matapan, a naval engagement between the Royal Navy and the Italian fleet off the coast of Greece back in March 1941
Although the invasion of the Soviet Union was proving more of a challenge than the German generals had anticipated, the Luftwaffe still found time to raid Caithness. On 31 July Wick Police received a message from Bomb Disposal Section: “There is an unexploded German bomb embedded in the ground at Dunnet. I was notified of this by the Coastguard, Dunnet, last night, and I went out there today. To get to the locus you go up the road leading from the Post Office to Dunnet Head, and it is a little distance from a house with a blue roof”.
Wick Burgh Council met this week and, “It was reported that the O/C Camerons, Wick, had offered a gift of five guineas for the good of the town as recognition of the facilities afforded to his battalion in the use of Bignold Park. On the call of the Provost, it was agreed to express warm thanks for the gift, which, it was agreed, should be applied towards the Wick Bairns’ Boot Fund.”
The most poignant discovery this week was that of a “small enamelled tin” which George Mackay found washed ashore on the rocks at Buldoo, Dounreay on 28 July. “The tin which was about 6 inches in height and shaped like a brasso tin with a clasp stopper, had printed on it “Barclay’s Sparkling Beer”, and scratched in two places near the top were the words, “Look inside”. Mackay opened the tin and found inside a folded sheet of unruled note paper with the words, “Few Survivors. S/S Warkworh” printed thereon in pencil.”
Finally this week, the John O’Groat Journal reported a curious story (“Boy Spent £1 a Week on Pleasure”). Two Wick boys appeared before Sheriff Trotter in Wick Sheriff Court, charged with the theft of a crab from the railway station. The elder, who was aged 16, admitted “that he earned £4 a week working for a firm of plumbers, gave £3 to his mother, and spent £1 on the cinema and other things.” The Sheriff declared “this was indeed deplorable and set one furiously to think”, but merely reprimanded the boys for a first offence.
