IN THE MAXIM GUN SECTION
Pte. S. Pogrund, 11,065, Maxim Gun Section, 2nd Batt. King's Own Yorkshire L.I., 13th Infantry Brigade, 5th Division, in the course of a letter to his sister, Mrs. Shooman, writes: “. . . I hope you will excuse me for not writing more, often, and also hope that you will explain to everyone that it is impossible for me to write often. I enclose a photo that was taken twenty-five yards from the Germans. The man at the gun is ready to fire, and should he go under I am just in a position to take his place. Most of the fellows on the photo are dead now, including the Captain who took the photo. He went under in the last charge of the Yorkshire light Infantry, in which we took a prominent part. Although we were so close to the Germans you can see by our faces that we were not downhearted. I hadn't had a wash for twenty-one days. Don't I look a comical beggar ? All my chums have either been killed, wounded, or taken prisoners. . . . I should so like a tin of salmon or pineapple and plenty of cigarettes. I am in the best of health and spirits.” [The photo referred; appeared in the following Wednesday’s Jewish World.'] .

On 17 December 1917, Osmanieh under the command of 38-year-old Lieutenant Commander David Richard Mason with soldiers and medical personnel left Southampton and set a course for Alexandria with a stopover in the southern Italian port city of Taranto. Taranto was reached on 28 December and Alexandria on 31 December. Even before the harbour entrance, the steamer was struck amidships on the starboard side at the position 31°10′8″N 29°48′3″E by a naval mine from a minefield left a few days earlier by the German submarine SM UC-34 commanded by Oberleutnant zur See Horst Obermueller.[2]
The ship sank in five to seven minutes, killing 209 people, including Lt. Commander Mason, two ship officers, 21 crew members, a Royal Navy officer, 166 other ranks and the eight nurses of Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service (QAIMNS).[5][2]
The day before, the troop-carrier HMT Aragon and the destroyer HMS Attack had been sunk with torpedoes at about the same spot by UC-34. 610 people died on Aragon and 10 on Attack. Some of the victims of these sinkings are buried at the Alexandria Hadra War Memorial Cemetery, where nameplates remain. However, several hundred were never found.[6]
One of the survivors of the sinking of Osmanieh was Jack Cohen, then a member of the Royal Flying Corps. After the War he founded the British multinational retail chain Tesco.[7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Osmanieh_(1906)

All Research by Lola Fraser