Alf Unwin was born in 1901 in Kilburn, London, the son of Alfred James Unwin, publican of The George in Glyn Road, Hackney, and barmaid Florence Mary Ann Spooner. He was raised by his maternal grandparents in Mile End.
Alf’s ambition was to go to sea. At age sixteen he applied to join the Merchant Navy but was initially rejected due to poor dental health, so he had all his teeth out and applied again. In 1918-19 Alf voyaged to the Mediterranean as steward’s assistant on the HMTS Mersey, then sailed as galley boy on the SS Carpentaria to New Zealand and assistant cook on voyages to Australia and South America. He graduated from the London School of Nautical Cookery in 1921.
In 1923 Alf married Rose Smith, a dressmaker and showroom assistant. Their son Alfred George was born the following year. Around this time Alf made a voyage to Boston, USA, where he was offered a partnership in a pastry chef business, but he turned this down as Rose did not want to move so far from England.
In August 1925 Alf was engaged as ship’s cook on the SS Arawa and in port at Wellington when British seamen worldwide walked off the job to protest wage cuts. The Arawa’s sailors were punished with imprisonment in the Terrace Gaol, to which they marched through the central city streets, singing union songs and cheered on by hundreds of sympathetic onlookers. Upon learning of this trouble Rose emigrated to New Zealand, distance no longer a factor.
The Unwins lived in Wanganui and Napier before settling in Wellington, where their daughter Zeala was born in 1927.
During the Second World War Alf made several voyages to the Middle East on the hospital ship Maunganui, a broken arm early in one crossing giving him the honour of being the first patient treated in its plaster room. He was chief cook on the ferries Arahura and Wahine and in later years worked for Niblet’s Food Products in Pirie Street.
Alf Unwin served in two world wars. He was a member of the Navy League, the New Zealand National Military Reserve, and the Legion of Frontiersmen. He passed away from pneumonia in Lower Hutt, aged 72. His ashes lie together with Rose’s in Karori Cemetery’s Services’ Columbarium Wall.
Plot: Soldier Niche 34 DIV M1
By Jacqui Beets (granddaughter)
All photos supplied by the author
Sources:
Ancestry.com.
“Arawa’s Men March to Gaol.” Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 65, 14 September 1925, Page 6.
Hospital Ship Maunganui, Hospital Ships of World War Two — National Museum of the Royal New Zealand Navy.
Merchant Navy Continuous Certificate of Discharge No. 1000528.
Papers Past.
Rickard, J (26 October 2007), HMS Mersey , https://www.historyofwar.org/articles/weapons_HMS_Mersey.html.
