HMS Wyvern

Stornoway Gazette, 24 May 1940
Three Lewis naval reservists were killed in action last week, and a fourth was seriously wounded.

Murdo Maclean, RNR, 1 Breanish, killed in action, is the first West Uig casualty of the war. He was about 27 years of age and unmarried. Louis Macdonald, 9 Ardroil, is reported seriously wounded. His father left Stornoway to see him in a naval hospital. Malcolm Maciver, RNR, 72 Coll and Peter J. Macleod, RNR, 10 Eagleton have also been killed in action, or have since died of wounds. Both were young unmarried men - Maciver in his early twenties and Macleod just nineteen. Malcolm was a brother of Angus Maciver, who figured in the capture of the German ship "Borkum" last year, which was afterwards intercepted by a U-boat when being taken to a British port by a prize crew. The prize crew escaped in two lifeboats, taking the German prisoners with them.

It is understood that all four of these reservists were serving on the same ship [HMS Wyvern, transcriber's note], but the circumstances of the action are not known. The Admiralty has stated, however, that naval units were neavily engaged by Nazi bombers off the coast of Holland, and it may be in these operations that these valuable lives were lost.
Immediately on the invasion of the Low Countries, British destroyers raced to the main Dutch ports and, until the country fell into the hands of the Germans, they did valuable work in the face of intense aerial bombardment.

The Navy not only took the Dutch Queen and Government to London, and removed millions of pounds worth of diamonds, gold and foreign securities, but carried out extensive demolition works when the position of the Dutch army became desperate. Oil tanks were blown up, naval lock gates jammed, electric machinery destroyed, harbours blocked, one by the sinking of an old liner across the entrance; German minefields were swept, British minefields laid and small crafted penetrated to the Zuyder Zee.