Bird’s eye view of Portsmouth Harbour when Victory was still afloat

He commanded the minesweeper HMS Wilton and was in the line-up at the Silver Jubilee Fleet Review in 1977.

James is in this picture of the ship’s company of HMS Comus in the 1950s when he was a leading seaman.

I will be writing a fuller obituary and giving the funeral service date next Wednesday. I am sure many former divers who trained under Lt-Cdr Thake will want to attend.

Here we see the ship’s company of the C-class destroyer HMS Comus. She was only in service from July 1946 until November 1958 when she was scrapped.

• Farlington Youth Choir was formed in 1968 and in 1972 had 40 members.

However, only 12 of them were boys and a call went out for any boy aged between nine and 16 to come forward to join the choir.

The organiser of the choir, Mrs RM Ryan also wanted more girls aged over 10.

At the time this photograph was taken, in the early 1970s, the choir performed a dozen concerts a year. They visited old peoples’ homes and clubs and helped charities.

The choir rehearsed in Drayton Methodist Church hall, the choristers coming from as far as Chichester and Horndean.

Are you among the children in the picture?

• Also below is a bird’s eye view of the statue of Queen Victoria from the bombed out and burnt bell tower of the Portsmouth Guildhall.

The Evening News photographer must have taken his life into his hands climbing the tower when it was in such a precarious state.

In the top left hand corner can be seen bomb sites.

To the uninitiated today, the statue is the only clue to where this picture was taken.

• My final picture today is a superb view across Portsmouth Harbour with Gosport in the foreground and Portsea in the distance.

I can date this to before 1922 as that was the year when HMS Victory, in the centre of photograph, was taken into dry dock to be preserved.

The swing bridge of the railway viaduct, which ran from the Harbour station into the dockyard, has been swung open to allow a vessel to pass through.

At the top of the picture the Guildhall (then simply called the town hall) can be seen in all its splendour before being burnt out in the blitz of January 1941.

On the left a cruiser is moored alongside the South Railway Jetty.