Shipton Moyne (Glos) and Derbyshire Tree

An extract from an article from the British Newspaper Archive states:-

"Blown up at sea - John Lovelock, 44, of Stafford-street, Derby, was accused under the defence regulations of assuming, as a British citizen, a name other than inn by which he was ... [Hull Daily Mail, 4 Oct 1941]"

This was Frederick John Lovelock (1897-1976). A fuller account, supplied by Alan Whitaker, appeared in the Nottingham Evening Post on 10 October 1941:

"Derby Man Who Changed His Identity. Frederick John Lovelock, 44, of Stafford-street, Derby, charged at Sheffield to-day with assuming a name other than that by which he was ordinarily known, and with obtaining food and lodging by false pretences, was sent to prison for six months. A statement he made, in which he said he was a citizen of the United States, and that he had been blown up in the Pacific, he later declared to be untrue. He said he had a wife and child at Derby, and because he was no good to them he decided to go away and change his identity. Mr McAvoy, prosecuting, said the story told by Lovelock read like a novel. Lovelock went to a policeman in Doncaster, and complained of feeling ill. He said he had lost his memory completely. The Doncaster police spent several hours trying to find something about him. He was taken to the Poor-law institution, and his photograph was circulated to the police throughout the country. He told officials at the institution that he was on the ship Steel Seafarer, that his name was Michael Cassidy, that the ship was blown up in the Pacific, and that he remembered nothing more until he found himself in Doncaster. He told a nurse he was making his way to the coast, and obtained 8s from her. From Doncaster he walked to Sheffield, where he repeated the story of having been blown up in the Pacific, and said he was anxious to get in touch with the American consul, as he was an American citizen. At Sheffield he told a similar story, and said he was born in Dublin, that his father was a docker, and that he was educated at Cheltenham. When asked to fill in a form, Lovelock complained of feeling ill. He was taken to hospital, where doctors certified that there was nothing wrong with him. His finger-prints were taken, and the police got into communication with London, Gloucester, Hampshire and Leeds, and his identity was discovered."

This seems more like a case of depression than something criminal, but in those days things were probably viewed differently. Apparently in the family (and in the Hull paper come to that) it was understood that he claimed his father was a doctor, rather than a docker as in this article. The Steel Seafarer was a real American ship, and was sunk in the war without loss of life, but it went down in the Red Sea, not the Pacific, in early September 1941. Had he read about that in the papers, perhaps?