News Release

BUXTON, N.C. - Coast Guard Sector North Carolina, the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum, and friends of the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum will conduct the annual British Cemetery Memorial Services at Buxton on Thursday and at Ocracoke on Friday. The public is welcome to attend.

The graveside ceremonies will include a 21-gun salute to commemorate the loss of British and Canadian sailors from the H.M.S. Bedfordshire and the British merchant vessel Sandelfino. The crewmen's bodies were recovered from the waters surrounding Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Island after the ships were torpedoed by German U-Boats in 1942.

The Bedfordshire and the Sandelfino were working with the Coast Guard and the U.S. Navy to protect American shipping lanes, where U-boats had been sinking oil tankers important to the war effort.

Representatives from the Coast Guard, the British Royal Navy, the Canadian Navy and the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum will be participating in the event.

The ceremony at the Buxton British Cemetery will begin at 11 a.m. Thursday. The Ocracoke British Cemetery ceremony will start Friday at 11 a.m.

For more information, please contact Mr. Joseph Scwarzer, Executive Director of the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum, at (252) 986-2995 or Coast Guard Petty Officer 2nd Class Andrew Kendrick at (757) 434-7721.