-H.M.S. Hood Crew Information-
H.M.S. Crew List

It is estimated that as many as 18,000 men served aboard the 'Mighty Hood' during the operational portion of her 21 year career. Unfortunately, there is no surviving official single listing of ALL men who served in her. Here you will find our attempt at creating such a listing. We are using the few, fragmentary crew lists known to exist, Navy Lists, various official reports, public records, and most importantly of all, inputs from the families of former crew.

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Simeon Hilton

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Date of birth: 4th October 1917
Place of birth: Wigan, Lancashire, England
Wife: Annie
Previous occupation: Stone hewer (miner)
Service: Royal Navy
Rank: Stoker 2nd Class
Service Number: D/KX88521
Joined Hood: Wartime
Left Hood: 24th May 1941 (on leave when ship lost)






Biographical Information: Simeon was born in Wigan, Lancashire, and moved as a boy to Rossington, a mining village near Doncaster, South Yorkshire. His father and brother worked at the local Rossington colliery, and Simeon spent some years there too, before joining the Royal Navy in 1936. He was serving in the Hood, but ashore on leave, when he received a telegram informing him that the ship had been sunk. At the time he was staying at the house of his cousin Harry in Wigan. Harry recalls seeing Simeon as he read the telegram and broke down in tears. The telegram also told him to report to another ship.After his Hood time, Simeon served in a number of destroyers. Whilst on leave he met a Wigan girl, Annie, and they got married in Doncaster in 1943, before he went back to sea. Again, Simeon was fortunate, late that year, to escape the sinking of another of his ships - destroyer HMS Eclipse.Simeon went all through the war, serving 12 years in all, and leaving in 1947. He returned to the Rossington coal mine, eventually becoming a deputy underground, and earning his overman`s papers.He and Annie had a son and two daughters.Simeon passed away in 1980, and Annie in 1999.


Additional Photos



Simeon on board Hood



Memorials
No known memorials


Sources
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
'Register of Deaths of Naval Ratings' (data extracted by Director of Naval Personnel (Disclosure Cell), Navy Command HQ, 2009)
Harry Pennington, Simeon's cousin, 2005, and Richard Hilton (son) 2015.