Leonard James – Royal Navy, H.M.S. Badsworth

Leading Stores Assistant Leonard James – Royal Navy, H.M.S. Badsworth

Early Life and Family Background

1939 Register

Leonard James was born in 1921 in Swansea, the son of Sidney James and Margaret Jane Harries. Very few official records survive that shed light on Leonard’s early childhood, and unlike many of the other Cwmgelli servicemen, his formative years do not appear in the earlier census returns.

1939 Register – Earl Street, Swansea

Leonard’s name appears in the 1939 Register, which records the James family living at 7 Earl Street, Swansea. His father Sidney was employed as a Coal Shipping Wagon Repairer, while his mother Margaret Jane undertook the household duties. Their daughter Averil Kathleen was listed as a Nurse, and Leonard himself was recorded as a Warehouse Clerk. The register captures a working Swansea household on the eve of the Second World War, with Leonard just entering adult life.

Royal Navy Service

H.M.S. Badsworth

Leonard later enlisted in the Royal Navy, serving as a Leading Stores Assistant. At the time of his death, he was serving aboard H.M.S. Badsworth, a Hunt‑class destroyer that saw extensive wartime service in convoy protection and Mediterranean operations.

Death and Burial

British Army and Navy Birth, Marriage and Death Records

Leonard James
Cwmgelli Cemetery, Swansea
credit - findagrave

According to the British Army and Navy Birth, Marriage and Death Records, Leonard died at the Royal Naval Hospital, Haslar, Portsmouth, on 24 May 1946. His body was brought home to Swansea and laid to rest at Cwmgelli Cemetery, where he is remembered among the city’s wartime dead.