Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Civil Division, O.B.E.; British War Medal (MID. P.W.T. KIME. R.N.R.); Victory Medal (MID. P.W.T. KIME. R.N.R.); 1939-45 Star; Africa Star, clasp North Africa 1942-43; France and Germany Star; Defence Medal; War Medal 1939-45 - unnamed as awarded.
Philip William Thomas Kime was born at London on 20 June 1901. Educated at Colet Court and St. Paul's School he entered the Royal Navy as a Midshipman in the Royal Naval Reserve on 30 April 1918. Posted to the destroyer Lively he was serving on her when on 10 October 1918, RMS Leinster, a steamer operating as a mail ship and ferry between Kingstown, Ireland and Holyhead, Anglesey, was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine UB-123. Lively, on patrol off the Skerries, Dublin, responded to the news of Leinster's sinking, and along with the destroyers Mallard and Seal set out to rescue survivors. Lively picked up 127 survivors. Kime was demobilised on 7 April 1919.
Between the wars Kime was a book publisher and continued the family legacy of publishing Kimes International Law Directory which is still published annually. According to the 1939 Register he was going by the name William Thomas Kime and was a Newspaper Editor and part-time ARP Warden living at 5 Hill Rise, Chorleywood, Herts.
During the Second World War Kime rejoined the service as Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on 21 March 1940 and appointed Assistant to the Staff Officer, Intelligence. Elevated to Lieutenant Commander on 30 November 1942 he was based at HMS Cormorant, the Royal Naval base at Gibraltar. He left Gibraltar in October 1944 and returned to England where he was posted to the stone frigate Odyssey for service in Naval party 1742 as Staff Officer, Intelligence until the end of the war. Rear Admiral Pridham, on whose staff he served in 1940 said this about him,
"Sound, steady and likeable. Will stick to any job he is given and deliver of his best. Though somewhat retiring and lacking in personality he has proved a very useful member of my staff."
Kime retired from the R.N.V.R. on 1 July 1961.
On 13 June 1957 he was awarded the O.B.E. for political services in Hertfordshire. Kime died on 15 May 1974.
Sold together with copied service papers and research.
