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"Wavescan" is a weekly program for long distance radio hobbyists produced by Dr. Adrian M. Peterson, Coordinator of International Relations for Adventist World Radio. AWR carries the program over many of its stations (including shortwave). Adrian Peterson is a highly regarded DXer and radio historian, and often includes features on radio history in his program. We are reproducing those features below, with Dr. Peterson's permission and assistance.
Wavescan N657, September 26, 2021
The Early Wireless Scene on Three Islands off the Coast of Wales - Part 2
In our program last week, we presented three segments of early wireless information: The story of the early Marconi wireless station at Holyhead on the Welsh island of Holy, the Lee de Forest wireless station on the nearby island called South Stack, and the transfer of the Marconi station from Holyhead to Seaforth, north of Liverpool in England itself. The main purpose for that early wireless station at its several locations (Holyhead, Seaforth and Anglesey) has been for communication with shipping entering and leaving the Port of Liverpool. This week, we pick up the story of this historic wireless station again while it was located at Seaforth Sands where it operated under the internationally recognized callsign GLV, indicating Liverpool.
We might add that two famous Wireless Operators received their training in Marconi equipment and operating procedures at station GLV near Liverpool. One of these well-known men was Jack Binns, who was the Wireless Operator on board the RMS Republic (MKC) at the 1909 collision with the SS Florida, and he sent out what is considered to be the first CQD distress call in Morse Code. The other well-known man was Jack Phillips, the senior Wireless Operator aboard the Titanic (MGY) at the time of its sinking in 1912. Phillips sent out both distress calls in Morse Code, CQD and SOS, though tragically, he died in the frigid waters of the Atlantic shortly afterwards.
OK, now we go back to the year 1862, which was when Hawley Harvey Crippen was born in Coldwater, Michigan, USA. In his formative years he studied Homeopathic Medicine. His first wife, Charlotte, died in 1892 when their son was just two years old.
Two years later (1894), Dr. Crippen married an American would-be music hall performer whose professional name was Belle Elmore. Three years later again (1897), they moved to London in England where they both took whatever employment they could find.
They held a party at their home on January 30, 1910, and that was the last time that the wife was seen alive. Suspicion began to fasten on the doctor after another girl, Ethel Neave, moved into his home, and so they fled to Brussels in Belgium, where they obtained tickets to travel back across the Atlantic, to Canada in fact, on the passenger liner SS Montrose.
However, Captain Henry G. Kendall aboard the SS Montrose (MLJ) grew suspicious about these two passengers who were traveling falsely as father and son, and so he sent a wireless message to the company headquarters in Liverpool via the Maritime Wireless Station GLV at Seaforth Sands. Law enforcement in Scotland Yard reacted quickly, and they sent a Police Inspector on another passenger ship, a faster ship, across the Atlantic, and he arrested the couple on the SS Montrose just before disembarkation in Quebec. Dr. Crippen faced trial in London, and he was executed for murder, though his girlfriend was acquitted of any serious crime.
The English maritime station GLV near Liverpool processed the Morse Code messages from the SS Montrose regarding the nefarious Dr. Crippen, and this story presents the first occasion when wireless was used for the apprehension of a criminal.
May 14, 1960, was the official date for Maritime Radio Station GLV to transfer from Sandy Road at Seaforth, north of Liverpool, to a new location and a new station on the island called Anglesey, back again in Wales. The Anglesey station was located in an isolated area of the island, and it was in use for a total of 26 years, until its closure on December 19, 1986. The maritime communication service was then transferred from GLV to the cliff-top station GPK at Portpatrick in Scotland, and the building was sold off to become a privately owned family dwelling.
As a postlude, a historic marker was recently placed on the site of the old Marconi wireless station GLV at Seaforth Sands on what had been the location for the original transmitter building. The entire complex was adjacent to what subsequently became the Seaforth Container Terminal.