Like John Cammish, William was a professional seaman in the Royal Navy.  He worked as part of a team maintaining the engine room aboard his ship the H.M.S. Welshman.  This ships primary duty throughout its last few months was as a convoy escort travelling between Britain and Alexandria.  At this point during the war German U-Boats were attacking ships and convoys crossing from Britain to Egypt with much needed supplies that were essential for the continued offensive in the Middle East and Africa.  In an attempt to combat this the Royal Navy began to protect the convoys with armed ships, although because the U-Boats were virtually undetectable until the final moments before the attack the scheme had only been partially successful.  Armed vessels were now sinking along with the merchant convoys and it was not until towards the end of the war when the British Admiralty finally managed to come up with a moderately successful way of eliminating the U-Boat menace.

          The Welshman’s convoy came under heavy attack on the date of William’s death, and at the end of the Nazi attack both the Merchant Naval convoy and the Royal Navy had suffered heavy losses including the entire crew of the Welshman (nearly 150 sailors along with dozens of soldiers and airmen heading out to new postings).  The Welshman was credited to U-617, whose torpedo was the final nail in the coffin of the hapless vessel.

          William was the son of William Henry and Maud Collings and had grown up in Filey before the Collings family moved to Ormesby when William was a teenager.  He is remembered on Chatham Naval Memorial for all the sailors who perished in the Second World War but whose bodies were never recovered.