THE daughter of a man killed in the HMS Dasher catastrophe has continued in her search to find where her father’s body is.

Dame Mary Richardson, 85, has been working for years to get to the truth of one of the worst British disasters.

Mary’s father was a butcher on board the HMS Dasher, a converted aircraft carrier which blew up off the coast of Ardrossan and was completely under the water within eight minutes.

The explosion is said to have been caused by a petrol leak.

379 personnel lost their life that day with 528 men on board, however only 23 were given official burials, with some in Ardrossan cemetery.

Official documents show that bodies were washed ashore for over a week after the disaster but there are no known graves of unidentified seamen.

And now the daughter of one of those men has sent out another heartfelt plea to uncover the truth, and has thought that some of the bodies had been buried in a mass grave along the Ayrshire coast.

Speaking to the BBC last week, Dame Richardson said: “Somebody must know, I hope somebody knows, and those men can be honoured.

“They seem to have been dishonoured, forgotten, hidden, disgraced and I just want them recognised and it’s not just my father I’m worried about.

“It’s all of the others who have lain for over 70 years unnoticed.”

Back in 2019, Dame Richardson told the Ardrossan Herald: “I remember VE-Day, I remember everyone having parties.

"But my mother, my sister and I were indoors crying because my father would never be back.

“The question of how it blew up and why has never been fully resolved, but that doesn’t matter to me.

“What does matter is all 379 men who went down.

“Loads were washed to shore, they rolled up on the quay and the tennis courts.

“There are 13 graves. But where are the other 366 bodies?

“We are not allowed to ask where our own father is buried. It’s unbelievable.

“When is the government going to respond before the last of the children are dead?

“Where is my father?”

Dame Richardson is determined to locate the bodies and give them an honourable military funeral at last and has called on officials to make more effort to help find out what happened.