118513: Mercantile Marine Reserve (MMR)

Many merchant seamen and fishermen were in the Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) during wartime. For example, they served on trawlers employed in anti-submarine and minesweeping duties, drifters engaged in boom defence, or on the armed merchant cruisers used to enforce the British naval blockade. 

During 1916-1920 the Mercantile Marine Reserve (MMR) was used to engage officers and seamen on board vessels employed on government service. The crews of vessels commissioned as auxiliaries by the Admiralty were signed on under a T.124 crew agreement, whereby they agreed to serve in any commissioned vessel, but retained aspects of their civilian pay and benefits.

(Information drawn from Royal Museums Greenwich).