大象传媒

Where was I on VE Day? Somewhere in the North Atlantic, on a troopship in convoy, four days out from Greenock, bound for Gibraltar. I remember the scene vividly - the brilliant foam flecked ultramarine blue of the rolling, sunlit Atlantic, the lines of merchant ships behind and about us; the protecting, bucking corvettes, away on the horizon, sometimes all but disappearing as they ploughed through the heavy swell. The announcement came through on our ship's intercom, grave, measured - Germany had surrendered, the war in Europe was over. But it added a warning, our vigilance must remain total, a caution reinforced by the occasional thump of a distant depth charge.

How did I feel, as a young sailor (not quite 19), enroute on his posting to his first ship? Relief that the killing was all but over, and that - save possible involvement in the war against Japan - I had been spared. Certainly there was no gung-ho youthful regret at missing the fighting. After nearly six years of war, I was becoming aware of its horror and tragedy, and of the sacrifice and suffering of millions.

I am reminded of a parents' epitaph on the headstone of their 18 year old boy in a Normandy war cemetery, which spells out that suffering so poignantly and which, many years later, brought tears to my eyes:

"Only one to all the world
But all the world to us".

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