大象传媒

My Life story as told to the pupils at Longford Primary School.
Ken Tyler No R203399

I joined the merchant navy in July 1939.

I was employed at the Kensington hotel in London and earned 6shillings and three pence per week.

There was a retired sea captain who was staying at the hotel and he filled my head with how to see the world and encouraged me to go to sea and told me my wage would be 拢3-4\6p per month I was only 16yrs of age and I jumped at the chance to go, so the next day he gave me a letter to go down to Tilbury and there I signed on the cargo and passenger ship, the ship was called the S.S Stratnaver.

The ship took mail and lots of children from Dr Bernardos Homes they were orphans they were going to start a new life in Australia, some looked so pitiful as they did not know where they were going, they were dropped off in various places.

The ship went up to Rabual and New Guinea, then we were ordered back to Sydney as war was imminent.

War was declared so they converted the ship to carry troops to the Middle East, we were the first to carry them. As we left Sydney harbour every thing that could float escorted us out of sight, something I will never forget.
On returning to England and took the privileged children and parents to South Africa we made four trips to Australia.

After Dunkirk the ship was in Southampton which was a closed port so we had to get out, that鈥檚 when I realised there was a war on, we were going down the English channel when a dive bomber attacked, dropping bombs off, when he went off another three came over the sky and set the other boat on fire, we could not help them as we had to get away ourselves and get out as fast as we could.

I left that ship in 1940 then joined the pool at Newport in south Wales to join tramp steamers and a lot of these steamers were not fit to sail on the canals.

I joined the Celtic Monarch carrying a load of coal to Rosario Argentino then returned to Millwall docks with a cargo of grain, the Blitz was on.

When I joined the Empire Mouflon which was built in 1924 the best speed was 8Knotsworst part of war ships getting blown up left right and centre a terrible sight and if a bomb hit an oil tanker it would go up in flames immediately a dreadful sight men being burned alive getting dragged into the propellers trying to jump in the water to escape the fire there were depth charges in the water and they would kill some of the men in the water others shouting for help we couldn鈥檛 stop to pick them up or we would have gone the same way.
I then joined the Gloucester city to Canada and back this was not too bad we watched ships being towed into St Johns Newfoundland shot to pieces some were in half, I eventually got back to the U.K and got sent up to the Clyde and was put on the Queen Mary as a passenger to pick up a brand new ship called S.S Samouse spent a lot of time in the Mediterranean taking supplies to Greece and Italy for our troops and bringing back troops for a rest as the battle of Mount Casino was going on.

Arrived back in England joined the Lady Kathleen an experimental ship made out of reinforced concrete built at Chepstow going U.E.O boat alley from Erith in Kent to Seaham harbour for coal joined the Lady Kathleen sailing out of the Bristol channel to Belgium and Holland with supplies.

I am one of the lucky ones to survive as many men and women who sailed out of Newport were lost at sea than any other port in Great Britain and most of the people do not recognise some of the conditions we sailed under and if you were torpedoed your pay was stopped and your dependants received no money.

How often do you see the merchant seamen鈥檚 war memorial shown on the television, which is situated by the tower of London.
My D Day started when war was declared when I was in Sydney.
I left the Merchant Navy in January in1946.

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