大象传媒

I joined the Royal Navy on January 13th 1943 when I was 17 1/2 years old. I met a lad there and we became good friends. After our training we were sent to different barracks but wanting to be with my friend I payed someone ten shillings to swap and go with him. Our ship was the HMS Crane and our first operation was the invasion of Sicilly and then we went on to the invasion of Italy. We then left Italy to bring the battleship HMS Warspipe back to the UK because she had been damaged and we had to escort her through the Bay of Biscay. Then we went to Newfoundland, being part of the 7th group of the Killer-Hunter class. We sunk two submarines, one off Portugal and one off the west coast of Ireland, with a loss of 96 lives. We then went on to the invasion of D-DAY on June 6th, after the invasion of Frace, we went out to the Far East to take part in an invasion near Japan. We then went into Tokyo Bay for the signing of the surrender, which took place on a US Battleship. By the time we'd entered Tokyo Bay, we had travelled over 100,000 miles and had oiled at sea about 135 times. My friend and I stayed together all the way through the war, and even see each other about 4 times a year now.
By Ken Benbow

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