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H. M. S. ST.ANGELO (Lascaris War Rooms) Malta. 1944.

Many have talked of the horrors of war. I thought the following would show the other side of the story.

I was a Telegraphist in the Royal Navy and all messages were transmitted and received in Morse Code. On the day in question I was working the Commercial Wave listening out for signals being broadcast.

I had my earphones on and became aware of the faint morse signal of CQ which was the call sign for a ship sending a message to all those listening. I commenced writing down the message but as the signal was faint I was unable to get all of it. I called the sender and asked for the parts I had missed and eventually managed to complete the message. We both signed off with a friendly ‘dit’ on the morse key.

I passed the message through to the Signals Office and thought no more about it. I was surprised therefore when the Petty Officer of the Watch told me I had been ‘talking’ to a German Hospital Ship.

I had been through over 4 years of conflict with all its tragedy and this incident stood out. Being 18 years old I had a glimpse of the other side of war.

From Malta we were also in permanent contact with Admiralty and because of their seniority they were the Controlling Station.

In February 1945 Winston Churchill, President Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin met for a conference at Yalta. As one will realise a great many messages had to be sent by Winston Churchill to London. The vessel he was on did not have the capability of transmitting these messages direct so they were sent to Malta for forwarding. I was fortunate to be one of the operators on the Admiralty bay during this time and as Winston Churchill was using Malta we took over as Controlling Station. We had a very busy but rewarding time doing this work. A message of thanks was sent to all concerned for their work during his time at Yalta.

Ronald Drew. Leading Telegraphist.

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