大象传媒

Message 2 - rocket ships

Posted on: 23 June 2004 by mindLakeside

My name is Bernard Chapman and I served in the Royal Navy from 1943 to 1946. I recall late in 1943 or early 1944 I was posted to an LCT{R} when it was then in its experimental stages. I recall a deck being fitted on which were placed over 1000 projectors in banks of 40 0r 50 the basses of which were about 9 inches up from the deck. A s I recall, these rockets were about three feet long and had to be loaded from the top of the projector, which meant someone had to sit on the top of them and slide them down. A long and tedious job. Came the day of reckoning and the test firing. .We set off into the Irish sea with the crew supplemented by numerous dockyard boffins. Just prior to firing my task was to carry out extensive electrical tests to ensue all was in order. This done I am sure the tanks were then partly flooded making the craft very low in the water in order to take up the recoil when the rockets were fired. Certainly the decks were flooded to minimise the flash.
The rockets were then fired in their proper order but sadly, a large percentage failed to project. Those that did fire caused total mayhem on board as anything breakable, cups plates lamps etc smashed from the recoil.
The next vital task was to get rid of those rockets which had failed to to project and this meant again someone sitting on top of the projector and lifting them out, one by one and then into the Irish Sea. Not a very pleasant job considering the rockets had been charged. At this stage it was thought my electrical tests prior to the launching was faulty so it followed I was the one to unload. From the subsequent inquest into the failings it was established the base of the projector was too near the deck so that when it was flooded,salt water got into the firing mechanism placed at the base of each projector.
Back to the dockyard where the projectors were raised further from the deck to solve the problem. After all the trials we paid off the ship to the American navy and we later heard it was sunk at the Walcheren Island incident.

Message 3 - rocket ships

Posted on: 09 July 2004 by John

Hi Bernard,

Are you planning on writing any stories for this site? I found your forum post to be most interesting - I enjoy real stories from those days.

It would be interesting to read any contributions you might have, with somewhat longer texts, perhaps what you did on D-day, and so on.