大象传媒

We arrived at Glasgow and were transported to Gourock and put on board a troopship called "The Empress of Scotland" bound for Canada. This ship was previously called 鈥淭he Empress of Japan", but for some curious reason, it was changed. My bunk was of course down below and was the top one (three high). We sailed out into the Western Approaches and wound up to 20 knots which means that we were going fast enough to avoid the problem of enemy submarines (maybe). Our journey took about a week. During the last few days, the weather became rather hot - it was May, June 1944. We were invited to have a wash in salt water. I don't think we needed to have bothered, not even with salt water soap.

We were billeted at HMCS York, a shore station by Lake Ontario. It was previously an exhibition centre. Here we had marvellous things like sugar, and peaches and apple juice for breakfast. So I had arrived in Toronto, wouldn't Mum and Dad be surprised.

Of course in a place like this there was an opportunity to meet girls. Apparently before we arrived, there had been a newspaper article about "The Amateur Situation鈥�, or young ladies on the game. One evening found me in the company of an attractive girl, no doubt attracted by a British sailor's uniform. It was after dark with the street lights on. She didn't lose much opportunity to open her blouse without my request. I suggested that we move over to a slightly less public and darker area - at that point she closed the shop, but why? So my education re females did not make much progress. However, there was a girl I wanted to go out with one evening but was laid low by some local beer. It was pale yellow and was very potent. Later I saw some quite nice girls who came on the boat. One was Miss Opal Johnstone. She was very nice, and we met a few times. We wrote to each other for a while and later exchanged wedding presents. During the war, she used to send my Mother food parcels.

We sailed in August 1944, and one young lady (not mine) was so overcome that she threw herself off the pier. The ship's siren gave a fond farewell to Toronto and Lake Ontario. We were constructed small enough to trawl down the canals to the mouth of the St Lawrence via Montreal and Quebec. On the way down, our Asdic dome fouled the bottom of the canal and the ship was bodily hauled up a slipway for repair at Kingston, Ontario.

Anyway we arrived at New London USA, not far from New York after an interesting trip, that is, if you like being thrown about, and sick as well. For the cure of mal-de-mer we were issued with pink capsules, so it was not more than one capsule every eight hours or be sick, which no doubt strains the heart anyway, so what's the difference? At New London it seemed strange to see the Stars and Strips flying from flag poles, instead of the Union Jack. While at our destination, I stayed on board, but some of the lads went to New York. Our cook came back having swapped his cap for a US Navy one. Next stop was Halifax Nova Scotia where we stopped for a few days and across the Atlantic we went.

It is all very well to sit on top of a troopship, but on "little ships" the tale of braving the elements becomes a little more personal. At one period I didn鈥檛 wash for three days, and was told about it by my PO. As you get into deeper water, heavier weather patterns affect the surface of the sea, and eventually, even in a calm situation, the ship is in for days of heavy rollers, with a wave height of some 25 feet. Part of the aft of the ship was awash for quite a while, and I didn鈥檛 feel too well. My quarters in the ship was forward i.e. at the sharp end, and at that position there was a great deal of up and down movement, great for seasickness oops.

We had to attend to our duties and listen out on the radio to "Routines" i.e. routine radio transmissions from the Admiralty, but we were of course also to keep radio silence. The signals were naturally all in code and had to be taken down in longhand on to a signal pad so that they could be decoded if they were intended for our ship. For these watch keeping duties, it was necessary for the watch keeper to wake the next operator. On one occasion I woke up about four hours late and was told off; the previous chap swore that he had woken me up. Whatever else, he should have made sure I was sitting up and coherent before going to crash his swede.

While we were trotting across the Atlantic I had been on watch and in need of a good sleep so I arranged with an oppo just on this occasion to change places and sleep amidships one deck down. Well I must have been pretty worn out, because I was next aware of being shaken awake by POTs, who asked why I hadn't been at my "Action Stations" position on the bridge. This came as a complete surprise to me. I found out that apparently something had hit the boat, and given cause for alarm. Well on the sounding of the siren it seems to have woken everybody else except me, even though the siren was only a foot or two away from me. Of course if it had been a real disaster, I can鈥檛 imagine I would have been thought about too much, especially as the hatch to the lower deck was bolted down. Since that event, for years I have thought that my having a good lifeline on my hand maybe helped to ensure the safety of the boat. Perhaps that is quite true, but it wasn't until just a few years ago that I met an old shipmate of mine, Ted Partridge, Radar Operator, who said he鈥檇 picked up a radar signal reported to be somewhere ahead and Action Stations was sounded. When the mystery was solved it turned out to be an iceberg which took a few shells as target practice... but if it had really been something nasty would I be about now?

Eventually we arrived off Liverpool, and the submarine left us. We proceeded up the west coast and anchored in Loch Ewe. To obtain rations of fish, grenades were dropped into the water, and up came the fish. Later, having negotiated the Pentland Firth which was rather rough, we arrived at Granton near Edinburgh, where we had a week's leave, and because of headaches, I had a few medical tests.

After our leave we proceeded via Southend to Milford Haven, where we waited for two weeks for fine weather so that we could escort a flotilla of MLs out to the Mediterranean, for onward passage to the far east. We bad a really good trip and on the way had a good view of The Rock of Gibraltar at 8 o'clock in the morning. We stopped there to refuel and on going ashore I got a touch of the backdoor trot. That was much better than what happened to our NAAFI manager who got drunk, fell down and seems to have been kicked in the head. He was in rather a poor state. At Gib we had to have injections and the MO gave me one shot, said "Wait a minute", left the needle sticking out of my arm, then came back with another syringe full.

So now we were in the Med with lots of sunshine, and no submarine attacks or air strikes all the way to Malta. On our way past Italy, just to show no ill feeling, we fired off a few guns. When they fired the main armament, it threw a lot of our crockery which smashed on the deck. It seemed so strange to leave England and step ashore again a few thousand miles away in Malta. Unfortunately my headaches persisted, and I left the boat to go into Bighi hospital. This was my first month stay in Malta. In hospital I slept for two days, so I must have been really worn out From this you may gather that the rest of the crew were made of sterner stuff. Maybe that's what they call "operation fatigue". I was in hospital for about two weeks while my ship went off to do minesweeping, a very important job.

At Mostar in Malta there is a church, and during the war some idiot dropped his bomb on it. Fortunately it didn't go off and when I was there the locals were so thankful that they put chairs round the rubble in a circle and offered up prayers.

Suddenly I was told that I had half an hour to pack up all my kit and fall in. A while later we arrived on the "Ile de France". On our trip to Toulon ('the Medlock scheme) I met a chap who I recognised - he was an interpreter whose father's shop in New Malden I was taken to for the purchase of underwear etc. On arrival at Toulon we went to a transit camp. I think the time of year was October and having come from sunny Malta and being tough? I refused extra blankets and of course it was a cold night. The following day we got on a train bound for Dieppe. The route took us along the coast for a while and I remember seeing the light from little villages by the sea. It all seemed odd after years of war and blackouts. On arrival at Dieppe we were efficiently whisked away by American trucks to another transit camp. While there, we had a look round a British War Cemetery. Very sad. After a day or two we went aboard a boat -- next stop Newhaven.

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