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Having completed the telegraphist鈥檚 training course at Royal Arthur I was drafted to the naval base at Portsmouth. Within a few days I was drafted to Horsea Island, in company with five other telegraphist ratings. The island (on the outskirts of Portsmouth, an island at high tide only) was used by the Navy as a wireless relay station. A brick built building housed what equipment was necessary and gave accommodation for the small number of ratings manning the station. Outside there were a number of tall masts, the aerials of which were being replaced by civilian contractors. Our job was to hoist them into place when they were ready 鈥攁 ten minute job about once a day. This posting lasted about a fortnight and then it was back to the Victory. Seven days leave was requested and granted.

It was now late May and the situation in France was becoming desperate and the evacuation of the army from France began, but recall to Portsmouth did not arrive and the leave was completed. Returning to Portsmouth I was promptly drafted to H.M.S. Europa, the Royal Navy Patrol Service depot at Lowestoft. The base consisted of a a number of huts and buildings within the Sparrows Nest, a peace-time park and concert hall. Experience was in its favour for it had performed the same task in World War One. Accommodation was on a bed and breakfast basis in the houses of local people, with an early morning walk into the depot, returning in the evening.

Again my stay was short with a draft to H.M.S. Lynx the base at Dover. The depot served a flotilla of destroyers, a number of mine-sweeping trawlers and several motor torpedo boats and was also home to the Vice Admiral Dover with his head-quarters in the tunnels extending from the top of Castle Hill into the depths of Shakespeare Cliffs. No time was wasted and I was on posted to H.M.S. Ut Prosim along with a visual signalman to H.M.S. Gulzar. Ut Prosim was no sleek destroyer of the Dover Patrol but a diminutive drifter. Presenting myself to its officer in the approved manner, 鈥淭elegraphist Martin reporting, Sir鈥� his answer was somewhat blunt and with little formality. 鈥淲ell, lad I hope you鈥檝e brought your own bloody set with you for we haven鈥檛 got one鈥�. A quick swap was made with the signalman unwanted on the 鈥淕ulzar鈥�.

The change was much to my advantage. Not only was the Gulzar bigger, she was far more luxurious, having been a private motor yacht of a high standard 鈥� it even had a bath-room, and I shared a cabin with the signalman, complete with wash-room and toilet. The ship had distinguished itself at Dunkirk and had merited a D.S.O. for its
commanding officer. Sea-going duties were light, consisting of an occasional night patrol.

Although now sea-going I was still rated and paid as an Ordinary Telegraphist at two shillings a day (10p). This was increased later in the war by an additional sixpence - paid out on demobilisation. I was now entitled to threepence a day in lieu of the daily tot of rum and the same amount for upkeep of kit. An extra payment was received as 鈥渉ard lyers鈥�, received by all ratings serving on small ships. All this brought my pay up to about twenty five shilling a week, a princely sum in those days!

After six months I sat a further examination and having passed now became a fully fledged Telegraphist. This was followed by another examination to qualify as a Trained Operator, whatever that implied apart from an extra threepence a day. After three years service I was granted a good service stripe with yet one more threepence a day.

This was not the end. One of the peculiar oddities of naval life was the catering arrangements of which there were two types 鈥� general and mess-deck. General messing applied to large ships and depots where the meals were the same for all ratings based on the daily allowance for catering. On smaller ships mess-deck catering generally applied. Each mess (in trawlers and the like there would only be the one) catered for itself and the daily allowance was totalled up at the end of the month and 鈥渕ess deck savings鈥� would be made. Or not, if there had been an over-spend when the deficiency had to be made up

Another benefit was the ability to purchase cigarettes duty free. There was a daily allowance of twenty cigarettes a day at about sixpence a packet. There was also a monthly allowance of pound of tobacco in half-pound tins as cigarette tobacco or pipe, or even in leaf form for making plug tobacco and cost one shilling and three-pence. Non-smokers like myself were very welcome for there was always someone who smoked heavily willing to take over any unwanted issue. Leave time an allowance was made but taking more than was due was an offence classed as smuggling, leading to punishment.

The highly attractive posting to HMS Gulzar was not to last for long. Towards the end of August the ship was sunk in one of the early raids that developed into the Battle of Britain. Fortunately most of the crew, including myself, were on leave at the time, so there was but one minor casualty.

Dover offered a grand-stand view of the Battle of Britain and the skies soon became full of the vapour trails. Part of the towns鈥� defences was a number of barrage balloons, serviced by the R.A.F., and they were kept busy as the German fighter planes took delight in seeing how many could be shot down. One day they shot down the whole lot of about twenty coming back for another dozen or so in the evening.

Returning from that leave I anticipated being sent back to Portsmouth but instead I was drafted to H.M.S. Lois one of the many mine-sweeping trawlers operating from there. She was typical of her breed, about a hundred feet long with one funnel, a
whale-back on top of which was the standard issue twelve-pounder gun, a wheel-house-cum-bridge a lifeboat and little else. Speed did not feature in their statistics, depending much upon how fast the tide was running. With a favourable wind and how strong was the desire to get a good berth on returning to harbour, eight knots could probably be mustered

They were ideal for the job they were to perform for it varied little from its peace-time use, just a bit more dangerous. They were crewed by one or two officers, usually RNR who had manned these vessels in peace-time, a chief petty officer as the senior seaman, a chief and petty officer engineman, four stokers (for the ships were virtually all coal-fired), a dozen or so seamen, a visual signalman and one telegraphist, with a cook and steward . The crew were housed in the forward mess deck which had previously served as the hold for tons of fish, the officers amidships, and the petty officers, cook and officers steward in the stern.

In the early stages of the war they were lightly armed, most from Dover had one Lewis gun on one of the wings of the bridge, usually mounted on the side pointing to German-held-France. The cunning Germans capitalised on this deficiency by waiting until they were going home from their raids before giving a short burst. This soon became no longer practical as supplies improved and additional armament appeared. Twin Lewis guns port and starboard were easily added whilst the addition of a twin point-five mounting on top of the galley had to await until a re-fit was due. The same applied to the addition of an Oerlikon in the stern. The ship had a small number of depth charges in the stern but due to the ships speed dropping one was quite likely to result in blowing off the ship鈥檚 stern. Other peculiar devices made their appearance as the war progressed including a rocket firing device with a small parachute with an explosive device attached designed to deter enemy aircraft. Room was found for the provision of an Holman projector which resembled a length of drain piping down which was dropped a Mills bomb to be expelled into the path of aircraft by a burst of steam.

Dover, apart from its proximity to the enemy, was a relatively comfortable base to operate from as most of the duties consisted of a night patrol and sweep roughly twice a week on a rota basis, making for regular shore leave. Of the mine-sweepers at Dover most, like the Lois, were fitted to sweep for contact mines with a wire trailed astern and out-board, hoping to catch a mine to be brought to the surface by a cutter on the wire, then sunk or exploded by rifle fire. There were also a smaller number of magnetic mine sweepers which operated in pairs, trailing an electrically charged wire astern, creating a magnetic field which, again hopefully, would explode the mine. Later in the war the Germans developed the acoustic mine, detonated by the sound of the ships propeller. To counter-act this a hammer device was installed on a frame in the bows, causing the mine to explode ahead of the sweeper. It also kept off-duty hands awake during the night!. .

Within a few days of joining HMS Lois I was visited by the Chief Petty Officer Telegraphist whose job it was to instruct newcomers on their duties. Apart from manning the equipment and keeping a log book, the confidential books had to be kept
up-to-date and a double bank of wet batteries maintained. Then came the do-nots. You do not do deck-watches. you do not scrub decks, you do not paint ship.
Your job on board is a telegraphist and you have quite enough to do with that 鈥� something of an exaggeration, I found later. When it came to act as duty ship, the signalman and I manned the telephone line on the pier for emergency calls and kept an eye on the signal station ashore. Another little task that came the way of most sparkers was the daily collection of mail from the Fleet Mail Office. All ships in war-time were addressed as 鈥渃/o G.P.O., London鈥�, a problem the G.P.O. seemed to take in its stride. All outgoing mail was subject to censorship and had to be submitted to the skipper, unsealed.
The crew was split into two watches, port and starboard for shore leave and for duty at sea where naval routine of four hour watches normally operated. I split my watch
with the visual signalman during the hours of darkness when any signalling that was necessary was usually by means of morse from a night signalling lamp. Daytime an Aldis lamp would be used. Semaphore was rarely used and flag hoists were generally only used when a big sweep took place when a flotilla of ships operated.

On such an occasion the ships would be under the command of the Commander Minesweeping and Patrol (CMSP). Both watches would be on duty and I would assist the signalman (known as the bunting tosser or bunts). He would need help for most CMSPs new the signal book forwards and backwards and the leading ship would be ablaze with flags flying from every possible hoist. Apart from the signals flown for specific mine-sweeping and ships manoeuvres, there would be an inter-mingling of orders designed to keep the crew on its toes. Everything from 鈥淢an overboard鈥�, 鈥淧repare to engage enemy鈥� and 鈥淔ire in the galley鈥� would be flown and heaven help the bunting tosser who made a mistake. Returning to harbour the ships officers would look forward to seeing a two letter signal 鈥淒L鈥�, signifying 鈥淲ell done鈥�, at the same time hoping that it would not be followed by the negative flag and pennant number implying that the of the ship of that number did not qualify for praise

As opposed to the occasional frantic duties of the signalman the duties of a Telegraphist were slight to the point of non-existence and most wireless traffic was generally directed to the large force of motor torpedo boats that operated from Dover. Other than that the receiver would be quiet for days. Transmission was rarely called for 鈥� traffic from ships at sea was not encouraged as it could betray the ships presence to the enemy.

A hazard peculiar to Dover was the occasional shelling from the heavy guns on the other side of the channel. Presumably the Germans did not have a large supply of ammunition for the attacks were rarely prolonged and not very accurate. After the first shell had landed a double warning signal would be made and all hands ashore would be expected to return to their ships 鈥� hoping for the all clear to sound so leave could be resumed. Our heavy artillery on the heights would sometimes reply

One of the key men aboard ship was the leading seaman. One of his duties would be
as winchman as the sweep wire was paid out or reeled in from the steam operated winch on deck in front of the bridge. His alertness as the sweep was reeled was essential for it was not uncommon for a mine to be entangled with the sweeping gear. This was demonstrated one morning when on our sister ship, the Fyldea, the winchman failed to re-act quickly enough and the ship was sunk with all hands lost. A few days later the same happened to the Lois but the winch was stopped just in time 鈥� on the bridge at the time the mine finished up about a couple of feet from my nose. The skipper did his best to get rid of it without avail and the whole lot was chopped adrift in safe waters.

On a brilliant moon-lit night in November 1940 the Lois cleared harbour at 1700 hours and I was on watch with the skipper. We had been on patrol for about an hour and the quiet of the night was disturbed by the sound of aircraft passing overhead from Germany towards their target. No sooner had the noise receded in the distance than it was repeated as further aircraft went on to the attack. This continued for the length of my watch, and beyond. The skipper remarked to me 鈥淪ome-ones getting a pasting tonight, Sparks鈥�. The patrol over, the ship returned to harbour at 0800. While the crew secured the ship the officer switched on his radio for the news and called out to tell me that the target for those aircraft on the 14th November had been Coventry. It was to be a couple of weeks before I heard that all was well with family and friends. On leave a little later, arriving at Coventry station at night I had difficulty finding my bearings as I walked through three miles of devastation and rubble.

The other key man on board was the often much maligned cook. They operated in difficulty for the galley, with a coal fired stove, was far from commodious and like the rest of the ship moved around a bit in rough weather. The first was a Scot of medium ability providing he could be kept away from the rum bottle. He was eventually escorted from the ship by naval police after throwing a bucket into the wardroom following a drunken dispute with the skipper. His replacement was much to our advantage. A butcher by trade he brought that little bit extra into his offerings and we continued to enjoy three hot meals day for the length of his stay. Fortune did not favour us further and the next cook was incapable of preparing any edible meal and a replacement was quickly found.

One little delicacy that occasionally featured on the menu was a selection of fresh fish. If a mine had been exploded there would be a shoal of dead fish floating around, buckets would be lowered and as many fish hauled in as possible while the ship was still under way. As can be imagined there was a great variety and an obliging cook would offer a choice ranging from eel to my preference, Dover sole. Apart from providing a welcome change of diet this treat also helped with the afore-mentioned mess savings.

At one time in the war we had a change of job and scenery. Along with a few of the other Dover-based trawlers we were moved up to the Thames area, joining others from different ports. From there we had the task of towing the large Thames barges down to various ports on the south coast, from Newhaven onwards. They were taken two at a time, sometimes towed astern and at other times lashed alongside. The latter did not make for a comfortable voyage for, no matter how tight the lashing, the sea could not be beaten and the heavy thumping could not be stilled. This job made a pleasant change in the routine with summer weather usually making for a smooth journey. What the idea was we were never told and guessing was rife, with buzzes about a second front predominating. Come the start of winter weather and it was back to Dover.

A normal home water draft lasted for two years and my two years came and went. Other changes in the crew took place regularly as crew members were promoted or just moved around. After three years a new arrival announced his presence 鈥渞elief for Telegraphist Martin鈥�. My time to move on had come.

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