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My name is G.J. Heritage and I served in the Royal Navy aboard HMS Spey, HMS Marne and HMS Oakley from 1940 until 1945. In that time, I had many unforgettable experiences of military action. Here are two of my stories from the World War II years.

I was Acting Leading Stoker on the HMS Spey on 11th November 1943 for the North African landings. I was escorting American and British convoy, the USS Thomas Stone transport ship, through the Mediterranean. This ship was suspected torpedoed, 1,100 American rangers aboard, admiralty message to HMS Spey, ‘All ranger to leave ship in landing craft.’

800 rangers were put to sea in landing craft. The Captain Boyd Smith of HMS Spey ordered American rangers in landing craft to follow his ship to Algiers.

Throughout the night and the early hours of the morning, a man on watch on the bridge reported a possible submarine on the surface. The Spey fired star shells to light up the surface. Then it was realized that the landing craft was passing the Spey.

The Captain ordered, at daylight, the rangers to be brought aboard the Spey as the landing craft sunk. The Spey had 130 crew to man the ship, and 800 marines were added to that 130.

We then made for Algiers. On arriving at Algiers the next day, the marines were landed ashore.

While tied up on shore, German aircraft came over and dive bombed the ship.

After landing the American marines in Algiers, we then escorted an American convoy to Bougie. On arriving at Bougie, we immediately came under dive attack my German, low level dive bombers and high level Italian bombers. This lasted for three days. Several transport ships were hit; Lord Roberts, a monitor battleship was hit. It made use of a 16 inch aircraft gun to bring aircraft down.

On November 13th, our Captain said that we had run out of ammunition. If there was no full moon that night, we would make a run for Gibraltar. We escorted three merchant ships and the Lord Roberts back to Gibraltar.

Then we returned to Londonderry to continue our North Atlantic convoys.

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