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On Boxing Day, 1943, I travelled by train to Liverpool. It was packed, mainly with soldiers, sailors and airmen returning from Christmas leave. At the station I’d said goodbye to my parents, and I was not to see my family again until I arrived home in Manchester in June 1945, a total of 17 months and 16 days later.

The longest voyage

In Liverpool I embarked on the Cunard liner Mauretania, bound for New York. Although I did not know it, this was to be the longest voyage of a 14-year career at sea.

Together with my fellow apprentice officer, David Crabbe, I had to share a cabin with four soldiers. The crossing, which was made without convoy, took about a week. We spent New Year spent at sea. It was a very rough voyage. The Mauretania lurched and rolled, and the four soldiers were sea sick for most of the time.

On our arrival in New York, the 30 or so crew who had signed up in Liverpool with me were accommodated in the Hotel Bristol on West 49th Street.

I had been to New York several times before on my previous ship, the SS Tetela. Through the Apprentice’s Club in New York, I had struck up a friendship with a Miss Agnes Dunlop, who lived in Mineola on Long Island. It was to become a romantic attachment, but, sadly, one that never developed into anything serious.

A new Liberty ship

I was to be in New York on this occasion for several weeks. We were waiting to join the new Liberty ship, the Samstrule, which was being fitted out in Philadelphia. It was some three months before we took the train south to board it.

The ship was called the Samstrule, because it was built by Uncle Sam and named after the Irish river, the Strule. There were many ships of the same class – the Samtrent, the Samleven and so forth.

Wages of £4 a month

As an apprentice officer I earned £4 a month plus a further £10 as a war bonus. During the voyage on the Samstrule I completed two years’ service, and so my pay went up to £6.10s. (£6.50p) per month.

Oddly enough, I felt quite well off, given that I had no food or accommodation to pay for. Even so, I found everything in the USA quite expensive.

Captain ‘Mouldy’ Jones

The ship’s captain was a Welshman from Mold in north Wales, a man who’d been at sea all his life, and who, inevitably, was known as ‘Mouldy’ Jones.

His first mate was Charles V. Cryer. He was, to be honest, a sick man, who should not have been at sea at all. His flesh hung from his bones in loose folds, and he always had a noticeable pallor.

The navigating officer was a Mr Snowdon, a South African, who grew a beard during the course of the voyage. Then there was the third officer, Hutchinson, a young energetic man of about 20, plus two apprentices, five engineers and three radio officers, making a total of 14 officers in all. The entire crew numbered in excess of 30.

Post-war tragedy

After the war I met Hutchinson again at Jewry Street Navigation College in London. From him I learnt of the fate that had befallen a number of the officers. Quite incredibly, as many as four of the them had died in tragic circumstances.

‘Mouldy’ Jones had been relieved of his command following the voyage on which I’d last seen him. He’d been offered a post ashore as superintendent in the West Indies, but he regarded this as demotion. As a result, he hanged himself.

It must be said that during submarine attacks by German U-boats, and one never-to-be-forgotten air attack in the Mediterranean, Captain Jones had become visibly agitated. In those circumstances, I had long concluded that he should never have been in command.

More predictably but just as tragically, his first mate, Charles Cryer, already in ill health, had gone into hospital after the same voyage. He died there after a prolonged and painful illness.

The ‘mosquito fleet’

The third engineer, R. S. Blood, who was always known as Stan, had gone with Hutchinson to Venezuela after the war. Together they had worked on what was known as the ‘mosquito fleet’. These were small tankers that were used to ferry crude oil down river from the oilrigs to large tankers anchored at sea, at the mouth of the river.

Stan, as I well knew, was an alcoholic. One night he and Hutchinson were returning to their ship after spending the evening in a bar. Stan, who was very drunk, slipped from the quayside into the water and drowned.

A litany of disaster

Finally, there was the sad case of the junior engineer, whose surname was Frost. After leaving the Samstrule, the young engineer, who could not have been more than 22, discovered that his girlfriend had jilted him. On receipt of the news, he took a revolver – God alone knows from where he got it – and shot himself.

The Samstrule, it must be said, had more than its fair share of tragedy and, consequently, holds some very sad memories for me.

Read Samstrule: The Great Invasion and Samstrule: Christmas 1944, also by Warwick library user 3.

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