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This story has been written onto the ´óÏó´«Ã½ People’s War site by Callington U3A — Meg Bassett — on behalf Mrs Sheila Lightbody. They fully understand the terms and conditions of the site.

At the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour in 1941 I was in Bermuda. At the outbreak of war I had (foolishly) decided not to continue with my studies at London University, instead becoming a temporary civil servant in the censorship. At this very dull job I was one of the lucky ones to be transferred to Bermuda to work in the grandly titles Imperial Censorship.

The staff at the old Princess Hotel on the waterfront was composed mostly of young, unattached girls with a minority of older expert linguist of the male gender. So, apart from bicycle rides and swimming at the many wonderful beaches, the highlight of our entertainment came with the arrival of a naval vessel — Royal Navy, Free French or U.S. Navy. A sort of grape-vine operated which gathered a group of six or seven girls at one of the local bars to meet up with an equal number of young officers on shore leave. Generally speaking a good time was had by all, although a girl had to have her wits about her to cope with some of the over-possessive Americans!

That first weekend in December the U.S.S. aircraft carrier Wasp was moored off the dockyard and eight of its junior officers had joined up with us at the Twenty One Club. I was lucky on this occasion to find myself seated beside one of the best sort of Americans — a quiet New Englander with a French surname. We had a good evening and were really thrilled when they were leaving to be invited to visit their ship the next day. This was a rare treat, probably only possible because the U.S.S. was still a neutral state.

Our friends were coming ashore for a round of golf at the Mid-Ocean club (one of the best in the western hemisphere in those days) and were to pick us up on their return to Hamilton to catch the officers’ day boat.

I was alone that morning, my room-mate being away, and I had switched on my radio for company. Suddenly an excited voice broke into the Glenn Miller programme. After all these years I don’t remember the exact words of that first report, but I was riveted for the next hour as the tragedy unfolded, the trembling excited voice interspersed with a spell of calming Glenn Miller music.

When my American friend arrived to pick me up he was aghast at my news. But his buddies, when they were told, simply refused to accept my information as correct ‘Pearl Harbour is impregnable’, they declared ‘It’s all a hoax’.

I can see them now, as the day-boat took us out to the aircraft carrier. A row of young, bouncy college students, dressed in the weirdest golf outfit of clashing designs and colours which no self-respecting English golfer would be ‘seen dead in’. And all equipped with the largest and fullest set of clubs imaginable. Remember, this was sixty years ago, when most of us played with three irons, one driver and a putter. Anyway, in my mind I took them down several pegs and felt immensely superior; no warriors these, I reckoned. They’d be no good on the war now forced upon them.

I suspect my attitude was a throwback to the days of Edmund Burke and the American colonies.

We climbed aboard the Wasp. Not one of the larger U.S. carriers, it was absolutely vast. Awe-inspiring. The golfers all disappeared to their quarters to change, leaving our little group of English girls in the huge wardroom where senior officers stood in a heavy silence, listening to the latest reports of Pearl Harbour. When they rejoined us a few moments later the transformation was dramatic. Gone were the gaudy colours and teenage manners. In their white ‘tropicals’ they were grave and serious — probably stunned somewhat by the realisation that this was no hoax after all.

One standing beside me commented quietly ‘My brother’s in her’ when the Lexington was reported on fire and sinking. Another said ‘Well, at least we know at last where we are now’. Their neutrality had been difficult to maintain.

Gone were the college boys. They had grown up. They had become warriors.

By dawn on Monday, Wasp had weighed anchor and slipped away through the coral reefs towards the new war. I don’t know if any of those college boys ever saw their homes again. Their ship went down in the Pacific.

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