大象传媒

"This story was submitted to the People's War site by the Barnsley Archives and Local Studies Department on behalf of George Beard and has been added to the site with his/her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions."
I was conscripted in to the Navy and I served on gun crews on merchant ships (they were all armed during the war). I was pleased to be called up as I had always wanted to go to sea. I worked on freight carriers and we transported ammunitions, troops, meat and dried fish. We worked in a convoy system.

On the way back from Bombay we got bombed and had to be diverted to Mombassa. It was a whole new world. We had got used to Asian habits as the ships were mostly Asian run, but this was a whole new world. After Mombassa, we were on our way to Durban when we rammed in to a whale. We had to line the ship with concrete to stop the leaks. We were carrying peanuts and when we got to Hull, the peanuts went up in flames. After that I had some leave.

My next ship was a troop ship to Durban. We got torpedoed on the way back at Cape Town. Six torpedoes, which was a lot. We had to abandon ship. From then, it took me three years to get home on a variety of ships. From Cape Town I went to Durban on the train, then straight on ship to Basra, then to Karach to pick up dried fish, which we took to Calcutta. Then I moved on to a Greek ship. It was terrible, with rats running about, running all over you when you were asleep. Then carrying army stores over to Burma. At this time, I left the India Coast and went to Portuguese East Africa, then to Port Said, then to Alexandria and then moved on to an ammunition ship. We followed the fleet around to replenish them whenever they had a bombardment. After three years I eventually got home on leave, but I was straight back on to a refrigerator boat for New Zealand, carrying general cargo. We called at the Pit Cairn Islands on the way out. It was an incestuous society then. We loaded meat at various ports on the New Zealand coast. When I got home, the war was over.

Immediately, I got back to England I was put on to a Union Castle boat to South Africa. When we got off the Atlantic coast we had to dump all ammunition overboard as hostilities had stopped.

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