大象传媒

This is Peter Goss鈥� story: it has been added by Ralph Lines (on behalf of the Fernhurst Centre), with permission from the author who understands the terms and conditions of adding his story to the website.

When our sea time was complete each CW candidate was interviewed by the captain and was drafted to HMS King Alfred. This was the general service RNVR officers training establishment. It was in three parts. The first was a house called Mowden at the back of Hove where each candidate appeared before the selection board. I was asked about my time on Argus and how we moored to a buoy. Fortunately I had studied my seamanship manual and managed to give an answer which appeared to satisfy them. Whilst at Mowden I had to take my turn as guard commander for divisions. When I was due to report I called my guard to attention marched smartly up to the Duty Officer, halted and gave him the smartest of hand salutes. It of course should have been a butt salute as I was carrying a rifle at the slope. It was like a Bateman drawing with horrified senior officers glowering at me. At least that is how it felt at the time.

After passing the selection board we moved to King Alfred 2 which was in fact Lancing school taken over for the duration. Here we did most of our officers training course with a lot of emphasis on initiative tasks and officer like qualities. My only noteworthy action was to stick a bayonet into the stomach of my gunnery officer. We did sentry duty at what was known as 鈥榯he farm鈥� on the entrance road some distance from the college. It was a dark night and towards the end of my watch I heard footsteps approaching. 鈥淗alt , who goes there?鈥� No answer and the footsteps came on. I repeated the challenge with no response. I worked the bolt of my rifle as we had been instructed (we were wisely not provided with any ammunition). By this time the footsteps were almost upon me and a torch was flashed in my face. I lunged forward with my bayonet shouting 鈥淗alt!鈥� 鈥淎lright,鈥� said the voice of my gunnery officer, 鈥渂e careful what you are doing.鈥� My bayonet point was touching his uniform jacket. I think it was his idea of an initiative test.

After several weeks at Lancing we moved to King Alfred 3 which was the sports complex on the front at Hove. We did chartwork and morse code and some boat handling using a battered tug in Shoreham harbour. We also carried out 鈥榗ompany drill鈥� among the box hedges on Hove sea front. It only required a mistake or two and squads were clambering through the undergrowth in a variety of directions while the gunnery instructor became increasingly apoplectic. Very few failed the course as preparations were being made for the invasion of Europe and many young officers were required. I had learnt to pitch an order on the parade ground and elsewhere and this must have helped because I failed a number of academic subjects. When I was interviewed by the appointing officer he asked me where I wanted to go and I said blithely, 鈥淐oastal Forces, sir鈥� as I had visions of dashing up and down the Channel in an MTB. He looked at my results and said, 鈥淲ell you failed navigation, you failed torpedoes and had to have two goes at signals. It鈥檚 Combined Operations for you.鈥�

So in the late spring of 1943 I arrived at HMS Helder a requisitioned holiday camp south of Clacton as a Midshipman RNVR. Crews were trained on an assault course and a mock up of a landing craft and beach in a Martello tower. One sailor got reprimanded for picking up a thunderflash and throwing it back at the instructor. 鈥楾hese things are dangerous鈥� he was told. We got to handle minor landing craft such as LCM Mk 3s which could take a tank and LCVs which could take a vehicle. I managed to sink an LCV or at least get it waterlogged one afternoon when we had taken on a Bren Gun carrier. When we beached the Bren carrier drove off, the bows went down and the water came in. When we raised the door it had jammed with shingle. More water poured in and flooded the engine. We had to be towed ignominiously back and I was told to 鈥榮tate my reasons in writing.鈥� I fully expected to be court martialled but all the training officer said was, 鈥淲ell you won鈥檛 make that mistake again.鈥�

Before long we moved to a camp at the back of Plymouth Called HMS Folliot but I was only there a short time before I was told that I had been selected for a Beach Signals Section. I was sent to HMS Dundonald a combined operations camp some miles inland from Troon I joined No 14 Beach Signals Section as second in command. A Sub- Lieutenant was the CO and we had one regular Petty Officer as Yeoman of Signals, A Hostilities Only Petty Officer telegraphist and about twenty signals ratings all HO and either VS (visual signals) or WT. We were sent to a battle training school on the shores of Loch Sheil on the west coast where we carried No 18 wireless sets up the hills. Later we were equipped with 22 sets which were more modern. We made landings on a derelict castle on the loch where we were fired on with live ammunition 鈥� one bullet at least was embedded in the gunwhale of the boat.

Returning to Dundonald we began to take part in landing exercises preparatory to D-Day. My CO went into hospital and I had to take the unit across Scotland with a railway waggon full of signal stores. We got off at Drem station east of Edinburgh where we expected to be met by army transport. The station was in complete darkness when out of the gloom appeared a large CPO. 鈥淎re you the draft, sir?鈥� he said and I thankfully agreed. He said that he had transport waiting. We had not gone far when he asked how Lee on Solent was these days. A bit nonplussed I replied that I had never been there. His face fell as he realised he had picked up the wrong group which he had expected to take to the Fleet Air Arm station. They were very good to us and fed us and bedded us down for the night. In the morning we contacted our army unit who took us to the exercise area at Gullane.

It was now the winter of 1943/44 and we took part in two big pre-invasion exercises Crown and Anchor. We got used to wet landings coming ashore from a landing craft and sleeping out in a bivouac on the beach while our battle dress froze on us. Eventually we moved to a naval base at Port Edgar near the south end of the Forth Bridge and then to our relief down to south of England to Poole Harbour and HMS Turtle. From there we were taken in a fleet of minor landing craft from Poole to the Beaulieu river where we went under canvas at Exbury House. I can remember the spring blossom in the gardens. D-Day was now close and we moved to one of the holding camps on Southampton Common. All leave was stopped and the barbed wire patrolled by sentries who had orders to shoot anyone attempting to communicate with the outside. We had been shown maps of the French coast and knew where we were going.

The landing was originally intended to be on the 5th of June and twenty four hours before we travelled through Southampton after dark and loaded on to an American LST (landing ship tank). These not only had a ramp but bow doors. They had two decks with a lift between. We lay at anchor in the Solent the following day as the landing was put back twenty four hours due to the weather forecast. The lines of landing craft stretched as far as you could see down the Solent towards Portsmouth.

We sailed eventually on the 5th and lay for a while rolling off the Needles. Eventually after dark we got going and I got some sleep but not very much. I had charge of the WT part of the unit while the CO had the VS part on another landing craft. Because an LST has a deep draught we were towing behind us a pontoon called a Rhino ferry with two huge outboard engines manned by two soldiers. Some time in the night this broke adrift and we never saw it again. When it got light we could see the coastline in the distance. There was a good deal of smoke but otherwise not a lot of activity. We beached sometime in the morning on a rising tide but because of the loss of our pontoon the water was too deep for us or the transport to get ashore. We were thus marooned on board for twenty four hours and landed eventually on D + 1. We were on Gold beach section G1 which was our destination. When got ashore we joined up with the rest of our section in a ruined house near Ver sur Mer. By this time the fighting had moved inland and things were fairly quiet although there was a sniper who fired at the beach over our position using tracer.

The next day being off duty I walked across some derelict fields towards the woods. Reaching the far side I noticed the backs of small notices at the edge of the field. Walking round the front I saw that each sign had a skull and crossbones on it and the words 鈥淎chtung Minen.鈥� I found several of our men looking for souvenirs in a German pill box. We suddenly heard the crack of a rifle from some distant woods. We discovered later that there was a sniper at large. I drew my pistol out and we made a hasty tactical withdrawal though I doubt if he would have fired again so soon for fear of giving away his position.

A few days later the WT section of the unit was moved a few miles inland to a village called Meuvaines. I took my turn as duty signals officer. It was fairly routine the only excitement being when human torpedoes were reported in the anchorage and I had the job of putting a 鈥榤ost immediate鈥� signal through and interrupted the calls of various senior officers in doing so. We were accommodated in a nearby orchard under canvas. I teamed up with a cipher officer and when we were off duty we walked or hitched a lift around the bridgehead claiming we were naval war correspondents if questioned as to our motives. We penetrated to the front on one occasion a mile or so short of the village of Bretteville l鈥橭rguilleuse on the main road between Bayeux (in our hands) and Caen (still in German hands). It was eerily quiet until we were passed by a small boy on a bicycle who waved and said, 鈥淏onjour Monsieurs.鈥� We were just thinking that perhaps we had gone far enough when we came across some Canadian troops crouched in a slit trench. That was definitely far enough and we began walking back when a machine gun opened up from some woods about half a mile distant. We crawled the rest of the way behind standing corn watching the bullets kicking up the dust behind us.

After a few weeks Beach Signals were no longer needed and we were sent back to the UK. We went first to a holding depot at Westcliffe on Sea from where we were sent on leave. We returned from leave to our base at HMS Dundonald. I had for some time wanted to leave Beach Signals but this was not easy as it was rumoured that we were to be sent out to the Far East. The only route seemed to be to volunteer for Special Service and this I did making myself unpopular with my senior officers. I was called for an interview in London. My idea had been to go for COPP (Combined Operations Pilotage Parties) who were the swimmer canoeists who surveyed beaches before an invasion. However no one was required in this area and I was offered Landing Craft Obstacle Clearance Units which I accepted without knowing what was involved. I was soon to discover.

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