大象传媒

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A Rookie鈥檚 Tale

Page 6/6 by Jack Nicholls

The boat filled with troops and was rowed to a paddle steamer some distance out. This was the Brighton Belle. We quickly climbed on board and went below where we were given a mug of tea and thick Bully Beef sandwiches. Manna from heaven!! We hadn't eaten or had a hot drink for what seemed days. In the meantime the small lifeboats went back and forwards to the beach bringing off more troops until the Brighton Belle was absolutely crammed full. Then we set off back for Blighty.

In the warmth of the saloon we began to dry off and being practically all in, quickly fell asleep. We hadn't been going very long when there was a terrific bang and the boat shuddered. The hooter started going in short blasts, the signal to abandon ship, as she was going down rapidly. There was no panic, - by
then we were so hardened, so tired and weary that no matter what happened it was just one more bloody thing, and we formed an orderly queue and went up the stairs ready for another dunking. Fortunately for us there was another paddle boatclose by, the Gracie Fields. She drew alongside and we were able to jump from
one ship to the other. The Brighton Belle quickly went down, leaving the top of her mast sticking out of the water. The Channel at that point couldn't have been so deep as I heard what had happened was that the Brighton' Belle had ripped a hole in the bottom, on the wreck of another ship that had sunk there.

We eventually arrived at Margate and disembarked there. What a sight we were, grubby and unshaven, some with boots on, others barefooted, some only in pants. They had taken their clothes down to the engine room of the Brighton Belle to dry off and had no time to rescue them before it went down. There was only a few of us from our Company still together and only four of us from
our Platoon. I'm a bit hazy as to what happened next, but from Margate we went to Tilehurst Barracks at Reading. The barracks were just in the process of being built and we were put into a room with a concrete floor and an unfinished roof. We were given a blanket and managed to scrounge a couple of sheets of corrugated cardboard to put between us and the concrete floor. There we slept the sleep of the just, our first night's undisturbed sleep since we landed in France. We couldn't have slept better on a feather bed.

We were re-kitted out and the process of reforming the Company started. We moved from place to place, each time meeting up with a few more of the Company who had managed to get back. Eventually we arrived at Witney in
Oxfordshire. Rumours were rife that we were going to get the 48 hours leave from there that we had been promised since getting back from Dunkirk and for once the rumour was true. Full of anticipation we marched to the Station and boarded a train for Paddington, from where we were to make our own way home.
It hardly seemed believable that at last we were going home for a couple of days. It wasn't. Just as the train was ready for leaving, M.P.'s came down the Platform calling for all 13th Troop Carrying Company personnel to get off the train and fall in on the platform. We did as we were ordered, - there weren't too many of us - and back to thbillets we went. I don鈥檛 think I've seen a more dejected lot of men in my life.

There we were told that our Company was completing the reforming at Harlech in N. Wales and we should get leave from there which we eventually did. It was a much smaller Company that reformed at Harlech than had landed in France. We had been there for less than three weeks, and in that time about a third of the Company had been lost, together with all our equipment, so it was a pretty disastrous time for us. We were no longer Rookies. We had learned the hard way.
What happened to us after that? Thereby hangs another tale, which perhaps I will tell in due course.

Comp. J. Nicholls

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