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Continued from Part 3
Aduattol was one of those little places that look wonderful in holiday brochures. Actually it was the opposite, terribly hot and humid. No swimming because of various things i.e. poisonous fish and coral, plus elephantitis. We spent weeks at sea as there were huge sea tankers in operation now and used to re-fuel at sea. There was the occasional tornado to contend with. All aircraft treble lashed down in the hanger and sail into the wind. You could see them coming towards you then all hell was let loose. The Yanks lost quite a lot of destroyers at sea this way, but it was kept quiet. I saw many waterspouts and gigantic whales. There was lots of action. Many Japanese ‘Kamikaze’ attacks — suicide bombers — and we saw many ships hit. We usually operated on one flank of the Yankee fleet. We had many attacks on us but received only minor damage; the aircraft used to scream over and just miss us and crash in the sea. My action station at one time was up in the flight deck. I’ve dived in the side nets many a time. The din itself was frightening, all guns on the ship banging away and aircraft screaming all around.
We spent most of the time in the Pacific chasing off Japan. Our planes were continually bombing around Tokyo and further south at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I had the chance of going up on a bombing mission on a ‘Grunman’ avenger but after six years in the Navy I was too canny/ I hadn’t survived that long at sea and with hopes of the war fading soon to want to risk that so I didn’t go. I’d heard too many tales of what the Japs did to captured airmen. Also, the old avengers were clapped out. We had them after the Yanks had passed them over as finished and our poor blokes had to fly them. They didn’t even lumber off the flight deck sometimes but fell straight off into the sea.
Everyone on a Navy ship has two jobs. Mine was still as it always had been in charge of the squadron stores. I liked it. It was interesting and varied. The second job was your action station job. I’ve done most things, gun-loading crew — deep down in the magazine room, P.O. in charge of a damage control team. All watertight doors had to be shut, all vents turned off, ‘X’ and ‘Y’ doors etc. I had learnt to catnap by now. Eventually we were told to lay off thirty miles and the atom bombs were dropped. The war then ended quickly and very unexpectedly. The bombs, although terrible did save many thousands of British and American lives as we were to join an invasion of Japan.
Sailed back to Sydney. We were ashore under canvas and it was very cold. I had a bad cough and couldn’t sleep. We sailed for home quite quickly. I was ASG25 — age and service group 25. It was first in, first out so I was away! I sailed home on a New Zealand liner ‘Ranjtiti’ (a river in N.Z.) It was a very pleasant trip home and I had a cabin. We broke down and limped into Wellington and given two weeks leave whilst they repaired the damage. There were about twenty of us taking passage home. A few of us were sent up country 200 miles to New Plymouth. It was all like a scene from an American movie. The train complete with huge smock stack and loud bell duly set off, there were only three trains a week. It took most of the day to get there. We stopped at a small station for dinner. We all got out, driver and crew as well and trooped in to a nice meal. The driver blew his big whistle and we all trooped back on and away we went. We had to drive through small towns slowly so everyone could keep clear. When we arrived at New Plymouth, a very attractive town, the mayor and a brass band met us! We were all allocated to stay with local families. I was met by a nice couple that took two of us off to a supply house. It was built in the local style up about five feet on huge piers. There were huge rooms and a bathroom about fifteen feet square. The daughter and her friend (both engaged to New Zealand air force pilots took us out and about. I met lots of nice people. We went up to the snow level on Mount Egremont 8000ft called the ‘Fujiama’ of New Zealand. It was very like England with much nicer scenery than Australia. The people were like the English, whilst the Aussies were more like the Yanks. There was a very large local park and it was like being out in the wilds. We played Mah Jong in the evenings and I had a very peaceful two weeks. I had thoughts about coming back there for good. I had several Maori meals cooked in leaves on hot stones in the ground. Back to Wellington — called ‘windy’ Wellington, a very nice city. The ship wasn’t yet fixed. We met a nice local man — a headmaster, who took us to meet the family — two of us — he had loads of children. I forget how many. He had a huge timber playroom in his garden with all the games there. It was in a suburb called ‘Lower Hutt’.
We sailed for home with a ship full of New Zealand girls who had married Yanks and were off to America to join them. There were all sorts of course but we met a nice crowd. One of the girls had a brother who was a New Zealand cycling champion but, I had some nice chats to them all. We went through the Panama Canal, there were beautiful villas with lush green lawns running down too the canal on both sides, presumably belonging to the various officials running the canal. I had a run around Colon, very colourful and bustling. There were plenty of shady looking characters around and we were warned not to stray too far. We called in at various places such as Trinidad etc. By the time we got home I would have sailed right round the world through the Suez and Panama Canals. It would cost thousands of pound s today but it would be a lot safer I guess!
We arrived home to HMS Daedalus, the shore base at Lee on Solent. I had the chance of a commission short term if I stayed on in the Navy but I said no thanks. I’d had enough. I’d enjoyed it in the Navy — some of the time — and would not have wanted to do anything else in wartime but it did not appeal to me in peacetime. The Navy was a wonderful way of learning about life and the ways of men. Many were from very poor homes and lots were orphans so joined the Navy for abetter life. I realised what nice chaps most regular service Naval men were. I also realised that in six years in the Navy I had done more ‘sea-time’ as it is called, than many regular service Naval men did before the war or in their whole careers. Although we may only have averaged say eighteen knots (about 20 MPH) it was a steady average for twenty four hours, day after day, equalling about four hundred and eighty miles a day i.e. about 175000 miles a year. Nothing like that was done in peacetime. Most boats were in harbour or ‘showing the flag’ i.e. visiting other ports around the world and at home. As for the supply branch, you may think it is a ‘cushy’ job. It had many advantages but try storing ship i.e. standing on a storm tossed lighter tied up alongside a carrier at midnight in Scapa Flow harbour and freezing winter and snowing hard in charge of about twenty cheesed off matelots, well I know as I’ve done it. There would be crates of stores swinging around and over your head as you bawl up to the chap on the crane on the flight deck ‘have it away handsomely’.
The main difference between say a supply sailor and a seaman is that the supply chap is in his stores and the seaman is cleaning his gun or scrubbing the deck or the heads (lavatories). When the ‘action station’ bugle blows off we all go to our respective action station and we are all sunk or swim together on the ship.
Other final recollections include the cockroaches, thousands of them in your clothes and in your locker. They were in the soup, in the bread, everywhere. And the rats, they ate all the bone buttons on my suit hanging up once. I used to lie on my camp bed, I slept in the store, and watch them, and I had them run over me sometimes — true. Another memory is of slippery wet decks, all hatches closed wartime and just the small circular middle to open then shut behind you. Our meals had to be carried from the galley down through these or down steep gangways/ladders. We all took it in turn to do this chore. There was no ‘canteen messing’ as it was later called, that was brought in about the end of the war — central messes for eating. If at action stations the ships cook used to bring us corned beef sandwiches and coffee.
My final job before being de-mobbed was to collect my ‘de-mob’ clothing. I was given a choice of ghastly suits. The least ghastly was a light grey double-breasted chalk stripe, together with a cheap trilby hat etc. I looked like a refugee from Siberia. I took it away and slung it all away except the suit and when I eventually started back at work I found that all the other chaps had picked the light grey chalk stripe as well, so I slung that away too! I started at the Co-Op men’s wear in January 1946 and started to look for a better job, along with umpteen million other men, It was not easy.

The End

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