大象传媒

Miriam O'Beirne Martin is willing to have her story entered onto the People's War website and agrees to abide by the House Rules.

Even though I must have been no more than five years old at the time, I can remember quite clearly the day my brother Bud left home to join the Merchant Navy. He would have been sixteen, no more than a school boy.

It was a cold rainy November day and as I skipped between the puddles up the path to the house I was excited by his great adventure and therefore shocked to find my mother, sitting looking sadly into the fire, the tears running down her cheeks. 'A seafarer's life is most terrible harsh,' she said.

There were four of us children in the family. Two born in America and two born in England and although there was friendly rivalry between us, we were actually all most devoted to each other. That is why, I suppose that Bud wrote home with great regularity and we diligently followed his travels in an Atlas wherever he went.

Bud's first return home after a number of years was spectacular for we hardly recognised the tall handsome sailor who stood smiling at us. Only the kindly grey-green eyes seemed the same. He was so happy to be home and arrived heavily laden with presents for us all, for that was the way of him. Better than Birthdays or Christmas by far, were the times when Bud came home from the sea.

Well I remember the presents he brought to me. Red Spanish dancing shoes (even though he knew I would never make a dancer). Carved ivory elephants in a tiny red bean with a carved ivory lid. Razor-sharp sharks' teeth which fitted like a jigsaw and were housed in a beautiful yellow wood box). A python's skin which stretched the whole length of the sitting room floor. There were perfumes and scarves, beads and bangles. Once a tiny tortoise from Casablanca and even a Blue Vervet monkey who peeped timidly out at us from the inside of Bud's jacket. We listened spellbound to Bud's endless stories; laughed at his jokes and were captivated by his songs. We hoped he would never go away again but of course that time always came and far too soon for our liking.

One day of his leave however was particularly special for me. He would don his uniform and looking exceptionally smart would stand waiting for me at the school yard gate. I was immensely proud of him and felt I must certainly be the envy of all the other girls.

As the years went by, he continued to come into our lives and go out again. This if anything merely seemed to increase the close bond between us all.

During the middle 1930's bud was on one of the small ships that ran the blockade into Bilbao in the Spanish Civil War. Bilbao, a port was heavily bombed and the British sailors sometimes ran for shelter in an old railway tunnel. It was Bud's first taste of war and its terrible effects 'There are small children, not much older than Miri here, trying to keep whole families together, mother and father both dead' he said sadly.

Perhaps this was why when he came home on leave in 1939 he was scarcely long ever in the house to make us laugh but instead spent most of his time with pickaxe and spade digging a big hole in the ground on a vacant plot nearby. Neighbours passing, confident of 'peace in our time' from Chamberlain mocked him good humouredly, asking if he was 'digging for gold', but later in the summer of 1940 during the Battle of Britain and then the Blitz, all in the area had reason to be thankful for what came to be known as 'Bud's shelter'.

Once the war began his usual flow of letters slowed to nothing and my mother desperate for news of him, less resolute than usual, fell into the habit of tuning in to the sneering commentaries of the traitor, known as Lord Haw-Haw. On one occasion he mentioned the name of Bud's ship. 'The crew have mutineed and the ship is stranded in Cape Town' he said. It left us most fearful which of course was the idea behind all of Haw-Haw's broadcasts. Months later Bud gave us the true story. 'It was only some of the crew who weren't British and didn't want to return to the war zone', he explained 'They just went ashore and did not return. They actually did us a favour for when the story got around about our plight we were inundated with volunteeers. South Africans anxious to work their passge, get to Britain and join up. One was even a Test cricketer who took on the job of a stoker. They got us back home and did their jobs well,' he said.

All during the war Bud came and went but while he was at home there were few stories and we did not ask for them. 'Careless talk costs LIVES' was in the minds of all of us. We never knew from which port he was leaving or for where his ship was bound. Like so many others we could only hope and pray for his safe return. One morning our attention was caught by big headlines in a national newspaper 'Merchant Navy Officer Saves the Lives of German Airmen!' An enemy plane one of a number with a record for attacking Merchant ships, not in convoy and afterwards machine-gunning the men who had taken to the life boats had emerged from heavy cloud to strike at yet another potential victim. This British Merchant Ship possessing only one gun; however it was used to good measure. The German bomber was shot into the sea and the surviving airmen took to a life raft. The gunnery officer went down over the side of the ship and swam with a rope to their rescue.

I read the story over and over again, convinced that the officer involved could only be my Big Brother Bud. The rest of the family argued in almost an amused fashion. 'There are thousands of Merchantmen taking part in this war' they said. So I tucked the paper carefully away and we said no more about it. When Bud finally came home again I showed him the account which he read with interest but made no comment.'Tell me' he said 'now that you are at the Big school, are you too grown up a young lady for me to wait for you at the school gate?'

As always the days of his leave sped by far too quickly and I remember after he had left wandering back into the house, thinking how his going seemed to leave such a gap in our close family circle. On the kitchen table I found a parcel addressed to me and opened it slowly knowing it was from Bud. The parcel contained a German Pilot's Flying Helmet!

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