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With my two closest friends already in the forces: Bill Cumming a sergeant pilot in the RAF and George Scraggs a seaman on HMS Ark Royal, I decided it was time to do my bit. Off then to the recruiting office in Camden Town and asked to join the Royal Navy. My papers came through in a couple of weeks, quite a surprise to my parents as I had forgotten to mention it.

Off then to HMS Ganges for seamanship training, all shore establishments have ships' names, then on to HMS Mercury at Petersfield for signals training: Morse — semaphore and flags. Next stop HMS ST Christopher in Fort William to learn about Motor Torpedo Boats and the like where all the crew are expected to know each others jobs — as near as possible. I learned how to load and fire a variety of guns. Prime and release depth charges and torpedoes etc. Then there was the Holman Projector! This odd contraption consisted of a long tube, mounted vertically, charged by a compressed air bottle. The object was to aim at a determined angle towards your target, remove the pin and drop a hand grenade down the tube then fire by means of a foot pedal. I never saw it used other than to fire potatoes at unsuspecting wildlife along the shoreline.

ML108 (11/04/1942 - 20/09/1943)
MTB695 (23/09/1943 - 12/03/1944)
MTB753 (13/06/1944 - 13/06/1945)
HMS Greenwich (25/09/1945 - 06/01/1946)

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