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This story has been added to the People’s War website by Anne Wareing of the Lancashire Home Guard on behalf of Gordon Foster and has been added to the site with his permission…

In 1937 I was 14, my family lived in Mansfield and I had started work as a grocer’s assistant.

On the 3rd of September 1939 the family listened to Chamberlain’s declaration of war speech on a radio, hand made by my father.

Before being called up I joined the Home Guard, the Sherwood Forrester’s 9th Platoon, 8th Battalion in September 1940. I still have a photograph. It was all square bashing and gun training. Mansfield was fairly quiet with little action the bombs and fires in the Sheffield blitz were 20 miles away, but we could see them from a nearby hill.

I remember there was a barrage balloon near the Plaza cinema and there were air raid and fire wardens, and in the blackout the private cars use to have metal grills or shutters on their headlights.

In the area I lived in there was a hospital for the American servicemen and the film star Clark Gable and heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis visited and I remember they both came in to my cousin’s restaurant.

When I was called up I became a sub mariner and on VE Day I was on duty aboard the HMS Taciturn in a dry dock near Bali Island. It had been built in Barrow in Furness in 1944, was transferred to the Pacific Fleet under the Captain Ben O’Brien D.S.O.

Once back to sea my duties were torpedo manning or on gun attack duty. During the journey the submarine surfaced and unsure as to whether a torpedo had been fired or not, an ex officer dived beneath the water to inspect the torpedo tube; a brave act worthy of a medal.

We sailed on and spent seven days in Freemantle Australia. Then sailing onwards, whilst on patrol during darkness the Lumbak Straights were a welcome sight, we could see the silhouette of Bali Mountain coming in to view.

We were flying victory flags when we were bombed by Japanese planes and all the lights on the sub were blown out.

At home mum and dad had read in the newspaper that two submarines had been bombed, they feared the worst and it was some time before they were informed I was OK.

Further to our skirmish with the bombers we were fired on by a merchant ship’s three inch guns. In return we sank the ship. In another incident the gun layer sank a torpedo boat manned by the Japanese. The Taciturn was one of the last two submarines to return home these last two submarines visited Australia and thousands of Australians greeted the crews. The Governor of South Australia said ‘We want your blood’ meaning they wanted us to stay.

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