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When I first joined the Navy I was fifteen and a half. I wanted to join the Navy- that was always my ambition. My mother didn’t want me to go, but I did go anyway. I was a boy/seaman and did my training in the Isle of Man for ten months. I joined my first ship in Hepburn - HMS Dorsetshire - after she sunk the Bismarck.

I joined at half past three on a Sunday morning. And then, we were in dry dock for about a month. Then, when we came out of dry dock we went up to Scapaflow and joined ships, HMS Repulse, Prince of Wales, Victorious - all the home British fleet. We did exercises and after that, we left on our own and met up with a convoy at Liverpool. We took this convoy of six ships from Liverpool to Freetown where we left them and did our patrols South Atlantic - looking for German supply ships and German raiders. And eventually we found one. She scuttled herself, when she saw us because she was supplying new boats and there were three U-boats alongside her. And when they saw us, we fired a shot from our eight inch guns and she scuttled herself.

The German U-boats were waiting for us to stop and pick up survivors, but we didn’t do that. We circled them and then made off down the South Atlantic until we came into Simonstown where we stayed for three days.

We then went to Durban and picked up a convoy there and took them up to Aden - that was Monty’s eighth army before he had the big push, when he pushed the Germans out of North Africa.

We went on to Singapore, where we took the last convoy. Then from Singapore we came back to Trinconmalee and from there we went to Rangoon.

We left a convoy of six ships at Rangoon and the next day the Japanese took Rangoon. After that we went to Bombay then to Colombo. We moored into dry dock, for what was supposed to be five days leave, in a place called De Et Le Wa (Sri Lanka). We left on a Friday and arrived on Saturday. We then had a recall and we re-fuelled alongside the far eastern fleet - two destroyers, our own and the Cornwall.

Then we came back to Colombo to refuel. At midnight on Saturday 4th April 1942 we went out to rejoin the fleet again but before we could do that, the Japanese got hold of us and sunk us.

This was the same Japanese fleet, which helped bomb Pearl Harbour. Over half the ship’s company died and we were in the water for over thirty hours before we were picked up. Eventually we were taken to the Maldives Islands and I cleaned up in the ships hospital, Vita, because I was burnt.

From there it took us a fortnight to get to Mauritius and another fortnight from Mauritius to Durban, where I stayed in a Durban hospital for a week. I went on to convalesce and my mother and father came down from Jobourg. I went back with them because I had fourteen days survivors leave.

I joined HMS Formidable in 1942 and we came from Durban to Rosythe. It was in re-fit for about two months and we went off up to Scapaflow and from there down to Lamblash which is in the Clyde.

Here we did DLT’’s (Deck Landing Trials). We were the first aircraft carrier to have Sea Firers on board. The only difference between a Sea Firer and a Spirit Firer is the Sea Firer has a hook on it when it lands so it can pick up the rest of arrester wire when it lands. We did the North Africa landings and we also did Sicily and Italy and eventually after eighteen months in the Mediterranean, I came home and we cleared up in Devonport.

I left Devonport after D-Day and went out on a ship called the Andes and sailed out to Simonstown and I joined HMS Falmouth where we were in operation at Rangoon, where the Japanese where chased out.

From Rangoon we went to Diamond Island - a small island at the mouth of the Baseen River. It was here we had to go ashore and had to re-build the foundations of a lighthouse that the Japanese had knocked down. Consequently we smashed all our boats in the surf and the coral. One night it was blowing a gale, raining - it was the monsoon season and the next thing we knew there were explosions and rockets going off. This was when we were told the war had finished and I was stranded on an Island at the mouth of the Baseen River.

After that we headed down to Singapore. We had to lead a convoy through the minefields. From Singapore we came back to Bombay where we spent six months ashore. Then after a re-fit we went to the Persian Gulf for four or five months and then came home.

I left HMS Falmouth in Devonport in 1946. I went ashore and had a good booze up! We had fourteen days leave. I had spent all my time at the Far East and the Mediterranean, so was very seldom home. And of course hadn’t seen my parents for over eight years by the time the war had finished. Eventually, I ended up at the Rame Head Fleet our Reserve Fleet of 1946. I was there for three years and nine months then passed for Petty Officer - after that I never looked back.

In time my wife and our two children went out to Hong Kong. We had two and half years in Hong Kong. As Petty Officer Guard there, I did all the ceremonial guards, court marshal guard etc. I used to have to patrol the barracks out there - HMS Tamar. I came home in 1954 and signed on for my pension then so then went from Devonport to Rosythe, where we spent a further two years. My mother and father were out in South Africa - my mother was working in ammunitions.

My brother couldn’t join the army because of his job. He worked as an engineer in a power station and the army wouldn’t take him because of his trade. He ran away twice from home to join, but they sent him back again. My brother still lives in South Africa to this day.

My father was a Guarder and eventually when I joined HMS Lynx in 1960, the Navy flew me to South Africa in Joburg to see him because he was very ill. So I joined my mother and brother and was out there for a period of about eight years. After which I returned to HMS Lynx and eventually that was our station down in South Africa. Over Christmas, the Navy flew me with the South African Air force to Pretoria to see my father- having three weeks leave given to me.

When leave was over I came back, left South Africa and went down to the West Indies. We were just coming into San Wan when I got a message to see the Navigating Officer. He had a telegram for me to say that my father had died. We spent our time around South Africa, South America and the West Indies for the following twelve months. We then came home and it was in 1964 that I came out of the Navy. That was it! My twenty-four and half years in the navy!

I attained the North Africa Medal, The Burma Medal. The Italian Medal. 1939 — 45. The Atlantic — The End of War Medal and The Fifteen Years Undetected Crime — which is for long service and good conduct medal — seven medals in total.

We were in these, ‘Theatre’s Of War’ and that’s why we were given these medals.

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