大象传媒

On Boxing Day 1943 Geoffrey said goodbye to his parents and travelled by train from London to Liverpool. There he embarked on the Cunard liner Mauritania bound for New York. Although he did not know it, this was to be the longest voyage of a fourteen year career at sea. He was not to see his parents again until he arrived home in Manchester in June 1945- a total of seventeen months and sixteen days. The train to Liverpool was absolutely packed to overcrowding, mainly soldiers, sailors and airmen returning from Christmas leave. Geoffrey and his fellow apprentice officer, David Crabbe, had to share a cabin with four soldiers. The crossing, which was made without convoy, took about a week, which meant that New Year was spent at sea. It was a very rough crossing, the Mauritania lurched and rolled, and the four soldiers were sea sick for most of the time.

On arrival in New York, the thirty or so crew members who had signed up in Liverpool with Geoffrey were accommodated in Hotel Bristol on West 49th Street. Geoffrey had been to New York several times before on his previous ship, the SS Tetela, but on this occasion he was to be there for several weeks until the crew were able to join a new liberty ship which was being fitted out in Philadelphia. The ship was called the Samstrule- Sam because she was built by Uncle Sam and Strule after the English river of that name. There were many ships of the same class- the Samtrent, the Samleven and so forth.

On previous visits, Geoffrey, through the Apprentice鈥檚 Club in New York, had struck up a friendship with a Miss Agnes Dunlop, who lived in Mineola on Long Island. It was to become a romantic attachment, but sadly, one which never developed into anything serious. As an apprentice officer Geoffrey earned 拢4 a month plus a further 拢10 paid as a war bonus. During the voyage on the Samstrule Geoffrey was to complete two years service and so his pay went up to 拢6.10s. a month. Oddly, Geoffrey was quite well off, he had no food or accommodation to pay for, but even so he found things in the USA somewhat expensive. It was about three months before the crew of the Samstrule took the train south to join her in Philadelphia.

The captain was a Welshman from Mold in North Wales, a man who had been at sea all his life. It was inevitable that he should have been called 鈥淢oldy鈥� Jones. His first mate was Charles V. Cryer, who was ,to be honest, a sick man, and should not, really, have been at sea at all. His flesh hung from his body in loose folds, and he always had a noticeable pallor. The navigating officer was a Mr Snowden, a South African, who grew a beard during the voyage. The third officer-Hutchinson- was a young energetic man of about twenty, then there were the two apprentices, five engineers and three radio officers making fourteen officers in all. The total crew was in excess of thirty.

After the war Geoffrey was to meet Hutchinson again at Jewry Street navigation college in London. From him he learnt that four of the officers had died in tragic circumstances.

鈥淢oldy鈥� Jones had been relieved of his command following the voyage, and offered a post ashore as Superintendent in the West Indies. This he regarded s demotion, and he hanged himself. It must be said that during submarine attacks by German U boats, and one never to be forgotten air attacks in the Mediterranean, Captain Jones used to become visibly agitated, and Geoffrey had long concluded that under those circumstances he should never have been in command.

Charles Cryer had gone into hospital after the voyage where he died after a long and painful illness.

The third engineer, R.S. Blood, who was always known as Stan had, after the war, gone with Hutchinson to Venezuela. Together they had worked on what was called the 鈥渕osquito fleet鈥�. These were small tankers which were used to ferry crude oil down river from the oil rigs to large tankers anchored at sea, at the mouth of the river. Stan, as Geoffrey well knew, was an alcoholic. One night he and Hutchinson were returning to their ship after spending the evening in a bar and Stan, who was very drunk, slipped on the quayside, fell into the water and drowned. Finally, there was a junior engineer whose surname was Frost.

After leaving the Samstrule, young Frost, who could not have been more than 22, found his girlfriend had jilted him. Where he got the revolver from, God alone knows, but he shot himself.

The Samstrule, it must be said, hold sad memories for Geoffrey.

Geoffrey Walker

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