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This story was submitted to the People’s War site by John on behalf of David Hassell and has been added to the site with his permission. David fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

David B HASSELL
David Hassell registered for service in Dec 1943, joined the Royal Navy and trained in the basic principles of naval procedures and communications, first at HMS Excalibur and then at Leydene House & HMS Collingwood. He spent weeks working at Portsmouth barracks doing shifts in unloading naval stores from trains at Fratton Goods Yard. When space ran out there they stores they were taken to Southsea Common. It was about this time that the first V1 rockets were coming over and he can remember that at about 5 or 6 o’clock on most days a warning came over the tannoy system to ‘take cover’ as one of these missiles approached. He had never seen mataloes move so fast! With one bound they would be out of hammocks and under the tables!
He remembers that there was a procedure for everything and that if you wanted anything then you had to ‘put in a request to the CO!’ He was then asked ‘do you want a draft? — they are looking for another coder!’ He went and saw the Drafting Officer who said there’s a vacancy on the ‘Queen Emma’ — which was on the ‘secret list’. He thought she was a Dutch Ferry and was powered by a diesel engine. The Dutch engineer had been kept on because he was the only person who knew how to operate the engines! He got on train to Portland only to discover — ‘she’s out’ and then wasted several days walking around and saluting US Officers to make them return his salutes! Portland was swarming with US troops
He then embarked on the ‘Queen Emma’ and they sailed for the Normandy Beaches — Utah Beach, Mulberry Harbour (British Troops) and then on to Le Havre and Ostend. He recalls there being a collision one stormy night This caused a hole to be knocked in the paint locker and resulted in water mixed with paint sloshing through the PO’s cabins and round the ship, and recalls seeing sunken ‘block ships’ keeling over. He also has memories at this time of meeting and striking up a good friendship with a chap called Jack Richardson, who was aged 25 and ‘the Doyen of the Mess’; their friendship began over a ‘shared bucket’!
At about this point he received a ‘Signal BISH’ , he realised that he had kept some information from the Captain which the latter needed. The Petty Officer didn’t seem to know what to do with me and was pacing up and down on the deck. However his attitude changed from one of contempt to respect — it was almost as if he was not used to being apologised to!
They were then give orders to refit and tropicalisation of the ship that winter in Woolwich Dockyard in readiness to sail for the Far East. Operation NEPTUNE had been under the command Admiral Sir Bertram RAMSEY who was a remote figure who was never seen. The ship was to be given a wooden lining on the outside and fans inside to keep the insects down. While this was going on I was involved in telephone watchkeeping. The preparations took nearly 6 weeks and this was during the period of the V2 missiles. There was no defence whatsoever against them; if you heard them then they had already arrived! Some landed quite near London Docks and shook the ship violently.
We were allowed to go on leave and I got into some ‘difficulty’ on a 24 hour leave in NW London as I misread my leave order wrongly and suddenly realised that I should be back on board at 1200 hours. I might just have been alright till the train stopped without warning at E Ham. I was late but I walked on board with the ship’s Doctor the Master at Arms was at the top of the gangway and had pleasure in putting him under ‘technical’ arrest for being adrift! The Officer of the Day, Lt Brown, was told that I had been 15 minutes adrift and absent without leave. I said that I had misread my leave pass. Then the subject of the bomb on the line came up and Lt Brown said that this showed that if I’d come back just in time then I would have been delayed by the bomb. He then dismissed the charge but suggested that I read my leave pass a little better in future! There was a reception committee in the mess when his colleagues — who had considered him a bit of a goody goody — thought that him being on a charge delighted them and that he was now ‘one of the gang’ and made all the difference!
They sailed up from Sheerness — where they stocked up with shells - to Greenock in Scotland where they spent several weeks in Glasgow and in Glasgow Docks. This was chance to see old friends in
Scotland, one of who had a delightful daughter with whom I am still in touch. I remember that we were anchored offshore and that steam drifters acted as tenders to the ships. They would move out in echelon and peel off to the ships they were taking people to or on leave. I can still smell the smoke!
Then the orders came in May 1945 that we were to sail to India via the Suez Canal which would take about three weeks. The Big Adventure was beginning; they didn’t know when they would be coming back. The Japanese were still fighting although the European was appeared to be coming towards an end. As we were rounding Ireland we heard that the war in Europe had ended. There was still a U-boat scare and several depth charges were dropped. At this stage we were in company with a large convoy. We had to be inoculated against tropical diseases and a heavy swell made the ship like a switch back at a fair with the bow going up and down about 40 ft. Added to this the ship had a number of landing craft lashed down on the upper deck but was not designed to carry such weight!
We turned at Gibraltar through the Mediterranean. The voyage through the Med was delightful with the sea like glass. We didn’t stop until we reached Port Said all the time sailing quite close to North Africa. Then all the officers appeared in tropical kit for the first time and we all cheered up! Down through the Suez Canal with sights of the Egyptian Desert and then into the Red Sea to Aden where we were issued with white straw hats! We stopped but didn’t go ashore, it was very hot. We had a very unpleasant ‘Jimmy the 1’ , an RNR Lt Cdr K who was a very hard bitten person with real class bitterness who loathed middle class types and set everyone against each other. An atmosphere developed in the ship. As an example it was a routine to empty the ‘gash’ down the gash shoot but there was an occasion when ‘Jimmy the 1’saw someone doing this and said: ‘your knicked —you’ll have to stay there until you find someone else doing the same thing wrong!’ This meant having to stay there until catching someone else doing the same ‘wrong’ thing — no meals, no work, taken out of the system! Fortunately the 1st Lt — Lt Brown - was on the scene and when he was on watch he said ‘pack it in’! As a Coder I was watch and watch about until a third Coder had arrived on board while we were in the English Channel. We were kept very busy.
It took us 3 weeks to get to Bombay, which was a revelation; it was the last year of the Raj. It was the gateway to India but the heat was oppressive and so began 15 months in South & East Asia. Bombay was a city of 7 million people with handsome buildings looking like Kensington, electric trams and double decked busses. I then found myself hospitalised in Columbo, but managed to get back on board before we moved on towards Burma, Malaya, Vietnam with members of the French Foreign Legion on board. The latter were to be landed by boat. Often went ashore — whole pineapples were the best buy! But I then spent a week ashore in hospital with skin trouble and was treated wit the new wonder drug —penicillin! With this exception I stayed on board for a series of long distance trooping trips.
In November 45 I met the Bishop of Rangoon’s chaplain. The second afternoon in Rangoon we had some difficulty finding the way to find the Cathedral because there were no maps and we were hoping that we would find out where the Cathedral was! I met a woman who turned out to be the Bishop’s wife! She took us to the Bishop’s Chaplain who looked after us for the rest of the day, taking us to see the Shwedagon pagoda, a Buddhist monument covered with gold leaf! (I was in touch with the Bishop’s Chaplain whose son became an actor in Sweden).
Leaving Saigon we set off amine; there was large bang and I happened to be on watch. The valves jumped out of the radio set, there was a cloud of dust from the deck and the ship stopped dead. We waited for the order to ‘abandon ship’.
My friend, Jock, who was a telegraphist, ran to the door of the signal office, but he still had his headphones on and this brought him up short and gave him time to have second thoughts and so he went back to his seat! It went dead silent. George was trying to replace the valves to get the set working again which was rather a waste of time as the aerial had been blown down! We awaited the order to abandon ship using the Carley Floats but no order came. We tried to signal that we had exploded a mine when the 1st Lt was seen running at the double past the door. I said to George ‘can I get my lifejacket?’ — I had disobeyed standing orders by not having it with me! George said that he wouldn’t take responsibility if I went but if I did would I get his as well!
Outside I was met by white faced sailors coming up on deck; most of them couldn’t swim. He got his and George’s lifejackets and took them back to the office before the PO came in and sat trying to send signals not realising the aerial was down! No-one had been killed on board but the concussion of the explosion had disabled the engines. The Captain’s comment was: ‘Blast — pilot where can we beach?’ We then had to send a signal saying that ‘we were not under command having exploded a mine which we did when a sister ship, Prince Beatrix, came alongside and we sent the signal through her. It had all been rather severe on the nerves and the Chief Yeoman had fallen down a companionway and broken his nose — this was the worse thing that happened!
The ship was towed to Singapore for repairs. These took 2 — 3 days but during that time a swarm of tropical insects invaded us — it was the only time the watch had to be doubled up to fight the insects! We used the sea hoses to fight the things that were like giant dragonflies! We had quite a pleasant time in Singapore; it was an easier routine, not much to do and plenty of sunbathing! The Chief Yeoman then switched routines round and had, and to this day I still don’t know why, us doing the day signalman’s work. This involved hoisting the jack at colours. There was a marine bugler who played whilst the flag was being hoisted. However on this occasion the flag jammed halfway up! The Captain, who was a real sterling fellow, explained how to face the block when hosting the flag and very patiently talked us through the routine without losing his temper!
One of the good things about being ‘out east’ was that we got to know our mess mates but the voyages were longer and enabled you to get over the seasickness! Life was certainly less hectic that the channel crossing! We were at Singapore for quite a long time and my closest friend was Bill ELSEY who was a Jewish lad from Sunderland. He was a ‘bit senior’ and had been involved in the chase of the BISMARK. Others I remember were Geo. JOHNSON, a good friend of Bill ELSEY and a Christian Socialist, the son of a plumber from Castleford, Yorks. He was a good influence on Bill ELSEY and the tone of the mess changed for the better — no bones about it! There was also Frank WESTON, who was a Catholic from Liverpool, whose mother had pushed a pram with IRA arms in it during the troubles of 1922! It was a really mixed crew from very different parts of the country.

Indonesian Episode
We then went to help the Dutch against the Indonesian ‘Rebels’, the French in Vietnam and the British in Malaysia. The C in C was MOUNTBATTEN and he came on board to explain why the troops had gone to Malaysia. Then the Atlee Government changed the policy and decided NOT to help the Dutch in a Colonial War.
We rescued some Dutch civilians who had been interned by the Japanese and who were now in danger from the rebels. There were teenagers, women and young boys, and we took them from Java to Singapore for onward repatriation to Holland. Then came a bad moment — ‘Jimmy the 1’ was sacked by the Captain for a ‘drunken episode’ ashore in Saigon! He was replaced by ‘a stuck up- proper stuck up RN officer’ - Hugh JANION I’ve often wondered what happened to him. Within a week the atmosphere had improved. His first job was to organise the rescue of some Dutch civilians, which was done 100 at a time of women and children — this was not what warships were designed to do. The messdecks were organised with curtains down the middle and men one side and women and children on the other! I can’t remember what arrangements were made with regard to the use of toilets! Officers and Petty Officers were doubled up in their cabins to release cabins for the older women. Fortunately we had beautiful weather and calm seas during the two weeks, fortunately there were a lot of deck chairs available, I remember there was also a notice in Dutch which read —‘Lunch at 12 0’clock’.
Altogether we did 5 round trips doing the same thing — picking up former Dutch prisoners — it was to Lt JANION’s credit that he could organise such a thing so smoothly and organise an accommodation plan like that so smoothly! With a man like that people do it! This was during late 1945 and Holland had been through bad times since the end of 1944 but a wealthy Dutch lady — Lottie van BENNIGEN — had talks with two concentration camp commandants to allow food parcels in and to disregard sending inmates to Germany. She had sent David a copy of a book ‘The Netherlands will Rise Again’, which he had with him and showed it to the refugees.
In August 1945 the war ended but it wasn’t until February 1946 that I was sent off the ship because I was too junior to be repatriated for demobilisation. He was dropped of when the ship was in Ceylon and was there between February and August 1946. He then spent three weeks on the cruiser, NORFOLK, in the watchkeeper’s wireless office before being transferred to the Aircraft Carrier, FORMIDABLE. This ship had been damaged in a Kamikaze attack. He remembers losing his way on board and ending up mixed with a whole lot of seamen! Then he remembers doing shift work in Trincomalee shore station as a coder in a large air-conditioned room but a very oppressive climate. For the next 2 or 3 months people gradually got drafted home. He remembers getting an ‘official holiday’, visiting a Buddhist temple, going to Ceylon 3 times by train — NATCHAKUNDA — and hearing Ceylon folk music.
People were gradually being sent to ships to go back to the UK. When his turn came he was sent to the frigate Lock ECK(?) which made the trip from Trincomoli to Devonport in 28 days at economical speed! He was on board as a watchkeeper and not a spectator. The ship was a steam ship with three expansive reciprocating engines and one ended up covered in droplets of soot all the time you were on deck! We sailed back in convoy with a frigate.
We arrived in Gibraltar on 7th August and spent a fair a mount of time painting the ship! We didn’t get to Devonport until 12th August 1946. During the crossing of the Bay of Biscay a rating fell overboard and was, fortunately, rescued. My Father came down to Devonport and was allowed on board; he was horrified to see that it was such a small ship. I was demobilised just before Christmas 1946. My last war memory was in Dec 1946 when I attended a Dedication Service at Westminster theatre. I was so impressed by the Cranmer Collects that I think it was this that turned me into an Anglican.
Finally I would like to pay tribute to some of the ‘Good Eggs’ that I met during my service time.

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