大象传媒

VOYAGE TO INDIA (1945) PART 2

No. We were not!
Once out into the middle of the Mersey, from where it was still more impossible to desert, down went the anchor. This time there was a veritable hurricane of cheers from the troops. We sat out there for three days, presumably all part of some lofty, critical analysis path mapped out by top brains of Higher Command, but received singularly unappreciatively by us passengers down in the cattle decks. I suppose the idea was that the convoy would eventually all meet up at the right place at the right time, with the maximum discomfort to all.
It was bloody freezing! It snowed. Thick, slippery ice covered the decks, and the ladders between decks were treacherous as hell. Icicles hung from the masts, rigging, railings, bollards, ventilators and most people's noses. A small 'canteen' (ha! ha!) served the assembled warriors with, to start with, a ration of 2 mini packets of biscuits and a bar of chocolate. The ship-encircling queue took about two glacial, frost-bitten hours to make the full circuit back to the canteen, so one nipped sharply out and rejoined the line of red-nosed hopefuls.
Unfortunately, whoever had organized the stock for the canteen had apparently been unaware that there would be 6000 semi-starving squaddies to service. Or perhaps did not care? Because, by the time Willie and I had got a second bite at the canteen cherry, the culinery choice was comparatively limited. You could choose anything you wanted, so long as it was Button-sticks, Brasso, Duraglit or Yellow Dusters. There was, indeed, sufficient stock of these high demand items to have lasted 12000 men throughout the voyage, but little actual uptake! Market Research was in its infancy then, I suppose.
As stated, we sat out there for three days, peering at the good citizens of Liverpool going about their lawful (?) business. They took not the slightest notice of us. It was now that my perspicacity and foresight in The Clarence on my last night in London paid off. My mother, seasoned trooper that she was, had insisted on piling odd things on me like biscuits, chocolate - Rona, working for the Americans saw to a good supply of that - so I was better off than most. Willie and I managed to survive.

VICTUALS

Food was cooked miles away in some God-forsaken corner of the ship's bottom, and each platoon on the Mess Decks sent two or three men to collect it three times a day. Naturally, they had long queues to contend with, then staggered back along miles of passageways carrying enormous 'hay-boxes' and metal churns between them. (The hay-boxes contained food, keeping it warm by being stuffed, originally, with hay between the inner and outer layers.; the churns held tea or cocoa, depending on the meal!) My God, how we wolfed it down when it eventually arrived. To be fair to the ship, there was lots of it. Little did we know that in another day or two the faintest whiff of stew would send most of us headlong to the bogs throwing up like mad.

ANCHORS AWAY

Suddenly it was time to up-anchor, and heigh ho for the ocean wide! The dreary dockscape of Liverpool slithered sluggishly by and disappeared into the dusk. With the icy, cutting wind of the open sea slicing through our greatcoats most of us headed below. Most kept their thoughts to themselves; for myself and Willie, we wondered if we would ever be back, but the idea didn't worry us unduly. I suppose. like so many others we subconsciously decided it wouldn't happen to us, always somebody else.
Below, the overpowering smell of fresh paint was stronger that ever. One of the few things to recommend the Otranto was that it had just been refitted, refurbished and repainted, so at least it all started out bright and clean. Unfortunately, the fumes from the heavily leaded paint mingled with the oily fumes from the engine rooms and pervaded the whole ship day and night. During the hours of darkness all openings and exits were closed tightly as a blackout precaution, and what the lead content did to some of us in those confined spaces I shudder to think! Imagine, I would probably have been a genius if it wasn't for that particular package tour. Maybe I should sue......?
We headed due west into the teeth of a good, strong blaw, - to a landlubber like me, any way - and the waves seemed to my jaundiced eye to be getting well above themselves. Not to mention above the ship and me!
It so happened, - (another bit of critical path analysis by the high heid'yins?) - that my platoon had been selected, no doubt from hundreds of eager applicants, for Guard Duty for the first two days. Of all the crass, idiotic, harebrained ideas that I came across in the Army from time to time, this was undoubtedly the crassest, idioticist, harebrainest.
We were summoned to the 'Guardroom' - a large, bare area only marginally above the keel of the boat, where we were handed a rifle but no ammo, and the Guard Commander allocated us our 'patrol areas'. None of the old 'one-by-day-and-two-by-night' nonsense this time. We were left entirely on our tods in whatever location decided. Me, - I had place of honour right up on the sharp end, out on the open deck. At least if we were about to hit something I would be the first to see it. No doubt it would be the last thing that I saw, too. What I was supposed to do or guard was never made clear in any way.
There WAS a companionway door leading down to the crew's quarters under my jurisdiction, and I suppose in the unlikely event of a mutiny I would stand and hold it alone like Horatio on the old Roman bridge against all odds. Ho! ho! He flung himself into the Tiber and swam to safety, but I didn't give much for my chances in the North Atlantic.
If I saw a submarine I presumed I would be expected to throw my rifle at it, as there was no way I could fire the damn thing. Perhaps I could lean over the side, and break the periscope glass with the rifle butt, thus blinding Herr Kapitan.....
Anyway, for two hours I swayed and staggered and moaned and vomited all over the deck, wind howling around me, and spray coming over the bows and soaking me. The ship was going up and down like a yo yo, me with it. However, good times never last, and I was eventually relieved by some other poor sod. I tottered down to the Guardroom where I spent the next two hours lying on the floor instead of standing up, and rolling, moaning and vomiting. This time I was not alone, of course, there were several other bodies all doing the same. I tell you, time races by when you are enjoying yourself, and soon it was back to the bows again for another stint in the (very) fresh air. (For 'fresh' read 'glacial')

It was just about this moment that I seriously contemplated suicide for the first and only time in my life. It really appeared to be a sensible, viable alternative to this ghastly, awful, demoralizing, never-ending sea sickness, with me and the boat heaving in unison every 5 seconds! 'Moral fibre' was a great catchword among the officers in those days. Had someone blared at me "Where's your moral fibre, man?" I could truthfully have replied, "Down there slopping about in the scuppers, Sir, in unpleasant-looking greenish dribbles"
Then over the tannoy came an announcement. "WE ARE CHANGING COURSE 90 DEGREES TO PORT. KEEP CLEAR OF THE DECKS." I tell you, these guys were a laugh a minute. Keep clear of the decks indeed. I was just wondering what it was all about, when over the side came a damn great wall of evil black water. Not just over the side, I may add, but all over me, too. It first soaked me from head to foot, - or at least the few places not already sopping, - then threw me to the deck and hurled me against some solid side rails. Deliberately malicious, it left me caught up there instead of taking me with it and ending all my troubles! Thank heavens I found I was still clinging to my rifle. If I had lost it overboard it would have cost me all my pay for months.
When I eventually began to realise how close I had been to handing in my dinner pail I got really angry at the thought of the waste for this stupid, daft, pointless, useless exercise of mounting a guard in these circumstances.
It was soon after that that the door at the top of the companionway flew open, to reveal a hairy-chested sailor chappie wearing a vest and trousers, and carrying a plateful of sausage and bacon, which he kindly and courteously offered to me. I wouldn't have thought there was very much left inside me to bring up, apart from a few ribs and my stomach lining, but the sight of that plateful of greasy gastronomic goodies proved me wrong. I shook my head and heaved. "Too bad, mate" said my would be benefactor, " 'spect you'll feel better in a coupla days." And he disappeared down into the ship again. Darkness reigned, not only on the deck, but in my soul!
We had two nights of this purgatory, then some other group of poor damned creatures took over. The storm and rough weather continued unabated. The next five or six days I remember only as a blurred nightmare of ghastly heaving seas, and ghastly heaving soldiery, rolling about on floors, eating little, keeping nothing down. The stench was appalling as about 5000 of the 6000 troops on board were in much the same condition.
From that sort of level things could only get better. I came back to life, rejoined the semi-human race. Then - hunger struck! For about a week I just couldn't get my hands on enough to eat. Most people were like that now, and victuals began to run short. For a few days I had plenty to occupy me, scrubbing down my filthy, evil-smelling clothes with seawater and special 'seawater soap' we had been issued with. Naturally, it didn't work. (Come back Trades Description Act, all is forgiven!)
From then on it was sheer boredom all the way. Endless games of Housey-Housey - Bingo, to the uninitiated - from one end of the ship to the other. It didn't matter where you went, you could not escape from the continual chants of 'KELLY'S EYE, NUMBER ONE' , 'ALL THE THREES, THIRTY THREE', CLICKETY CLICK, SIXTY SIX', TWO FAT LADIES, EIGHTY EIGHT'. And so it went on.
Towards the end of the second week, Troopship Dysentery struck! The loos, - or 'bogs' or 'heads' as they were called - were attached to each troopdeck. Sort of 'en suite'. Ha! ha! ha! There was no door or partition to the main bog area, just a wide gap in the panelling, with a step about 5 inches high to step over. Or more like trip over! Inside there were row upon row of loos, no seats as such, just a small wooden strip screwed to the top sides of each bowl.. No doors, and a 3ft or 4 ft high partition between each, over which you could sit and chat to your next door neighbour! Very matey! Quite a shock to the nervous system, too, if you had been brought up being used to a modicum of privacy.
Fortunately someone had decreed that there should be raised wooden duckboards along the aisles in front of each battery of bogs. A good piece of forward thinking, perhaps, or the result of bitter past experience. Because, not to put too fine a point upon it, when thousands and thousands of rough and licentious soldiery are gathered together in one place, and all have 'the runs' as it is so aptly named, then things get pretty revolting. And bearing in mind that a few unfortunates failed to get over sea sickness at all, you might get some idea of the hellhole it turned out to be. And all this right next to our sleeping and eating quarters. Happy days....
I really should have learned something from my early experience of reporting sick at Maidstone. But, always a devil for punishment, I reported sick once more when hit by Troopship Dysentery, in the hope of getting treatment. Some hope!!! The routine was the same for all. 24 enormous tablets, about the size of 5 pence pieces were handed to you. You then had to swallow 8 of them on the spot, under the eagle eyes of the RAMC Sergeants. This was more difficult than you my think, as they were apparently made out of 3rd rate blackboard chalk, and there was very little to wash them down with, water being rationed.
You were then told to take the remaining 16 during the next 24 hours. and come back if you needed more. It was a most successful and effective treatment from the M.O.'s point of view. The pills made no difference at all to the dysentery, as far as anyone could tell, but NOBODY ever reported back for more. However, the pills were not entirely without benefit. They were ideal as 'counters' when playing Housey-Housey around the deck, so large and heavy they never blew away!

o o o o o o o

I remember once having a narrow escape. We had to wear our lifejackets everywhere in case of submarine attack, and climbing up a vertical steel ladder from one deck to another carrying books or something in one hand, I could only use the spare hand to grab at the rungs one by one. Naturally, I missed somewhere near the top, fell outwards and backwards, sailing about 10 feet down to the deck I had just left.
The back 'cushion' of my lifejacket was not tied down - as they were supposed to be, - which was very fortunate, as it wafted upwards and was under my head when I hit the deck like a bomb. Without it I am quite certain I would have been killed, at least smashing my skull all over the deckboards. I didn't break my back either, though it jolly well felt like it, I can tell you. Still, even without the addition of splintered bone and buckets of blood, it gave about 1000 bored spectators a good laugh, and relieved the monotony of the voyage briefly. One or two even asked what I did for an encore!

o o o o o o o

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