大象传媒

A Seaman鈥檚 Life
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On 22nd October 1942, I signed on the Largs Bay troop ship, approx 14,000 tonnes. The following day we sailed from Avonmouth up through the Irish Sea and met up with our convoy, four troop ships and escorts. As we sailed out into the Atlantic, a cruiser with a sea plane on lowered it on to the water but the sea was too rough so it was taken back aboard. We carried on down the coast of Brazil, of course old sea dogs were saying, 鈥測ou will know when you cross the line you will feel the bump鈥� but anyway we did know because Father Neptune was on board with all the troops it was great fun for all. My mates and I got to know some of the soldiers. One soldier told us that his brother was in the brig. We knew that the brig was the other side of our mess bulkhead and there was a number of fair sized holes in the bulkhead so we gave him cans of beer through a straw and we gave him some smokes. He was only in there for four days for throwing paper on the deck.

Not long after crossing the line, we entered Bahia. Some of the troops were taken ashore for a route march and when they returned 87 were missing, we were only there for a few hours taking on fresh water, etc. When we crossed over the South Atlantic to South Africa, we were having engine trouble (steam turbines) but we got to the bottom point of Africa and called into Cape Town for one day and we came out there heading into the Indian Ocean. The horizon was full of ships and we were told that three troop ships had been sunk. One of the ships carried troops, one had civilians on board the other one had prisoners on and so the beaches had been closed.

As we were going into Durban 鈥淭he Lady in White鈥� was singing all the songs we knew. It was great. We got into port, all the troops got off so the first night we had to sleep on the 鈥淓mpress of Scotland鈥� which had been renamed from 鈥淓mpress of Japan鈥�. Our ship was being fumigated because it had become over run by rats and cockroaches. We had three days in port and we took on board German and Italian prisoner of war so we though we were going home, but no, we called into Freetown. Loads of ships were there some big passenger liners with destroyers painted on their hulls to make them look like escorts. We were there for three days then sailed on New Year鈥檚 Day 1943. We started off in convoy but after two days we left the convoy as they were going home to England and we were going to New York. We plodded on gradually going north east and the weather got really bad, our cabins
Were right in the bows of the ship and the bows were going up and up and up and would come down with a tremendous thump, it broke all the crockery and there was fire extinguisher foam everywhere. I was sleeping thwart ships on my head and then standing up but I slept well. Anyway it busted some of the hull plating where the fresh water tanks were. We tried making coffee but it was still salty. During one night, most of the crew were on deck and they could see a battle going on, on the horizon. I have read some books and I think it was a nine tanker convoy that was following Operation Torch to North Africa. They lost six tankers.

We carried on and went into Hoboken floating dry docks in New Jersey for two weeks for repairs. It was snowing a blizzard the whole time we were there. We went past the Statue of Liberty and met up with the convoy, 67 ships and a force 10 to 11 was blowing in the Atlantic. Anyway the convoy started off neat and tidy with all ships in their right position but as we went on we could see less ships. It was a terrific storm and when we got near to Ireland the weather abated but with a very heavy swell, like mountains. We saw only one other ship, a little corvette and she wanted to know her position, all her instruments had smashed. I found out later that 13 ships had been sunk by submarines.

We docked in Liverpool and were 'paid off'. Then I caught the train to Bristol. My first day home after a rough Atlantic crossing; I couldn't walk straight and when walking up to local pub to see if any mates were home - A girl came up to me and said 'No uniform?' I'll have to send you some white feathers. I was wearing civvies, but she didn't notice my little M.N.(Merchant Navy) Silver Badge in my lapel.

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