Approach of the storm Chapter 38

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Louise Treloar of the ‘Action Desk — Sheffield’ Team on behalf of Thomas Arthur Russell, and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

Approach of the storm Chapter 38
By
Thomas Arthur Russell

I joined HMS Saumarez in February 1946 after constantly haunting the vicinity of the Detailed for Draft Office (DFDO), much to the annoyance of the staff employed there. She turned out to be all I wanted, sleek and fast looking, her single slightly raked funnel with its broad black painted top, informed me she was the flotilla leader, the number three on her light grey side told me of the 3rd destroyer flotilla. Indeed a ship to be proud of for she was awarded the following Battle Honours;

North Cape 1943
Arctic 1943-44
Normandy 1944
Malaya 1945
Burma 1945

My wife would be proud to know all about my new ship; soon we were to sail for the Mediterranean to join the fleet. Of particular interest to me and more of the older veterans of the stokers’ mess deck was the fact that we were carrying some new National Service hands, we wondered how they would stand up to crossing the bay. We soon knew; pale faces and heads retching into buckets or quick dashes in a groggy manner for the upper deck, to heave anything still left in aching guts over the side. Sea sickness was something we had all suffered in our time and we sympathised with these new lads, some very young, although the manner in which it was offered did not always show it, words such as, “Eh I could eat a nice fat bacon sandwich with the fat dripping out,” then, “The first two years are the worst,” or, “Wait till it gets rough,” and from the sea sick one, “For f***s’ sake shut up I’m f****** dying.” But soon they got used to the moving deck beneath their feet, the steel room called a mess deck with its creaking, changing plane, first your mates were tilted below you then on a higher level, we had seen it all before and indeed had to fight in all sorts of conditions.

The younger lads used to look up to us veterans, for I was indeed a veteran of six years of war and not yet 26, I was proud of the six red war service chevrons worn on my right forearm, they were good for a few drinks off the younger lads when the watch was ashore.
We put into Villefranche in the south of France on a beautiful day in May, it wasn’t all that beautiful, for as the anchor shackles were struck and the chain went rattling down in a shower of rust and vibrating through the for-d mess decks, the ship was immediately besieged by more beautiful women in all shapes and sizes of small craft, than I had ever dreamed of. They came out in inflatables, canoes and boats, I had never seen this before.
Not only the younger lads were goggle-eyed; the promises from these people had ‘Jack’ wondering and hoping his watch was the first ashore.

When shore leave was piped, there was a queue outside the sick bay for an issue of “Pussers Johnnies” as the issue condoms were called. I recall I was watch aboard, auxiliary watch, keeping with a Jack Hammond in the engine room. As a staid married man I envied these boys. I would have to be patient, the woman and child I loved were many miles away.

I did manage a couple of runs ashore, one took me to Nice, women were everywhere and mostly good looking, I stuck to the wine and something they called beer. Temptation all the time, but memories and what waited for me at home helped to overcome it.
The time came to sail for Malta, with trips ashore to the sailors’ well known haunt, the notorious ‘Gut’, a steeply rising street near Grand Harbour, noted for good cheap meals, beer and hostesses, who had an uncanny knack of parting a new young sailor from his pay, by perching on his lap and asking, “You buy pretty girl drink Jack?” If you were young and foolish you did just that, what the drink was I never knew, I only knew that I never saw one of the girls drunk, they worked on a commission basis and I never knew a sailor who had it off with one of them.

We indulged in fleet exercises, in which I saw a near ramming incident. We were dashing all over the place one dark night with star shell being fired. Suddenly, in the eerie white light of one of these a cruiser loomed up and seemed to be bearing down on the Saumarez, she was moving very fast as the luminous white of her bow wave showed. The helm of Saumarez was put hard over and as she heeled over, her guard rails were nearly washed by the sea. Just one little incident but a bit scary.

One day, the flotilla indulged in a high speed race. We had opened out the line abreast and from the hatch stern over the tiller flat. I has a grandstand view of three destroyers looking white against the blue of the Mediterranean, they made a magnificent picture, as they threw a large wave up in a slightly surging sea and leaving a snowy wake behind them, they had all turned and heeled over as one; at such moments, you feel a strange little feeling of pride. The wind of our passing threw salt spray into one’s face, making it smart and leaving a faint deposit on sun tanned cheeks.
Eventually we reached our final destination, Haifa, a part of Palestine. This was to be our operational base, and our duty was the interception and arrest of ships carrying illegal Jewish immigrants. At this time the Jews were laying claim to Palestine, and although terrorism was rampant in the shape of three organisations, we did manage some shore leave in Haifa. The Haganah, the Irgun Zvai Leumi, and the Stern Gang were the organisations responsible for bombings, shootings, and land mines, indeed our feelings were inflamed by the hanging of two British Army Sergeants in an orange grove, men who had probably fought to free their compatriots.

Then they blew the King David Hotel up, causing many casualties. We used to take it in turns to operate out of Haifa, acting on intelligence reports of suspicious sailings from several Mediterranean ports. It seemed so strange to us older hands that these people who we had fought to liberate, now had become our enemies, I recall two incidents where they called us Nazis and shouted insults across to us. Boarding parties were sent abroad armed with pistols and Lancaster sub machine guns.

According to reports from boarding parties, these heavily laden crowded ships, which ranged from Greek caiques to French Schooners or ex trawlers, used to stink for the sanitary arrangements were never meant for such a cargo. We never had any trouble with them even after the insults, in fact they cooperated once they were boarded, we often provided what medical assistance we were capable of, for many of the more elderly people were in poor shape. Our feelings ranged between anger at being sometimes called Nazis, to sympathy, a situation we had never expected to be caught up in. Such was the politics of the early port war years. Even now we still see the repercussions, the Palestinian problem and the Lebanon civil war, and the spread of post-war terrorism for it apparently worked for the Jews and has since spread.

I remember a visit from the commander Lionel Crabbe, an expert in underwater warfare. We soon realised we were at risk from limpet mines that could be fixed to our hull while at anchor. To underline this risk the deportee ship Empire Rival was damaged by an explosion under her stern, tearing a hole three feet by eight in her hull. Three men swimming near her had been fired on by military guards, but were not hit. This ship and the Empire Heywood, they were ex liberty ships, used to transfer illegal immigrants to Cyprus.

About this time I remember we sailed and were informed over our tannoy system that we were attempting to intercept a French schooner with her cargo of Jewish people. I remember darkness falling over a calm sea and my duty watch now was Chief and E.R.A.’s mess man, so I could sleep all night unless we were needed for other duty. The air was balmy and warm, we were at a slow cruising speed and I decided to sling my hammock back aft on the upper deck, I attached it to the guard rails and the depth charge davit used for lifting the charges onto the throwers. I remember a clear night, a velvet sky, stars so brilliant and large they appeared to be near, the steady swaying of the boat and the after mast swaying from side to side in a semi circular movement soon lulled me into a deep sleep.

Meanwhile the ship’s radar was constantly searching in the dark for the schooner, it must be remembered that the ship was darkened as in war time. What happened is not fully clear to me to this day, how she came up to us in the dark I don’t know, I only knew a terrific crash overhead and I lay on the deck. As I gazed up from sleep fuzzed eyes, I saw what appeared to be a large black shadow pass overhead, in fact it was the schooner’s bow sprit, she had apparently tried to ram us. The davit was slightly bent, another lucky escape for me, I could possibly have been crushed. We did arrest her and escort her in; an old shipmate of mine was on the wheel at the time this happened, a Dan Mulcahy, now a firm friend on the Committee of the Corfu Incident Association.

Sometimes we hove to at sea if conditions allowed and indulged in ‘Hands to Bathe’. At such times I’d don swimming trunks and clamber over the guard rails to jump into the clear blue sea, I’d hold my nose and open my eyes underwater to see a fizzy world of bubbles and suns rays piercing the depths, then suddenly I’d pop up to the surface as if catapulted upwards. The Mediterranean always seemed so buoyant to me. I’d lie spread-eagled on the swell looking up at the blue sky being rocked by the sea and feeling relaxed and cool. These ‘Hands to Bathe’ times did morale good and helped to keep the crew fit. I was switched from E.R.A. and Chief’s mess man and was gear room watch keeper with a young stoker with me, for I once again had to keep a check on the plummer block temperatures and the steering engine and tiller flat, besides the forced lubrication system. The exhaust fan repeatedly broke down, so making the gear room uncomfortably hot. I looked to be losing a lot of weight by constantly running with sweat, so much so that our skipper, old ‘Joe’ Selby cleared lower deck and in a speech, he thanked us and asked us to tolerate it till we had the chance to really put it right.

We had a rest under canvas near Beirut in the Lebanon and I remember an incident in which the Jews murdered some sleeping ‘air borne’ men when they got into and machine-gunned a dormitory. I still feel the anger of these acts, and wonder if I ever did fight on the right side. Some good news came, but the good news was to prove in the near future a death sentence on many of my comrades, we were to proceed to take part in a Fleet Regatta. These Regattas meant water sports and competitions between ships, so we were all looking forward to this. Meanwhile events had taken a sinister turn, events no one had expected.

The Lost Son:

I was your son and now many fathoms deep, I sleep not in earth but in the quiet deep,
Below the oceans surge in slumber undisturbed I sleep, so mother do not weep for me.

Remember me for what I was, the infant you first held in firelights glow across your knee,
The schoolboy you took by the hand and the love you gave to me, and now my mother do not weep for me.

My land, and all you are I am, hillside and mountain grey against the green,
Shepherds whistle echoing across the valley deep, echo of the barking of dog across the screen,
Remember me and mother do not weep for me.

Clogged feet clatter in the early morn towards the mine so dark and deep,
Through damp and murky dawn while the world lies asleep,
This was me, my mother and in the deep I now do sleep,
For me my mother do not weep.

I was the boy who answered the factory whistle shrill, the errand boy who shoved his bicycle up the hill,
I answered the call to arms with willing feet, I pledged my faith to my land to keep, and now in the ocean deep to sleep,
For me my mother do not weep.

I was the youth who as a sailor was born to die, among that highway of shattered ships under a grey Atlantic sky,
I gave all for you my mother, and for my land, to sleep in honour in the deep,
For me my mother do not weep.

Pr-BR

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