Approach of the storm Chapter 22

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Approach of the storm Chapter 22
By
Thomas Arthur Russell

Wednesday and we had managed to drink the bar dry of lager, and we were now on brandy. Mr. Steele was there — bleary eyed but happy and I wondered if the man ever had been sober. I suspect as a babe he’d been weaned on brandy. What a character, and yet his efficiency as a pumping engineer wasn’t impaired.

Alec McDonald, the boss of the factory said it would be difficult to replace him. Alec was a medium built man of middle age, a Scot and with a humour we grew to like, the sort of boss who didn’t appear to be one who would ignore the welfare of his workers.

His wife was fairish and slim, a very charming lady who I had the privilege to dance with. She overcame my shyness when she asked me onto the floor and soon put me at ease.

It was an occasion when they’d put on a dance for us, and that evening, cars came in from Newcastle and the surrounding areas bringing a wealth of girls and not so many men.

Just imagine, there were seven of us and just a few men of the village. It was held in the village hall, a small place where they sometimes had a bioscope show, the cinema. Music was provided by record. I knew I had had a few and didn’t want to leave the bar, but after a bit of persuasion, I went along to please my hosts. That was when I danced with Alec’s wife and I was glad I had gone. I hoped she would forgive the smell of beer. That is when I met Mary Bayne.

I had seen the two Marines hanging around her and tried to avoid her. “Pippi” said a time or two why not try your luck “Russ”, but I left the field clear for them. I remembered Mary being in the office when we arrived, and now she came up to me and soon we had arranged to meet.

By now the leave was getting on and it was Wednesday evening. Now I found myself wishing it were a month. All kinds of possibilities were opening up and even a few days had made me fond of the place. I felt more at home here than shore leave in a large port like Durban. It even got to the point where one young white man who lived a bachelor existence in a neat and tidy round hovel suggested I try desertion and staying there but this was impossible, as everyone knew where I was, even if I had contemplated such a thing.

Thursday, and we managed a football match and I came to run rings round a big burly chap who didn’t like it a bit. They said it was Mary Bayne’s day. He was blowing quite a bit I remember; I did hear rumours that he wasn’t the kindest of dads.

We were taken out driving and had places of Boer War history pointed out to us. “Leo Kopje”, and old stone stockade I remember well. One of the loveliest sights was sunset over the veldt, the tawny coloured grasses stretching away onto the distance till they changed to a purple colour to blend in with the sky.

The sun looked bigger than the sun at home as it sank with remarkable rapidity behind the horizon, leaving a purple hue to blend in with the plain, only dotted by the occasional thorn bush; a lovely place.

I saw Mary on the last few evenings and we walked and talked. She seemed a shy gentle type and although we did a bit of cuddling, we never allowed things to get out of hand. I had a great feeling of respect for her and I was torn between the memories of the girl who was waiting for me at home and who is now my wife, and this girl I’d met here, so far from home and had sought me out from my shipmates.

“Pippi” and I were invited to the P.O.’s place one evening; it seemed hard to make them hear us. We walked in and saw a sight that made us laugh.

Empty bottles everywhere, with them sat on the floor, dressed in pyjamas, canned out of their minds and droning “my hand on myself, what have I here”.

Nearby, a white enamel bucket was two thirds full of “p***”, covered with young log jammed full of cigarette ends floating on the surface. “Come in, come in, help yourself to some bottles, the f****** night’s young and soon we’ll be going back to that one funnelled b******”. I can see them now, their heads gradually sagging on to their chests, drooling like bottle-fed babies.

We stayed just long enough to drink a couple of bottles we fished out from a nest of bottles on the floor of the wardrobe, and then off we went. I’d visions of that bucket of piss ending up on the floor and didn’t fancy ending up having to mop that lot up.

The lager hadn’t run out before the new consignment had come in. They had certainly made sure of their share, next morning found the two P.O.’s chirpy as ever, not a hair out of place, uniform spic and span.

How they could recover so quickly from such a binge, I used to wonder at.

I bet they could have raised a head of steam with a bottle in each hand.

Soon the day came to say “Goodbye” to this wonderful place and its people. We had had a wonderful time. They had provided for us, had thrown open their doors and hearts to us. What they had they had freely given, unstintingly. It must have cost a bomb. On the station platform, we did try a bit of a dance, I don’t think one man was really sober. A few drinks would ease the pain of leaving.

Mrs. Younger came and found me and said, “Tommy you must say goodbye to Mary, she is crying back there.” I made my way to her and she was indeed in a it of a state. We made promises and I said I would come back on my first long weekend leave. She perked up at that. I gave her my address aboard ship so she could write, and I wrote to her c/o Mrs. Younger, Ballingeih Natal.

The train came in, kisses all round, handshakes from the men, a long hug and kiss from a tearful Mary Bayne, then the whistle and off we went. I last saw her waving as the train drew away. I never did go back. I set off once on a long weekend and got off at Pietermaritzburg, got a skin full and went back to Durban, and after a nap on the beach went back aboard ship.

Mary wrote and I wrote to her. I still have the photo she sent me, placed in an album with other wartime pictures. Forty-three years have passed since I met her and I hope she is still there; I hope sincerely she met a man worthy of her. I did contact her once again, on another ship and another day but by telephone from Durban. I remember asking her something I knew was impossible, and it was to ask her to come down by car. She hadn’t time and I should have had more sense than to ask or expect it.

So here we were back aboard, turning to port of ship and working to prepare her for what we hoped would be the trip home. Meanwhile we did manage a few trips to the coastal resort of Illover Beach, Amamizimtoti and Umkomas. One of these places had a hotel where families evacuated from Singapore were accommodated, and one day we were invited in by one of the women. The men had been left behind, probably to fall prisoner to the Japanese. The women and children were given priority in the evacuation of Singapore. They treated us like heroes and we sang with them the patriotic songs, “There’ll always be an England” and “Land of Hope and Glory”, “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary” and such. Next the inevitable impromptu dance, I was never a dancer but I soon fell into the clutches of a woman of about thirty five who had me shuffling around with her and kidded me on that I could dance. Then someone suggested tea and sandwiches, which met with universal approval. The woman I’d danced with suggested we go to make the sandwiches and I couldn’t refuse. We went to the large kitchen, and it now being dark, she found the switch and as it flooded the place with light I heard a queer rustling noise and just caught a vision of what appeared to be hundreds of cockroaches scuttling away into dark corners.

I’d seen cockroaches aboard ship, but never in such numbers, I suspect I’d eaten them occasionally, for I’d seen them at odd times in the ship’s bread, looking like a misplaced currant.

The woman brought a large loaf from somewhere and some cold meat, so we set off, making a large oval plate up with sandwiches. Not many minutes had gone, before I heard the unmistakable noise of a siren, the same noise as I’d heard when the bombers had flown over to Merseyside while I was on leave.

But the thought crossed my mind, “Where could the bombers have come from to get here?” We seemed miles away from the war. Next the lights went out and the woman and I were alone in that dark kitchen, wondering what next could happen.

I wasn’t left long in doubt, a man starved woman of that age and a man of 21 caught in this situation inevitably ended up in an embrace, one of the things that the fateful days of war could occasionally throw up.

There used to be a saying in the Navy that a “standing cock has no conscience.” Maybe that is true, but things hadn’t gone as far as that before the lights suddenly came on again, regretfully we had to take the sandwiches in.

The knowing looks and smiles, the ribbing from my mates and the blushes of the woman indicated what they all had guessed, if the blackout had not finished quickly, anything could have happened in that kitchen.

It had been a false alarm; some vessel had reported a submarine on the surface and within shelling range of the shore, with the possibility of being a Jap sent on a nuisance raid. We left that place smothered in kisses and wishes of good luck, my bloody luck had run out when that light came back on, but at least I’d had a good chance which my mates missed.

The week passed by and the emergency repairs finished, we left the dry dock. We now had to prepare for sea again, so we were re-ammunitioned and refuelled, fresh supplies were taken aboard and we gradually came back to normal. I did receive a photograph from Mary dated 5th August, 1942. We sailed not long after for the UK via the Cape.

A short stay here and a spot of shore leave where I met a girl by the name of Barbara De-Mendonca, but we weren’t to have a very long acquaintance for we soon set sail with a few ships and a destroyer escort. The mess deck was now full of the old familiar buzzes. We were going on the “Med” back to the North Atlantic and the Russian convoys, but it must have been obvious that we were going home, for the large steel patch was really a temporary job.

We did suffer a tragic loss on our way home; 50 miles off the island of St. Helena. Part of the watch duty was to ditch waste materials, which was fastened up in sacks and would hopefully sink and not be spotted by a submarine. Sometimes a man from the engine room or stoke hold would come up after his watch had been relieved, to get a breath of fresh air and marvel at the star lit tropical sky. What occurred that night no one ever know. One man reported hearing a muffled splash but the for’d porthole H.A. crew were found all asleep with no look out. One man was missing and that was the reason they had been awakened for their turn. The ship was searched extensively from tem to stern. His mates were questioned but no answers could be found. No one knew why he’d gone over the side. Some said he was worried that he had caught the boat up, a reference to what could happen if you went with the wrong female company ashore, but no one really knows to this day.

It could have been depression or a foolhardy skylarking. It cast a shadow over the ship’s company for a few days, which gradually lifted as the ship got nearer the equator, for we knew that after our next refuelling stop we would be on the right side of our journey.

I never stopped marvelling at the beauty of the sea. Most of my off duty hours were spent on the upper deck, either walking on the focastle, having conversation with a friend and taking in the fresh sea air or gazing from the gun deck, which also served as the stowage area for the piquet boat and other boats we carried. It was high and a good vantage point to gaze at the pitching escorts, dipping bows down, then heaving up in a flurry of foam.

Odd times one would break away, its Aldis lamp flickering. As it flashed its signal across the water with a dark puff of smoke from its funnel, would increase speed to investigate a possible contact somewhere ahead, resuming its position later. It was good to know these boys were on their toes; a mistake in the war could turn to large-scale tragedy in a matter of minutes. We all know what had happened to the Barham and the Royal Oak.

One U-boat, one salvos of torpedoes and what had been a great ship could be gone along with most of its crew. No one will ever know what happened inside a ship in such circumstances, one can only guess. We made port safely.

In Freetown, with its heat and humidity, sweat was trickling greasily down suntanned bodies and drenching the shorts we wore. But we were not bothered now we were nearer home and we could brag a bit, now we had been tin-fished and survived.

What would my old folks think when I told them and my friends in Civvy Street. One incident stands out in my memory. We were refuelling and someone must have shut a valve down too early, without warning the tanker to ease her pumps and therefore decrease pressure. The build up caused a burst in the armoured hose, right over the large brass connection on the upper deck, and thick black stinking fuel oil sprayed the beautiful white, well scrubbed planking and some of the ship’s upper works in the immediate vicinity. One or two of the men gathered nearly caught a bit, but were lucky not to get drenched. Amid a panic-stricken hail of shouts, the boiler shut her pumps down, then (Jimmy the one) the officer of Commander Rank came on the scene with a face like a thundercloud. When he saw the mess created to his beloved planking, and the ship’s paintwork, his language was far from that of an officer and gentleman, more like the language of the pit: f****** hellfire who the f****** hell’s done this, it will take f****** months to clean this up. Off came his cap, gold oak leaves and all, and he actually jumped on it several times.

He must have come very near a cardiac arrest. He was livid, and what made him worse was a voice from a black in one of the bumboats, which had paddles alongside. He was obviously amused at what he saw. A black smiling face with its flashing white teeth gazed up and shouted with an appropriate gesture, and use of the forearm and clenched fist, “Up your fat arse commander,” to which the irate officer replied, “F*** off you black b******.” Thereupon the Negro replied, “You come ashore f****** commander, me show you.” With this parting shot, he paddled off leaving us with the painful job of trying to keep straight faces in case we drew No 1’s wrath down upon our own heads.

He wasn’t long in organising a cleaning party, and in a remarkably short time, and with the use of scrubbers and pumice stone, the deck resembled its previous condition. The paintwork wiped down more easily, so things were not so bad and had given us a laugh - not a bad thing in war times.

Pr-BR

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