Alone on a Wide, Wide Sea Read online

  What qualities, you may ask, did these archaic-looking biplanes possess that they were used so long and with such success? (And there can be no doubt about the fact that they were successful; for it was Swordfish which crippled the Italian fleet at Taranto, Swordfish which found and helped to sink the Bismarck, Swordfish which kept the U-boats at bay from our vital Atlantic convoys, and Swordfish which sank a greater tonnage of enemy shipping than any other type of aircraft.)

  It was certainly not their speed that commended them; for the only time they could “do a ton” was in a dive or with a gale behind them. It was certainly not their fire-power; for their defensive armament was a solitary hand-operated Vickers gun, and their offensive armament no more than a few bombs or a torpedo, or eight rocket projectiles or four depth charges. And it was certainly not their beauty of line; for they looked as though they were glued together by a cat’s cradle of struts and wires – hence the epithet “Stringbag”. They had open cockpits, and their engines, like those of a vintage car, had to be started by hand-cranking. However, on the plus side they were robust, reliable, manoeuvrable, without vice, forgiving and above all ideally suited to flying from carriers. It was this last quality which endeared them to a decade of Fleet Air Arm pilots. Aircraft operating from carriers often suffer heavier losses from accidents than from enemy action – Seafires covering the allied landings in Italy for example lost twenty planes taking-off or landing for every one lost in combat. Swordfish, with their short take-off run, slow landing speed and sturdy undercarriage were able to operate from carriers by night, in heavy seas and in weather conditions no other aircraft could have survived in. If 835 Squadron had been flying any other type of plane, the odds are we wouldn’t today be telling our story.

  With few carriers and outdated aircraft the Fleet Air Arm at the start of the war depended heavily on it personnel. And they, like the curate’s egg, were good and bad in patches.

  To start at the bottom of the naval hierarchy … The maintenance crews, whose job was to keep the Air Arm’s planes fuelled, armed and airworthy, started off with a disadvantage that could have been crippling. Between the wars, naval aircraft had been serviced by RAF ground crew. It was therefore inevitable that when in 1937 the RAF severed its connections with the Air Arm, most of those engineers, riggers and fitters who had been looking after the Navy’s planes returned to service on RAF aerodromes. This left the Navy bereft of those artisans without whose skills its aircraft couldn’t be kept in the air; and in particular it left them bereft of those long-service non-commissioned officers who have worked their way up through the ranks and are the backbone of every effective fighting force. The Navy embarked on a crash programme of training riggers and fitters; but, as was the case with its carriers, eighteen months of activity couldn’t make up for eighteen years of neglect; and in 1939 the majority of Fleet Air Arm groundcrew had little in the way of experience, and nothing in the way of tradition to fall back on. Bearing this in mind, the high standard of maintenance achieved in carriers and shore establishments throughout the war was remarkable. And this perhaps is the place to pay tribute to the unsung heroes of 835 Squadron.

  It has been estimated that when a carrier is operating in difficult conditions – bad weather and heavy seas – for every hour a plane is airborne, it takes two hours to get it onto and off the flight deck, fuel it, arm it and carry out essential inspection, maintenance and repairs. Our squadron riggers and fitters had a heavy work load, and their task was complicated by the fact that it is a great deal harder to keep planes serviceable in a carrier than on an airfield. Safety precautions have to be more rigorous, working conditions are more cramped, more malodorous and in heavy seas more dangerous; because of lack of space, spare parts are always in short supply, and there isn’t the option of simply lifting the phone to order a replacement. In view of these difficulties the wonder is not that some of our planes were sometimes unairworthy, but that any were ever airworthy at all.

  Next step up in the hierarchy were the aircrew. The small core of RN observers and pilots who had learned their trade at Lee-on-Solent and Netheravon were the crème de la crème. In 1939 many of these dedicated men were given the job of training their RNVR successors, and they managed to pass on to their pupils something of their own commitment, expertise and esprit de corps. Although it may seem conceited to say so, there was not much wrong with the standard of flying in the Air Arm at the beginning of the war, or for that matter at any time during the war.

  The situation was not so roseate in the next echelon of the hierarchy; for the Air Arm was bereft of officers of flag or even captain’s rank who had experience in operating aircraft carriers. It was a different story in the American and Japanese Navies; they had large numbers of senior officers who had graduated to their position through the ranks of naval aviation; but because the Fleet Air Arm had been controlled until 1937 by the RAF, it had virtually no officers who were senior enough to fill key positions in an aircraft carrier. This was a serious lack. It was felt throughout the whole duration of the war – witness the fact that when, in 1944, a new captain was appointed to command our aircraft-carrier HMS Nairana, the man chosen for this not unimportant job had previously served only in cruisers and destroyers, and had no personal experience of what aircraft could do or how to operate them.

  With such a conception, it is hardly surprising that the birth of 835 Squadron was a low-key, almost apologetic affair. Indeed it seemed for quite a while that it wasn’t going to take place at all.

  2

  BIRTH

  On my second day at Eastleigh I resumed my search for colleagues or aircraft, but to no avail. The snow continued to fall. The wardroom remained deserted.

  That evening I walked into the town in search of the Station Hotel, which I’d caught sight of as I got off the train. Everything was blacked-out; but when it came to locating pubs I seemed to have a built-in homing instinct – enhanced perhaps by my training as a navigator. Getting to the Station Hotel was no problem. Getting a beer was another story. I asked for a pint of bitter, and was told I could have a half. (Beer was not officially rationed during the war; but it was often in short supply, and some pubs had a “locals only” or “no more than a pint” rule.) At first I was the only person in the bar, but after a while a middle-aged man came in. We wished one another “good evening”, and, thinking this was going to be the only chance I’d have to celebrate my 21st birthday with a companion, I asked him if he’d like a drink. The statutory half-pint was duly poured and drunk. But, alas, when my new-found friend said it was his round, we were told we had had our ration!

  As I walked back to HMS Raven the snow had stopped and the sky was bright with stars. It was a beautiful evening. All the same, I could think of more exciting ways of spending one’s 21st birthday.

  Next day, finding I was still a one-man squadron without aircraft, I approached the captain’s secretary. What I had in mind was a bit of belated celebrating. What I asked was: “Why don’t I go to the Admiralty and find out what’s happening?”

  Returning to Eastleigh a few days later, after various episodes in London which did indeed include a brief visit to the Admiralty, I found that over the weekend five somewhat bewildered sub-lieutenants (A) RNVR had arrived at HMS Raven, all looking for 835 Squadron. Three of the newcomers were pilots. There was “Taffy” Jones from Llanelly: fair haired, shrewd and exuberant. Robin Shirley-Smith, an architect by profession: reserved but unfailingly even-tempered and considerate. And Johnny Hunt from north London, one of those gifted, easy-going and modest men who are liked by everyone. The two observers were Jackie Parker: a delightfully innocent young man, anxious to do his bit and full of admiration for anyone who had already done theirs. And Jack Teesdale, who was soon to become not only a personal friend but – as Stores Officer – quite literally the prop and stay of the Squadron.

  About the last to arrive was our squadron CO, Lt-Cdr Mervyn Johnstone, DSC, RN. Nobody dared ask if he was late or we had been early!


  Johnstone was a maverick. Important things he did very well; routine things he got someone else to do; trivia he ignored. First, he talked to each of us individually. I was rash enough to volunteer the information that I’d previously served in HMS Eagle in the Mediterranean. On hearing this, he promptly appointed me Senior Observer and Squadron Adjutant. He then assembled the whole squadron – all six of us – and told us why we’d been brought to Eastleigh.

  835 Squadron, he said, was going to consist of four Swordfish, four pilots, four observers, four telegraphist air gunners and thirty-four maintenance personnel. Our objective would be to carry out convoy protection duties, flying from one of the small escort-carriers currently being built in the United States. We would go first to the Royal Naval Air Station at Palisadoes, near Kingston, Jamaica. Here we would pick up our aircraft. Then, as soon as one of the carriers under construction in the yards of Norfolk, Virginia was ready, we would fly north and embark in her.

  We were not sure what to make of this. So far in the war Swordfish had been used mostly as torpedo-bombers – they had crippled half the Italian fleet at Taranto and been instrumental in sinking the Bismarck – and most of us, I fancy, had secret dreams of emulating these great feats. Convoy protection would, we knew be different: not the occasional dramatic sortie, but long hours of circling a slow-moving convoy on anti-submarine patrol. Valuable, yes. Exciting, no. In retrospect, I wonder we didn’t ask ourselves the obvious question: why was the squadron to consist of no more than four ancient biplanes, and why was there no British escort-carrier from which we could operate? These questions did occur to some of us later. But at the time we were simply delighted at the prospect of exchanging the snow, cold and gloom of Eastleigh for the sun, warmth, palm trees, rum and limbo dancing of the Caribbean.

  And suddenly it was all happening. Next day the CO told me to prepare a movement order to take the squadron first by train to Glasgow and then to the SS Andalucia Star, at anchor in the Clyde.

  Johnnie Johnstone then disappeared into the best hotel in Winchester to enjoy a few days of unofficial leave with his wife. I wasn’t sure then (and I’m still not sure now) whether to be flattered that he trusted me to do everything that had to be done, or disgruntled at being landed with all the work.

  We left Eastleigh with few regrets on the afternoon of 29 January, the last of our observers, Sub-Lt(A) S.W. Thomas, joining us literally only a few hours before we got on the train. For those with romantic connections in the south there was a last rendezvous with loved ones at Victoria Station, for those with romantic connections in the Midlands a last rendezvous at Crewe. Those with romantic connections in Scotland were unlucky. There was no time for any sort of rendezvous in Glasgow. Within a couple of hours of de-training we were aboard the Andalucia Star, and next day the ship moved downriver to the Tail O’ The Bank at Greenock.

  It was dark and cold as, a little after 1 am in the morning of 4 February, a small convoy stood silently out of the Clyde. Apart from the Andalucia Star there were only two other merchantmen in the convoy, and we were escorted by just two destroyers. The latter saw us safely through the sea-lanes north of Ireland, which in those days were a happy hunting-ground for the U-boats; then on 7 February they left us, and the three merchantmen split up, each heading at top speed for its destination.

  And speed, on these solo voyages, was a matter of life or death.

  Luckily for us, the Andalucia Star was a fine, fast vessel. One of the élite of the Blue Star Line, she had been launched in 1936 and had a displacement of 15,000 tons and a cruising speed of 16 knots – in other words she was just about as fast as a U-boat on the surface. She was well, indeed luxuriously, appointed, and remarkably well stocked with food and pre-war vintage wines; so our passage across the Atlantic had all the trappings of a pleasure cruise.

  The squadron telegraphist-air-gunners and maintenance personnel travelled third-class: not uncomfortable but by no means luxurious. With them there happened to be the leading airmen of the 50th Observers Course on their way to Trinidad to complete their training, and among these trainee observers were A.R.J (Johnny) Lloyd and A.C. Arber who were later to join the squadron.

  The pilots and observers travelled first-class, and, conforming to the practice of the day, we were strictly segregated from our companions below decks. Also travelling first class were a number of ladies, most of them officers’ wives, on their way to join their husbands in the West Indies, Canada or the United States. It didn’t take us long to wake up to the fact that several of our travelling companions were most attractive, especially a young lady of French extraction with the name of Marianne. Taffy Jones did his best to zero in on her; but, having surveyed the field, it was Johnny Hunt whom she invited to sit at her table. Other pairings followed, it being generally felt that Shirley-Smith’s might be the least successful, since his American girl friend insisted on carrying her handbag with her wherever she went, and in it a small revolver.

  As we headed south the weather got warmer. Tropical rig became the order of the day; deck-tennis and quoits became increasingly popular; the food seemed to get better and better, the wine to flow ever more freely, and the dancing to go on ever later into the small hours of the morning. It was an idyllic interlude: ten days of the sort of cloistered luxury that first-class passengers on first-class liners took for granted between the wars. Some of us, when we weren’t dancing away the night, found ourselves watchkeeping; and it could be that the ever-present threat of U-boats gave our amours an urgency that made them the more memorable.

  But all good things come to an end. On 16 February we sighted Jamaica. It was an evening for parties, a night for farewells; and on the morning of 17 February the Andalucia Star nosed up to one of the long wooden jetties in Kingston harbour.

  Maybe the wind was gusting, maybe the tide was exceptionally strong, maybe the ship’s officers had been kept awake by our farewell party. Whatever the cause, the Star came alongside with an almighty crash which not only buckled the jetty but so terrified a group of Jamaican dockers that they dived headlong into the sea!

  After this somewhat inauspicious arrival, we disembarked and were taken to Palisadoes, in those days a naval airfield a little to the south-east of Kingston. Here we were given a warm welcome and fine airy cabins; and that afternoon the CO, Jack Teesdale and I took charge of our four Swordfish (numbers W5966, W5968, W5973 and V4719) and the squadron’s mobile equipment. These aircraft and their accoutrements – bombs, torpedoes, spare parts, spare compasses and servicing apparatus etc. – had been left for us several months earlier by HMS Furious when she had called at Kingston, en route to Norfolk, Virginia, where she was due for a refit.

  At last we were a proper squadron, with aircraft. And it seemed we were in the right place at the right time. For that evening we were told that U-boats were shelling the oil installations at Aruba, in the south of the Caribbean.

  In fact our short stay in Jamaica turned out to be more enjoyable than eventful; though, as far as the U-boats were concerned, our mere presence may have been a deterrent – a state of affairs to be repeated many times in the years to come.

  February 18 was a busy day for the ground crew. They worked flat out to get our four aircraft not only serviceable but operational. Airframes were tested, engines tuned, compasses swung, radios and machine guns checked. And the squadron’s Fair Flying Log records that next day we ventured for the first time into the air: not anything dramatic or even useful, just the CO leading his four Swordfish on a “familiarization flight” over Kingston and its environs.

  The sun, I remember, was warm, the sea a deeper-than-Mediterranean blue, the Jamaican jungle a brighter-than-emerald green. It was a different world from the cold grey reaches of the North Atlantic which were to be our stamping ground in the years to come.

  Next day, 20 February, 1942, Taffy Jones and I flew the squadron’s first operational sortie: an anti-submarine patrol.

  Since anti-submarine patrols were what most of us would
be doing over the next three years, some explanation of why they were so important and how they were carried out seems to me to be called for.

  To say our job was to sink U-boats would be not only simplistic but misleading. Our theatre of war was the North Atlantic. This was the setting for a Homeric conflict on which the outcome of the war depended. “The battle of the Atlantic,” wrote Churchill, “was the dominating factor all through the war. If we had lost that we would have lost everything.” So the work we were called on to do was of some importance. This is worth emphasizing because much of our flying seemed at the time (and indeed seems in retrospect) unexciting, uneventful and apparently unrewarded: ever circling ships that we seldom saw, protecting them from an enemy we never met, most of our anti-submarine patrols were carried out either at night or out of visual range of the convoy we were guarding, while many of our aircrew never so much as sighted a U-boat during the whole of their active service. Nothing here, you might think, to fire the imagination! Nevertheless, it was squadrons like 835 operating from escort carriers which tipped the scales in our favour in the Battle of the Atlantic. For early in 1943, at a time when things were going badly, it was carrier-based aircraft which helped to turn the possibility of defeat into the certainty of victory.