Description
Object description
British seaman served aboard HMS Walker in Mediterranean and Arctic, 1943-1945
Content description
REEL 1: Aspects of period in London, 1924-1942: joined army cadets age 14; employment with cabinet maker; made redundant on outbreak of war, 1939; family background; volunteered for Royal Navy when called up, 12/1942. Aspects of training with Royal Navy in GB, 1943: posted to shore base HMS Glendower, Pwllheli, North Wales; four months basic training; drafted to HMS Walker at Chatham; description of conversion of ship; rank; officers and crew; messing arrangements; posted to Greenock, Scotland. Aspects of operations aboard HMS Walker in Mediterranean and Arctic Ocean, 1943-1945: description of duties escorting convoys to Gibraltar; route; number of ships and escorts; story about wife of soldier serving in Gibraltar; action stations at Oerlikon gun and depth charges; story of celebrating 21st birthday in Gibraltar; issued with winter clothing; transferred to duties on Arctic convoys from Greenock to Murmansk, Russia; amusing story of steering ship out of Greenock harbour; watch system; story of Canadian officer being lost overboard; description of Russian women unloading ships at Murmansk; carried 12 American sailors back to Greenock; picked up Russian survivors from sinking ship; use of box camera to take photographs on board ship; story of sailing through storm.
REEL 2 Continues: problem of drying wet clothes; sleeping arrangements; duties chipping ice off ship and reason for always wearing gloves; received a shilling a day extra pay; ship dropped depth charges; description of operations during Normandy landings, France, 6/1944; role of ship protecting ferry from Larne to Belfast against U-boats; posted to Barrow-in-Furness, 1945; duties at Scapa Flow disarming German U-boats following end of war; story of taking clock from U-boat as souvenir. Aspects of period in GB, 1945: story of being arrested by Military Police for smuggling bottles of whiskey and cigarettes; taken to depot ship HMS Egret in Liverpool; sentenced to 14 days in Walton Gaol; put on bread and water for three days; role in charge of deserters in Gaol; released back to HMS Egret; role escorting deserters to London; duties in cookhouse; story of accident while chopping meat; various memories of friend Bill Perks. Aspects of post-war life in GB: issued with Arctic Medal and Russian medal at Imperial War Museum, London; reunions; employment; story of visit to Murmansk, 2005.