A View from the Back: The Recollections of a Fleet Air Arm Observer 1941-1946 by Tony Inman (Part 10 of 14)(Nov 44 — Mar 45)

A View from the Back: The Recollections of a Fleet Air Arm Observer 1941-1946 by Tony Inman Part 10 of 14 (Nov 44 — Mar 45)

After the trip with Victorious we must have returned to Katakarunda by road for my log book shows we flew back to China Bay, (the name of the airstrip at Trincomalee) a few days later to act as anti-submarine escort to Argonaut, one of the new cruisers coming out to join the Fleet. The logbook shows we flew for 3 hours but never met her. I don’t know whose fault that was!

There was a navigation exercise which rather demonstrates the dangerous laisser-faire attitude we had fallen into. When I climbed into the cockpit I found there was only one compass instead of two, which meant I could only take bearings on one side. I decided this was sufficient and we took off. It soon became apparent that this one compass was no good, not giving proper readings and needed to be reswung. Still in a reckless mood we carried on relying on the pilot's compass alone which proved equally unreliable, for after flying several legs which should have brought us back over land, even my brand of navigation should have brought in sight of the coast. We flew hopefully on for a while but nothing in sight. What to do? We did not know our position, we were an unknown number of miles from the island, somewhere over the Indian Ocean, trying to find a coastline which only went so far. Being resourceful, (as well as foolish) naval aviators we agreed to fly due east taking our bearing from the sun. After about half an hour it was clear that this was not working and we became anxious that we would miss the bottom of the island and disappear into the Bay of Bengal. So we altered 45 degrees to port to fly northeast. Only just in time for after a bit we sighted land away to port and then it was not far to base. A salutary lesson.

Part of our duties was to act as officer of the watch at the camp and one day I found myself on the forenoon watch, 8am to noon, which at least had something to do, starting with hoisting the colours and ending with issuing the rum ration. About five to eight I arrived at the mast followed by the duty escort and the Marine band. As 8 eight bells was being struck I started to give the orders to the escort and the chap who actually hoisted the ensign. I hadn’t reckoned with the band which started to play the National Anthem, completely drowning my voice. Luckily everybody was more used to the flag ceremony than I was and my orders were not really necessary, and, job completed, they all marched away without interference from me. As time for rum issue approached the duty stores Petty Officer and Regulating P0 appeared and together we measured out the rum to be issued, neat for Chiefs and Petty officers and watered for ratings. When the issue had been made there was some left over (surprise, surprise) which the Officer of the Watch had to ensure was thrown away. And so it was but not before said officer, the Petty officers and some of their henchmen had had “gulpers". This ensured I had a sleepy afternoon.

It was not unknown for interlopers to creep into the huts at night to steal and on one occasion they were interrupted by a Marine officer who was stabbed, (not fatally) for his pains. The miscreants were caught and were taken to the police in a truck guarded by marines who were not pleased that their popular officer had been knifed and rumour had it that the police accepted some rather battered prisoners.

The time had now come for our pilots to do their first deck landing in an Avenger. These were to take place on Unicorn and the C.O. had decided to fly out to witness their efforts. He was going to fly a Swordfish and wanted an observer to navigate even though Unicorn was only about 10 miles offshore and almost in sight of land. Nobody wanted this job as he was a notoriously poor pilot but I ended up with it as I was not present to argue. This was probably the afternoon after the rum! The C.O's landing on the carrier was not bad, judging by later experience, and I was able to watch our pilots’ performance from the safety of the goofers. They each did several take-offs and landings and I was very pleased with Norman who caught the right wire each time. There were usually eight arrestor wires and it was considered best to catch the third one, which he did. Although I don't remember the flight back, my logbook says it was "dicey". The take-off, I expect.
Training was now finished and I see the report at the end of the course describes me as 'Keen and intelligent", but perhaps he was mixing me up with someone else. Though I was still keen to fly. It was now time to move on to Australia and after 4 years in the Fleet Air Arm I was at last going to sea in an aircraft carrier, but even now not to fly from her.

Chapter 11:
Sydney

I have very little memory of the voyage from Colombo to Sydney. Certainly there was no 'Crossing the Line' ceremony, so we must have acted as tourists and idled along. There was one moment of surprise, perhaps terror, when we were snoozing on the quarterdeck in the shade of the round-down of the flight deck. For practice, the 4-inch gun turret opened fire, and this turret was just above our heads. The voyage lasted about a week and we did not sight land until we reached Sydney. As we were unescorted we had been going at something approaching 20 knots, which could not have helped fuel consumption.
The ship's navigator was a rather old Merchant Navy, RNR, and the buzz was that when the ship had been going to Durban he had had three stabs at the coast before getting it right. There was some mild betting on how many approaches to Sydney would be required but this time he had it right and we entered the harbour between Sydney Heads, the two headlands at the entrance. The harbour is huge with dozens of small boats dashing about. Unicorn went right up to the dock area and anchored just before reaching the famous bridge. I understand we could not go under the bridge for Unicorn had the highest mast in the Fleet, 150 feet, which was too tall.

After disembarking we went to live in a hutted transit camp on Warwick Farm racecourse, Sydney's second racecourse after the well-known Randwick. There was a station with frequent trains for the short journey to the city centre. We saw a few of the sights, rode on the trams, and experienced the pleasures of the '6 o'clock swill'. Licensing hours meant that pubs had to close at 6 o'clock so all the workers in the city would dash straight to the pub to swill the beer down before 6. After a few days we were among six crews appointed to 854 squadron in Illustrious which was in dock in Woolloomollo, adjacent to the notorious area King's Cross. By this stage of the war Illustrious was feeling her age from the numerous batterings she had suffered but she was still highly revered. We joined and were told that it had been decided that the squadron would be increased from 18 to 24 aircraft, but it was, at present, away at Nowra, working up. Nowra was an aerodrome about an hour's flight away. We were told to go leave for 7 days as the squadron would be returning by then and there was no point in us turning up for the last few days. We were allocated cabins which meant going down ladders, through watertight doors, down through watertight hatches, miles below the waterline, and so far aft I swear the cabin was astride the propeller shaft. I was glad to get back on the upper deck. One thing I did notice was the number of Oerlikon positions along the sides of the flight deck. I counted 32.

The citizens of Sydney had opened a Hospitality Centre where any member of the Fleet could go when they were on leave and be fixed with a holiday. Three of us went together, myself, Norman and another observer, Bruce Cook. We were offered riding on a sheep station, climbing in the Blue Mountains or beaches and bathing. This last suited our rather lazy desires and we went by train up the coast to a small place, Hawks Bay, where we were met by our host and hostess, Fred and Joan Moses, in their car which was gas driven with a huge bag on the roof. After a couple of days we realised that Hawks Bay was really a private village where all the houses were summer cottages owned by well-breeched people who had farms or businesses in other parts of the State. Plus, of course, a few necessary shops. Everyone knew each other and we were made very welcome. It was now getting towards the end of February and summer was coming to an end when everybody would depart until next time. The residents did not want to take any drink home with them and this was an excuse for a party every night. I drank more in those days than I do now, so the nights were long and blurry. This did not stop some of the more resilient members of the community from getting us out of bed at 6 o'clock to go bathing before having breakfast on the beach.

The word 'barbecue' had not been invented than but I well remember eating lamb chops cooked over a fire of driftwood. I think most of the people there were sheep farmers and the size of their farms was huge. One of them told us the nearest farmhouse to his was 50 miles away, but I took this with a pinch of salt.

Leave ended too soon but we had some contacts who would entertain us if we were ever again in Sydney. Back to Illustrious and anti-climax. In our absence minds had been changed and 854 was not being increased after all so we were surplus to requirement. Our total time in Illustrious was only a few hours for we had been appointed to Striker, an escort carrier that was very much the poor relation to the mighty Illustrious. But I was not sad to leave my subterranean cave.

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Chapter 4:
HMS Striker

Striker was one of the Striker class carriers. Others of this class had names like Biter, Smiter, Fencer, and Charger. These ships were basically merchant ships with necessary alterations and additions such as hangar and flight deck. The deck was 420 feet long and if you convert that to yards, 140 seems a very short distance to get a loaded aircraft of 8 tons airborne, especially as the whole length could not be used because of other aircraft. These carriers were not armoured like Fleet carriers and had a wooden flight deck. They were used mainly for convoy escort, spare deck (if the main carrier's deck was unusable for some reason) and ferrying replacement or damaged aircraft. The damaged ones were known as 'flyable duds', capable of being flown but having some other defect making them unsuitable for operations. These were ferried to a repair base. They were therefore different from Unicorn in which repairs could actually be done. We were replacement crews but I don't remember how many of us were sent forward. I remember only one where the pilot took off with the propeller in the wrong pitch so that the engine did not develop full power with the result that the aeroplane fell off the end into the sea. All were rescued safely by our attendant frigate and transferred back aboard where they were greeted with ribald laughter.

We went first to Manus in the Admiralty Islands which are just south of the equator. Manus is the main island of the group which are gathered round a large deep lagoon and this formed the forward base of the British Pacific Fleet, otherwise known as Allied Task Force 57. Here we first made contact with the Fleet Train and some of the ships became very familiar in the next few months, particularly Robert Maersk, an ammunition ship. The only duties that I remember doing was as Captain's 'doggy', a naval term for what is now known as a 'gofer' Certainly we did no flying, as air escort was from Speaker, another escort carrier.

We were in Striker for nearly two months, but after the initial excitement and trepidation of going towards the action and the probability that we would soon be involved, it all became a bit humdrum. We watched the re-supply of the main Fleet but it was rather remote, as we not personally involved. We stayed at sea for about two weeks at a time before returning to Manus to refuel and pick up another set of ships for the Train. There were always rumours that we would be going somewhere else, perhaps to the American bases at Truk or Ulithi. But we did not go to either of those places but to Luzon in the Philippines, God knows what for. We anchored in this wide bay that contained dozens if not hundreds of other ships, both naval and merchant, and mostly American. We went ashore only once, to a "Recreation Centre" set up by the US Navy. It was just a place to drink, much sought after by our Allies whose ships were 'dry'. The Cox of the liberty boat had a hard job returning as the ship was so far out as to be hull down. This would have been in mid-April for while we were there President Roosevelt died. The CinC ordered all British ships in harbour to fly the Stars and Stripes at half-mast (as the Americans were doing). I was acting as assistant officer of the watch for the morning watch when the signal came through. It was normal practice for those on forenoon watch to come about 15 minutes early to prepare for the flag ceremony at 8 o'clock. Relief that day was a bit late and did not have time to read the signals. Those being relieved did not wait to tell him but dashed below to get breakfast. The result was Striker being the only ship not wearing the US flag, for a while, anyway.

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