The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 269 No 7229 p915-917
21/28 December 2002

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A national serviceman's brief memoirs, culminating with a visit to the Empire Games

When I was conscripted for national service it was nearing its end. The majority of young men joined the Army, some joined the Royal Air Force and a relatively small number entered the Royal Navy.

Having arrived at HMS Victory in Portsmouth we were given a number, kitted out, provided with a hammock, which we learnt had to be lashed up with a length of rope long enough to take seven turns (equal distance apart) when not in use. When we moved to another ship we had to carry our heavy kit bags as well as our hammocks. An unpleasant requirement was the compulsory jabs we had to have. The contrast with today is remarkable. The whole squad lined up before a "sadistic" sick berth attendant who then used the same needle for more than a dozen sailors.

Training

After six weeks of basic training we were delegated to a branch, such as seaman, supply or education, and subsequently could apply for advancement and training. I did not say I was a pharmacist because this would have meant being drafted as a sick berth attendant and performing menial tasks, such as scrubbing floors. In those days pharmacists were only attached to naval hospitals, wore civilian clothes but dined in the wardroom. Fortunately I was successful in being selected to attend, and ultimately pass, a number of fleet boards to be promoted to upper yardman. This rank wore a sailor's uniform with broad white stripes on each shoulder, identifiable for miles. We were roused at 6.30am and if you emerged from a building up until 8pm you were not allowed to walk, you had to proceed at the "double", unless you were marching in formation.

The course lasted nine months and the rate of pay was four shillings and sixpence (22.5p) a day. Its simple objective was to test us to the extreme, physically and mentally. The "Hood Term" of about 24 men had to be better than anyone else at everything. This engendered a close team relationship, with a similar motto to that of the three musketeers. No one dare to provoke us, either singly or as a group. Within Hood Term however, nothing or anyone was sacred.

One morning I was delegated to break the church pennant at the masthead. The pennant had to be tied in a complicated way, which took some time. As I had various duties in the early morning I decided to tie the pennant the night before. When all the ship's ratings and officers were mustered and on parade, with the church service about to begin, with one tug of the rope the pennant flew from the masthead but to my embarrassment, our captain and officers were showered with confetti. I was the only seaman on parade not guilty.

One of our final tests was a viva for which you could choose any topic. We had discovered from our predecessors that with due notice of a few weeks, the examining officers had time to research the topic and ask some searching question. We decided to try and reduce the odds by selecting obscure titles. One topic was "A roof over your heads" chosen by a newly qualified estate agent. Mine was simply "C2H5OH" — after the session was over, we were told its length was a record, since so few questions had been researched.

Promotion

On promotion to sub lieutenant, I was posted to the Third Submarine Squadron and reported to HMS Adamant, the depot ship in Portland. We immediately sailed for the Gareloch — it was the first time that the Squadron had moved to a new base — it is now known as Faslane, the headquarters of nuclear submarines. On arrival it looked as though the grand fleet was at anchor. The ships included two battleships HMS King George V and HMS Anson, and cruisers, such as the well known HMS Jamaica.

One day I was summoned by my commander for special duty. I had to take a few sailors on to HMS King George V to ensure that no documents were lying about. She was a fantastic ship, her guns were 18 inches in diameter, (they could fire shells weighing over a ton at ranges over 22 miles). The admiral's cabin was huge, covered from the deck to deck head with beautiful polished wooden panelling. I was the last RN officer to board the ship, the morning after our inspection she was towed away to be broken up.

My first jolly

My first jolly on a submarine was on board a T class boat, HMS Taciturn. You dropped your bag down the hatch to the base of the conning tower, climbed down a ladder before proceeding to stow your gear. The smell of diesel was appalling; it could be smelt on my working uniform 10 years later. As I was supernumerary, my sleeping berth was the wardroom dining table.

After completing the first watch I stretched out on the table and soon fell asleep. I was woken up by an almighty bang. My immediate thought was that we had hit a mine. No one else seemed to move, I then realised that I was sleeping on a gate leg table and had not locked a leg in place before falling asleep.

When diving under normal conditions it is hard to realise that you are going down, the only noticeable feature is the first lieutenant giving orders to open the vents of the ballast tanks. For the first time on this jolly I discovered the spectacular view and sensation of looking through a periscope at the waves, then seeing the bows of our boat come up on to the surface.

One Friday afternoon we had a visit from the first nuclear-powered submarine in the world, USS Nautilus, which had been commissioned in 1954. She appeared at the Rhu narrows to enter the Gareloch and berth alongside our depot ship HMS Adamant. This manoeuvre took one of our boats about 20 minutes; Nautilus took about two hours. She misjudged the angle went further up the loch, turned, tried again, missed, and repeated turning and returning until she eventually tied up alongside. It was difficult to believe that such an awesome boat was capable of such poor seamanship. I discovered the reason many years later when I read 'Submarine' by Tom Clancy. It included the following: "If you were to travel throughout the world and talk to submarine captains, and the captains of the surface ships who might have to oppose them, and ask them whose submarines they most fear, you might be surprised. For while everyone deeply respects the Americans with their technologically and numerically superior submarine force, they all quietly fear the British. Note that I use the word fear. Not just respect. Not just awe. But real fear at what a British submarine, with one of their superbly qualified captains at the helm, might be capable of doing. The US Navy system creates superior submarine drivers and engineers; the Royal Navy system is designed to produce seamen and pure leaders like a Nelson, Rodney, or Woodward." Compared with Taciturn the Nautilus belonged to a different world. The environmental contrast was remarkable: there was masses of space, you could walk around without having to bend your head. In the control room I was immediately struck by the odourless air conditioning and bright light. The periscopes seemed to be huge. Access to the nuclear reactor was controlled, I had to pass through a passage with signs about radiation hazards; there was nothing to be seen — it appeared to be a large stainless steel cylinder. It was astonishing to see ice cream machines in the seamen's mess decks; even more incongruous were the hooks on the bulkhead of each officer's cabin to hold a sword. We had to keep ours in the bottom of the wardrobe in our cabin on the depot ship.

On occasion engineers would appear on the depot ship, stay for a few days and, when they left, the submarine lying alongside would have new domes fixed to the casing. A little later the crew would be issued with Arctic clothing and appear with almost shaven heads. We all knew they were about to embark on a special mission.

Atropine overdose

On one occasion, the day before sailing, a few men in civilian clothes appeared and, over drinks and lunch in the wardroom, gave us to understand they were from the Admiralty and were joining the submarine to test new equipment.

During the afternoon as I was walking to a different part of the ship I bumped into the junior doctor (he was serving a short service commission). He said: "Taff what is the dose for atropine?" I replied: "Very small, about a hundredth of a grain." He then dashed away. Later in the day I met the doctor again and asked why he was so agitated. His response was incredible. He had been busy in the sick bay trying to catch up on his schedule of PULHHEEMS (Physical state, Upper limbs, Lower limbs, Hearing — right ear, Hearing— left ear, Sight — right eye, Sight — left eye, Mental state, Stability; every man on board had to complete this series of fitness tests) and the chief petty officer had shown him a prescription to check. The junior doctor asked who had written it and the CPO replied that it was the surgeon commander. The junior doctor said it must be alright.

Shortly afterwards the junior doctor, with sixth sense, asked the CPO for a sight of the prescription. It had apparently been sent to the sick bay by one of the men from the Admiralty because he sometimes had stress pains with gall stones. When the junior doctor saw the prescription again he made an expletive and dashed away to find the man. When he had seen me he had been on his way down to the submarine HMS Taciturn. On arrival in the control room he had asked for the man from the Admiralty and had been told he was lying down in the captain's cabin because he was feeling unwell. The doctor had immediately woken the patient and asked him if he had taken any of the medicine. He had replied "no". There was not a duty free mess in London and he had drunk an extra gin since he was not on duty until the next day.

The junior doctor had immediately taken away the bottle of medicine and, while he was still on Taciturn's casing, poured the contents into the loch.

He and I calculated that there were 10,000 maximum doses of atropine in the 10 ounce bottle. That evening I was officer of the day when the sick berth petty officer came to look for me and asked if I would go and look at the CPO. It transpired that when the CPO was dispensing the medicine, he thought it smelt foul, tasted it and immediately spat it out. When I saw him his pupils were like billiard balls. I suggested to the PO that he immediately order an ambulance from the new hospital nearby. We managed to find the surgeon commander just as the ambulance arrived.

At about 10pm, the ship's first lieutenant advised us that he had just been involved in an emergency. He had to arrange to fly the CPO's wife up from Portsmouth as he was on the danger list. Fortunately the CPO made a complete recovery. Some weeks later a Board of Inquiry was held. The junior doctor and myself sat in our best uniforms outside the room for nearly the whole afternoon but we were not called to give evidence.

The Empire Games

On a Saturday night, just before I was due to leave the navy, I was in the wardroom when the captain of HMS Seraph asked me if I was familiar with the port of Barry? His boat was scheduled to visit the port to "show the flag" during the Empire Games. When I replied in the affirmative he asked some questions and said: "Taff, I think it would be a good idea if you go down there before us to arrange public relations and accommodation." Seraph operated the hot bed routine: when port watch went on duty the starboard watch used the same bunks. Later in the week I was sent for by my commander who told me he had a request from the captain of Seraph for me to accompany them to Barry, near Cardiff. He said he had granted the request.

I duly returned home with all my gear and made the necessary arrangements for the visit. PR was no problem because Seraph had been the submarine star of a film "The man that never was", as a part of Operation Mincemeat, a deception plan to mislead the Germans and Italians on the whereabouts of the invasion of southern Europe. She had dropped a corpse dressed as a Royal Marines major, Major Martin, off the Spanish coast, complete with an attaché case of forged papers and documents that had false invasion plans. The washed up papers had immediately been transferred to Berlin. Hitler reacted by sending Field Marshall Rommel to Athens and diverting valuable panzer units from the Russian front when history's greatest tank battle was about to commence in Kursk.

Seraph duly arrived and formal "duties" commenced. We played charity football matches and seemed to attend receptions galore. This week happened to be the official Barry Marine Week. At the first reception I was introduced to the mayor who had the most successful pharmacy in the centre of town. As on every other morning, the officers assembled in the control room to agree duties. On the Saturday morning a duty rating requested to see the captain because there was a civilian who wished to see him. A man was ushered in and told our captain he was the harbour master; even at 10am he was offered a gin and tonic. The purpose of his visit was to inform the captain he had two first class tickets for the final afternoon of the Empire Games, would he like to have them? The captain accepted with the greatest of pleasure. When the harbour master had left our captain asked what should be done with the tickets. The response of all the officers was that Taff and Mrs Taff should have them in lieu of the excellent arrangements that had been made.

Later in the day my wife Joan and I sat about 20 yards away from the royal party when the Queen announced that she had bestowed the title of Prince of Wales on Prince Charles. The athletes performance that afternoon was phenomenal, particularly some of the middle distance runners from the Caribbean.

That evening we were whisked off to the formal marine ball. The mayor was embarrassing in his hospitality. Joan seemed to disappear. A while later I looked around and she was with a group of Caribbean men all wearing blazers. Sometimes one needs to be rescued at receptions so I went over to join her. Her face was beaming as she introduced them. Every one of them had won several medals; all, at least, a gold medal. At the time the cinemas in Cardiff were showing a film about a submarine. The athletes trained in the morning and went to the cinema in the afternoon. So I asked them if they would like to visit Seraph on the Sunday for drinks and lunch. They accepted with alacrity. At this point I thought I ought tell our captain about the invitation. When I said that I had asked half a dozen to lunch, he began to tell me that his permission was needed first. When he knew who they were Joan had to begin introductions all over again.

Sunday lunchtime arrived. Gins were liberally spread around. An hour went by. No medal winners. Another hour went by. Still no medal winners. The cook was going mad. Just as we were about to sit down for dinner they arrived, full of apologies. They had been "hijacked" to attend a reception. When they heard it was my last night in the Navy they made some calls and hired a small restaurant for the evening. The party was one to remember.

Next morning Joan stood on the harbour side with me resplendent in my best uniform. The captain gave the order to cast off. He saluted, I saluted in response, and HMS Seraph slid away from the dockside. We waited until she disappeared around the far jetty. My naval career was at an end. I was now destined to be just another ordinary pharmacist.