On being asked what his BEM was awarded for, Desmond said he got it in China. His principal recollection of that period was that he had been away from “her and my two kids. I saw quite a bit of action. The African invasion - I spent two and a half years in the Mediterranean. Malta convoys, Malta to Alex … I was away from home for two years and seven months. Away from her and my kids. You just wait for the mail to come aboard. That was basically the only way you got in touch with your wife and children. And the Russian convoys… nothing was very pleasant, during the war.”
He is grateful to have survived it. “Many didn’t,” he says.
Mr R. G. Hylands, Royal Navy, was born in1914, and when called up in 1940, joined the Navy to avoid going in the Army.
“In early 1940 we were in a terrible mess with the war and as I was 26 years old and would have been called up in my group I wanted to avoid going into the Army … So I wrote to the Navy and said I would like to join and had a reply right away. About two weeks later I was sent to Fareham for my training, May 8th. I was quite a bit older than some, who were teenagers. One other who joined the same class as me was from Jersey where the Germans had taken over and another from Sussex. The other 22 were from Scotland, all about 18 and what a lazy bunch they were at first, but soon shaped up. I did six weeks and got my first leave to get home, Saturday and Sunday 12.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m. I got married at the Town Hall in Eastbourne June 15th, no time to marry in the church. At the end of my training in HMS Collingwood I was drafted to RNB [Royal Naval Barracks] Portsmouth and was there for two weeks, sleeping in the shelters after getting turfed out of our hammocks.
“When my draft came through it was for IST [inter-services training]. When I asked about it, I was not given any answer to my question. The lorry that took a couple of us ended up at a South Hayling camp just for housing sailors until other places were available for us.”
After two weeks and two days’ leave he remembers, “On my return, I was not allowed to enter the camp after midnight and could not walk there by that time. Soldiers who patrolled the bridge were kind enough to let me and one other sleep in their stores tent until 0700 the following day. We could enter the camp at 0800. Eventually we were taken to Northney who were not yet very well ready to take the ratings they were going to train on landing craft; this was the cause of the secrecy of the camp.”
Mr Hylands helped to man the telephone exchange until sailors were replaced by Wrens in 1943, when he was transferred to the Boat party, which took training crews to the landing craft “which were slowly beginning to arrive from boat builders. They had to be moored, and roped to the shore over the very muddy area at low water.
“In early 1944 there was a need for men to be transferred to other parts of the forces. We had about 400 different types of craft. We had to take boats to and from Portsmouth and Southampton and at one time took 12 LCAs to Southampton and loaded them on the Daffodil, one of the two boats used for carrying the LCAs. These were used by the Canadians but were sunk as they approached France.”
When a German invasion appeared to be imminent, “The Captain arranged that personnel would be employed to try and hold the Germans back. The army on Langstone Bridge were going to blow it up and all we sailors and Marines were going to do what we could in trying to stop the advance. My duty with another rating was to get to the railway and place sleepers on it at various places.
“When I was a coxwain, I was on duty one night when an officer got me out of my bed to go to see if we could help a plane that had landed short [of the runway at Thorney Island]. We had a very fast boat with twin engines and a mate stoker down below the deck but when we arrived south of Thorney, all we could trace were magnesium flares floating on the water like candles. We waited for half an hour to see if we could pick anyone up but were unlucky.
“Another time I was called during the dark hours because a sentry had been found shot and we were sent to see if we could locate any enemy, in a boat of sorts, but we saw no-one and on our return I said to the sub officer, ‘What have we got in the way of guns to protect ourselves?’ and he said ‘I’ve got a pistol!’ I said ‘What about me? I’ve got no armament.’ He just shrugged. I learnt my lesson. I would have refused to take off in future without a gun.
“One thing I did not mention, was that an officer and myself and two ratings went to Littlehampton to collect a new LCA which was built there, and as we approached Selsey Bill, we had to go out to sea a bit more, to avoid a ship that had been sunk and the masts stuck out of the water about 20 or 30 feet. It looked very eerie.”
Mr Arnold Sharples was drafted as L/S Coxwain to LCI(L) 171, a troop carrier.
When beached, “We had two gangways on each side of the ship which were run out on to the beach, to disembark personnel. I was drafted to this particular ship, leaving all my pals in the Boat Party after our being together for two and a half years. It was a bit daunting at the time, taking charge of a ship with seventeen crewmen plus the Captain and 1st Lieutenant, issuing rum and taking charge of the victualling. Our arms were Oerlikon guns and machine guns. Our sleeping quarters were also our living quarters, called mess deck. I had to allocate duties like watch-keeping, wine splicing, shore leave etc. It was made a lot easier by having a very good crew, who were very helpful to me. As coxwain I had to take wheel at action stations and on entering harbour - not good for anyone who was claustrophobic because I was in the tiller room, all in darkness, portholes covered. I had to listen for the captain’s voice down the pipe giving orders, ten degrees to port or starboard and keeping an eye on the compass. A bit nerve-wracking when guns were being fired.
“One thing I did notice while transporting troops of different nationalities, Americans, Poles, and our Tommies, was that the rations that our Tommies carried were far less in quantity than the other forces had. It amazed me that the coloured Americans were far more polite and interesting to talk to than the white Americans. Not all, of course. They liked to play dice.”
Arnold recalls putting in at the Royal Pier, Southampton to pick up supplies as his ship was going somewhere in a convoy. “We collected all the supplies plus rum, took them down to the pier-head but unfortunately the lorry was too tall to get on to the pier, so we unloaded them at the entrance so that the lorry could go back to its depot. Looking around outside the pier entrance, we found a small van with keys in the ignition [that was an offence, in war-time]. We waited about 15 minutes, then I ordered the three crewmen to load the van with our supplies. We made three journeys, and had just put the van back in its place when the owner turned up … there were a few words said but when I said I would give him a wine bottle of Navy rum, and not report him to police, he went away quite happy.”
Landing craft in line astern: LCS(M) 92 ahead of Mk1 LCM’s
Earlier, Arnold recalls a visit from Lord Louis Mountbatten to HMS Northney I. “We cleared lower decks, in other words, all personnel assembled on the parade ground. Mountbatten inspected us and spoke to me, wanted to know my age, because my hair was grey. Hereditary - I was grey when I married. I was dressed in overalls plus duffel coat as most of the Boat Party were.”
Arnold also recalls Meadowsweet, the canteen run at their home by local ladies in Hayling: “They were lovely ladies,” he says, “and made the servicemen and women very welcome. Excellent meals and chit chat.”
Brian Bignell, a member of the LCT and Landing Craft Association, volunteered for the Royal Navy when he was 17½ and joined HMS Collingwood at 18; did his training, went to Stockheath camp at Havant and after two weeks’ leave came to HMS Northney III on Hayling Island, which was a training centre for those who