WE JOIN OUR SHIP

There are grey old Admirals in our land
Who never have stood where now you stand:
Here on your feet, in His Majesty’s fleet,
With a real live enemy close at hand!

Punch: Sept. 1914.

Hastily we scrambled aboard, in the excitement of the moment nearly forgetting to salute the quarter-deck. Fortunately all recollected that ceremony in time with the exception only of one, who was promptly dropped on by the Commander—much to his confusion and dismay.

In obedience to the order of the cadet captain in charge we “fell in” on the quarter-deck while the Commander went below to report to the Captain. As we were awaiting further instructions the first Lieutenant, who was also the Torpedo Lieutenant (commonly known in naval slang as “Torps”), came up and spoke to us. He told us he would probably have to look after us, and said he hoped we should like the life on board. We all thought he seemed to be a very nice officer—an opinion we found no occasion to change, and we were all sincerely sorry when, three months later, he had the misfortune to fall into the hands of the enemy.

The Commander then reappeared and told us to go down to the Captain’s cabin. We ran down the gangway he had just come up, and our cadet captain knocked at the door of the after cabin. A voice said “Come in”—and Carey entered, leaving us standing outside. In a few seconds he returned and beckoned to us to follow him. We did so, and came to “attention” facing the Captain, who was seated at a knee-hole writing desk.

He was a small man of middle-age, inclining to stoutness, clean shaven, slightly bald, with deep-set eyes, which appeared dark in the shadow of heavy overhanging eyebrows.

He eyed us keenly until we were all assembled, and then, leaning forward towards us, he rapped sharply on his desk with a ruler, and said in a deep bass voice—

“Young gentlemen, it is war-time, and you have been sent to sea as officers in His Majesty’s Navy!”

He then continued, so far as I can remember, to express the hope that we might worthily uphold the traditions of a great service. Further he informed us that all our letters would be strictly censored; that our relatives and friends would only be able to write to us “Care of the General Post Office, London”; and that on no account must we write them one single word indicative of the whereabouts or work of the ship; for, under the Official Secrets Act, any infringement of this rule rendered us liable in the words of the Articles of War to “Death—or some such other punishment hereinafter mentioned!”

Then having asked our names, and chosen the two seniors—Carey, the cadet captain, and Baker—to be signal midshipman and his own messenger respectively, he curtly dismissed us. The almost complete severance from all home ties which the above prohibition implied came as a rather unforeseen blow. We knew how anxiously our people would be awaiting news of our doings; and to be able to tell them practically nothing seemed a hard condition. We went away feeling very small and rather crestfallen, and I am afraid we thought our new Captain rather unnecessarily stern and severe, though it was not long before we recognised the absolute necessity for such restrictions. It must be remembered that at that time we were only raw inexperienced boys and most of us barely fifteen years old. Later on, when we had worked under Captain—— ‘s command—above all, when we came to know of the letters he, in spite of his many and onerous duties, had found time to write to our mothers—letters so kindly in their sympathy and understanding, so generous in their recognition of our efforts to do our duty—we appraised him at his true worth; and when he, together with so many of our ship’s company, gave up his life for England in that disaster in which our ship was lost, those of us who survived mourned the loss of a true friend, and carry in our hearts for all time the honoured memory of “a very gallant gentleman.”

•••••••

When we once more found ourselves on deck, we were met by a petty officer, who escorted us down the ward-room hatch, and showed us the gun-room, which was then being stripped of all light woodwork which might catch fire or splinter in an action, and having the bulkheads shored up with heavy pieces of timber.

We placed our overcoats in a corner, and then went up on deck for a look round.

We were anchored in the centre of the Hamoaze, and the tide being at flood, our bow pointed down the harbour to Plymouth Sound. Various war-ships were dotted about, some, like us, in mid-channel, some alongside the wharfs. To port the town of Devonport could be seen through a mist of masts and ropes. To starboard wooded banks, clothed with the dense foliage of midsummer, rose steeply from the water. The hulls of several ancient battle-ships, dating from the time of Nelson, and some from even farther back, were moored close to the shore. Three old four-funnelled cruisers, painted black with yellow upper works in the fashion of war-ships towards the close of the Victorian Era, contrasted oddly with the sombre grey outline of the more modern ships preparing for action.

At 7.30 we had dinner in the ward-room, as the gun-room was not yet ready for occupation, and at 9 o’clock we turned in.

Next morning after breakfast the chief petty officer, who had shown us the gun-room the night before, took us round the ship, naming each flat and pointing out the various stores, etc.

By lunch-time the gun-room was ready for us, and, that meal over, we “fell in” on the quarter-deck and the Commander appointed us to our several duties. Carey and Baker having already received their appointments from the Captain as afore-mentioned, Jones, the next senior, was now told off to the Torpedo Lieutenant as his messenger. Browne became the Gunnery Lieutenant’s A.D.C., and McAlister the Commander’s “doggie.” Wenton was “Tanky,” i.e. the navigator’s assistant, and Barton, Fane, Cunninghame, and myself were appointed watch-keepers.

As we were not expected to take up our duties until the following morning, we spent the rest of that afternoon watching the cutting away of such portions of the forebridge as were not absolutely indispensable for purposes of navigation, the removal of the forward searchlights to the shelter deck, and the pitching—literally pitching—of the ward-room and gun-room furniture into lighters alongside. This, I may mention, was performed without the slightest consideration for damage to the articles in question, for time pressed and every minute was of greater value than much fine furniture! It was War.

On the next morning (Thursday) we entered upon our respective duties, and I took my first “dog-watch.”

In the forenoon the Gunnery Lieutenant had us all assembled in the gun-room and informed us that we should all be in the fore transmitting station (hereafter called the Fore T.S.) for action; that is, all except Carey, who would be in attendance on the Captain. Then he told us our different jobs and showed us how to work the various instruments for controlling the guns, after which he showed us the way down to the Fore T.S., and, having placed us in position before our instruments, gave us a trial run of ranges, deflections, and the various controls under which the guns could be operated in the event of the primary control position being shot away or the communications cut.

Then came lunch, followed by another two hours’ practice in the Fore T.S., and after tea more of the same instruction.

At 5 a.m. on Friday we got under way to proceed into dry dock. At about ten yards from the mouth of the dock both engines were stopped, and our first and second cutters lowered. The ends of wire hawsers were then conveyed by the cutters from capstans, dotted at intervals round the dock, to the ship, where they were made fast inboard. These capstans had already been manned by parties of seamen attached to the dockyard, who were commanded by warrant officers. They stood by to back up the wire as soon as we gave the signal for the capstans to heave round, and in this manner the great ship was hauled into the dry dock. This seemed a ticklish business to the uninitiated, it being essential to get the ship exactly central in the dock, but the Captain controlled operations by signalling from the forebridge, and in due time it was accomplished. The ship floated motionless in the centre, the great caisson was hauled into place, sunk and locked, and the powerful centrifugal pumps began to drain the water away.

After these two hours of hard work we went to breakfast with hearty appetites.

On looking out of a scuttle a little later I saw that the water had already dropped some six feet and the ship was resting on the bottom with about four feet of her sides visible below the usual water-line. As she had been lying up in Milford Haven for a year before the outbreak of war, she was in a filthy state, and her sides were thickly coated with that long ribbon-like seaweed often seen thrown up in masses on the shore after a storm. Already the dockyard men were placing large pieces of timber between the ship’s sides and the sides of the dock, wedging them tightly so that she would remain upright when all the water had been pumped out.

At 9 o’clock we had to go to “divisions.” Each of the watch-keepers had a division, and the messengers accompanied their officers on the rounds of their different departments. “Divisions” over, a lecture on first-aid was given by the Fleet-surgeon and occupied us until lunch-time.

By 2 o’clock three-quarters of the water was out of the dock, and those of us who were not on duty went over the brow (i.e. the gangway) and down into the basin to explore and have a look at the bottom of the ship.

A dry dock is constructed with two galleries at the top built into the stone-work, and is reached by a flight of steps usually standing back about twenty feet from the edge.

Below these galleries comes a series of ledges, each one about three feet high and two feet deep, leading down to the bottom, which is about ten yards in width. On the centre of the dock are a number of wooden blocks, each about two feet high and four feet broad, and distant about three feet one from the other; on these the keel of the ship rests. A gutter just below the ledges drains off any water that may leak in. One end of the dock is rounded off in a semi-circle, the other narrows into a neck where an iron caisson, or hollow water gate, locks the entrance and keeps the water out. When this gate is to be moved, the water is pumped out of its interior, and it then rises to the surface and is hauled out of the way by ropes. Near this gate are two big, square holes, by means of which the dock is reflooded when the ship is ready to go out again. Parties of seamen on rafts were already at work scraping away the weed from the ship’s sides, and others were painting the cleared spaces with red lead to prevent rust.

The next day was Sunday, but as we had no padre on board there was no church parade, and since it was war-time, and we’d got to join our Fleet, which had sailed the night before, as quickly as possible, the work of scraping and painting was continued without intermission.

During the afternoon we inspected a new light cruiser which was in process of construction in an adjoining dock.

At 2 o’clock the following day, the work being finished, the water was let in. It came rushing through the square opening in a solid green mass, to fall with a dull roar into the rapidly filling dock. Two hours later the ship’s keel gradually lifted, and as she rose higher and higher the timber props floated free, grinding and jostling each other in a manner somewhat reminiscent of a Canadian lumber river. Then the caisson was pumped dry and towed out of the way, and by 4.30 we commenced to warp out and went alongside a neighbouring wharf, to which by 6.30 we were safely secured by ropes. I remember that H.M.S. “——,” England’s latest Dreadnought, which had just been launched, was lying in the basin, being fitted with engines, guns, etc. With her two enormous oval funnels standing out against a group of workshops and towering high above them, her huge turret guns which still lay along the wharf amid a litter of smaller guns, searchlights, and armoured plates, she made an impressive picture of Britain’s sea power.

A new navigator and two Royal Naval Reserve lieutenants joined that night, and their arrival completed our full complement of officers.

It was 6 in the evening when finally our warps were cast off, and, running alongside, we coaled for half-an-hour, in that time taking in seventy tons, and then proceeded to sea with coal still stacked high on our decks. Through Plymouth Harbour the ship slid like a grey ghost—all dead-lights down, and in total darkness save for the occasional flashes from the shaded arc-lamp which replied to the challenges of the torpedo-boat patrol and boom vessels.

Once outside we met the Channel swell, and the ship, burying her nose in a huge roller, lifted a ton of green swirling water on to the fo’c’sle, where it broke into creaming cascades at the foot of the fore-turret, smothering the guns in white foam and rushing aft on either side, until, thrown back from the closed battery doors, it sluiced overboard with a baffled roar.

All hands turned to and stowed the coal in the bunkers, after which the decks were washed down with hoses and we went below for much-needed baths.

Then came dinner, after which we went to night-defence stations.