HMS Crane - April 20, 1959 to October 10, 1960

HMS Crane

This ship's Company re-commissioned the ship at Singapore on April 30, 1959, and altogether have steamed CRANE 36,400 miles round the Far East Station. After an initial 'work-up' in the Singpore area and a brief visit to Hong Kong, the first operational duty undertaken was on Anti-Piracy patrols off North Borneo, where a two-day call was made to Tawau. Returning to Singapore in July for three months re-fit until October, the ship then sailed for the Maldive Islands to act as guardship for the RAF Station on the island of Gan in Addu Atoll. Returning to Singapore again after six weeks, in time for Christmas, the ship sailed for Hong Kong for guardship duties for six weeks and then returned to Singapore for an intermediate docking period. On completion of this the ship sailed once more for Hong Kong to escort the Hong Kong Flotilla over to Manila, where they took part in the SEATO exercise 'Sealion', and then escorted them back again. In May 1960 the ship set off together with most of the Far East Fleet for a cruise of Korea and Japan, calling in at Chinhae, Yokohama, Nagoya and Beppu. After returned to Singapore for another docking period, the ship took part in the latter stages of Exercise 'Fotex', and then sailed with the Squadron for a five-day visit to Penang. The last lap of the commission brought a farewell visit to Hong Kong and a brief stay at Bangkok before finally returning to Singapore to recommission on October 12.

I had to get to Stanstead Airport in Essex where about 60 of us were going to pick up a twin-engine Hermes and fly to Singapore. I think the trip was supposed to take about 2 days, but of course, things never go according to plan. I can't remember all the stops but our first one was Brindisi, Italy where we stopped for refueling. No super-sonic travel here, I'll tell you. We were allowed off the plane but the Officer in Charge, who was going to be my Divisional Officer when we got to the Crane was a young Sub-Lieutenant (who was about a year younger than me) wouldn't let us undo our ties and roll our sleeves up even though it was very humid and sticky. I thought 'We're really off to a good start here. Hopefully it'll get better." After we left Brindisi things started to get a bit complicated. Our route would take us over Ankara, Turkey, but when the airport found out that it was a military plane we had to land and disembark while government officials got together to determine how much of a threat we were. We were all boarded out in various hotels to await further developments. We were all told to get early calls in the morning from the hotel switchboard to ensure that we were at the airport in time for takeoff. The room that I was in, along with four other guys, was a little cramped, but cots solved that problem. So we went to bed and the next thing we woke up and it was WAY past the time we were supposed to get our call. Holy shit, we were now adrift and panic stations set in. Quickly we got dressed and out of the room, got downstairs - and asked what happened to our wake up call (nobody seemed to know, but there was a slight language problem). We grabbed a fast black (taxi) and got him to take us to the airport where a PO Powell told us to report to the same S/Lt who was so fussy about our attire back in Brindisi. So I thought to myself 'this is going to be interesting'. He started in on us right away, saying how irresponsible we were. I said to him "Excuse me, Sir. But we did not get a call this morning." To which he replied, "Yes you did, everybody got a call." This conversation lasted about 5 minutes in this same vein before he finally said "You five will report to me every hour on short stops and every three hours on long stops between here and Singapore." Everything went well for the first little while, and S/Lt DeSalis didn't mind being disturbed every hour, but as the trip went on I remember him saying "Enough!" after he'd been disturbed at 2000 hours, 2300 hours and 0100 hours. I didn't mind disturbing him, but I guess he'd had enough. I think that lasted until our refueling stop at Karachi, Pakistan. After that our next stop was Bombay, India. We had a really nice beachfront hotel. We loafed around in the sun most of the day and went out for curry for supper. The next day we flew to Singapore - remembering we are now about a day and a half behind due to the problems back in Turkey. By the time we got to Singapore our little trip from Stanstead had taken us 5 days, and several crew changes. I had a flat ass from sitting in the plane for so long. Then things got worse! The instant I stepped off the plane I started sweating like a pig! It was so humid! I'd never experienced anything like it, and wearing my UK shirt, pants, shoes and socks wasn't helping.

                                                                      The ship's company

I don't remember going through customs, but I guess we must have. We then loaded ourselves onto a couple of Navy buses and took the 17-mile trip to Singapore dockyard. The buses were not air-conditioned but at least we could open the windows and get a breeze going. The trip took about an hour on reasonably good 2-lane roads, but we passed through several little villages, which slowed us down. Eventually, we arrived at the dockyard and HMS Crane. We grabbed our kit and stood around sweating profusely on the jetty. Then the Gunnery Instructor (who incidentally was dressed in his cool "whites" - a cap, shirt, shorts and sandals) told each of us what our mess deck would be, and what our jobs were for the next 3 months. My job was Bosun's Mate with an Able Seaman Cook (he was the Quartermaster - he had 1 good-conduct stripe - so he was senior to me). We were both considered gangway staff, but if there was to be any running around carrying messages etc., I would be the one doing it. We hit it off right away. We went on board and put all our kit away in our respective mess decks (I was in the Watchkeepers mess). We had the rest of the day off, but the morning after that I changed into my set of whites and returned to the gangway to take up my responsibilities.

(although not taken at the ship, this would have been my gangway attire along with a white cap)

As soon as possible after settling in, we did sea trials so everyone would get used to what they were supposed to be doing. One other very important thing (when we had shore time) was to get the ship's soccer team organized! So I put my name down for trials and got picked as a right-winger (#7). After only 3 weeks the HMS Brides Bay challenged us to play for the Anderson Trophy. We lost. 5-1. They did have a slight edge on us as they had being playing together for months, and they were also used to the heat and humidity. But once we got going, a few months later...revenge was sweet...we took the trophy back off them, and beat just about everyone else in the 3rd Frigate Squadron. We developed into quite a good team.

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team Crane after winning back the Anderson Trophy

l-r back row: McPartland, Johns, Stewart, Vance, Collins, Collins, Kingshot, S/Lt Down

l-r front row: Hancock, Lister, Brown, Brown, Middleton

(our colours were black and gold)

Soccer 1st XI (by RE Jarman)

An almost unchanged side has represented us since the teams became settled in the early weeks of the commission. At times our football has been a treat to watch and games that will remain in the mind are our defeat of the Royal Malaysian Navy 9-0 followed a week later by that of the Dockyard Chinese 4-0 neither team being easy opponents. Surprisingly enough our infrequent slumps to rock bottom form have been against the weaker "no chance" teams. The Anderson Trophy is still held by us after successfully defending it five times against St Brides Bay and Cardigan Bay, but the Kwong Lee Trophy has proved to be our bogey, the closest we've come to winning it was a 2-2 draw with Finisterre though several times we've been all over the opposition. All the same we enjoyed our football and it's that rather than silverware that counts. Of the stars in our side probably the brightest is M/E Spilsbury. His goalkeeping throughout the season has been of the highest quality and far above the usual standard of ship's teams. His performances have saved many a game and at least two displays vs Gambia and the Lancashire Regiment were certainly in the professional class. Next to him must come L/S Pat Brown our PTI who has proved himself an exceptional player in almost any position, who prefers center-forward to his equally able center-half. Our deadliest ball-kicker, he has saved almost as many goals as he had scored. Another two who deserve mention are A/B Collins and A/B John (although the former has not been with us as long nor as often as we would have liked): they both have consistently played well. M/E Kingshott who has captained the 1st XI is probably the only full 90 minute player that we have in every match. He is always there with a final burst of energy to secure the victory.

Regular members: M/E Spilsbury, A/B John, M/E Collins, A/B Collins, A/B Stuart, M/E Kingshott, A/B Hancock, L/S Brown, A/B Lister, A/B Kane, L/S Brown, L/S Middleton, M/E Rossetter, A/B Smith.

Record: P-57, W-29, D-7, L-21,F-120, A-101

Me (left-footed no less!) with Jumper Collins on the left and Lenny Lister on the right

...and up on the hill was our accommodation during refit at HMS Terror.

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Rugby

rear l-r: ???, Hancock, Stevens, ???, Holden

centre l-r: ???, Duckett, Williams, Brown, ???

front l-r: Jarman, Whelan, ???, Derrett, John

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Now we were going to spend some time in the naval dockyard near Singapore. Usually though, instead of going all the way into Singapore for a run ashore, which was 17 miles away, most of the time we stayed in the dockyard, and guys either went to the canteen at HMS Terror to watch a soccer game; the dockyard canteen; or Nee Soon village, which was a short taxi ride outside Terror. Transport was available in the form of navy buses which ran on a schedule, but I think maybe I only made it into Singapore (proper) a couple of times. You had to make sure you caught the last bus back about 0100, otherwise you had to find a place to crash and get an early call. The first bus left Singers about 0530 or 0600, as all-night leave expired at 0700. Unfortunately shortly after our arrival a new political party was elected and the Prime Minister put a stop to bar girls and juke boxes. Things became really civilized, and there was even less reason to go into Singapore.

One of our job at this particular point in time was Anti-Piracy patrol off Borneo. I was the designated Bren-gunner for this assignment. A Bren gun was a machine gun which was situated on the bridge. I never did fire a shot in anger, but did a really good job of sinking an empty 45-gallon barrel drum.

taking my turn as jetty sentry in Tawau, Borneo

We then made a trip to Hong Kong - this being my first time to what would eventually turn out to be my favorite run-ashore anywhere. It was everything I hoped it would be, including the fact that the China Fleet Club was right outside the dockyard gate, and no more than a 10-minute walk (or perhaps I should say, stagger) from the ship. I was soon introduced to San Miguel beer, which I think was my preferred brew of choice. Although Tiger beer was pretty good too, that was back in Singapore. While in Hong Kong I got my big tattoo of St George and the Dragon done on my back. Four and a half hours of a certain degree of discomfort. Getting this tattoo seemed reasonably apropos as my birthday falls on St George's Day.

Most guys for their run ashore stayed in Victoria. Not too many went to Kowloon on the mainland, as we had everything we needed on Victoria Island. We soon learned where the movie theatres were and how to get to them by tram. The tram cost about 25¢ HK and the theatre, as far as I can remember, was about $3 HK. A meal from a street vendor was usually about $2 HK, and consisted of fried beef or chicken, and noodles or rice. The RN had their own bars they frequented, as did the American sailors. You only went into the American bars if you were invited, and vise versa.

There was always a game of soccer against another ship or one of the Army teams. One night we played 7-aside against a Chinese team in Wanchai on a concrete pitch. We had a large Chinese audience, because our style of soccer was a little different than what they were used to. The Chinese team tapped the ball around a lot, whereas we were a little more direct, and would take a shot at goal from anywhere. If was almost as if they wanted to walk the ball into the net. Honour was satisfied on both sides as the final score was 2-2. A great game, and a lot of fun.

(our team that night)

 back l-r: Rossiter, Spillsbury, Stuart, me, Kingshot

front l-r: Brown, John

One stop in Hong Kong that you almost had to make, was to the Tiger Balm gardens. It was all about Chinese mythology. Very gory. The figures were very well painted. The gardens were a donation from the gentleman who thought up Tiger Balm. It was a big fact of Chinese life. I think even some of the guys onboard had some of the balm - I know I sure did. It was very good for aches and pains.

Myself, Nick Nickolson and Shady Lane at the gardens

After sampling the fleshpots and cooking pots of Hong Kong we went back to Singapore to go into dry dock for refitting. This meant that we were moved off the ship and into HMS Terror, but we would still go to work on the ship every day. Our routine was what was called a "modified tropical routine". We would be onboard by 0730 and work until 1230.

Then it was back to Terror for lunch and grog, and that was it for the day. Lots of time was spent at the swimming pool. It was hard to take, I tell you. We were allowed to wear civvies if we went ashore. Remember that it is still called "ashore" even though we were in Barracks.

Pat Brown, myself and Stormy at Terror pool with Mugsy hanging on the edge

By this time I was out of the Watchkeepers mess and into 8-mess (as I've already mentioned). My new job was B-mounting sweeper, and part of the Gunners Party. The guy that had been doing it was not doing a very good job and he did even less of a good job while in refit. Why they picked me, I have no idea, but I got stuck into it and made B-mounting my pride and joy. Rip even made a little sign for me which said "The Magnificent Obsession" or "The Obs" as it was commonly known.

The Gunnery Officer, The Chief OA, A/Bs Nickolson, Hancock, Paker, Nicoll, PO Wilson, OA Duckett

The GI, O/S Goldsmith, A/B Callus, A/B Sargent, O/A Stevens, The Gunner

A/Bs Platt, Bentley, Lake , Osborne

So far this commission, including workup, we have:

Fired 3213 assorted rounds of 4-inch

Fired 7478 40 mm (equivalent to 8 weeks beer issue in cans)

This was spent doing: 17 Surface Shoots; 11 Starshell Shoots; 12 AA Sleeve Firings; 5 AA Throw Offs; 18 Close Range shoots; also 21 hours of gun drill (336 man hours).

Results are: 4 Sleeves shot down; 2 landing craft sunk (that was an effort);

and the AA TROPHY (No comment)..........Going overboard?

Also by now we had our "going ashore" mates. My main 'run ashore' oppos were Tony "the Postie" Derrett, Dennis "Chas" Cooper, Jeff "Nick the Trog" Nickolson, and Pat "the Abo" Parker. I had some onboard mates, namely: Colin "Rip" Ripley, and William "Cookie" Cook. Rip was a nice guy, but he was a bit too wild for me when he got ashore, but we used to share a dhobey (laundry) bucket which had the "Wop's Oppo" on it. I was the Wop, because I was part Italian, even though I was born in England and raised in Wales. And Cookie always seemed to be under punishment, or stoppage of leave because he was suffering from a "social disease". The few times that Cookie managed to get ashore he always seemed to have to ask me for a "rubber" (aka a loan). I was his bank, I guess you could say. Also at this time, we in 8-mess were running a mess fund (strictly illegal, of course). Postie was in charge of it, and the basic rules were: if you borrowed $10, you paid back $11, and if you borrowed $20, you paid back $22. This money was kept aside for one big glorious mess run later on in the commission.

most of 8-mess at the Luk Kwok bar in Hong Kong

L: Parker, Holden, Middleton, Cook, Stuart, Lister, Roberts, Brown

R: myself, Derrett, Cooper, Robson, Nickolson, Mawditt

missing are: Ripley, Collins, Kane, Campbell, Smith, McMullan, and Faulkner

Life in Terror was pretty good, though there was one little hiccup in all this serenity. One late evening I was walking through the barracks when I noticed 3 or 4 guys off the Crane discussing ways to break into the Coke machine. I said to myself 'That's not very bright.' as I walked by. I carried on and thought no more about it. In the morning, however, I received a message to take myself down to the dockyard police and I thought 'oh, shit'. So, off I went, and met this police officer who asked me what I knew about the previous night's vandalism. I pleaded ignorance, of course, but then he said they had a witness who heard me say what I did (a certain PO, I believe). My plea of ignorance was useless, because they would take a POs word over mine any day. Besides, the PO had obviously told the police the names of the perps, and I just had to confirm it. I didn't have a lot of choice, although the thought of being a stoolie didn't sit well with me. Two of the guys got about 45 days in detention quarters (a sort of military prison); I can't remember what the others got. I apologized to the one guy I remember (Ken Platt) and he said 'Don't worry about it, Hank. It was a pretty stupid thing to do for all of $3'. So none of them bore me any malice. The thing that really got me though was, why didn't the PO just stop them and tell them to go away?

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Our days of sunning and swimming and nights at the canteen at HMS Terror were over. The refit on the Crane was done. We were off to Gan in the Maldive Islands in the middle of the Indian Ocean. It was a staging post for the RAF. There was also some unrest in the surrounding islands. We were sent there as a guard ship. On the way (November 5, 1959) we had to do the Crossing the Line ceremony for those onboard who had never done so before. We were summoned to Neptune's Court where a charge of trespassing was read out against us. The punishment was to be lathered and shaved and dunked into the canvas swimming pool on the quarterdeck. Even Captain Kitchin and 1st Lieutenant Gerald St. John Roland Buxton had to take part. It was great fun and a good time was had by all. Those involved received a Crossing the Line certificate.

my certificate

Neptune (in real life - the Chief Stoker)

a trespasser getting his punishment

L/S Denham & A/B McPartland (Neptune's cops)

S/Lt Down getting his shave

Captain Kitchin getting dunked - no one was immune

Once we got to Gan we were relieving HMS St Brides Bay, who had been on station for six weeks. Now you have to remember that there are no women on Gan, except for one OLD lady from the Women's Volunteer Service who used to run the library. On the Crane we had one young lad named Tony, an O/S, who had very delicate features. For a lark, we put a scarf over his head and gave him a set of fake boobs. When we pulled up close to the Brides Bay, Tony stood up on the bridge and waved at the other ship. There was a lot of whistling and lewd suggestions put forth. Without further ado, the Brides Bay up-anchored and was gone. We wondered what we had let ourselves in for due to their abrupt departure.

There were various activities to pass the time. Things like beard-growing contests, fishing, the occasional soccer game against the RAF, banyans (picnics) and taking out 10-ton trucks and having drag races on the airstrip. Of course, the drag racing used to take place after an evening in the bar. During one of the fishing contests somebody was casting off the forecastle and on the back swing hooked my oppo Chas Cooper right in the hooter! There was much consternation and screaming (mainly from Chas). Everyone was very "sympathetic" of course, with snide comments about the size of his nose, and much wondering about how anyone could have missed it previously. He was taken down to the sickbay, where the MO performed a delicate operation and removed the fish hook. There was a rather large audience looking down through the hatch and he received many congratulations upon completion.

The six weeks went by pretty quickly actually and we were replaced by my old ship from South Africa, the Mounts Bay.

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After Gan, we went back to Singapore for Christmas. A whole bunch of us decided to spend the evening in the Britannia Club. First we checked out Bugis (pronounced Boogie) Street where there was always Big Eats to be had. There were people from all walks of life wandering around. There was everyone from sailors in uniform, to men in black tie and ladies in evening gowns. It was quite an entertaining street scene to be a part of. I even had my paybook nicked out of my back pocket! But the stall owner (where I was having my Big Eats) saw a young lad do it, chased after him and retrieved it, with much gratitude from me. Losing your paybook was quite a serious offense. But you had to carry some form of ID with you and that was all I had at the time. After that it was time for some beer at the Britannia Club. By end of the evening we were all more than ready for the last bus back to the dockyard. A good Christmas was had by all.

l-r: Lake, unknown, Smith, 2 unknown, Lane, Nickolson, Parker, Stuart, Lister, me

After a bit of a rest at Singapore, we were off to Hong Kong to do guard ship duties patrolling the waters around HK, otherwise we were tied up at the dockyard in Victoria. Everyone was looking forward to spending six weeks in HK. There was always lots to do: going to the movies, visits to the China Fleet Club and the Britannia Club (which wasn't as big as the one in Singapore); a few soccer games against the Army team and other ships, and going out for Big Eats.

Sightseeing was always a favorite thing. The peak tram was something you had to do while there. Picking a good day was important so you could see all of HK and part of the mainland. You really hoped you didn't get fogged in while you were up on the mountain. It could be really miserable. We used to go to a place called Happy Valley which was a racetrack surrounding a lot of soccer fields. Most of our games were held there.

The dockyard was like a U-shape. We were tied up alongside the left hand side of the "U", and at the bottom of the "U" small wooden inshore minesweepers were tied up. One fine day the Brides Bay was coming in from the top-right corner of the "U" to tie up on the right hand side. But something went wrong and instead of stopping, she just kept right on going and ran right through one of the minesweepers.

when the dust settled, I think it was an engine telegraph malfunction

After our spell in HK, on our way out of the harbour we were signalled from Admiralty House to heave to, and remove the "painting" off the side of the Crane. The 1st Lt got the ship's boat lowered and went to see what the fuss was about. Painted in large black letters on the side of the Crane was "WE HATE KIPPERS". We had been tied up on the outside of an Australian frigate for a couple of days because we were leaving first, so when we were told by Admiralty House to get it painted over and then proceed on our way while an inquiry was held to find out who was responsible, we had pretty good idea who the culprits were. The word came back that two ratings and an officer were the miscreants! All three were quite drunk. For the uninformed "we hate kippers" roughly translates into "two-faced and no guts". You may have gathered from this that the Brits and the Aussies didn't always get along. They always seemed to have a chip on their shoulders when it came to the RN, and they would get especially belligerent if during an argument you told them to go rattle their ball and chain (referring to Australia's beginnings). I think the officer probably lost a couple of months seniority and the two Matelots lost a couple of weeks shore leave privileges.

On the way back to Singapore and yet another stint in dry-dock, our beloved Divisional Officer Sub-Lieutenant De Salis was having his birthday. So Postie decided it would be polite to ask him to come to the mess for a drop of rum. Being a very young officer, and not wise to the machinations of the lower deck, he accepted. He was plied with much rum and by the time lunch was over he was feeling no pain. He wobbled off to go back to the wardroom. Unfortunately for him he ran into the 1st Lieutenant, who asked him what he'd been doing. He said he'd been very kindly invited to the top mess for a drink to celebrate his birthday. The 1st Lt. explained to him that this kind of thing was "not done". The word got around to the Captain and poor De Salis was confined to his cabin for three days. I think he had words with Postie after his three days was up to the tune of "you knew I wasn't supposed to do that" and Postie said "it's a good way to get to know your men, sir." I don't think the experience hurt him - apart from the hangover - and it certainly made him a better person - much more approachable.

Contrary to popular belief, we do not have all the rejects from Devil's Island in our division. True, we are no angels, but who is? Nevertheless we have been pretty successful in the sporting field, winning the swimming gala during the main re-fit in Terror, also the inter part football cup beating the POs 2-1 in the final. At the moment we are doing well in the league having lost only one game. The majority of Topmen play some sport or other and we provide quite a large percentage of the ship's teams. We also had a few other successes. Our D/O got rated up to Lieutenant, A/Bs Middleton, Campbell and Fred Brown picked up their hooks and I passed for mine; with much help from my messmates I might add. Like all divisions we lost and gained a few people during the commission, perhaps the most notable being the postman, L/S Derrett who got himself naturalized early in the commission with an air of 'If you can't lick 'em, join 'em'. There are so many characters in the Top Division that it is impossible to mention you all, but you can rest assured you will never be forgotten, I know, I've seen the reward posters! Before closing this brief resume, I would like to thank our D/O Lieutenant De Salis for his efforts during the commission, after all, it was no easy job. I would also like to dispel the rumour that he will be spending his leave in a nursing home. The Doc says that if he takes it easy he should recover all right.   (by A/B Nickolson, aka TS Trog)

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The Postmistress (by Postie)

The windswept young lady shown is no stranger to any of us. She joined the ship during main refit and has been an established member of the ship's company ever since. Her origin is more than just obscure, it is untraceable.

Sex

Various theories have been put forward as to her parentage; some say a cross between a Boogie street rat and a Bombay runner; others have more unprintable ideas. Regardless of where  she came from, that she should come to sea was obvious. When found she was in a gutter in Boogie street doing battle with a shrimp. Some say she was eating it, but with the shrimps size in proportion to hers this was highly improbable. During the commission she has incurred the wrath of most of us from the Captain downward. No doubt the Captain still remembers what happened to his fishing bait at Gan - during the competition too! Many have had that "I'm hungry" look at meal times and she has the uncanny knack of always finding some wet paint to sleep on. She has come to know the ship's routine and pipes as good as any of us. With the pipe "Ice cream is now on sale" she is on the jetty in a flash and in the course of a half hour she has scrounged a dozen or so ices. When entering harbour with the pipe "Hands may now use the upper deck," she is over the brow and having a go at the nearest policeman she sees, after first anointing the jetty of course.

An Officer lately called her a "Proper lower deck hound". She does in fact show a preference to junior rates, whether this is natural or bu private tuition during the night watches, it's not certain, but anyone wearing a peaked cap usually comes in for a canine blast. Whatever her faults and graces (if any) she must have given us most of us some pleasure at least some of the time. Here's hoping she gives the same to many others.

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Next it was back to Singers and another spell in dry-dock. If you were on a ship that was in the Far East for 18 months, you were allowed one week station leave. Some guys opted to take it, some didn't. Those that had some money usually spent their week at some hotel in Singapore. For those of us that didn't, we were given a few options, one of which was to spend a week with the Army at Ipoh. This meant we would be in Army barracks, but not part of regular Army life.

Going back a little bit in time - there used to be what was called an "emergency" in Malaya, where Communist Terrorists tried to take over the country. These troubles started, I believe, around 1948-50. As the Army cleared these CTs out of the areas were classified as "white", where there were still CTs around the areas were considered "black". Remembering that most of the action was performed by National Servicemen with a few Regulars. By the time we got to Ipoh there were only a few "black" areas around, a long way away from where we were.

So the Army brass asked us if we'd like to go on a patrol into the jungle. We thought 'yeah, sure'. They fitted us out with jungle greens, special boots, and a Lee-Enfield 303 short-barreled jungle gun. I think there were 7 of us. There was 5 of us sailors, a regular Army Corporal, and an Eban tracker from Borneo (whose original lifestyle on Borneo used to include head-hunting - but for whatever reason he thought that working for the Army was a good thing). He carried a machete and Remington repeating shotgun. When it came time to bed down for the night we were given instructions what to do, but not being familiar with making a bed in the jungle it seemed to take forever. The tracker and the soldier were ready to put their heads down in about 15 minutes. But we persevered and tried not to think about the creepy crawlies.

After a night's kip, we headed back to base, but our Corporal got us lost, and it took a little bit longer than anticipated. In the end, we did get back safely. I'm glad I didn't join the army, it was quite an experience. The rest of the time in the camp was spent drinking beer in their canteen, swapping stories and finding places for Big Eats.

After seven days we went back to Singapore, whereupon we set sail for Hong Kong again, but only for a couple of days. Then we were off to Manila with the Hong Kong flotilla for SEATO exercises. We had a couple runs ashore in Manila, which wasn't too bad, but everywhere was really crowded with all the sailors from the exercises. Because there were so many of us, I think they only let a few of the ship's crews ashore at the same time.

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The Crane went back to Hong Kong again to refuel and stock up with food, for we were off to Korea and Japan, which I think everyone on board was looking forward to. We went to Chinhae (aka Jinhae) in Korea - I don't remember going ashore there, though some did. From what I gather, not many were very impressed. Next stop was Yokohama (after going through the Inland Sea):

The Inland Sea deserves a description of its own as it is probably the most unique stretches of water in the world. Although it is some 300 miles from end to end, and at its widest 50 miles, it is entered and left by very narrow channels, some as narrow as 200 yards, through which flow tidal streams of strength up to 11 knots. The sea is full of islands; one chart alone having shown over 60. We entered the "sea" from the west at 0800 on Monday the 6th of June by the Shimonoseki Straights. The passage took a full day; we passed south of Kobi at midnight and left by 0300 the next morning.

On my way back to the ship one night (on my own) I thought I would stop in a bar for a nightcap. It wasn't very crowded. There were a couple of white guys at the bar - possibly Merchant Seamen. A group of about 6 Japanese - 3 men, 3 women (the men in suits, the women in traditional dress) asked me if I'd like to have a drink with them and I agreed. They didn't drink like sailors drink. Their beer was all poured from one bottle. After that bottle was empty I bought another one and we had a good talk. One man, who was the most talkative and whose English was the best, told me he was a pilot in WW2. He emphasized that he was NOT a kamikaze. Then we started talking about movies and he tried to whistle the music from "The Bridge on the River Kwai". I thought to myself 'where are we going with this?', but he said "A good movie! All about people!" I breathed a large sigh of relief. He asked me if I would like to dance with his wife, who up to now hadn't said a word, so I said "Perhaps she doesn't want to dance?" and he said "If I say she dance, she dance." So, not wanting to upset the gentleman, up I got and off we went onto the dance floor. I don't think we talked very much. We sat back down, chatted a bit more, possibly with another bottle of beer. Then I made my apologies and said I should be getting back on board. Hopefully having improved Japanese/English relationships.

The Japanese were allowed to come right close to the ship tied up at the jetty. One guy asked how we felt about the Prince of Wales being sunk, and someone on board answered back "pretty much how you felt when the bomb was dropped on you." Remember that although most Japanese were quite friendly and didn't seem to have a problem with our being in Japan, there would always be a few that didn't want us to be there.

Our next port of call was Nagoya. In the year previous to our arrival there had been a very large storm with heavy flooding as was evident when we got ashore. There were high water marks on the buildings in the dock area. We had some good runs ashore here along with the usual soccer game and a rugby game as well. The rugby game was quite interesting because Postie suggested that we take some beer ashore with us as all rugby players like a beer (so he says). The Gunnery Officer, who was also on the team, vetoed the idea, saying the Japanese team were athletes and not drunken bums like us. But lo and behold, when we got to the field we found cases of beer piled up on the sideline! It was a good game - which they won by a narrow margin. Afterward, most of us went back on board, got cleaned up, and went off bar-hopping.



We were there for four days and during that time we discovered the pleasures of Japanese bath houses. The ritual is to sit on the side of the bath; get soaped up by young ladies and then rinsed off and then go sit in the bath. One of the guys finished his soaping and rinsing and then stepped into (what he thought) would be about a foot of water, only to discover that it was about three feet of hot water - much to his discomfort! But that's the way it was done, and we soon got used to the idea. It was a very pleasant stay in Nagoya; we all enjoyed the Japanese hospitality. Then we sailed to Beppu on the southern peninsula of Japan. Beppu didn't have any dockside facilities, so we had to moor out and take a boat back and forth to the ship. Seeing as Beppu had accommodation, we were allowed all-night leave. Early mornings, while waiting on the jetty for the boat to come and pick us up, we availed ourselves of some warm Saki from a vendor who had set up a tent. Very enterprising of him and he did a good business.

Beppu was (and may still be, for all I know) primarily a honeymoon destination. It had hot sand on the beach which was considered very therapeutic. You would dig yourself a huge hole in the sand and cover yourself with the hot sand. I guess most guys could last about 1/2 hour before it got too much to stand. There were also sightseeing tours to the hot springs and a lot of Buddhas and temples. The bus on the trip that I went on was very deluxe with individual seating that swivelled so you could look out all sides of the bus. In the rear of the bus was about a dozen cases of beer - they must have thought we were going to be thirsty - and though we gave it a good try, I don't believe we managed to drink all of it.

Just over a month later we sailed back into Hong Kong. At this point I'd like to discuss one of the characters we had on board the Crane. The one that springs to mind was EM Roden. He was a nice guy but should never have left Britain. He used to get terribly drunk and very maudlin about his wife back in UK. No amount of talking to him could get him excited about anything. One night he came back on board several sheets to the wind as per usual and promptly disappeared. Everybody knew this fellow and tried to keep an eye on him in case he did something silly, but after searching the ship from stem to stern we couldn't find him. We never heard a splash so we assumed he hadn't gone over the side. First thing next morning there was much ado going on as EM Roden had been found - by the Captain no less! It seems that the Captain, upon arising, went for a bath and found Roden wrapped in a blanket and sound asleep in his tub. After the dust had settled a day or two later, the Captain and Roden had a little chat to the effect that Roden was not suited to navy life and he would be sent back home and discharged - but not dishonourably.

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