The Boy and the Battleship

by Christopher Cummings

  Graham couldn’t believe his ears. Two nights in a row! His immediate fear was whether his mum would allow it. “What kind of games?” he asked, knowing his mum would ask.

  “Oh, Snakes and Ladders, Monopoly, Uno, that sort of thing,” Thelma replied.

  Janet giggled. “Uno, you know!” she quipped and laughed again.

  “Who will be there?” Graham asked.

  Thelma shrugged. “Same crowd as tonight and a couple of Danelle’s friends,” she replied.

  Graham was thrilled. “I’d love to come.”

  “Tomorrow night then, 7:30, at Janet’s. Just wear old clothes. It isn’t a party. See you then,” Thelma said. Before Graham realized what she was doing she reached up and kissed him on the cheek. The warmth and waft of her perfume made his senses reel. He couldn’t believe it. It was too good to be true!

  Thelma, Janet and Danelle climbed into the car. Pinky and Jerry waved as the car drove off but then just turned and walked away. Graham was left in an ecstatic daze. He walked slowly along to where his mother had parked and got in.

  “Good movie dear?” she asked.

  “Mmm. Yes. Great mum,” he said. Then he paused, arranged his thoughts and said, “Mum, Thelma has asked if I can come over tomorrow night to Janet’s to play games.” He described the games. “May I?”

  Mrs Kirk put the car in gear and pulled out before answering. That made Graham’s heart palpitate with anxiety. “Will the parents be home?” she asked.

  Graham hadn’t thought to ask that. He felt his hopes crash. “I don’t know. I suppose so,” he replied.

  “Don’t forget you have your day out on the Landing Craft tomorrow. You might be very tired after that, or late. We will see how you feel when you get home from that,” she said.

  Graham had forgotten the trip on the LCH. For a moment his interest quickened. He resolved that no matter how tired he was he would not show it. I want to be with Thelma!

  At home he had to tell his mother about the movie over a cup of Milo. He made no mention of holding Thelma’s hand, or of what the others had been doing. All he wanted to do was get away on his own to dream of Thelma. It was with relief that he made his way to the toilet, and then to bed.

  Once there he was too excited to sleep and lay fantasizing for what seemed like hours, until he slipped into a sleep filled with erotic dreams—about Cindy.

  Chapter 29

  HMAS TARAKAN

  Graham stood self-consciously among the naval cadets standing on the wharf at HMAS Cairns, the naval base on Trinity Inlet. In front of him was the Landing Craft Heavy HMAS Tarakan. On either side were berthed other naval vessels: two Patrol Boats and a survey ship. It was 0830hrs and the sun was shining down from a clear blue sky. It was a prefect winter day in Cairns, just cool enough to cause a person to shiver in the sea breeze when not wearing a jumper.

  In fact it was what he was wearing that largely contributed to Graham’s self-consciousness. Because he had not been issued a uniform he wore civilian clothes: a pair of dark blue longs and a blue long-sleeved work shirt. But he felt very conspicuous as all the others wore the mottled grey and black navy camouflage work dress. On his feet he wore rubber soled gym boots and old socks. All the other cadets wore navy issue caps and Graham’s was the only head with a non-regulation piece of headgear. His mother had insisted he wear a hat in the sun and the only hat available had been an old felt hat.

  Before arriving at cadets Graham had taken the hat off but Lt Ryan had asked him if he had a hat and then insisted that he wear it. So now he stood among the others, wishing fervently that he looked the same as them. On the wharf in front of him stood a navy sub lieutenant in white shirt, white shorts and cap. He looked very trim and fit and had a friendly smile.

  Lt Cdr Hazard introduced him. “This is Sub Lt Richards and he will be our host for the day. He will now explain the ship to you and what is going to happen, thank you Sub Lt Richards.”

  Sub Lt Richards nodded and cleared his throat then spoke loudly and clearly. “Well, hello cadets and welcome aboard HMAS Tarakan. In a moment I will have PO Wilkins give you more details and then he and his team will take you on a guided tour. Before he does that there are a number of things I must stress. First is safety. This ship is a working naval vessel and we are going to do a job of work. If you are told to go somewhere, or to stay somewhere, then obey. We don’t want any accidents.”

  He listed things they must not do, and places they were not to go then said, “You will do a couple of safety drills before we leave the wharf including how to put on lifejackets and man overboard drill. But I will say again, just do what you are told and you will be safe. Now, the task; the ship is going out to investigate a report from some tourists of an unexploded bomb on a reef near Michaelmas Cay. That is about 20 nautical miles and will take us roughly 2 hours. There is a team of Clearance Divers on board and they will look around when we arrive. OK, this is PO Wilkins.”

  The Petty Officer, a chunky man with close cropped grey hair, took over. He had a seaman hand out pamphlets with the basic data on the vessel. Graham took one and looked at it. He had looked up the facts about the LCH in one of his dad’s reference books the night before so already knew most of it. Even so he read the pamphlet to make sure he knew as much as he could.

  ‘Landing Craft Heavy: Displacement 323 tonnes (loaded 511 tonnes); length 44.73 metres; beam 10.06 metres, draft 1.75 metres,’ he read. That’s not much, he thought. She will float in water that is only just over my head! He knew from his dad’s barge that such vessels usually drew slightly more aft than forward, so that they could slip more easily back off the beach after unloading.

  He noted that she was armed with two 0.5” machine guns but these were not visible. That did not surprise him as he knew that those types of small weapons were stored out of the weather until needed. The speed was given as 9.5 knots and he saw that she had a ship’s company of two officers and 11 ratings. If Sub Lt Richards is the XO then the CO must be a Lieutenant, he reasoned.

  The pamphlet mentioned that 8 LCHs were built in the 1970s and that two of them: Salamaua and Buna were transferred to the PNG Defence Force in 1974. The pamphlet listed three that were decommissioned in December 2012 and made the point that the remaining three were due to be paid off in the next few years. The three still in commission were Tarakan, Brunei and Labuan. The three decommissioned LCHs were Balipapan, Betano and Wewak.

  Wewak, Graham noted. That is the name of my dad’s landing barge.

  These names obviously caught the attention of another cadet who asked: “Please sir, why do they all have these funny foreign names?”

  PO Wilkins smiled and explained: “They are all named after places where Australian forces carried out amphibious landings during World War 2. Most are in Borneo and a couple in Papua New Guinea.”

  The cadets were then divided into four groups, by watches and part of watch, and handed over to young sailors to care for them. Officers of Cadets went with each group. The rating in charge of Graham’s group was a pimply faced young man who looked like he had just left school. He said his name was Ken and they were stick to him like glue. While he talked Graham studied the details of the LCH with an eye to making a model of her.

  She had a very distinctive profile. About two thirds of her length was the well deck for cargo. This was open on top. The sides of the well deck were raised towards the bow and the pennant number was painted on this; white paint with black edging on one side to make it stand out. L129. She had a flat ramp as her bow. The stern section had a deck over it and on this was a double story superstructure.

  Ken led them up the gangplank onto the deck, then along a walkway on top of the sides above the well deck. Graham looked down and was disappointed to see that all she was carrying were two aluminium dinghies and two rigid inflatable boats with outboard motors. Several men were working on a litter of diving gear laid out on the deck. Most of these men wore shorts, shirt and sandals but some wore only shorts. Graham studie
d them with interest. They were the clearance divers. Mostly they looked very ordinary men but were certainly fit, with muscles rippling under their tanned skin.

  Graham turned to Ken. “How many army tanks can she carry?”

  “Three main battle tanks. Or she can carry about six APCs or eight trucks,” Ken replied.

  Andrew had been listening to Ken, and asked. “Do you carry them very often?”

  Ken shook his head. “No. Only once last year, to an exercise at Shoalwater Bay. Normally we carry trucks and stores. We also do a lot of support for the hydrographic people.”

  “Who are they?” asked a cadet.

  “Survey. They are the people who study the ocean and make the charts,” Ken explained. “And we also do a fair bit of this sort of thing, supporting diving teams.”

  “What do they do?” asked a girl.

  “Rescue, salvage, you know, diving down to recover crashed planes, sunken ships and so on, and a lot of mine clearance. They will give you a talk once we are under way. Follow me aft and we will check out the lifejackets.”

  Graham would have liked to stay and watch the clearance divers preparing but had to follow the others. They went under the bridge and were each handed a lifejacket and shown how to put it on. Graham had no trouble with this, having done it many times on his father’s ships. However one of the girls, Tina Babcock, who was another Year 8 at Graham’s school, seemed to be having difficulty. Ken sprang to her assistance in a way that made Graham smile.

  As soon as they had been briefed on safety the barge got under way. The mooring lines were cast off and she eased out into the current. Graham stood at the taffrail and thrilled to the feel and smell. The deck trembled as the engines were engaged. He gripped the rail and sniffed deeply at the sea smell: the familiar odours of oil, salt, decaying marine life, paint and diesel. Below his feet water swirled as the propellers churned up the muddy tidal water. The bow swung out into the current and the voyage had begun.

  As soon as they were well down the channel their tour was resumed. They were taken into the superstructure and shown the interior layout: cabins, galley, wardroom, senior ratings mess, heads and so on. As they made their way through these spaces Graham experienced several searing flashbacks to the French destroyer and then of Cindy and the matelot. Oh! I wish I had been able to stop her, he thought.

  Ken led them down a steep ladder into the engine room. Here they were handed ear protection and had things pointed out but were not taken close to the machinery. As always Graham marvelled that men liked machines and were content to work in such a place instead of up in the clean fresh air. He watched with fascination the rippling movements of the tappets and rocker arms on top of the huge diesels. Incredible, he thought, how engines can run for hundreds of hours non stop.

  They were led up to the upper deck again, then up to the top of the wheelhouse to see the masts, aerials and radar scanners. By this time the LCH was nearing the end of the long shipping channel and were starting to butt into larger waves. Graham screwed his eyes up against the glare and looked out to sea. We are in for a bit of rough water when we get out of the lee of False Cape, he thought, observing the tumbled state of the waves further out.

  Next came a visit to the bridge and an introduction to the captain; Lt Howe. He reminded Graham very much of his dad. He had the same stance, feet apart to balance himself against the roll, hands gripping his binoculars which were slung around his neck; the same weather-beaten complexion and the same distant horizon look in the eyes.

  The bridge held no mysteries for Graham. Even so he listened carefully and looked at each instrument as it was explained.

  Lt Howe looked out and said, “OK, we are out of the channel now. Who would like to have a go at steering her? Who is the youngest; your newest recruit?”

  PO Armstrong pointed to Graham. “Recruit Kirk sir. He only joined last week.”

  Lt Howe smiled and nodded. “Fine. Relieve the wheel please Recruit.”

  Graham swallowed. He was embarrassed but mostly because he did not want to show off. The quartermaster at the wheel grinned and stepped aside. “OK son, take over,” he said.

  Graham stepped forward and gripped the wheel and looked down into the compass repeater. “Aye, aye, sir,” he managed to croak.

  “Steer zero two five,” the quartermaster said, watching carefully from beside him.

  “Zero two five, aye, aye, sir,” Graham replied. He gripped the small wheel and carefully studied the numbers on the compass. With a minor adjustment he lined the pointer up then looked out, feeling very self-conscious.

  After a minute Lt Howe said, “You are doing very well young fellow.” He turned to the quartermaster and said, “You want to watch out Swain. This young bloke can steer as straight as you.”

  A bearded Chief Petty Officer guffawed: “That wouldn’t be hard!”

  The quartermaster looked aggrieved and said accusingly to Graham: “You’ve done this before.”

  “Yes I have,” admitted Graham. “A lot.”

  He then had to describe how he had spent many weeks at sea on voyages with his father and often did a full watch at the wheel.

  “Who is your dad?” Lt Howe asked.

  “Captain Kirk sir. He owns a coaster named the Malita and a landing craft the Wewak. She is a landing craft like this one,” Graham replied. He deliberately, and somewhat defensively gave his father the title of Captain, although his real ranking was as Master Mariner.

  Lt Howe laughed. “We picked the wrong nipper here Swain! I know your dad young Kirk. We often pass his ships. In fact, the Wewak is due in today. I heard her chattering on the radio a while ago.” He turned and said to a rating at the back of the bridge: “Brian, call up the Wewak, the one that carries freight to the gulf ports, and ask her where she is now.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  Graham meanwhile continued to steer the barge with the effortless ease of long practice. The ‘Swain said, “OK young fella, step aside and let someone else have a go. Who else wants to try?”

  Andrew stepped forward. “Me please sir.”

  Thankfully Graham stepped aside. As he did he deliberately showed off. “Steer zero two five. Wheel relieved sir.”

  Lt Howe nodded with approval. “Good.”

  Graham edged to the rear of the bridge, blushing but also glowing at the praise. For the next 20 minutes he stood quietly at the back while the others in the group had a turn at steering. By this time they were running into larger waves, the flat bow thumping into them with a crash which made the ship shudder and pitch. Several of the cadets began to look a bit green around the gills. Their evident discomfiture gave Graham a real sense of superiority to offset his recruit status. At least he did not get seasick, no matter how rough it got.

  It was the turn of another group by then so they were ushered out and down to the main deck where they sheltered on the lee side of the superstructure out of the wind and spray. Graham sat quietly beside Andrew and Blake and just enjoyed it all: the sparkling blue waves, the fresh cool air, the tang and taste of salt spray. It was good to be alive; great to be a navy cadet.

  ***

  At 11:00 the LCH nosed into a narrow channel in a coral reef. By then they were in calm water, sheltered from the wind behind the line of reefs which made up the Great Barrier Reef. Graham had often been out to The Reef and was not particularly interested. He stood at the rail and looked down into the crystal clear water with an eye to navigation rather than marine beauty. The brown and black shadows off to port he knew were coral, the yellowish to pale green below indicated sand. A few fish flitted past but nothing of any interest.

  As soon as LCH was inside the shelter of the lagoon she was turned hard to port and made her way slowly to where a red pontoon with a flag on it was moored. The LCH was made fast to this and the engines stopped. All cadets were then called to move to the well deck.

  Here they found the clearance divers with all their gear laid out. The divers were all now dressed in wet
suits, with knives strapped to their ankles and lead weighted belts around their waists. A huge bear of a diver with a massive black beard stepped forward when they were all seated.

  “I am Warrant Officer Crabb,” he said in a deep voice. “This is Naval Clearance Diving Team Four, the best in the navy.”

  His men grinned and held their thumbs up. WO Crabb then proceeded to explain exactly what clearance divers do. “Our main job is to destroy mines which cannot be swept by conventional minesweepers,” he explained. “You know, the old fashioned sort of mines which you see in the movies. They are a big round thing with horns on it. They are anchored to the seabed by a wire or chain and can be cut loose by a minesweeper using an Oropesa sweep or paravane. But most modern mines aren’t like that. Modern mines often lie on the seabed and some are like a torpedo. They have propellers and controls and when their sensors pick up what their on-board computer determines is a target their engine starts and they head off to meet it.”

  This was all new to Graham and he found it fascinating. With frank admiration he carefully studied the men and their equipment. Frogmen was the popular name for such divers, and the movie image of them was swimming into enemy harbours to place explosives on the bottoms of enemy ships to sink them. Blake thought this and asked if they ever did that.

  WO Crabb grinned and said, “We could, but most of our training is to search the bottoms of our own ships, and their anchor chains, to find and remove such things. Some of the army Commando types and the Special Air Service are trained as assault swimmers. We also do reconnaissance of enemy coasts for planning amphibious landings.”

  Graham remembered stories his father had told him about when he had been a young officer on supply ships to the Vietnam War. The ship had anchored in the muddy waters of the Mekong Delta at a place called Vung Tau. Navy clearance divers had then swum around underneath her day and night to stop enemy frogmen placing limpet mines on the hull. On one occasion they had even met some enemy frogmen doing this and had fought them underwater. It sounded like the bravest possible thing to do as a job. In Graham’s mind the divers were heroes and he had it in his mind that he might like to be one.