by John Wingate
SUBMARINER SINCLAIR
Submariner Sinclair Series
Book One
John Wingate, DSC
Written for those who follow after, this book is dedicated to the Officers and Ratings of The Fighting Tenth who did not return.
Table of Contents
THE SHIP’S COMPANY OF HIS MAJESTY’S SUBMARINE RUGGED
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
ALSO BY JOHN WINGATE
GLOSSARY
THE SHIP’S COMPANY OF HIS MAJESTY’S SUBMARINE RUGGED
Lieutenant James Croxton, R.N.
Commanding Officer
Lieutenant John Easton, D.S.C., R.N.
First Lieutenant
Lieutenant Andrew Hickey, R.N.
Navigating Officer
Sub-Lieutenant Peter Sinclair, R.N.
Third Hand
C.P.O. George Withers
Coxswain
C.E.R.A. Reginald Potts
Chief E.R.A.
Acting P.O. Jack Weston
Second Coxswain
Acting P.O. Rodney Slater
Torpedo Instructor
E.R.A. Joseph Saunders
Outside E.R.A.
Leading Seaman David Elliott
Higher S/M Detector
Acting Leading Seaman Michael Flint
Leading Torpedoman
Signalman Alec Goddard
Signalman
Able Seaman George Stack
Gunlayer and ‘chef’
Ordinary Seaman Tom O’Riley
Ward Room Flunkey
Able Seaman William Hawkins
Seaman
Able Seaman Alexander Davis
Seaman and Trainer
Able Seaman Henry Bowles
Seaman and Trainer
Ordinary Seaman John Smith
T.I.’s Mate
Stoker Patrick O’Connor
Stoker
S.P.O. George Hicks
Stoker Petty Officer
Ordinary Seaman Henry Keating
Telegraphsman and Telephone Operator
COMMANDOS
Captain Jan Widdecombe
Captain i/c
Commando Graves
Commando Jarvis
Commando Jock Macdonald
CHAPTER 1
First Command — The Narrow Seas
“Let go!”
As the little ship swung to her anchor in the tideway one mile off Ramsgate, the young Captain glanced at his watch.
Just in time for a quick supper before the convoy comes round North Foreland from Southend, he thought.
Wearily he unslung his binoculars and hitched them over the brass voicepipe. He clattered down the steel ladder but halted on the middle rung.
Looks nice enough, but it’s all too quiet! he mused as his eyes scanned the peaceful scene.
Half a mile to the north-east, the massive cliffs rose from the grey deep. The first fingers of the setting sun stole across the sea and the rose-tinted cliffs were reflected on the placid surface of the water. Only the gentle hiss of the tide, as it raced across the swinging anchor-cable, betrayed the danger of these treacherous waters.
Peter Sinclair, Sub-Lieutenant, Royal Navy, Commanding Officer of Chaser 25, continued to enjoy the peace of the evening. He turned his head to the east, once again noting the ship’s position. He was anchored in the Downs, off the quicksands of the Goodwins, now known as ‘The Graveyard’. Some two dozen rusty sticks jutted out of the sea and Peter instinctively counted them again.
“Twenty-four,” he muttered.
They were the masts of the wrecks now littering these dangerous waters — wrecks of the obstinate colliers and merchant ships sunk by the enemy, only nineteen miles distant. Shelled by the gunfire from German gun-emplacements on Cap Gris Nez, torpedoed by lurking E-boats, blasted by mines, and caught by the shifting sands, these grim reminders poked their rust-scarred masts skywards. But, undaunted, the convoys kept on coming — one westerly from Southend to Portsmouth, and one easterly; once a week, undeterred by the enemy’s fury, they still passed through the Narrow Seas, for coal and food were the lifeblood of the Island. These sad, skeleton-like masts emphasised the sacrifice which the merchant sailors were making.
“Blast the Germans!” Peter growled, as he walked aft to the Ward Room. He reached the hatch and turned to give one last look to the north-eastward, but the convoy was not yet in sight. He was descending the ladder when he heard the spluttering of an aircraft. Peter turned his head and his grey eyes took in the outline of a single-seater fighter that swept three hundred feet above him.
The Spitfire crackled, coughed, and gusts of black smoke belched from its engine and he heard the whine of the wind as it hissed along the shapely wings.
She’ll never clear the cliffs! Peter thought as he stood mesmerised by the tragedy of the returning fighter. She hit the sea half a mile away, in a large plume of spray.
Sickened by the sight, Peter began to turn away, but at that moment his heart leaped as a tiny white mushroom floated like thistledown above the subsiding foam to billow gently upon the sea.
“He’s baled out,” Peter yelled. “Action stations, Number One!”
The tousled head of Peter’s First Lieutenant appeared through the Ward Room hatch. “Aye, aye, sir,” shouted Sub-Lieutenant James McDonald, as he rushed for’d to call the hands from the mess decks. “Action stations, action stations!”
The seamen poured out from below, and the little ship gathered speed and was soon alongside the crumpled silk parachute, which had now become sodden in the water.
The pilot lay on his back, his yellow Mae West a bright spot of colour.
“Well, that’s sure dinkum of you, Cobbers!” a broad Australian voice twanged from the water as a tanned face grinned up at them.
Two seamen went over the side and hauled him to the scrambling net, and then the pilot slipped from his harness, whilst helping hands bundled him over the guard rails.
“Come and have supper!” Peter greeted him.
“Thanks, Cobber, I will.”
Pools of water flooded the coconut matting on the deck as the dripping man padded forward to Peter’s cabin below the bridge. The cook handed him a mug of hot tea as he went by the galley.
“Thanks a lot, chum.”
“That’s all right, sir,” the burly cook grinned, “plenty more where that came from.”
After a hot meal, Peter and Jamie McDonald took their temporary guest on deck. The sun was sinking below the horizon, and from Ramsgate’s breakwater a white bow wave grew larger every moment.
“Bit late, that rescue launch!” the pilot observed.
The launch was soon alongside, its throaty exhaust coughing and spluttering in the swell.
“So long!” Peter said as he shook hands. “Good hunting!”
“Thanks — and the same to you.”
The eyes of the two young men met. Their two lives were to go different ways. Peter’s, to join up with the
convoy now three miles distant and swinging down upon the tide. The pilot’s, to give his life over the New Guinea jungles, and to win a posthumous Victoria Cross.
The launch was soon lost to view and already the green, red and white lights of the buoys could be seen winking in the gathering dusk. Ten minutes later, the black outline of the first ship slid by Chaser 25. It was the leading destroyer, shepherding her flock through the intricate swept channel of the Downs. Silhouette after black silhouette lumbered after her, until Peter had counted fourteen. Close on either side, diminutive M.L.s fussed around their charges, hustling them into their two columns.
They were now entering the dangerous area, for off the south-western buoy the German guns would inevitably start shelling from Cap Gris Nez. The shaded blue lights of signalling lanterns winked in the darkness, urging the ships to make all possible speed. Streamers of black smoke trailed from the squat funnels. The tide was under them, as they slid past the black outline of Dover Castle.
As ‘tail-end Charlie’, Chaser 25 was stationed at the rear of the convoy. Her duty was to keep the laggards closed up, and, in the event of disaster, to pick up survivors.
“There she flashes!” Peter murmured to Jamie, who was enjoying the night air on the bridge with his young Captain. It was futile to turn in until they were past the shelling area and far better to be blown to bits in the open than caught below in a steel coffin.
Sure enough, fine on the port bow of the convoy, the white light of the south-west Folkestone buoy winked its impatient warning as both young officers looked southwards towards the French coast, which was now invisible in the enveloping darkness.
A vivid white light suddenly flickered along the southern horizon and the young Captain reached for his steel helmet, put it squarely on his head and tapped its crown for luck. Methodically he adjusted the strap so that it only reached the tip of his chin for he had once seen a man’s neck broken by the shock of the helmet flying back against the blast, when the strap had been fastened beneath his chin.
At the head of the convoy, an orange flame burst and a sharp crack reverberated against the cliffs as the first shells exploded on the water. Spouts of foam cascaded upwards and golden plumes of spray showered gently downwards, lit by the fierce explosions of the next salvoes.
Peter tried to hide his eyes from the blinding flashes. The light dazzled him, so that he was blind for minutes afterwards.
“We’re entering the area now,” he said to the steel-helmeted lookouts, crouched by their Lewis guns in the wings of the bridge.
“So I can flippin’ well see,” the port lookout muttered to himself and his teeth gleamed as he grinned in the darkness.
“Start counting seventy-five,” muttered Peter to his Number One, as the French coast danced into light again.
Both men glanced at their watches and waited with a sinking void in their stomachs. “Seventy-two, seventy-three, seventy…” Jamie counted. An ear-splitting crack interrupted his counting, and bright orange flashes lit up the bridge. Peter’s sharply-drawn features turned towards the explosions but his eyes were shut to prevent dazzling.
“All right, Number One, pass the word, ‘Normal Shelling Routine’.”
Jamie moved to the brass voicepipe and shouted down it, “Normal Shelling Routine!” and from the wheelhouse below them, the Quartermaster repeated the order, his voice hollow and distant in the thick darkness.
Jamie went to the drawer of the chart table and fumbled for the large whistle which he hung around his neck as a long and distant rumbling, like midsummer thunder, reverberated along the French coast.
“There goes the sound of the guns! Strange, isn’t it, after the arrival of the bricks?” said Jamie, half to himself. Once again the French coast lit up as he glanced at his watch. Just over a minute later, he put the silver whistle to his lips, took an enormous breath, and a long whistle-blast added its contribution to the cacophony.
“Down, all of you!” Peter shouted.
The men on the upper deck threw themselves flat, covering their heads with their arms. Seconds later, four spouts hurtled upwards, two hundred yards from their port bow and close to the dark mass of the last ship in the seaward column. A fierce blue light split wide the night, which became a crescendo of sound.
The men in the Chaser climbed to their feet again, but, as suddenly, the French coast flickered once more. Again the whistle blew.
Peter was at the voicepipe adjusting his course, but he threw himself to the deck and it was as well that he did so, for suddenly the night became as day in a holocaust of vivid flashes. Shells burst round them, one fifty yards short, and three over, in a perfect ‘straddle’. A peculiar fluttering whined through the air and a sharp jar shook the little ship when the clang of metal upon metal rang from aft.
“We’re hit, I think, Number One. Go and investigate.” But already Jamie had bounded down the ladder and was back within the minute. “Only a splinter against one of the depth charges, sir. No damage.”
“Better shooting than last week!”
“Yes, they are improving; and so they should, the perishing swine!”
“They get enough practice,” muttered Peter as he moved to the voicepipe. “Port ten.”
The little ship swung to port to follow the convoy which had altered to its new course for Dungeness. Astern of the Chaser, the south-west Folkestone buoy, now some three miles distant, still winked derisively and it slowly dawned on them that the shelling had stopped. Now a lull of eerie silence replaced the infernal racket.
“Well, another C.W. convoy safely through, Number One.”
“Yes, sir, and nobody hit.”
They removed their tin hats. Peter wiped his forehead, already sore from the weight of the steel helmet. “Better get some sleep, Number One. Send the hands to cruising stations.”
“Aye, aye, sir. Good night.”
“Good night, Number One.”
Peter settled down to the loneliness of the night’s vigil. He still kept the night watches, because his First Lieutenant was not yet experienced enough for them. The lookouts relaxed and started to sweep the horizon with their binoculars, their shadowy figures a blur in the wings of the bridge.
To the eastward the moon swung into the heavens, masked from the convoy by her gossamer veil of high cirrus. Night became as day, the pale luminosity spreading across the calm and glassy sea, grey and mysterious in its undulating serenity.
A grand night. I should raise Dungeness Light in an hour or so, Peter mused.
The wireless loudspeaker on the bridge crackled. Peter’s head jerked to hear the message which was in code, but which he now knew by heart.
“From Athelstan. To all Convoy C.W.17: Suspicious vessels in sight, port bow. Am investigating.”
“Confound it! That’s the end of a peaceful night. E-boats, I’ll bet,” Peter muttered as he moved to the voicepipe. “Action stations!” he shouted down the voicepipe and, thirty seconds later, men stumbled from their hammocks to rush, half asleep, to their quarters on deck.
From the fo’c’sle just below him, Peter watched a small group of men clearing away the seventy-five for action. The clanking securing-chains dropped to the steel deck. The lean barrel swung to the port bow, the dangerous quarter. The steel tube shimmered in the pale moonlight.
Up ahead of him, the two columns of the rugged little coasters and colliers stretched to the horizon, but in the darkness to the westward, the column leaders were invisible. The Senior Officer of the Escort in the ‘Hunt’ class destroyer was out of sight.
Waiting was a cold and dreary business. Men huddled together for warmth, stamping their feet and swinging leaden arms in their heavy duffel coats. Repeatedly were they turned out for action, which only too regularly proved a false alarm.
“Same old story,” muttered one of the gun’s crew; “wish the perishin’ Hun would let us ’ave a crack at ’im.”
“You’ll get your chance, matey, before this lot’s over,” the cook, who was the
oldest member, retorted.
The loudspeaker on the bridge crackled again.
“Vessels identified. Am returning to my station.”
“Fall out action stations!”
Peter sighed as he leaned over the bridge to give the order. This constant interruption of sleep made men irritable, but he was lucky in his ship’s company. Not often was there serious grumbling.
Once again the convoy settled down to its journey westwards and trails of black smoke streamed from the jaunty funnels. Now the tide had turned and the convoy was only making four knots. By one o’clock in the morning, they still batted their way westwards, with Dungeness Light barely abeam. The occulting light sent its pencil ray streaking across the horizon, but for twenty minutes only while the convoy was in the vicinity. This was long enough, however, to betray it to the lurking enemy.
It’s too bright for E-boats, anyway, Peter thought, the western horizon’s clear now, as bright as day. Reckon I can have a pipe in this visibility. He turned to the lookouts. “Carry on smoking.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Gnarled hands fumbled for hidden ‘roll-me-own’s’ and eager lips dragged at dank tobacco which was lit from the smouldering slow-match hanging by the chart table. Peter puffed contentedly at his favourite pipe and settled down on the hinged wooden seat fixed to the bridge-side. One arm over the ‘splinter-mattresses’ which festooned the bridge, he swept the horizon with his binoculars.
Nothing in sight! Might be a peacetime manoeuvre, he thought, Royal Sovereign Lightship and Beachy Head next, and then we’re nearly there.
It really was a lovely sight. On either bow stretched two straight lines of merchant ships, the largest of which was only about 2,000 tons. To seaward of them, small dots of M.L.s chugged onwards, dipping and curvetting in the long swell. The unseen moon, screened by a film of fleecy cloud, cast her light upon a sea that ran like quicksilver.