Down Among the Weeds

by Harry Beaves

  After three spectacular years in Norway the good news was that I was to be posted back to 148 Battery in January 1992. We decided that Barbara would move back in early December so that she would have the married quarter in Poole set up for the boys to come to, straight from school for the Christmas holidays. The normal route back would have been three hours by car, in the snow, from Lillesand to Stavanger, then by ferry to Newcastle. An alternative was to drive twenty minutes to Kristiansand and pick up a freighter to Immingham (Grimsby), a scheduled sailing time of twenty-three hours. The freighter was the more attractive option as the difficult road journey through the snows of Norway would be very much shorter.

  We arrived at the commercial quay in Kristiansand expecting the freighter at 10pm. It was cold, dark and deserted and howling a gale with a force ten forecast for the crossing. Helen Monk, wife of the BMTC Sergeant Major, was going on the same ship. We waited and waited and nothing came. Unlike a civil terminal there was no check-in or inquiry desk to find out what was happening, but eventually we discovered that the ship had been delayed coming down from Oslo and would not arrive until 5am so we went back to Helen’s house and dozed fitfully. At about 5.30 the ship arrived, we drove our cars on board and they were shackled to the deck.

  The captain warned us that we were in for very rough weather and we settled into a cabin which was several decks up facing forward. At about 7.30 we had breakfast, which was to be my last meal for three days, then went to sleep, shattered from a night spent waiting for the ship. Outside the wind howled and the weather lashed against the windows of our cabin as the ship ploughed forward into gigantic waves. At about 6pm a Filipino crewman came in and told us we were to move to other accommodation as the Captain was worried that the storm might blow the windows of our cabin in! I was given a ‘shoe-box’ higher up in the ship, and Helen and Barbara went to the sick bay where the motion was slightly gentler.

  I took to my bed and didn’t go for supper as I was feeling very unwell. Every few hours a crewman would come in to the cabin to check that everything was OK; most probably he was checking on the windows and fittings rather than me. On one occasion I asked where we were. ‘Off the north of Scotland,’ was the reply. I thought nothing of it and withdrew to my misery. So time went by with me and the others unable to stir from our beds. Each time I asked where we were I was told the same thing: ‘Off the north of Scotland.’

  After three days I was beginning to get my sea legs and started to wonder why our twenty-three-hour journey was taking so long. I was able to get up and walk around the ship and I met the Captain. He explained that some of the cargo of containers had shifted on the first night, causing the ship to list heavily, as was all too obvious. With the list and the force of the gale he had been unable to point the ship sufficiently south to hold a course for Immingham, hence our position off the north of Scotland where we had been riding out the storm.

  Barbara was also recovering and we were permitted to go up to the Bridge, a huge narrow area that stretched from one side of the ship to the other with just the Captain, the helmsman and one other watch-keeper, totally unlike any of the warships that I had been on. From the bridge a huge expanse of containers stretched away to the bow. Somewhere amongst them was my car, being pounded with spray. We didn’t stay on the bridge long as I was very aware of the huge list and didn’t find it a comfortable place, neither physically nor mentally.

  The same day the Captain announced that since the storm had abated a little he was heading for Rotterdam to sort out the cargo, but we had had enough and asked to be put ashore in Holland. He reluctantly agreed and we drove off, never more relieved to be on dry land. We took the next ferry from Rotterdam to UK and were home with Barbara’s parents for tea after four and a half days stuck at sea in a howling gale.

  I returned to Norway on a scheduled ferry for my last few weeks with BMTC. In the weeks before Christmas we ran a ski-race training course from a base at Sjusjøen near Lillehammer.

  I was in my car, a Volvo estate, it was a cold, bright day, the road was straight and empty, Eric Clapton was playing ‘Layla’ very loudly on the stereo, and I was nearing the end of my journey. Everything was well with the world and I just let the Volvo run. Then, all too late, I noticed a police car parked on the side of the road and a couple of kilometres later I was waved down.

  The procedure is the same in any country. ‘Is this your car, sir? Did you know that the national speed limit is 50kph?’ Then it became difficult as my car was registered in UK, but I said I was a British serviceman living in Norway. There weren’t any British armed forces in Norway except at the NATO HQ in Oslo. It was too complicated so the policeman phoned ‘the office’. It seemed that in Norway there was a sliding scale of fines for speeding which rose every 10kph that you drove above the 50kph limit. The last step was at 110kph, above which your licence is confiscated on the spot. Thanks to Eric Clapton I had been clocked at 113kph (about 70mph) and the police wanted to take my licence, then and there.

  I was seriously worried and suggested that they could not take a British licence off me as it would mean I could not drive at home and I was returning to the UK permanently in three weeks’ time. Things were looking bad and there were more confused conversations with ‘the office’. I was desperately trying to be polite and helpful and suggested that if perhaps they recorded my speed at 110kph rather than 113kph I could be given the maximum fine and we would avoid any further complications. They rubbed their chins, ‘the office’ agreed and they awarded me an eye-watering spot fine of 3,000 Krone, about £300. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as I was given a slip of paper to pay at a Post Office within seven days. I drove cautiously away consigning Eric Clapton to the glove box and reflected on the fact that our generous allowances in Norway did not allow for the cost of speeding fines.

  Three weeks later I was back safely with my family in Poole after another three brilliant years and many fond memories of life in Norway.

  We have never been back to visit any of our old haunts in Norway, but I think perhaps that I would like to just pop back and see how Isefjaer is now. BMTC was closed down as part of a round of defence cuts about a year after we left and the site was sold off. The headquarters and the buildings at Isefjaer currently function as a very discreet and secluded holiday camp for naturists!

  Chapter 33

  Health Problems

  Returning to Poole was like going home and meeting many old friends again. I was happy to accept that I was now too old to work among the weeds, but there was a buzz about being back in the company of the energetic young men who now did the job and led the life that I had so enjoyed. My job title was Royal Artillery Liaison Officer for Naval Gunfire Support (abbreviated to RALONGS) and as such I was the Army’s expert on shore bombardment.

  As BC I had worked with the members of the Battery to build on the lessons learnt in the Falklands War. More than half of my new job involved working with the Royal Navy and I was looking forward to doing a similar thing with them. It was going to be great fun. Much of my time involved teaching naval personnel the drills used by the observer when a ship fired at a shore target. In particular I ran courses teaching fire adjustment procedures to Naval Air Crew and Principal Warfare Officers (PWOs) who are the successors to the RN Gunnery Officers of old.

  When a ship fires, the rounds are directed (adjusted) on to the target by a Naval Gunfire Observer (NGFO) from 148 Battery who passes left or right and add or drop corrections by radio to the ship. A Naval Gunfire Liaison Officer (NGLO) is on board the gunship making sure the orders are fully understood. The NGLOs were provided from a TA pool and, although they were very knowledgeable and experienced, tended to be older and frequently of a ‘comfortable disposition’. Unfortunately this was the image that the Navy was given of 148 Battery, entirely at odds with the hard lean young professionals who actually do the job. I always had the feeling that the Navy saw NGS as a difficult technical exercise without fully appreciating that the troops ashore
who were calling for fire would often be in great danger and needed a quick, accurate response.

  In my early days as BC I had met the Captain of one of the ships that had been sunk in the Falklands War, a brave and much respected man. The NGFO had been on his ship before it was hit and he had obviously made a big impression as the Captain described him as a ‘most fearsome Irishman’ and enquired whether he had got through the war safely. This had to be Willie McCracken, one of the great characters of the Battery, and the Captain was delighted when I told him that not only had Willie got home safely, but he had gone on to win a Military Cross for his skill in directing NGS during the attack on Mount Longdon. Shaking his head, the Captain repeated the phrase, ‘A most ferocious man.’

  Willie was a good friend, a tall smiling Irishman with an irrepressible sense of humour. When I got back to the Battery I found him and told him the tale. ‘You obviously made a big impression with Captain X on HMS Y. What on earth did you do?’

  ‘Oh, when I was on board I had to share a cabin with the MO, a really nervy character. He came in the day before we landed and found me sitting on my bunk greasing the pins of my hand grenades with vaseline from the sick bay. Nearly wet himself.’

  In a way, that illustrated the Navy’s lack of awareness of just what soldiers needed to do ashore.

  My predecessor, Maj Alistair Harvey, had made many improvements from the pre-Falklands days and I wanted to build on this. In particular I wanted to broaden the Navy’s understanding of Naval Gunfire and to point out the risks involved and tactics that might be employed.

  The Army has directed gunfire from aircraft since the First World War and it has always been acknowledged as a very difficult skill to master. If a helicopter pilot does it the easy way and hovers to watch the target as the round explodes, he is very vulnerable to anti-aircraft weapons. The tactical alternative is to stay low, move behind hills and woods etc, and pop up to observe the round just as it bursts. This is achieved by the ship telling the helicopter when it has fired, together with the time of flight of the round from the gun to the target. The air observer clicks a stop watch and the pilot pops the helicopter up from behind the hill, ideally five seconds before the round explodes, and goes back behind the hill when it has been observed. Naval pilots had never done this before, and no one had pointed out their vulnerability, but they readily accepted it and I taught the principles on the Naval Air Crew courses that I ran. I also made them practise it every time I was involved with live firing exercises with Naval Air Crew. I might add, this was to my personal detriment, as tactical flying severely tested the strength of my stomach!

  I visited the PWOs’ course during their live firing practices at HMS Cambridge and in Gibraltar. They also came for a day to Poole to be taught NGS from the observer’s perspective and to introduce them to the ‘real’ members of the Battery. I always used an exercise scenario to add realism, again something that had never been done before and the Navy was not used to. There is probably a generation of PWOs who will remember firing a paper frigate in support of the operation against the Dorset Freedom Fighters who had mounted an uprising and declared Purbeck a free country!

  By then I was qualified and recommended for promotion, but the collapse of the Communist Bloc in the early nineties had effectively scuppered my chances. In the first year that I had been eligible thirty-six majors in the Royal Artillery were selected for promotion. Then the Berlin Wall fell and the government rapidly decided the Armed forces needed to shrink. The next year there were only twenty-four and the following year just eighteen were promoted and that was my chance gone. Perhaps if I had kept my career moving along conventional lines and not taken time out for jobs that I enjoyed I might have slipped through with the last of the large batches, but it was not to be and I certainly don’t regret the choices I had made. My posting as RALONGS was normally filled by a person approaching the end of his career. It was for three years, but was frequently extended to suit the incumbent. I had ten years left before my discharge at the age of fifty-five and my aim was to stay in Poole for as long as possible, then sneak a final posting back again to Tywyn for my last few years as an Acting Lieutenant Colonel.

  With the family firmly rooted, we bought a house in Sturminster Marshall, about six miles from the camp, and the boys moved on as boarders at Allhallows College near Lyme Regis. I had now entered the twilight of my rugby years and had joined Wimborne RFC who had a well-supported Veterans XV. We met each Wednesday evening to play an uncompromising form of touch rugby. In the winter it was under floodlights at the club and in the summer on the beach at Sandbanks. Needless to say we undid the benefit of the strenuous exercise by drinking large quantities of beer afterwards. Through the season we played matches about every three weeks against similar styled teams.

  Barbara re-acquainted herself with Hamworthy First School and followed the familiar route from supply to part-time and eventually to teaching full-time. Everything seemed to be ticking over nicely with little to worry about.

  In Norway I had thought my fitness was declining because of my age. Jogging, for me, was like starting an old car – I huffed and puffed at the beginning but improved as the engine warmed up. In Poole I began to think there might be something more seriously wrong as I seemed to be becoming breathless after very mild exertion, even just walking downhill. Nevertheless I continued to jog, each time forcing myself on until the engine seemed to be ticking over properly. One lunchtime I was walking back from the Mess with a friend who was the same age as me. It was about 200 yards up a gentle slope to the Battery, and I was out of breath, while my friend had strolled up untroubled. My problem was plain to see, so the following day I went to see the MO. She put me through the normal routine of blood test, X-ray and Electro Cardiogram (ECG). My cholesterol level was on the upper limit and my ECG was abnormal so I was sent to Poole General Hospital for an exercise ECG. I jogged happily on the treadmill, but as the cardiologist monitored me she began to look concerned and kept asking me how I felt. ‘I’m OK, I normally feel like this when I start. I just run through it.’ But she had seen enough and stopped the test.

  The ECG had confirmed that I was suffering from angina; the next test was to discover the reason. My cardiac catheterisation was done in a civilian hospital in Portsmouth. It involved passing a fibre optic tube through the femoral artery into the main arteries of the heart while events were monitored on an X-ray display. A liquid was passed into the heart through the catheter and could be seen on the monitor as the heart pumped it round the body. This would show up any constrictions.

  In the afternoon the cardiologist who had done the tests came to see me as I was recovering. ‘Well, Mr Beaves, I’m afraid your three main arteries are sixty per cent and ninety per cent blocked.’

  ‘Is that bad?’ was my stupid reply.

  ‘Well one hundred per cent is a heart attack. I’m afraid you will need bypass surgery.’

  Back at Poole the MO told me I could go back to work if I wanted to, but that I should not do too much. I stopped exercising and continued to work, as hard as I was able, which was much as I had been doing before! Gradually the seriousness of my situation began to dawn on me and I felt very angry and frustrated. Why me? I was only forty-seven and none of the normal causes of heart problems affected me. I was a non-smoker, my weight was fine, I exercised regularly, my diet was good and my alcohol intake was within limits. The only two factors that applied to me were stress and family history. My father and grandfather had both suffered heart problems in their sixties and, even without the anxiety that I have referred to as the ‘submarine’, I would have described myself as a ‘natural worrier’. I became acutely aware of my mortality and in the back of my mind was the thought that at some time I might run for a bus, the lights would go out and that would be it.

  The services’ medical system was under revision around this time, and there was still a network of Army, Navy and RAF Hospitals, but they were only capable of fairly routine surgery. In cases, like mi
ne, that required major surgery the services ‘bought in’ to the NHS system. I had first reported sick in March 1994 and I was eventually programmed for a Cardiac Bypass Graft (CABG) in February 1995 at the Royal Brompton Hospital, one of the leading heart hospitals in the country.

  I was well aware of the seriousness of the operation, but I knew that it simply had to be done. There would be a painful recovery period, but I would eventually be close to normal again so I was entirely optimistic. Most importantly, I had a young family and everything to live for.

  The vein was stripped from my left leg from just above the knee to the ankle and this and part of my left mammary artery were used to bypass obstructions in the three main arteries in my heart. Life in the Royal Brompton was not very good. Patients on the ‘fast track’ recovery went home after six days and normal (i.e. asthmatics, the very old, the overweight, diabetics and others with complications) after eight days. I should have been ‘fast track’, but continued to feel weak and listless and didn’t feel I was making great progress. For a while my temperature was high, but I was considered fit enough to go home on the eighth day.

  Back at home I had a progression chart of things I could begin doing, goals to achieve, as the days and weeks elapsed. It was important that I quickly became mobile again, so on my first day at home Barbara walked me, swathed in scarf and hat against the February frosts, gently along the roads around the house. Each day we did the same route in the expectation that I would become stronger and walk further, but I showed little progress.

  Here the military medical system came seriously unstuck. The MO, in effect my military GP, worked from camp. He did not do house calls or have any community nursing staff, nor did he have my notes from the Brompton. I had been transferred in to the NHS for my operation and now had to register temporarily with my local Health Centre as a ‘visitor’ for my cardiac aftercare. So a GP who had no personal knowledge of me was receiving the notes on my cardiac operation and tasking one of his District Nurses to visit me.