BRIGG MAN CAMPAIGNS OVER NAVY SIGNING UP BOYS FOR 14 YEARS

Cliff Turner - raised and educated in Brigg - today offers more memories from his time in the navy. Cliff is now 91 and lives in New Zealand.


Towards the end of 1948 we went into Singapore Dockyard for a refit and what became a turning point in my life.
Normally most of the crew would have been put into barracks while we were in dry dock but for some reason which was never explained the crew of the Norfolk remained in barracks after she had been refloated so we had to endure the heat, and our sanitary arrangements on the side of the dock were totally inadequate for a full crew. For obvious reasons the ship's bathrooms and toilet facilities could not be used while in dry dock.
When in Trincomalee I used to visit a library attached to the shore station there and took to reading Hansard, the record of Parliamentary proceedings in London. One day I read of a Scottish M.P. called Willis who said in a debate that boys should not be allowed to sign on in the navy as I had done. I wrote to Mr Willis and learned that in his youth he too had joined the navy as an artificer apprentice, served until he was 30 and then had gone into politics. I then started writing to M.P.'s using an alphabetical list and had got through about 150 before going to Singapore. My letters all had the same theme; that it was unethical to allow a boy not yet 16 to sign away 14 years of his life.
Many of the MPs I wrote to referred my letter to a minister in the government, the Civil Lord of the Admiralty whose name I have forgotten. He had so many letters from MPs that he used a duplicate letter to reply and so I had many of these letters sent on to me. They explained that the training of artificer apprentices was so expensive that it was necessary for us to serve many years in recompense.
The situation in Singapore put me onto a different tack. There were more than 100 Chief and Petty Officers in the Birmingham and the number of W.C.s and washbasins in the ablution facilities at the dry dock were totally inadequate so I wrote to about 12 MPs about this. Sometime later I went ashore and bought a copy of the Singapore newspaper The Straits Times. I learned that one of them had raised the matter in Parliament and had been told that the conditions were indeed as I had described them.
Next day I was summoned to appear before Captain Pakenham and several other officers on the quarter deck. The captain opened the proceedings by saying "You will notice that you still have your cap on." By this he meant that I was not being dealt with as a defaulter on some kind of charge. 
He asked me why I had written the letters instead of making a complaint to him as regulations permitted. I replied that I had no faith in the complaints system. After a while I told him that I did not wish to continue as I thought I might lose my self-control and say something I could regret.
At this he said "Come with me" and took me to his cabin. He offered me a cigarette (declined) and told me to speak freely. He also remarked that I had been in the ship for three years, longer than any other man, with an unblemished record and that my immediate superiors were highly satisfied with my work performance. 
I told him I hated the way we lived; no peace, no privacy. I also told him the stokers' mess-deck was a disgrace to a civilised country. 
After a while he told me that he could see that I was very unhappy in the navy and would try to get me out of it.
Eventually we did get into the barracks and it was while we were there that Prince Charles was born and the King ordered "Splice the mainbrace" so we all had an extra tot of rum. 
I remember the blacksmith saying "May she have another one soon". But by the time Princess Anne was born I was a civilian.
I was still in the ship at Christmas 1948 but soon afterwards was sent to the sick quarters ashore at Trincomalee. Looking back I think I should have not taken that without protest - there was nothing wrong with me - but I was so keen to get out of the navy that I accepted this. 
I forget how long I was in the sick quarters before embarking in HMS Sussex which was on its way home after a long spell on the Far East station based at Hong Kong. 
In the Sussex I carried out normal duties but as she was going home to be scrapped there was not a lot of work done. Strangely, I cannot remember the name of any person I came into contact with in the ship. 
We called at Aden and I went ashore long enough to buy 1,000 duty free cigarettes but I cannot recall if we stopped at Malta or Gibraltar. 
More memories from Cliff to come on Brigg Blog...