And my bloody mother had to let me down by crying!
Was it '55 or was it '56 - I can't remember. Certainly, it was Paddington Station; and the great steam locomotive headed the line of waiting carriages like a snorting beast, steam hissing from greased glands, proud tally plate, glittering red and gold, bearing some now hallowed name, waiting to be unleashed on its way to Liverpool.
The Company was paying the fare. I had already said good-bye to my sweetheart; and my spanking brand - new cap had, for these past two weeks, been stowed under my mattress, in the bedroom of my childhood home, the bedroom that looked over the marsh and all the way to the foot of the Downs and to the sea. It had been 'stowed': When I was a child, things were 'put away' - now I had to be careful to remember that things were no longer 'put away' - they were stowed. Well, anyway, it had been stuffed under the mattress for all that time so that it should not let me down, so that it should look as if I had been doing this, going away to sea, for ever and for ever and for ever.
And my Bloody mother had to let me down by crying!
It’s funny what you remember and what you forget. Presumably my father comforted her as, presumably, someone blew a whistle; and, presumably the train left Paddington and arrived in Liverpool - but I remember none of that.
I remember the hotel though: The Great Western Railway Hotel - and my room there; and the breakfast, I remember, certainly: This sixteen year old cadet, doeskin brushed and buttons gleaming, cap thrown nonchalantly on the vacant chair beside him; waiters fussing, the decor of crimson velvet and gold, the nearly clean starched tablecloth; and the bacon, eggs and toast. The Company was paying for that, too; and I suppose I remember it because we were never a hotelly sort of a family. Going to holiday on Arran, once and waiting for the morning boat, we had to put up at the Temperance Hotel at Oban - and I remember the guilty feeling about how so much unmitigated indulgence was costing my father. And I can still feel guilty about it now, if I try hard enough!
Tunnel under the Mersey - by taxi, paid for by the company, of course; to Ellesmere Port and the great Queen Elizabeth oil terminal, just newly built: And, then, there she was: My first ship, my first ever, ever, ship, oil tanker, steamship Hyalena!
They say your first ship is like your first love - you can never forget her; and they could be right: Up the brow (‘not a ladder, boy, brow!’) suitcases dragging: Steel decks painted red, tank hatches, butterfly clips and pipes - yards (or should that be furlongs?) and yards of pipes. More ladders to be negotiated; and so to the Deck Apprentices’ cabin.
‘So, you’re a first tripper?’ Then, to someone yet to be met and doing whatever Deck Apprentices did, in some uncharted part of that great steel hulk: ‘Hey, Bill! You’ve got a first tripper relieving me!’ And then, to me, ‘The Old Man’s not bad. But the Mate’s a bastard.
'Well, I’m off. Good luck!’
‘Thanks.’
I'm alone. I look around the small cabin, the Company regulation furnishings, the single, small brass port and the rows and rows of rivets which hold us together: So this was my new home. A photograph of a wife or sweetheart stands on the small desk. Well, this was my home, too, now; so I unpack and set down my own treasured photograph of my beloved Caroline.
Now I smell the all pervading smell of oil, hear the clank of pipelines being disconnected, hawsers being cast off and coiled down. Then the ring of the telegraphs and the throb of engines. The tugs are conversing by strange siren calls, all unintelligible, save for the last which, even to the uninitiated, clearly said, ‘God Speed!’
At first there was a communication problem: This was a Scouse ship, the crew were Scouse and they spoke Scouse. Though never very bright at school, I had some French and, of course, Latin; but no one had ever tried to teach me Scouse. Luckily the young adapt quickly and after about two weeks I was learning to understand and be understood; and soon I had learned to expectorate through my teeth and hit, with unerring accuracy, any unfortunate seagull that happened to alight on board.
Da-dit-dit-da-dit. The lantern flashed out, ‘What ship? Where bound? What cargo?’ Rockall, fuck-all: I learned the routines and I learned the jokes; and we talked of foreign ports and runs ashore and of favours bestowed by ladies.
But, soon, there were no seagulls and no other ships to talk to - only the flecking foam and the sound of the sea being parted by the bow, murmuring and caressing the flanks of this steel giant, as we thrust South-west by South and into the tropics.
Night watches, where the cardinal sin was not to wake up when shaken; not to fall into working serge, not to be on the bridge at least five minutes before the previous watch was to end, in time for eyes to get adjusted to the darkness, for cocoa to be offered and taken, for the night order book to be read, the course checked.
‘Yes, I have it!’ Those words signaled taking on the mantle of responsibility. But what did I have? The Quartermaster yawned and hoped for the relief that would enable him to nip down aft for a quick drag and some respite from the interminable blackness of the night; and, whilst Iron Mike, our automatic pilot, held us on a steady course, I would wander out onto the wing of the bridge, breath in the balmy night air and watch the stars: Alphucca, Orion, the Bear and the Cygnet, I was beginning to know them all and they were my friends.
Phosphorescent plankton, now; and flying fish on the bow. How far away was home; and how long the soliloquies I would deliver in the gentle night, alone on the bridge wing, to my sweetheart, to my beloved Caroline, as I told her the names of the constellations, showed her how to take a position sight and showed her proudly over the length and breadth of my great ship.
‘There’s a brothel in Curacao and it’s run by the Company. The girls get inspected every month. But don’t let the 5th Engineer take you. He’ll only get drunk; and then you’ll have to find your way back to the ship alone. Not recommended, at night.’ They nurtured me with almost touching concern.
After Curacao, Maracaibo; and after Maracaibo, Las Palmas, Marseilles and Genoa; and then Suez and the jewel spangled Orient: Days into weeks and weeks into months; long sea passages interspersed with falling out of taverns, falling into dustbins and running away from fights. Letters chased us, trying to catch us up; and, at Genoa, bad news from home: My Caroline, my beloved Caroline, had taken a job in Wiltshire, girl groom to a hard riding farmer; and she was going to marry him. A body blow. And, after that, on the wing of the bridge at night, I spoke with no one; and, quietly, I bled inside.
And then, unexpectedly, orders for home.
On a grey, drear, November morning, at the dockside, feeling unloved, I put a two-penny piece into the slot of a cigaretty phone box; and at the familiar sound of ‘Stone Cross 71,’ I pressed button ‘A’.
‘Hello, this is Tony here.’
But, when I had left, I had only been Anthony; and, certainly, I never had a Scouse accent.
‘Tony?’ they asked, ‘Tony who?’
‘Look, Mum, I explained, patiently, ‘You remember, a year ago, you had a son and he went away to sea? Well, he’s back!’
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This story has a happy ending: Looking back in my journal, I see that, when the bad news came, bravely I had written, ‘Well, I shall just have to screw around for a couple of years; and then, maybe, the right girl will come along.’
Well, the right girl did come along - although it took a bit more than a couple of years. You see, for both of us the intervening years must be part of another story - but forty years later - and after a few failed marriages between us, at Petersfield Registry Office, I married the same, my beloved Caroline.
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