Chapter 6 A Word in Season; Pay Day; RAN College; A Ship is Reborn

R.A.N. COLLEGE

Twenty-seven years have elapsed since the first group of cadet midshipmen completed their course at the Royal Australian Naval College. Since 1912, boys from every State of the Commonwealth have been sitting for the annual competitive examination for entry to this training centre for embryo officers of the R.A.N.-the only break was in 1936 and 1931 when national economy measures precluded the holding of entrance examinations.

The first applications, called in 1912, attracted one hundred and thirty-seven entrants for the twenty-eight vacancies. The actual course of studies and residence at the college did not commence until February 1913. At that time the college was in temporary premises at Geelong, where the local Harbour Trust had placed Osborne House at the service of the nation, free of charge, for use for defence purposes. It was fitting that the R.A.N. College should bear the name of England's famous Preparatory Naval College. The new training centre was officially opened by the Governor-General on the 1st March, 1913, with Captain B. M. Chambers, R.N., as the first commanding officer.

On the 11th February, 1915, the college was transferred to Jervis Bay, an area whose place names have behind them considerable naval tradition: Jervis Bay itself, for instance, perpetuates the memory of the Earl of St Vincent, one of Britain's great admirals of the past; Captain's Point (the site of the college) bears the name of the ship which Nelson commanded at St Vincent's crowning victory.

When the transfer to Jervis Bay was made, the new college comprised fifty-eight buildings. On the 1st May of that year, the personnel totaled two hundred and eighty-seven, including seventeen officers and eighty-seven cadet midshipmen.

In 1930 the college moved again, this time to Flinders Naval Depot, where it still operates to-day as a separate entity. The transfer was dictated mainly by the defence economy measures of the period. The decision to hold no entrance examinations in 193o and 1931 curtailed the numerical strength for a time, but the standard of training was not affected, and the college continued to turn out youths fully equipped to embark upon a career as naval officers.

By February of the year of the transfer to Flinders, one hundred and seventy-three officers who had passed through the college were serving with the fleet, and there were then fifty-one cadet midshipmen under training.

In these present days of war the work goes on apace, and the record of the R.A.N. ships in action testifies to the thorough training imparted at the college, as it does to the efficiency of the grounding given to ratings at F.N.D. itself.

A SHIP IS REBORN

ONE day one of His Majesty's Australian naval dockyards commenced to modernize a war vessel. This job may sound simple enough to execute. Merely a matter of careful planning and time, you may assert. The Navy has been doing jobs like this for years, and ought to know all about it by now. Yet not so fast. Actually the job is one of undreamt of complications, and the men endeavouring to carry it out are confronted with difficulties at every turn.

Take our ship, H.M.A.S. Riverina. After three years of policing the sea-lanes in her own right, of roaming the oceans and anchoring in romantic harbours she secures to her berth at the dockyard. For her, one life is over, and from her old shell, Eke a moth from a pupa, will emerge a newer and better ship. Already most of her officers and ratings have been drafted to other ships. Only a handful of men remain on board. These are the men who will stand by their ship during her transition period.

They are usually men who can be trusted to work on their own, and have the confidence of the ten or a dozen officers on board. The White Ensign still flutters proudly from the gaff and the internal routine of the ship is the same as that of every other ship of war; but her crew know that she will not put to sea again for at least three months. To a man accustomed to the sea and its many moods, loving it and feeling restless whilst in port, the prospect of three months in harbour is nothing short of heartbreaking. However, one can grow accustomed to almost anything in time.

As soon as the ship is well and truly secured,
a whole army of dockyard employees swarm
aboard. A multitude of trades are represented.
Plumbers, joiners, shipwrights, riggers, electricians, boilermakers, painters, and dockers, are but a few of them.

Slowly the ship is, literally, torn to pieces. For she is going to be practically reconstructed. No punches are pulled.
The dockyard is quite ruthless, as indeed it
has to be if results are to be produced in
reasonable time.

Wireless aerials are dismantled, boat davits plucked out by a giant crane, stays unshackled, and altogether the' ship is completely shorn of her finery. Inside her the havoc, and there is no other word for it, is indescribable.

Cabins simply disappear to make larger spaces, bathrooms become temporary storerooms for artisans, and the word "privacy" is, for the time being, placed out of use. To conform with current schools of thought on the matter, all unessential woodwork is to come out. Many a ship has been lost owing to uncontrollable fires raging between her decks.

In the midst of all this noise and mess our little party of officers and ratings lives and works. They still do the same things they have always done. The ceremony of "colours" is still carried out, request men and defaulters still appear at the Executive Officer's "table", hands still leap to obey the orders on the boatswain's "pipe", and rounds are still done at 2100. But things are definitely not the same.

With envious eyes the men watch other ships proceeding to sea. On some counts our party might be considered lucky. They get plenty of leave, perhaps an occasional weekend, and the majority of them have nearly every night in bed. The ship is not moving,

nor likely to. So there is no handling of the engines, no hawsers to man-handle. Their lot, however, is far from a rosy one. All day and half the night they have the dockyard employees to contend with. There is riveting, banging, the whining of drills, the hissing of welders' equipment, shouting and mild cursing. The ship is alive with workmen. They are everywhere. No place, except perhaps a cabin with a Yale lock, is sacred. Of course there can be no drills or "divisions", as every square yard of deck is taken up with machinery or gear of some kind. For once, the men cannot really call the ship their own.

Meanwhile, a different ship is taking shape. Slowly Riverina begins to appear something like the plans drawn up for her, and less like a heap of junk. After several weeks, living on board really becomes uncomfortable. You simply cannot keep the dockyard employees out of the ratings' mess-decks as they have so much work to do there, and the officers suffer equally as much as their men. An electric lead has to pass through an officer's cabin. This requires about three different trades. For five days at least the officer will have these workmen in his cabin.

All suffer alike. No one escapes the omnipotent dockyard. Still, no one complains. The attitude, from the Captain down, is that "it cannot be helped, so we must make the best of it". As time goes on the situation, for those living on board, grows worse and worse. The men are left with very little space to call home. An officer might be seated in his cabin, and have the bulkhead stripped about him. If he tries to move to another cabin-"Oh, we're sorry. But you can't go there yet, sir. The polishers haven't done the furniture yet." If the officer asks where the polishers are-"Oh, sir, they're flat out doing the wardroom chairs, and after that they've got to do the ship's office."

It is impossible to keep the ship clean, a desire all naval men possess. You sweep up one deck. Half an hour later it is covered with shavings, old leads, and rubbish from holds or cabins.

There are many amusing aspects of such a rebirth. To quote one example, there had been fitted in Riverina a brand new telephone system. It was decided to have a minor reshuffle in the officers' cabins and the fact that the telephone wires had been installed was momentarily forgotten. When the telephones came along it was found that a very junior officer had a nice new telephone and a very senior officer had none. It is well nigh beyond the scope of human pen to describe the hundred and one difficulties which beset both dockyard and ship's personnel. There is a fresh problem every hour of the day and no hard and fast way exists of dealing with any of them.

About three weeks before the completion date the full ship's company, a new one, joins. Riverina emerges from a camouflage of scaffolding and red-lead to show her new form to the world, although the greater part of the world may see little difference in her. The decks now stay clean, and woe betide any remaining dockyard workmen who make a mess. There is a last minute rush to complete some jobs.

An old hand may be heard to say:

"They'll never make it. I know the dockyard."

Yet somehow they do "make it". Senior officers of the port and dockyard officers, together with the ship's heads of departments, make a tour of inspection and there are many smiles of satisfaction. They have produced a ship of which Australia might well be proud. Her ship's company settles down quickly. Everything is "on top line". The party who stood by during the period of transformation breathe a sigh of relief, and are glad to have their ship in full commission again. Every one is happy to be away from the dockyard, with its noise and inconveniences. It is a strange aspect of war, this rebirth of a ship. But it surely is just as vital to the country's war effort, in its way, as a gun duel between two cruisers or a hunt for a U-boat.

Once again HMAS Riverina puts to sea, a new life ahead of her. Who knows where she might go, what she might do? And she sails with the good wishes of hundreds of men who have helped to transform her.

So a ship is reborn.

LIEUTENANT W. N. S.

SHIPBOARD SABOTAGE

"CORVETTE" IN CORAL SEA by Engineer Lieutenant A. W. M. L. Monsoon season in the Coral Sea brings heavy seas and dirty weather. Pictured here is one of H.M.A. "corvettes" butting her way through a head sea between Australia and New Guinea under grey, rain-laden skies.

THE accompanying water colour drawing (above) has a story of its own which might bear repetition:
The Engineer Officer of the ship, whose hobby is the creation of water-colour seascapes, was in the process of evolving one of his occasional effusions and the yarn about his efforts to complete his masterpiece is told in the wardroom with gusto and no little exaggeration.

It is an epic story of grim determination to finish the job in the face of opposition from enemies as implacable and annoyingly persistent as Tojo's hordes themselves.

The predilection possessed by the ubiquitous ship's cockroach for any sort of pigment is well known. This fact is now particularly impressed in the mind of the artist concerned, for, labouring, at his brain child in his spare moments at night, he would wake on the morrow to find his precious efforts of the previous evening discounted by several shades of colour.

Determinedly, he would snatch a few moments to darken down the scene again and just as consistently would the voracious insects attack the picture by night. So it went on.

The battle became one of tactics-but despite the most ingenious devices of wrapping and packing, the jolly little fellows found some way to circumvent these strategies and so satisfy their peculiar epicurean tastes.

"Chiefie", casting an anxious eye on his precious three pigments, which were already running low, set his teeth, and, urged on by much ribald and facetious "moral support" from the wardroom mess, accomplished a massacre. The enemy retaliated by sending out an intelligence call to every crack and cranny in the ship, bringing up reinforcements in strength until it seemed that the whole ship's company of cockroaches was engaged.

Feverishly the Chief darkened his drawing. Hungrily the rapacious invaders doubled their patrols; but at length his determination got him through. Gradually he wore the enemy down, and, gaining a little colour each night, the day at last dawned when, flushed with victory, he announced that the fight was over, and won.

"Beers are on me, chaps," he remarked. "But, by gosh! "-he mopped his brow-"it was tough while it lasted. Like getting the Japs out of New Guinea?"

ENGINEER LIEUTENANT A. W. M. L.

LOOKING BACK

"Dear Mother and Dad,

Well, I have just completed my first week as a rating in the Women's Royal Australian Naval Service and it is even more marvelous than I had imagined. . . ."

Well over two years since I wrote that first letter home, and two of the fullest and happiest years a girl could spend. The first unwitting enthusiasm soon died, but was replaced by a feeling which has deepened steadily with the weeks and months until it is a great thing in one's life-a thing worth giving of one's best.

The Service was very young when I joined its ranks-a Service trying to gain a footing and trying very hard to live up to the high traditions set by the Royal Australian Navy, of which it was such a humble part.

We were trying to learn in a fortnight customs, ideas and even a language which a sailor learns over half a lifetime in the Navy, and we made many mistakes which we thought would be irretrievable. Through these early mistakes we learned one of the first rules of our naval careers-a mistake is rectified by the "powers that be" and then forgotten-provided one doesn't make the same mistake

twice.

Naval discipline was completely incomprehensible to the majority of us in those first bemused weeks. We were all very willing to learn, but very few of us chose the "proper Service channels" of doing anything for some time, until we discovered that discipline was mainly a matter of applying good manners in a Service way.

My first actual encounter with naval discipline will undoubtedly keep me punctual for the rest of my life. I inadvertently committed one of the worst sins-I was two minutes late coming on watch, and I might just as well have been half an hour late. I was informed in no uncertain manner that "it is better to be ten minutes early than ten seconds late". Those words may not sound very drastic to an outsider, but it is interesting to note that never since have I been late for an appointment, either with work or otherwise.

By the time I received my uniform, I was more or less accustomed to the sight of naval uniforms, but it was the first time I had, in fact that any one had seen a W.R.A.N.S. uniform and I was actually entitled to wear it. I made a few minor alterations to the skirt and sewed on my badges the night I received it. How proud I was next morning and how that pride withered when I arrived on watch and found myself not the centre of an admiring circle but the object of general amusement had sewn my Telegraphist badge on upside down. This incident, unfortunately, is of the kind that is not forgotten and has been retold me unknowingly many times.

To-day the W.R.A.N.S. is a rapidly expanding Service with fast-growing traditions of -its own-traditions which we have tried in a very small way to 'model on those of the Service of which we are so proud to be a part. The work which is expected of all members of the W.R.A.N.S. is not always easy-each girl is literally "on duty twenty-four hours a day". There are no "union rules" and each girl 'in her "watch below" is always prepared to be called on duty. This is perhaps the most satisfying aspect of it all-we all know that there is a job to be done, and the Navy has shown us how to do it. It takes girls of all kinds and from all walks of life, and from this heterogeneous collection emerge not a race of automatons but a group of people working and pulling together.

"On the strength of one link in the cable

Dependeth the might of the chain.

Who knows when thou mayest be tested;

So live that thou bearest the strain."

Thus runs a very brief extract from "The Laws of the Navy" and this we try to make true also of the Women's Royal Australian Naval Service. The weakest of us are made to realize that so much depends on us that one unconsciously gives one's best at all times.

THIRD OFFICER J.C., W.R.A.N.S.

"ALL THE NICE GIRLS.. "

IF you're going to sign on the long dotted line,
- Just think what the Navy'll avail yer;
- While some may go balmy over Air Force or Army,
- All the nice girls love a sailor....
If your shoulders are round and your sad lack of pounds
- Is the woe and despair of your tailor,
- In a round-rigger's suit you'll look dashing and cute,
- And all the nice girls love a sailor....
When you walk down the street, and a damsel you meet,
- Don't hesitate, lad-boldly hail 'er;
- Though she hates your square collars-just show her your dollars-
- And all the nice girls love a sailor....
When the girls cluster round as you swagger through town
- With the sea-roll that never will fall yer,
- You can afford just to shrug and look bored,
- For all the nice girls love a sailor....
If you take home a miss and you ask for a kiss,
- And you see her complexion turn paler,
- Don't be misled-though she's shy (so she said!)
- You know all the girls love a sailor....
If you're spinning a dit and you stretch it a bit,
- As you tell of your days in a whaler;
- Though the story be tall she won't doubt you at all,
- For all the nice girls love a sailor....
When you're just out to sea and you're sick as can be,
- And your poor tummy couldn't feel frailer
- And some cheery dolt says, "Buck up, Old Salt!
- just think how the girls love a sailor!"
When they give you to eat only bully-beef meat
- And biscuits that couldn't be staler;
- While the wife that you wed brings you breakfast in bed
- Can you doubt all the girls love a sailor?
Though when leave is all done and you've had all your fun
- And you're broke-and the "miseries" assail yer;
- It's not much reward when you get back on board
- To know all the girls love a sailor....
So if as a civvy you feel you're a skivvy,
- And every one says you're a failure,
- Enlist in the Navy-you'll still be a slavey
- But all the nice girls love a sailor!

LEADING TELEGRAPHIST S. V. T., W.R.A.N.S.