Description
Mr. Brown describes his time in the Arctic Ocean when their British fleet sank the Scharnhorst..
Robert Brown
Mr. Brown was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba on March 5, 1924. He was the oldest in his family, having only one younger sister. His father worked as a carpenter with the Canadian National Railway. His mother died when he was in Grade 10. Mr. Brown continued his education before joining the Winnipeg Sea Cadets. In February 1943, he joined the navy and was given the choice to go directly to sea or take a trade. He requested an opportunity to take a diver’s course training. As the Canadian Navy did not offer this course at the time, he received training as a torpedo man instead. During this time, the Canadian government arranged with Britain to take over the British cruiser, HMS Belfast. Mr. Brown was put aboard the cruiser and served as crane operator and torpedo man under British command. After the war, Mr. Brown returned to Canada and held a 35 year career in the field of fire fighting.
Transcript
When we sank the Sharnhorst my friend was up on the bridge. He had a view. I was down in the shell room, and he said after the ship went down there were a lot of lights on the water, which would be the lights on the sailors’ life jackets. They sent in some destroyers to pick up as many survivors as they could. I think there were only 15 survivors out of about 1500. Well, December, north, and you’re in the Arctic Ocean, boy, that’s cold. But, anyway, there were - the survivors all signed a sheet of paper and our admiral signed in one corner and the admiral of the fleet signed in the other corner. They photographed that and each of the men in the fleet that were part of that action got a 5 x7 print of all those signatures, the survivors. One of them was an American and he was a German American, and what had happened, the family went back to Germany in 1938 for a visit and he was conscripted into the German navy. He was a signalman on the Sharnhorst. That’s kind of a trick of fate.