It Was a Terrible Mistake

Heroes Remember

It Was a Terrible Mistake

Transcript

I decided I would become a professional anti-submarine officer and then people would actually listen to me and do as I told them instead of doing something different and taking eight hours and risking the ship while doing it. But that’s just my opinion. His was probably quite different. Anyway, I applied to do a specialist course and become a professional anti-submarine officer, because in the navy, you could become an acknowledged expert by doing extra training in particular things. Like, you could be a gunnery expert, signals communication, and anti-submarine was one of them. It took six weeks for it to be approved by the British to let me into their school so I then went to their training school and became a professional anti-submarine officer. I’m not sure I learned anything there at all, but at least I had AS after my name which, you know... Now, my purpose, my purpose in doing this was so that people would listen to what I had to say, ‘cause I had a high opinion of myself. As a hunter, I was a very good hunter when I was a kid in Manitoba. I used to guide people from Winnipeg, you know, when I was 14 years old. I knew how to chase things down, ducks, geese, deer, you name it. And submarines to me was just another quarry; there was a right way and a wrong way to do it. So my plan was to sink the entire German U-boat fleet after I’d qualified. Well, it didn’t work out like that, funny enough. Because instead of being left in a ship with all it’s armament and depth charges, I was sent to Halifax to train other people to be anti-submarine people. It was a terrible mistake and after two weeks of - I was issued a class of people - after two weeks I said to my boss, I wasn’t going to to accept this nonsense. So I said to my boss that I was going to fail the whole class, that they had been badly selected. Tthey were basically irresponsible, not fit to be in the anti-submarine branch. Now, instead of firing the class, they fired me, which is what my purpose was.

Description

Mr. Welland describes taking advanced anti-sub training and being disappointed at being removed from combat duty to train other anti-sub personnel in Halifax.

Robert Welland

One of five children, Robert Welland was born in Oxbow, Saskatchewan on March 7, 1918. His parents immigrated to Canada from England, where his father had been an officer in the British Merchant Navy. Influenced by his father, Mr. Welland decided at the age of 14 that he would some day be a warship’s captain and an admiral. In 1936, he joined the Royal Canadian Navy, but had to go to England and join the Royal Navy in order to obtain officer training. His first active wartime service was aboard the F class destroyer, HMS Fame. Aboard her, he was involved in the rescue of survivors of the Athenia sinking, and the destruction of U-353. Mr. Welland then joined HMCS St. Laurent; she took part in the Dunkirk evacuation and the rescue of survivors from the Arindora Star torpedoing. In 1943, he assumed captaincy of HMCS Assiniboine; this vessel was involved both in convoy duty and harassing German shipping in the English Channel. Captain Welland remained in the Canadian Navy, and took HMCS Athabaskan into service during the Korean War, assisting in the NATO blockade there. He was later to become Commanding Officer of naval airbase CFB Shearwater, and his distinguished career saw him retire with the rank of rear admiral. He had fulfilled his boyhood dream! Mr. Welland later had great success as an entrepreneur, retiring at the age of 82.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 3:05
Person Interviewed:: Robert Welland
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Branch:: Navy
Units/Ship:: HMCS St-Laurent
Rank:: Lieutenant
Occupation:: Anti-submarine officer

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It Was a Terrible Mistake

Heroes Remember