Assignment on HMS Prosperine
Heroes Remember
Assignment on HMS Prosperine
I became an officer, I guess I was commissioned in sometime
in April or May of 1941, and because my mathematics was so
terrible, my navigation was likewise terrible. And so I thought I
must do something that, that doesn't involve navigation or
doesn't commit me to doing navigation. And at that point,
the admiralty was looking for volunteers for mine disposal and so
I thought, "Well, mine disposal is something I can do."
And so I was sent for a, a three-day course to HMS Vernon in
Portsmouth, which was the torpedo and mining school,
and shown how to disarm all kinds of mines; our own and the
German mines. This was really a crazy thing for me to do
because I hardly knew how to use a screwdriver. Anyway, that's
what I did. And I was appointed to HMS Proserpine, I would
call correctly pronounced "Perserpine" but of course the navy
mispronounces all their classical names, which was the fleet base
at Lyness in the Orkneys on Scapa Flow. And there I shared
the mine disposal responsibilities with a very nice Glasgow
salesman whose, whose Scottish accent was so ferocious,
you almost needed a translator to know what he was talking about.
Anyway, the two of us shared this job and so we went out and
disarmed mines; they would wash ashore whatever.
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