Mike's Post War Story

We took the boat out to the Sober Islands which are part of the entrance to the inner harbour of Trincomalee and they were linked by the Royal Navy during the war by a causeway as part of the general fortifications to keep out hostile submarines. We went dressed in beach shorts and plimsolls, and Babbadeen carried a long flare made of a gallon can with a protruding spout which had a piece of sacking wick stuffed through it, leading into the paraffin in the base. The whole contraption was suspended from a long 8ft pole. 
We waded in the water at knee height amongst the rounded boulders with the jungle coming right down to the very edge of the sea shore in the warm gentle evening air. As we walked, the crayfish which were large weighing about 3 lbs or so , would flash past in a spurt and one had to be quick to spear them. It was whilst wading that I slipped on a smooth slimy rock and fell, and the machete ran straight through the fingers of my right hand down to the bone. Curiously there was little pain, and not much blood, it was more the shock of what I had done that concerned me. 
I called out to the others and we made for the launch. We were extremely lucky that there was a Royal Navy Cruiser in port, HMS Gambia, and we made for it straight away in the dark. Our boat shortly drew up alongside the gangway, and someone shouted “accident” and we were ushered on deck in our beach shorts. Jill, Anne and Bob were taken to the wardroom for the usual pink gins, whilst I was led down to the sick bay to see their surgeon. He took one look at the wound and said to me: 
“Could you please close your hand”. Only my thumb and forefinger worked. 
“Oh my God he said, its U.K. for you my boy. You have cut your tendons in three fingers , but you are lucky that your main index finger although cut has missed the tendon”. 
“Well can,t you sew them up again ?” I asked. 
“That is impossible, as once you have cut them they spring back with the tension of the muscles. You are jolly lucky in one respect, in that I am an orthopaedic surgeon doing a six month sea going tour of duty. We can patch you up tonight in the Naval Hospital ashore at HMS Highflyer, but after that you will have to fly home to England. There is only one man you should see, who is the leading expert on finger and hand grafts and that is Mr James at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Gt. Portland St.London. I suggest you see him as soon as possible.” 
So I was quickly taken by the Gambia’s launch ashore to the Naval Hospital at HMS Highflyer where I was met by Surgeon Lt. Hayes. As I lay on the operating trolley he took out his pentathol injection and said “ Just try and count slowly to five” and of course I was out. At about 4 o’clock in the morning I started to come slowly out of the anaesthetic and in my doze I could hear two cockney orderlies chatting. 
“Who’s this geezer. He seems new, he weren’t here yesterday?” 
“Oh he’s only some silly bugger that has cut himself crayfishing!” 
The sound of their voices, and banter was the greatest relief I could ever have had. I knew instinctively I was being treated in clean hygenic surroundings by western personnel who were efficient and clean, in stark contrast to my experience at Welimada only a month before. Up until this period in my life I never had cause to be stitched and now in the space of only a few weeks, I was being sewn up all over the place! Later in the day with my hand all bandaged up I was released to go back home with Jill, and we repaid the hospitality of the officers from Gambia and the surgeon from Highflyer by inviting them all to a drinks party with curry puffs and fried white bait which they all seemed to enjoy and we heard from one of the officers who was in the action about the battle of Matapan in the south of Italy when the Royal Navy crushed Mussolini’s fleet ! 
A couple of days later Bob and I were coming across Trinco Harbour on a breezy afternoon in our motor launch. I looked out over the sea and some distance off I spied what looked like a huge shoal of small albacore running and stirring up the water. 
As we got nearer we saw one of the two most amazing sights I ever was to witness at sea in Ceylon. It was not albacore running but about 8 or 10 giant manta rays just swimming by the surface with a rolling up and down motion , at a tremendous speed with only just their wing tips slicing up through the surface of the water. The boat got nearer so that one could follow them and see them at really close quarters. They had probably come into the inner harbour to mate. But I had an impulse which was very naughty to ram one with the bow and see what would happen. I was sitting amidships in our launch with the steering wheel in my hand when I made the manoeuvre, but Bob was not amused at all. 
“Look Mike, we have had enough damn accidents on this trip. You are still in bandages and we will not go ramming 3 or 4 ton manta rays”. With that he seized the tiller at the rear of the launch and we pulled away. I chided him for being “windy”, but seriously I knew he was right. 
A fortnight after my accident Jill and I flew back to England. It was only the second time that I had ever done a long haul flight, the first being in the RAF York which was in effect an adapted Lancaster bomber and took 3 1/2 days. This time we boarded a B.O.A.C. Argonaut or Skymaster which was two or three times bigger. The actual plane had been part of the King’s flight and had a plaque saying that it had been used to take our young Princess Elizabeth on her tour of Kenya, when she had been suddenly informed of the death of her father George VI, and had become the new Queen of Gt. Britain and the Commonwealth.
The plane was faster and bigger than the York, but seemed to be forever making stops.We had 7 in total: Karachi, Baghdad, Damascus, Nicosia, Rome, Frankfurt and finally Heathrow. Jill was feeling very sick and rough on the flight for most of the time, because although we did not appreciate it at the time, she was in her first stage of pregnancy and the start of morning sickness. As the plane came to land at Karachi the sky was pitch black and there had been an almighty storm just before, with the flood waters were just pouring across the desert engulfing everything in its path.It was though a giant had tipped a barrel of water across a smooth floor. We delayed our take off for a hour longer , but eventually at about 6 in the afternoon the plane with its slow grinding noisy petrol engines took off, and eventually we hit the storm which was absolutely petrifying. One minute the cabin was dark, next it was illuminated by a flash that was so bright that it was impossible to see owing to the dazzling glare. It seemed to go on for ever with the engines straining away ,but I suppose it was no longer than 10 minutes or so, and then just as suddenly we broke through into the clear desert atmosphere to our intense relief. At Baghdad at the end of our stopover, I came to collect our passports which we had handed in , but they were missing. I called out to the RAF officer in charge, and he came over to say that he had held them himself having seen our name on them, as he was Canadian and was married to Olive Charnaud who later we used to see quite a lot when we were in Turkey. Then it was home to Heathrow where the overseas terminal consisted of two open ended Nissen huts. In one was a trestle table, probably taken from a village hall for customs control, and a small utility desk for the passport officer. Such were the small beginnings of one of the world’s largest international airports.

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Post War 12 Accidents & Mishaps

Post War 12
Accidents & Mishaps