With three large suitcases and a large steel cabin trunk, on the 11th September Mother and I made our way from Sussex, across London to Euston to catch the boat train for Liverpool. The porter dumped our luggage on the platform and as we waited for it to be loaded into the wagons and there was a general buzz of activity of all the other colonials meeting up with friends for the journey out East by the Bibby Line Cargo/Passenger “M.V Warwickshire”. Suddenly Mother spotted Michael Sparkes a young planter whose family she had known for years and said.
“ How nice to see you Michael. How are you? I wonder if you would be so kind to keep an eye on my young Michael who is going out for his first working tour of Ceylon. Look after him and help him on the trip.”
With that we bade our goodbyes. Mother kissed me so tenderly with tears in her eyes, and I knew that she would be crying her heart out later, and yet she was so glad at the same time that I was going to Ceylon to look after our family’s interests. I boarded the train which arrived at Liverpool Central and then on to a bus through the Mersey Tunnel to Birkenhead docks where we arrived at about 5 o’clock in the afternoon in a dockside warehouse opposite the moored ship. There was a general confusion as dockers and porters scrambled over all the vast array of suitcases, some going to the hold, some to each cabin. Port and emigration officials stamped passports, asked about contents again and after about a couple of hours eventually everyone was boarded, but the ship remained moored all night, and much to annoyance of everyone, the bar was closed until next morning at 11 am when a tug came up, and we finally cast off and were gently nudged into midstream. There was the heavy throb and vibration as the diesel engine gathered speed, and we cruised off into the Mersey and then headed out to the open sea. The whole process of departure which had taken about 10 hours of travelling and waiting around to board ship, and a further 17 hours of waiting in port, was for a total of about 120 passengers plus of course the 7,000 or so tons of cargo that had been loaded in the previous days . I had a nice cabin to myself on the boat or promenade deck which was comfortable clean and very pleasant. That afternoon we cruised in absolutely calm seas down to the North Wales coast and by next morning we were off Lands End and the Scillies.
The Bibby boats that plied between Liverpool and the Far East were “one class” ships, but that also meant that standards of dress were rigorously applied. The Dining saloon was divided into two, with the Captains Table and those near it having to wear full evening dress for evening dinner. Those on the far side were excused, but were still were expected to be suited and wearing ties. Michael arranged a table for four to dine at. Our other two members being a huge fat very garrulous planter from South India called Rogers, and a thin grey rather pedantic representative or agent of a fertiliser company called Cooke who was also going on to Madras. When we first set sail and made our acquaintance Cooke said little, but it soon became apparent that Mike and Rogers had a great love of drink in common. Mike was about 5 years older than myself , and of the generation that came of age and enlisted in the forces during the last few months of the war. As a young subaltern he had been posted to Berlin as part of the occupying army in the British Sector of the bomb damaged divided capital. There among all the ruins, the starving German population who would perform any service you could mention for some meagre food or a packet of cigarettes.Mike with his easy going personality, he had slowly developed a weakness for drink. Partly as an escapism from the horrors all around, and a chance to be convivial with fellow officers in their sanctuary of the Mess and the Naafi, inexorably from a few drinks at a time, he had begun to be slightly over dependant on alcohol. Not only was he my mentor on board, but he was also due to become a close neighbour in Ceylon when I would be doing my “creeping” or learning on Ragalla Estate, when he would then be close by on the small steep high elevation estate called Eskdale. He was due to be followed in a couple of months by his pretty young dark haired wife Anne, and he was I felt quite glad of the brief opportunity of freedom to enjoy himself at the bar. Rogers on the other hand, a Falstaffian character, almost twice his age in his mid-fifties was permanently propped up at the bar where a duty free glass of scotch cost only 3 pence. He managed in South India a large mixed tea and coffee plantation for the Scottish Agency of James Finlay & Co. Rogers hated his employers, whom he would forever curse for their alleged meanness and over-thriftiness. He would regularly start putting on a broad Scottish accent when he was a bit far gone and would say something derogatory like;
“ Do ye ken that there is nae money at all for a rise and there neer will be for the likes of you”. Amongst the passengers there were a number of mostly very charming Scots, so there were often robust arguments in which he always seemed to have the last word. One evening whilst sitting at the bar, and obviously very well oiled, his tummy bulging out over his cummerband, one of the rather primmer elderly Scottish ladies turned to him and said:
“ Rogers, seeing you sitting there on that bar stool with your stomach all hanging out, God I think you look totally repulsive. If I saw that tummy on a woman I would think she was pregnant”.
He stood up, smiled courteously, bowed to her, and in a soft but very polite tone replied:
“ Madam don’t worry, this stomach of mine has already been on a woman and she is pregnant!”
His retort brought the house down, and she retired to the laughs of everyone around. Cooke meanwhile as was customary on these long slow passages, had started a romance with a middle- aged woman travelling east. He was very silent and coy about his relationship with her, but they were never out of each others company. His silence annoyed Rogers, and at table he was constantly being goaded by him, Mike would try and maintain peace, and I the youngster just sat quiet and watched the scene around me. The shipped ploughed its way southwards slowly at a steady 15 knots. The crew laughed at the rake of the funnel and said “a 25 knot funnel for a 15 knot ship, when she isn’t going backwards at night”. As we got into warmer latitudes in the Bay of Biscay, skittles were laid out on the well deck by the side of the holds and endless quantities of beer were consumed during the course of a game. The passengers were a mixed bunch and included a most ravishingly attractive blond girl of about 25 years of age called Anna, who would lounge by the small swimming pool in a white swimsuit with her legs apart in a most provocative way. To make matters worse and to further stir the male hormones, she was not shaved down below and there was a large fringe of blonde pubic hair which drove the young men wild, and at the same time she was completely impervious to their attentions. It turned out that Anna had been married to a Hungarian professor of languages for only 9 months, and was now going out to Burma for six month’s to make a new Burmese-English Dictionary starting from scratch with no previous knowledge of the language. There were about 20 Burmese on board, and all her attentions were single mindedly turned to them as she learned and familiarised herself with the new language all day without