Tuesday, May 22, 2012

“GO WEST, YOUNG MAN”: Chasing my dad Part 7

I’m resourceful? I think so. At the very least I can be resourceful when I put my mind to it, and on the fourth day of my trip west I had to switch from Sleeper Plus Class to economy class (i.e., from my easy life of absolute luxury to I didn’t know what), so I started building up a stash of food that would sustain me ‘til the next morning.

Though I joke about the switch in my journal, and say I got “kicked out of 1st class for disorderly conduct”, the reason is much more ordinary and respectable. A one-way ticket in Sleeper Plus from Toronto to Vancouver wasn’t available in the time period I chose for my trip. I could get to Jasper in luxury, but had to buy a separate ticket, in economy, to travel the last leg to Vancouver. My ticket home, however, was “Full luxury, all the way, Baby!”

[“Note: SPECIAL NEEDS on my boarding pass”]

I come by ‘stashing’ naturally. The following story my dad tells in his naval memoirs may prove it’s in my genes:

“One day, about day three, a large net full of wooden cases landed on my landing craft. Stencilled on the side of each case were the words NAVY RUM; destination Officers’ Mess. I decided that the Officers’ mess was in the engine room of our LCM. I never worked so hard and enjoyed it so much in my life.” (pg. 107)

[“Dad’s hand-written notes, from 1975”]

Of course, had I shared the above story with a Navy official while touring Esquimalt Navy base after reaching Vancouver Island and Victoria, I wouldn’t be sitting at home now telling the tale. I’d still be in a Navy brig, living on cold rations, serving hard time for my dad.

[“Former brig at Esquimalt Navy base.
It has very thick walls!”]

However, the paragraphs preceding and following his admission of stashing the officer’s rum surely give observers good reason to consider leniency in Dad’s case.

First he writes, “At midnight July 10, 1943 a vast number of merchant ships carrying the machinery of war were strung out as far as the eye could see, close inshore off the southeast coast of Sicily. Aboard a number of merchantmen (LSIs) were about 250 Canadian sailors with their landing crafts, whose job it would be to deliver this machinery ashore for the Army and Air Force. Every article required was there in the correct spot, and in the early morning light we went over the side and the invasion of Sicily was on in earnest.

“The surprise wore off before noon and bombs began to fall. Some ships were hit and many Canadian sailors suffered from shrapnel cuts and burns. The worst attacks from German bombers came in very early morning and late dusk when a ship’s masts and super structure could be clearly seen but the planes weren’t visible. Attacks out of the sun were so fast there wasn’t enough time to be scared or unlimber a gun.”

[Dad’s story re stashing rum appeared next.]

He continues, “Late that same night, we were resting aboard ship, trying to round up some food and comforting a chap with a terrible toothache, when suddenly the sky all along the beach lit up like a ball diamond at night. A German plane with its engine cut had coasted overhead and dropped chandelier flares. Amidst the racket of ack-ack fire we all abandoned ship, toothache and all, and headed our landing craft out of the convoy. We knew the bombers would swiftly take advantage of the lighted sky.”
  
The resourceful and enterprising nature of my father and his mates was continually on display in several theatres of war, i.e., in North Africa, Dieppe, Sicily and Italy. Once ashore, merchant mariners had to scrounge for most of their food and clothes for weeks at a time.

[“Resourceful sailors turned biscuit tins into stoves”]

About this Dad writes, “A few miles up the beach we anchored our craft, took out our saltwater soap and went for a swim while all Hell broke loose down the beach. The word got around somehow that I had rum and before long I had more friends than you could shake a stick at...”

“...After about a week of being continually harassed by bombers, ack-ack fire and dog fights in the sky (we Canadians shot down a wing tank and almost single-handedly drove the Americans from the skies) one of our fellows on a short reconnoitre ashore found an abandoned limestone cave. This cave, a huge hump in the beach landscape, was to become our shelter at night for nearly three weeks. About 60 of us slept there, including another Norwich boy, the late Buryl McIntyre. The remaining Canadian boys slept in holes dug along the beach, covered over by whatever they could scrape up.” (pg. 108, “WELL DONE, DAD”)

My own adventures aboard The Canadian do not actually belong on the same page as the above stories. Perhaps I should have chosen one of a hundred other stories from Dad’s civilian life about how he ‘made do’ or ‘got by’. However, my trip west was about chasing my father’s footsteps almost 70 years after he had been on Vancouver Island, so I call for leniency from readers as well.

As I look at notes in my journal I am reminded of more than my own routine and resourcefulness during my fourth day of travel. 

The scenery deserved a few words. “Stunning scenery,  e.g., long valleys, gazillions of trees. In spite of low clouds, there is still a feast for the eyes, and the sting of getting kicked out of first class has been removed.”

[“Too much to see and photograph”]

Later, the scenery and my switch to economy deserved a few more. “Too much to see and photograph, therefore sit back and enjoy, e.g., Moose Lake, head waters of the Fraser R., it was 8 miles long. not bad for economy, w Hockley Black and Tan (beer I’d smuggled aboard in Toronto), although I did notice the switch from 2-ply to 1-ply.”    

Though my notes for Day 4 end abruptly, I know that later the same day I read several pages from ‘Combined Operations’, because lengthy references to two particular passages appear in notes I jotted down the following day.

Stay tuned.

***

Please click here to read “GO WEST, YOUNG MAN”: Chasing my dad Part 6.

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