The next day,
21st July, the ‘stranded’ aircraft from Point Cook returned to the ship. The
body of L/Cdr Hearle had been recovered from the sea, and the funeral of he and
A/B Timmons took place
at 1600 hrs before the ship headed for the open sea and Sydney, New South Wales.
Long-range fuel tanks were fitted in preparation for ‘search and shadow’
exercises with the Australian Fleet on our way to Sydney. We were ‘at war’ the
next day, the ‘enemy’ being one cruiser, three destroyers, and two frigates, the
‘might’ of the Australian Navy. The day ended with the ‘enemy’ being routed
without any opposition and the two fleets then met and combined to end an
interesting day, then headed for Sydney.
The exercise was to fly in Group formation (along with aircraft from HMS Glory)
over the city. This was carried out successfully. Lower decks were cleared for
entering harbour, and as the ‘fleet’ steamed through the Sydney Heads
approaching Sydney Harbour, all the vantage points on land were packed with
sightseers cheering and sounding their car horns at what the local newspapers
described as ‘A Majestic Spectacle’. Theseus tied up at No. 2 Wharf,
Woolloomooloo Bay, and HMS Glory followed and tied up at No. 7 Wharf. Sadly
there were some more deserters who had been picked up in Melbourne waiting on
the quayside, handcuffed to Naval Police.
It seemed that each place we visited, the residents were determined to outdo
their counterparts. We went ashore in the afternoon, and once again we were
overwhelmed by the hospitality. We started the round of parties, dances and all
the other social invitations all over again. A cocktail party aboard HMAS
Australia - the ‘victim’ of our war a few days previous - was arranged for the
officers.
The hangar was cleaned out ready for ‘Open Day’ on the following day. As usual
the crowds turned up in thousands, and they all seemed to thoroughly enjoy it.
Again many conquests were made; it was all too good to be true. The Group
officers were granted four days leave, the object being for them to relax. Some
set course to farms, or up into the mountains for ski-ing
A very interesting trip into the Blue Mountains was organised for us. We went by
train, and every station we passed through was crowded with well-wishers, with
bands playing and flags waving. The news that we were coming must have been
passed on, as they were waiting for us to go past. A few of us had another super
day surfing at the famous Bondi Beach. It was a very enjoyable and relaxing day,
quite a change to get wet ‘outside’.
Monday 28th July was my 20th birthday and there couldn’t have been a better
place to celebrate it than in Australia. We certainly painted the town red. I
had further cause to celebrate, because I became of age to receive my daily
‘tot’ of rum. The rum ration (grog) was another old naval tradition going back
several hundred years. There were three rum categories in the Navy, UA (under
age) T (teetotal) or G (grog). At the age of 20 one could elect to be G, and on
doing so was entitled to a rum ration every day when ‘up spirits’ was piped.
Sadly this tradition has now been abolished.
Another ‘Open
Day’ was organised for Wednesday, as there were far too many people the previous
Sunday to accommodate them all. Once again the ship was teeming with interested
spectators. This was another good day for making many friends, and dates. At the
end of the day it appeared that there were still many thousands of interested
residents who were unable to get aboard, so it seemed inevitable that the ship
would be ‘open’ again before we left Sydney.
We turned out in force on the Thursday for a march past through the streets of
Sydney. It proved as interesting as had Melbourne, with a very large turnout of
civilians to cheer and wave us on; they just couldn’t get enough of us -
absolutely unbelievable!
It was decided to have a final ‘open day’ on Sunday 3rd August, as our stay in
Sydney was rapidly drawing to a close. In the evening a concert was organised on
board, and £2,000 was raised for the ‘National Food For Britain’ appeal (a lot
of money in those days). Monday was to be our last day in this lovely city of
Sydney, so we all made the most of our last run ashore
Theseus slipped her berth at 1600 hrs, destination, Brisbane, Queensland, and en
route, more exercises with the Australian fleet. The crowds turned out in
thousands as in Melbourne and, once again, it was tears all round on the
quayside as we moved off to the strains of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ leaving behind many
happy memories of our 12 days stay. It was expected that there would be more
deserters, in fact two of our own mates decided to have a go at settling in
Australia. They had become besotted with two Aussie girls, and had been told
unofficially that if they kept their noses clean, the local authorities would
turn a blind eye. One of them even had the nerve to pop up out of the crowds and
cheer us off as we left. As far as I know they were never caught. Our officials
declined to comment on how many deserters there actually were in total, we only
knew of the ones that were caught.
Our intended flying programme the next morning was eight Fireflies for an
interception exercise. Two were declared unserviceable in the range before take
off, and one had to return due to undercarriage trouble, which left five to
complete the exercise. Disaster befell us again during the ‘land on’.
We were waiting on the flight deck for our aircraft to return. I had to go
quickly down into the hangar for some tools and whilst I was there, word was
received that there had been an accident on the flight deck. I quickly went back
up to find that there had been a terrible crash.