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CHALLENGER 
The Life of a Survey Ship 


by 
GEORGE STEPHEN RITCHIE 
Captain, Royal Navy 


ABELARD-SCHUMAN LTD 
NEW YORK AND LONDON 


First published in U.S.A. 1958 
© Copyright by Abelard-Schuman Ltd 
Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 58-6427 


Printed in Great Britain by 
William Clowes and Sons, Limited, London and Beccles 
for the publishers Abelard-Schuman Ltd. 
404 Fourth Avenue, New York 16, N.Y. 


Preface 


By VicE-ADMIRAL Sir Guy Wyatt, K.B.E., C.B. 
Hydrographer of the Navy 1945-1950 


sure that all who read it will agree that he has made a first-class 

job of it. 

Iam also happy that he has asked me to write a Preface because 
it gives me the chance to say a few words in memory of this well- 
loved ship and to my old shipmates. 

During her twenty-two years of life Challenger saw the final 
passing of the old methods of survey and the firm establishment 
of the new for, though she was fitted with echo sounding gear on 
her first commission, it was still experimental and often un- 
reliable so that much work was done with the lead; her boats 
relied entirely on this ancient means of sounding; fixing position 
depended on good visibility. At the close of her career echo 
sounding was used exclusively both in the ship and her boats, the 
lead being relegated to one means of obtaining samples of the 
bottom; the fixing of position no longer depended entirely on 
sight, for various electronic devices made fixing possible under 
any conditions. 

Nowadays nothing but human limitations or a gale of wind need 
prevent the surveyor sounding both day and night for weeks on 
end! A most alarming thought for all of us who used to look for- 
ward to a day of rain or fog to allow us to catch up with office 
work or just have a ‘caulk’. 

Nearly all those mentioned in this book were shipmates with 
me in Challenger or other surveying ships or in the Department ; 
some, alas, are no more. It has been a great pleasure to read of 
their adventures and to recall the times we spent together. So I will 
end this Preface by saying to them, ‘Old Ships—Here’s to the 
memory of our old ship and to old shipmates who have passed on!’ 


| AM SO glad that Captain Ritchie has written this book and Iam 


Holly Tree Orchard, 
Woodbridge, Tasmania 
June 1957 


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Contents 


Foreword: ‘A Famous Name’ 
The New Ship 

Labrador 

Windward Isles and the Grenadines 
The Winter Party 

Spring in the North 

The West Indies 

Sandy Shores 

Iceland 

War at Sea 

Gambia River 

The Eastern Fleet 

Torres Straits 

The Persian Gulf 

Cyprus Interlude 

World Voyage Begins 

The Pacific 

Atolls 

The Deepest Depths 
Homeward 

Appendix : Challenger’s Captains 
Index 


113 
126 
146 


201 


214 


233 
24.2 


24.3 


List of Illustrations 


Challenger Frontispiece 
Rounding Cape Harrigan. Voyage North—July 1932 facing page 10 
Pan Ice. Voyage North—July 1932 Io 
Nain, Labrador II 
The Carenage, St. George’s, Grenada 26 
Lieut.-Commander Baker and Officer’s Steward Holgate starting off fora 

day’s surveying 27 
Petty-Officer Stevenson feeding the dog teams 27 
Nutak—half way to Hebron 42 
Hebron—the journey’s end 43 
Renatus building snowhouses 58 
A survey camp between pages 58-59 
Springtime travel between pages 58-59 
Buck Baker and Dennis Deane going out from Nain to meet Challenger, 

July 1934 facing page 59 
Main Street, Hillsborough, Carriacou, Grenadines 74 
The surveyor’s topographic task in the Grenadines TE 
In the floating dock—Bermuda 90 
The new furnaces arrive in Bermuda 91 
Christmas—1937. Alongside the new wharf at Trinidad 106 
Fishermen at Port Said 107 
Passing through the Suez Canal rea 
Anchored off Muscat 123 
Sheikh Khamis Bin Hilal approaches with his ‘Army’ 138 
Commander Baker with Sheikh Khamis Bin Hilal and his Brothers 138 
Anchored alone at the head of Hvalfjord, June 1940 139 
Making Sail 154 
Camouflaged—Sheerness, May 1942. Before sailing to join the Eastern 

Fleet Eo « 
Rigging a survey beacon on deck 170 
Laying a moored survey beacon 17I 


Challenger’s echo sounding launch.—Winter Harbour, Vancouver Island 186 


Coming alongside—Pearl Harbour 187 
viii 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


ix 


facing page 
Heavy weather—North Pacific 202 
Black-footed Albatross alongside the ship—North Pacific 203 
Fijian women dance the ‘Meke’ 218 
Children on Funafuti Atoll 219 
Challenger’s judo team—Ominato, Japan 234 


Arriving at Portsmouth for the last time. Commander Ashton poses for 


the Press wearing one of Challenger’s many ‘Trophies’ 235 
Maps and Diagrams 
Somerville sounding gear page 5 
The coast of Labrador.—The inshore route north taken by H.M.S. 
Challenger in 1932 12 
The Submarine Sentry as 
Scheme of Triangulation 29 
Survey area northwards from Nain, showing first part of sledge journey to 
Hebron 44 
Theory of station pointer fixing 63 
Approach route to Ras at Tannura 78 
Triangulation mark in the Gambia River 116 
Swept depth channels, Torres Strait 150 
Portion of Fair Chart ‘Approaches to Umm Said’, as surveyed by 
H.M.S. Challenger. Drawn by Lieutenant P. J. D. Hayter, Royal 
Navy. 174 
Portion of Admiralty Chart 3787, published 9th April, 1948, from the 
survey by H.M.S. Challenger GMs 
A seismic refraction experiment, showing the paths by which various sound 
waves travel from explosion to the hydrophones 187 
Structure of Funafuti Atoll as deduced from seismic experiment 223 
Baillie rod and sinkers 227 
The Western Pacific, showing positions of the main ocean trenches 231 


Acknowledgments 


Letters of Proceedings at the old-fashioned mahogany desk 

in the Commanding Officer’s ‘cuddy’ in Challenger. Before 
telling the story of the ship I had to read all these and I am 
indebted to the Hydrographer of the Navy for giving me access 
to them, and for his permission to reproduce portions of two 
charts. | 

Some of these Letters of Proceedings hint at interesting or 
amusing happenings and give some description of the difficulties 
being encountered by the Surveyors, but for the most part they 
are but brief factual accounts of the movements of the vessel and 
the month-to-month progress of the work. When I had read them 
and made notes I had a framework upon which to hang the tales 
of her Company and the stories of the ship herself. 

I have, therefore, to thank a very large number of persons, 
many of them in the Royal Naval Surveying Service, for so 
willingly assisting me to spin the yarn, for I have served but a 
brief period in Challenger compared with many of my informants, 
who have returned for second and even third commissions in the 
dear old ship. 

To list the name of everyone to whom my thanks are due 
would be a long task. I must specially mention a few who have 
supplied me with invaluable material: Vice-Admiral Sir Guy 
Wyatt, K.B.E., C.B., who lent me his manuscript of a paper on 
Challenger’s pre-war work in Labrador which appeared in the 
Journal of the Royal Geographical Society; Captain E. H. B. 
Baker, D.S.O., R.N., who lent me his spirited diary kept whilst 
on detached survey work in Labrador, and gave permission to 
use many of his excellent photographs taken whilst serving in 
Challenger; Commander G. P. D. Hall, D.S.C., R.N., who gen- 
erously allowed me to make the fullest use of his notes made 
whilst serving in Challenger and which he had intended for a book 
of his own; and also Commander Alun Jones, R.N., and Com- 


mander J. M. Sharpey-Schafer, O.B.E., R.N., who both supplied 


N DOZEN different Captains wrote nearly three hundred 


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS XI 


me with a number of anecdotes about the ship during their 
respective periods in command. 

Among others who have helped me with material and given 
encouragement are Vice-Admiral Sir John Edgell, K.B.E., C.B., 
F.R.S., Captain R. M. Southern, R.N.; Captain G. D. Tancred, 
D.S.C., Royal Australian Navy; Captain H. Menzies, R.N., 
Captain C. C. Lowry, R.N., Commander C. Sabine, O.B.E., 
R.N., Commander R. Bill, D.S.O., R.N., Commander R. T. 
Tripp, R.N.., Lieutenant-Commander E. E. Croome, R.N., 
Commander D. L. Gordon, R.N., Commander D. N. Penfold, 
D.S.C., R.N., Commander J. C. Grattan, D.S.C. and Bar, R.N., 
Lieutenant-Commander J. A. B. Thomson, R.N., Lieutenant- 
Commander S. J. Hales, R.N., Lieutenant-Commander G. J. B. 
Simeon, R.N., Lieutenant-Commander J. M. Nicholas, R.A.N., 
Chief Petty Officer C. Long, B.E.M., Surveying Recorder First 
Class, and Petty Officer J. Greenshields, B.E.M., Surveying 
Recorder First Class. 

Also, I must thank Commander Bill Ashton, D.S.C., R.N., 
who throughout many years’ friendship has told me countless 
amusing yarns, many of them about Challenger, in which he 
served as Navigating Officer and later as her last Commanding 
Officer. 

To these must be added Mr. R. J. Crowford and Mr. C. T. 
Laws, formerly Royal Marines serving in Challenger, who are now 
back in their civilian employment at the Hydrographic Supplies 
Establishment at Taunton, and who told me much of their work 
and play in the old ship, during one cold snowy night when we 
were sheltering together in the bar of the Castle Hotel, Taunton. 
Mr. Crowford prepared the maps and sketches for this book. 

To Dr. Tom Gaskell and Dr. John Swallow I must give very 
great thanks—they showed me that there is much to be found out 
about the bed of the ocean apart from its mere depth below the 
surface. They never tired of answering my layman’s questions 
about their scientific experiments, and many a night watch I 
passed away in Tom’s company as he described his theories of 
the deeps. Dr. Swallow took most of the photographs used to 
illustrate the World Voyage. 

I have to thank Mr. G. B. Stigant, O.B.E., late Chief Civil 
Hydrographic Officer in the Hydrographic Department of the 


xii CHALLENGER 


Admiralty, and Mrs. C. S. Auckland, in the Secretariat of the 
same department, for forwarding references to me when I was at 
sea and far from the amenities of the Admiralty Library; and also 
Mr. J. A. Jerome on the staff of the Chief of Naval Information, 
who helped me with some of the difficulties of writing a book 
for publication in England whilst sailing the waters of the Pacific. 

Finally, I owe a great debt to my wife who has read and 
corrected my work at every stage, and who rescued the manu- 
script of the final chapter from among the springs of an old sofa 
where it had been taken by my eldest son’s white rat for use as 
nest-building material. 


G. S. Rircuie 
H.M.N.Z.S. Lachlan, 1956. 


Foreword 


‘A FAMOUS NAME’ 


was established at the end of the eighteenth century and at 

first formed only a very small section within the Admiralty. 
The duty of this branch was to record and index the large amount 
of surveying data which was gathered at that time by many of 
England’s navigators, including such men as Captain Cook of 
the Royal Navy and Dalrymple of the East India Company, who 
was chosen to be the first Hydrographer of the Navy. Very soon, 
however, it was seen that special ships would be needed for 
surveying duties and that officers should be specially selected for 
this valuable work which requires devotion and endurance to an 
exceptional degree. So the Surveying Service was formed and for 
many years about eight ships have been maintained by the Navy 
for surveying work, and about 60 or 7o naval officers who have 
specialised in hydrographic surveying have gone to sea in these 
ships with naval crews to make the Admiralty charts in many 
and varied parts of the world. 

Surveying ships carry no guns or offensive weapons in times 
of peace and they can be distinguished from other naval vessels 
by their white hulls, with yellow funnels and upperworks. 
Nothing pleases a naval surveyor more than to be greeted with 
a word of praise for his ship: “I saw your vessel working in the 
bay last week. She looked just like a beautiful yacht.’ He likes 
to hear the reference to the work as much as he does the com- 
parison of his ship with a yacht, for he prides himself on being 
a hard worker. Every advantage must be taken of spells of 
suitable weather and very long hours are worked by all onboard, 
for when the gales come the ship may lie weatherbound in some 
remote anchorage, the Captain anxiously peering from his cabin 
windows at the wind and the rain and turning to look at his 
barograph for any sign that moderating weather will allow him 


xiii 


Te Naval Surveying Service, a branch of the Royal Navy, 


Xiv CHALLENGER 


to resume work on the survey; while the junior surveying officers 
are often content enough to hear the wind howling or to see 
the fog closing in to give them some respite from the apparently 
endless days of sounding in boats. 

Modern surveying ships have borne the names of many of the 
great surveyors of the past, such as Cook and Dalrymple, Fitzroy 
and Flinders. 

The ship about which this book is written also bore a famous 
name. She was called after H.M.S. Challenger, built at Woolwich 
for the Royal Navy in 1858, and more famous in the fields of 
science and exploration than in the line of battle. This earlier 
vessel was a screw corvette of 1462 tons displacement with a 
two-cylinder engine, using a twin-bladed propeller which could 
be disconnected and hoisted clear of the water when she was 
under sail. 

In 1861 she left for service on the east coast of North America 
and the West Indies, taking part in operations against Mexico in 
1862. Her next commission was on the Australian Station, where 
little unusual occurred, except that she visited Fiji on a punitive 
expedition to avenge the death of a missionary and his dependants 
who had been murdered by the Fijians. 

It was in 1872 that her career took a dramatic turn when she 
was selected as a surveying vessel to be employed on a scientific 
cruise round the world. 

For some years the Royal Society had been sending scientists 
to sea in naval surveying ships. These were the first real efforts 
made to find out something of the physical make-up of the ocean 
and of the life within it beyond the immediate vicinity of the 
coast. Professors W. B. Carpenter and Wyville Thomson had been 
the prime instigators of these cruises which had been conducted 
off the north-west coast of Scotland and in the Mediterranean. 
But knowledge of the depths of the oceans was still extremely 
vague ; there was a widespread belief that there was an azoic zone 
below a thousand fathoms or so where no life existed, despite 
evidence to the contrary provided by starfish which had become 
entangled in deep sounding lines; many considered that the 
ocean’s floor would be flat and featureless ; of what the ocean bed 
was composed no one knew; there had been considerable dis- 
cussion, based on slender data, whether the temperature of the 


FOREWORD XV 


oceans decreased steadily with depth or whether there were zones 
of warmer water alternating with cold. ‘The vast ocean lay 
scientifically unexplored’, said the Circumnavigation Committee 
of the Royal Society when they approached the Admiralty with 
a proposal that a world voyage should be made. 

Dr. Carpenter had already been in communication with their 
Lordships and had done much groundwork so that things moved 
swiftly, and in a very short time the Hydrographer of the Navy, 
Admiral G. H. Richards, was vigorously under way with plans. 
Captain G. S. Nares, a surveying officer of great experience, was 
chosen to command the Challenger. As the Royal Society had 
nominated Dr. Wyville Thomson to be the scientific leader of 
the expedition these two worked in harmony from the start, 
for they had sailed together in similar appointments on the most 
recent oceanographic cruise to the Mediterranean in the surveying 
vessel Shearwater. 

The sparse nautical figure of Captain Nares, with his neatly 
pointed beard and high bald forehead, and that of his more portly 
but active scientific companion were familiar enough in and 
around the dockyard at Sheerness during the summer of 1872, 
and the ship steadily took shape as the first British vessel ever to 
be fitted out exclusively for oceanography. Her spars were re- 
duced and all her guns except two were landed. This made room 
for laboratories and workrooms, stores for thousands of fathoms 
of dredging and sounding ropes, storage spaces for the almost 
countless specimens which it was planned to collect, for the 
spirits of wine which would be needed to preserve them, and 
for the trawls, nets and dredges with which they would be 
taken. 

By 6th December all was ready and the President and Council 
of the Royal Society and the members of the Circumnavigation 
Committee were invited to inspect the Challenger at Sheerness. 
‘A saloon carriage will be ordered to be in readiness to convey 
them to that port by the 10.30 a.m. train from Victoria Station’, 
wrote the Secretary to the Admiralty. 

A few days later the ship sailed for Portsmouth, encountering 
a great gale off the Kentish coast; in fact the scientists, who had 
not yet found their sea legs, were landed by request in the Downs 
and travelled by road to Portsmouth. 


Xvi CHALLENGER 


Captain Nares,* a ‘devilish good fellow’, as Sub-Lieutenant 
Swire described him in the jargon of the day, was assisted by a 
fine team of deck officers and engineers, with Navigating Lieuten- 
ant Tizard, one of the cleverest surveyors in the service, in charge 
of the surveying work and of the fixing of the positions of the 
many sounding and oceanographic stations which were to be 
occupied by the ship. The scientists under Wyville Thomson 
numbered three naturalists, Murray, Moseley and Willemoes von 
Suhm ; Wild, who was secretary to Thomson, and was also a most 
capable artist, and Buchanan the chemist. Dr. Suhm died at sea 
of erysipelas during the latter part of the voyage. 

The objects of the expedition were clearly set out in the 
instructions issued to Captain Nares and Dr. Thomson. These 
were fourfold: 


1. To investigate the physical conditions of the deep sea in the 
great ocean basins (as far as the neighbourhood of the great 
southern ice-barrier), in regard to depth, temperature, circula- 
tion, specific gravity and penetration of light. 

2. To determine the chemical composition of the sea water at 
various depths from the surface to the bottom, the organic matter 
in solution and the particles in suspension. 

3. To ascertain the physical and chemical character of deep-sea 
deposits and the sources of these deposits. 

4. To investigate the distribution of organic life at different 
depths and on the deep-sea floor. 


At first the weather was furiously against such work and on that 
first Christmas Day at sea there were many of the scientists, and 
sailors too, who wished, as the ship wallowed and creaked in the 
heavy seas, that they were enjoying their Christmas dinner in 
the familiar surroundings of the homes they would not see again 
for nearly four years. Nor were the first attempts at dredging 
successful even when the weather did moderate, for all were un- 
accustomed to this novel and difficult technique for hauling 
quantities of life from regions completely unknown to Man. Three 


* On 18th January, 1957, Vice-Admiral J. D. Nares died in harness as 
Director of the International Hydrographic Bureau at Monaco. He was born 
in 1877, about two years after Captain Nares’ return from the Challenger voyage, 
and, like his father, spent his life in the Naval Hydrographic Service. 


FOREWORD Xvii 


times did the dredging rope part with loss of gear before the ship 
reached Lisbon, her first port of call. 

Here the King of Portugal paid a visit to the ship, being the 
first of many personalities who were to interest themselves in 
the fascinating work of the Challenger. 

After sailing from Lisbon the expedition’s luck changed and 
soon the sounding, dredging, trawling and the taking of water 
samples and temperatures became routine work. No fewer than 
362 of these stations were made during the course of the world 
voyage; at each of such stations sail was shortened, for it was 
necessary to navigate under steam to keep the vessel up to the 
sounding line so that a true vertical distance to the sea-bed should 
be measured. 

To avoid sudden jerks on the one-inch Italian hemp line which 
was used for sounding this was rove from the deck engine through 
a leading block slung from the foreyard before descending to the 
depths. The leading block was secured to the foreyard by a so- 
called accumulator composed of twenty stout india-rubber ropes, 
each being passed through individual holes in two large wooden 
discs to keep them separated. These accumulators were capable 
of considerable stretch and took up the violent motions of the 
heaving and pitching vessel without transmitting them to the 
sounding line. 

In the early days of the cruise there would be a great concourse 
on deck each time the dredge or trawl broke surface to watch the 
naturalists attacking the formidable task of sorting hundreds of 
specimens of marine life which scattered the deck, or lay con- 
cealed in the grey or reddish ooze from the seafloor—fish of 
strange colours and shapes, deep-sea corals, sponges, starfish, 
deep-sea worms and sea urchins and many more, some large and 
obvious, others small and obscure, to be searched for with sieve 
and microscope. But soon this work became boring in the ex- 
treme to those handling the ship or working the winches during 
the day-long task of bringing one haul from the depths. Only 
Wyville Thomson and one or two of his assistants would be there 
at nightfall to see their treasures tippled from the net, or, as on 
one or two miserable and notorious occasions, to see the trawl 
ropes part just as a heavy catch was raised clear of the water, 


allowing a mass of life to sink back into the ocean before their 
2 


XVili CHALLENGER 


eyes and containing perhaps priceless gems never to be captured 
again. 

Whether or not something new would be taken in the next 
haul became a matter for betting with gin and bitters as stakes, 
and for many of the wardroom this soon became their only interest 
in this tedious business. 

And so the ship crossed and re-crossed the Atlantic, the 
southern part of the Indian Ocean and the Pacific. She called at 
the British ports of Gibraltar, Bermuda, Halifax, Cape Town, 
Melbourne, Sydney, Wellington, Hong-Kong and Port Stanley to 
re-provision and carry out repairs. She visited Madeira, Teneriffe, 
St. Thomas, Cape Verde, Bahia, Yokohama, Valparaiso, Monte- 
video and Vigo, and at each place expeditions were made into 
the hinterland by the scientists and the officers, their observa- 
tional powers sharpened by the knowledge of the importance of 
the voyage upon which they were embarked ; they recorded details 
of the lives of the people; the activities, or lack of such, by 
governments, and the flora and fauna of the countryside. Many 
little-inhabited or uninhabited islands were visited, where speci- 
mens were obtained of every animal, plant or even stone to be 
found upon them. These included St. Paul’s Rocks, a small group 
less than one hundred feet high situated upon the Equator far out 
in the Atlantic, and past which the river of the Equatorial Current 
runs so steadily and so swiftly that the ship was able to secure by 
a hawser to one of the rocks at the western side of the group and 
lie there for two days and nights, whilst the scientists examined 
the few inhabitants of this barren spot; these consisted of two 
species of noddy, a booby, a spider and a crab. Meanwhile the 
men fished for abundant cavalli from a boat made fast to the 
hawser securing the ship to the rocks. 

The visit to the island of Fernando Noronha, lying between 
St. Paul’s Rocks and Bahia, was not such a success, for although 
the vegetation and the birds were both of considerable interest, 
the island was a Brazilian prison and the Governor, although 
courteous, would not give permission for collecting. 

Tristan da Cunha was reached on the way to the Cape and here 
some high-priced provisions were bought, and two Germans, who 
had been living a Robinson Crusoe existence on nearby Inacces- 
sible Island for over 18 months, were rescued from a life among 


FOREWORD xix 


myriads of penguins and a herd of pigs rendered inedible by their 
diet of penguin flesh. 

Prince Edward Island, Crozet and Kerguelen in the far southern 
Indian Ocean, and known only to a few inarticulate whaling 
skippers, were explored, every detail of their natural history being 
recorded. From Kerguelen the ship sailed southward and crossed 
the Antarctic Circle in February 1874, the first steam vessel to 
do so, and here spent some weeks among storms and icebergs and 
low visibility. Many anxious days were spent in endeavouring to 
trawl among the forest of icebergs and more anxious nights en- 
deavouring to keep clear of these rugged rocks of ice; on one 
occasion the ship collided with a berg at night, losing her jib 
boom but suffering no more severe damage. ‘All hands on deck!’ 
was a frequent cry on those cold nights as disaster loomed up 
ahead through the falling snow. 

The expedition visited many islands in the south-west Pacific, 
recording the way of life and the material culture of the native 
population, both of which were changing rapidly at that time as 
the full impact of the western world was being felt with the 
ever-growing influence of the missionary and the trader. The 
anthropological records made by scientists and officers of 
the Challenger in these areas may one day prove to be among the 
most important they made, for they photographed, sketched and 
collected material among the natives of Tonga, Fiji, New Heb- 
rides, Cape York, New Guinea and the Admiralty Islands. 
Moseley in particular noticed how the old life was fading away 
and realised how vital it was to record every vanishing facet. 

The efficient colonial rule of the Dutch was seen in the 
Moluccas, the crumbling rule of the Spaniards was observed in 
the Philippines. Members of the expedition were granted an 
interview with the Emperor of Japan; King Kalakano of Hawaii 
was entertained, he at that time steering a wavering course 
between British and American supporters; Queen Pomare of 
Tahiti, much under the thumb of the French, attended a ball 
onboard the ship. And here at Papeete the Challengers had a 
wonderful time ashore where then, as today, the welcome for 
the seafarer was overwhelming. The Tahitians are among the 
friendliest and most lovable people on this earth. 

Early in 1876 Challenger passed through the Straits of Magellan, 


xX CHALLENGER 


seeing some of the Fuegian Indians, the most miserable and 
dejected people they had encountered on the whole voyage. 

The old ship anchored in Spithead on 24th May, 1876, having 
been away 33 years and having sailed 68,500 miles. Out of 243 
men who had set sail, 61 had deserted the ship on the long voyage, 
an interesting light on the discipline of those days. But much was 
also the same at sea then as it is today; a seaman, Wilton, was 
lost overboard from the chains in heavy weather in Cook Strait. 
‘He was a quiet, well behaved man and always did his duty well’, 
wrote Sub-Lieutenant Swire in his journal. ‘Such men are scarce 
in the Navy nowadays.’ This remark might be heard in a ward- 
room today. 

There is little evidence of any serious friction between the 
naval officers and the scientists on this long and arduous voyage, 
which says a great deal for the skill with which the Hydrographer 
of the Navy and the Royal Society chose these men. There were 
of course many minor incidents, such as the calling on deck of 
the men at night to search for a broken spar, for the officer on 
watch had heard an ominous crack. In fact this had been caused 
by Moseley in his cabin firing a paper pellet from his airgun at 
a large cockroach which had for long escaped him. On another 
day Commander McLean, the executive officer, stubbed his toe 
on a giant spider as he put his feet into his seaboots. The naturalists 
had brought this animal onboard for study but it had gone into 
hiding. 

One of the tasks set the Challenger scientists was to investigate 
‘bathybius’, a supposed primordial stuff of life believed to exist 
in the depths. This fabulous white matter had been found in 
samples taken from the sea-bed but proved eventually to be 
nothing more than a white precipitate resulting from the addition 
of preserving spirits of lime to sea-water. However, before this 
had been discovered the philosophers were in a great state of 
excitement one day when a deposit of ‘bathybius’ was found 
among sample bottles in the laboratory. While they were 
gathered excitedly around this a marine came in to ask if anyone 
had seen his pipeclay which he thought he had mislaid somewhere 
in the laboratory. 

The ship lived on, dismasted and unrigged, as a coal hulk until 
1921. Captain Swire, the last survivor of the expedition, died in 


FOREWORD XXxi 


1936. But the ship and her company will never be forgotten in 
the world of science. 

An expedition of this nature would not have gained lasting fame 
had not the results been carefully prepared and published. Sir 
Wyville Thomson set up an office in Edinburgh for this purpose, 
and here, under his direction, Murray commenced to write the 
famous Challenger Reports. In 1882 Wyville Thomson died and 
Sir John Murray eventually published the fifty volumes, each 
carefully edited and many beautifully illustrated, these forming 
the very basis for all studies concerned with the oceans from the 
time of their publication until the present day. To these must be 
added several popular accounts which were written by members 
of the expedition, each stressing their particular interests on the 
voyage. So today, whether one is studying oceanography, 
geology, geophysics, ornithology, zoology, botany or anthropology 
one cannot read far without stumbling across a reference to the 
Challenger Expedition of 1872-76. Such references run into 
thousands and provide the most suitable memorial to the famous 
old ship and the enquiring and forceful men who sailed in her. 

Whether the surveying ship Challenger, which has so recently 
been towed away to the breaker’s yard, has, in her very different 
way, upheld the famous name, the reader will be able to judge 
for himself. 


otk 


I 


The New Ship 


searching for and surveying new fishing grounds in northern 
waters, and as such she was to be paid for by the Ministry 
of Agriculture and Fisheries, but was to be administered and run 
by the Hydrographer of the Navy. The ship’s officers and crew 
were to be men of the Royal Navy, the Captain and the deck 
officers being surveyors. A small scientific team was to be carried 
to study the environmental conditions of the fish; a trawl was to 
be part of the ship’s equipment and a fishing skipper and four 
trawlermen were to be carried to shoot it on the fishing grounds 
to see what type of catches could be expected by commercial 
fishermen. As the ship was to be built in the Royal Dockyard at 
Chatham and was to sail under the White Ensign, the Ministry of 
Agriculture and Fisheries suggested that Rear-Admiral H. P. 
Douglas, then Hydrographer of the Navy, might like to name her. 
His mind at once turned to the earlier surveying vessel which 
had been so successful in carrying out scientific investigations in 
the oceans and he had no difficulty in selecting an honoured name. 
So Challenger it was—the sixth ship of this name to serve in the 
Royal Navy and the second to serve in the Surveying Service. 
Challenger was to be a single-screw steam ship of about 1200 
tons, just over 200 feet long; she was to be broad in the beam 
with a high forecastle; her stern was to have an overhanging 
counter. She was of an unusual design for a naval vessel, planned 
to stay atsea for a month or more in the waters around Spitz- 
bergen, Iceland and Greenland where heavy seas are common- 
place and ice forms on the decks and rigging. Many took a hand 
in the planning of the ship and by no means all of these were 
in agreement with the design. Minutes written by those con- 
cerned in Admiralty at the time include one which reads: ‘God 
help all who have to sail in this fantastic ship.’ 
She was built in a drydock in Chatham Dockyard and was 


I 


C- LLENGER Was originally planned as a suitable vessel for 


2 CHALLENGER 


launched on rst June, 1931, by Miss Addison, daughter of Dr. 
Addison, the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, in the pres- 
ence of the Hydrographer of the Navy. 

She was not allowed to take the waters gracefully in the normal 
manner, but unromantically floated on the slowly rising waters of 
a dry dock, and as the bottle of champagne was broken on her 
bows, towed away by an undignified tug. Later she entered dry 
dock again for final fitting out. 

Lieutenant-Commander E. H. B. Baker was appointed to 
Challenger about the middle of 1931 to ‘stand-by’, as it is called. 
This officer assists the dockyard officers with the siting of many 
of the minor fittings, boat hoisting arrangements, ship’s com- 
pany’s amenities and numerous other items which can be much 
improved with the advice of a sea-going officer. A boatswain was 
appointed to assist Baker, the Engineer Officer having been 
appointed earlier. 

These three officers were standing on the deck as the water 
was let into the dry dock to float the completed ship. The water 
rose towards the ship’s water-line and then slowly above it. The 
wooden shores supporting the ship on the starboard side floated 
clear but it was obvious to the officers on the deck that the 
shores on the port side were still under great pressure; then, 
suddenly, there was a rending and crashing sound as the port side 
shores splintered and broke as the ship heeled quickly over to 
port. The heavy work boxes belonging to the dockyard workmen 
which had been stacked on deck slid down with a terrifying 
clatter, and the small group of officers found themselves alone 
on a deck sloping at about 12 degrees. 

There had been no one of importance on the dockside to see 
the second launching of the Challenger, but very soon the Admiral 
Superintendent of the Dockyard and many other “brass hats’ and 
senior dockyard officers were mustering around the dockside, to 
see the distressing sight of a brand new vessel lying afloat in the 
dock with a heavy list to port. She had compelled men of 
importance to witness her final launching. 

Some miscalculation or some departure in construction from 
the plans had caused this instability, and many tons of ballast 
had now to be placed in the bottom of the ship to make her 
stable. Those who had doubted her suitability for her work felt 


THE NEW SHIP 3 


that they had been justified, and others said that a mishap at the 
launching boded ill for her future. In fact, when she had been 
properly ballasted she proved to be one of the most seaworthy 
vessels ever built; although she was lively she was extremely ‘dry’ 
—that is, she rode the seas and shipped very little water onboard. 
All who have served in Challenger speak highly of her fine qualities 
in this respect. It was an exciting experience to stand on the 
bridge looking aft when the ship was running before a really high 
following sea; great waves would come towering towards her 
tiny quarterdeck and at the last moment, when you could be 
sure that it was too late and that she was to be badly pooped, 
her stern would rise steeply upwards and a great wave would pass 
safely below. 

Challenger was completed in the autumn of 1931: her Captain 
had been chosen and the scientists had been selected; but 1931 
was the year of the great financial slump, the economy drive was 
on, and soon the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries realised 
that they would be unable to afford this ship. So Challenger lay, 
complete and ready for sea, in the basin at Chatham, her future 
uncertain at the very commencement of her career. 

Lieutenant-Commander Baker, a forthright officer, and known 
affectionately in the Surveying Service as ‘Buck’, took command 
of the ship with only a handful of men to keep her alive. Buck 
knew, as all good seamen do, that if a ship is once reduced to a 
care and maintenance state she will take a very long time to get 
back to sea again. A ship lives only when men are looking after 
her, and when her gear and equipment are receiving daily atten- 
tion. Buck resisted, as only he can, all the efforts of officialdom 
to reduce Challenger to a care and maintenance state. He, his 
Engineer Officer, his Boatswain and his few seamen and stokers 
got down to the work together, wielding brooms and paint 
brushes, deck scrubbers and holystones. The ship remained alive 
but her future was still undecided. 

This was the state of affairs a few days before Christmas, 1931. 
Every man who could be spared from Challenger’s skeleton crew 
had gone on Christmas leave when the Captain was called to the 
telephone. The Operations Officer on the staff of the Com- 
mander-in-Chief, The Nore, asked him if he could be ready to 
sail for Portsmouth in the morning as the ship was required by 


4 CHALLENGER 


the Admiralty to go there at once. The ship’s boilers were in a 
state of preservation, the fuel tanks were empty and the crew on 
leave: tomorrow was impossible, but by recalling the crew from 
their Christmas festivities and by every man’s doing his utmost, 
the ship sailed in three days’ time, the skeleton crew being 
augmented by a few ratings from Chatham Barracks to form a 
steaming party. 

The Captain had been told that His was urgently required at 
Portsmouth and he thought he had done well to get there so 
quickly. In those days a Commanding Officer put on his frock 
coat before waiting on an Admiral, and as he stepped ashore at 
Portsmouth so attired he was pleased with himself and anxious to 
know what urgent work lay in store for his new vessel. He was 
shown in to the Admiral who had been informed that the C.O. 
of Challenger was there to see him. ‘Good morning, Baker,’ he 
greeted him. ‘What is Challenger—a new fleet repair ship?’ Buck 
wondered where the urgency lay. 

Naval ratings are all attached to one of three manning ports— | 
Chatham, Portsmouth and Devonport—and in peace time at least 
it is the custom to man a ship with a crew all drawn from one 
of these three depots, as they are called. Although the ship had 
been built at Chatham it transpired that her arrival at Portsmouth 
had been ordered so that she might commission with a Ports- 
mouth crew of about one hundred men, which she did on 2nd 
January, 1932. Except for the war years, when crews were 
mixed, she has had a ‘Pompey’ (naval slang for Portsmouth) crew 
ever since. 

It had been decided to take her over as a full-time naval 
surveying ship, and, as this service is limited in its number of 
ships, often an old and well-loved ship goes to make room for the 
new. H.M.S. Iroquois was due at Portsmouth in a few days’ time 
from the Red Sea after many years surveying in the East, and 
orders had been given that all her stores and surveying equipment 
should be transferred to Challenger on her arrival. Iroquois’s 
surveying days were over. 

Surveying ships in peace time go to sea for their working period 
during what is called the ‘season’, which lasts for eight or nine 
months while the weather is at its best. The remaining three or 
four months of the year is known as the ‘lie-up’, when the ships 


THE NEW SHIP & 


are refitted and the surveying officers draw the fair charts from 
the data collected during the past season. In Home waters, the 
season usually commences about 1st April and the removal of 
funnel covers from surveying ships is as much a sign that spring 
has arrived in a dockyard as the note of the first cuckoo in the 
countryside. 

So Challenger was to start her first season in April and in 
January Captain A. L. Jackson took over command from Baker, 
who once again became the First Lieutenant and went ahead with 
his preparations for the coming season. Like all good First 
Lieutenants he kept his eye open and acquired little things for 
the ship which might otherwise have benefited no one. The old 
battleship Marlborough was being stripped at Portsmouth prior to 
being broken up, so it was only sensible to become friendly with 
the nightwatchman on board her, and soon the wardroom of 
Challenger was embellished to the extent of a fine mahogany table 
and a fitted sideboard. But perhaps the acquisitions of the 
Challenger did not go quite unnoticed by authority. ‘Good 
morning, Number One,’ said the Inspector of Dockyard Police. 
‘That fine spar there is for the Royal Yacht. I thought I had better 
tell you, as I have heard Challenger requires a lower boom.’ 


The most vital information on an Admiralty chart is the depth 
of water; thus the taking of soundings is the most important part 


Leather mark to be hove 


AI 


Leading block / 


Y Z 
A | Sounding position q 


yo Marked leadline 


Somerville sounding gear 


6 CHALLENGER 


of the hydrographic surveyor’s work, The traditional method of 
sounding is by leadline, that is lowering a weight to the sea-bed 
on the end of a line marked in fathoms and feet. This would be 
easy enough if the ship could be stopped for every sounding, but 
as this is not practicable, the lead must be heaved far ahead so 
that it reaches the sea-bed at the moment the leadsman passes 
over it. An ingenious mechanical apparatus for accomplishing 
this had been devised many years previously by Admiral 
Somerville, a well-known surveyor, and this gear was fitted 
in Challenger as standard equipment. By means of a steam 
winch operated aft the lead was hauled forward after each 
sounding, the leadsman being stationed near the winch on the 
quarterdeck. A trailing counterweight kept the leadline nicely 
taut. 

In 1931 a shallow water echo sounding set was being introduced 
in surveying ships. This machine emits a sound toward the sea-bed 
and measures the time taken for the echo to return to the ship. 
These early machines employed a formidable hammer in the 
bottom of the ship which banged out a signal at frequent and 
regular intervals; the operator on the bridge then ran a drum 
marked with the various depths backwards and forwards until he 
received the loudest returning signal in his earphones, when 
he read off and reported the sounding showing on the dial. 

In Challenger, in addition to shallow water sets, there was 
fitted a new deep echo sounding machine designed to take 
soundings in the deeper ocean. The first thing to be done before 
the season started was to carry out trials on the echo sounding 
sets and to do this the ship would have to proceed to seaward of 
the continental shelf to find deep enough water for trying out 
the deep sounder. 

The continents are surrounded by a comparatively shallow and 
gently sloping shelf formed over millions of years by deposits 
carried seawards by water flowing off the land. At a depth of 
about 100 fathoms the edge of this shelf falls rapidly away to 
depths of 2000 fathoms or more, and the true oceans have been 
reached. The whole of the English Channel lies within the con- 
tinental shelf, and to reach the edge of the shelf the ship had to 
steam south-westward from Plymouth for a distance of 200 miles 
or more. 


THE NEW SHIP I) 


The deep set recorded the depths on iodised paper, and clear 
recordings were obtained to a depth of 1200 fathoms. These 
soundings were checked by the ‘Lucas’ wire sounding machine, 
which employs piano wire on which a sounding lead can be 
lowered to the greatest depths and can be recovered by the 
steam engine which forms a part of the machine. 

The first half of the surveying season was then spent off the 
green, rock-bound coast of Aberdeenshire, charting the Buchan 
Deep, and later in the turbulent waters of the Fair Isle Channel 
assisting oceanographers to measure the flow of water from the 
Atlantic into the North Sea. It was an uneventful period, but it 
served as a ‘shake-down’ cruise, as they say in the Navy, when 
officers and men appointed to a new ship become familiar with her 
and her equipment; for every ship is an individual to be studied 
and humoured by her company before she will give of her best. 

In June Challenger was ordered to the coast of Labrador. 
Labrador was administered by the Colonial Office and thus the 
charting of her coastline was the responsibility of the Hydro- 
grapher. It was generally desired at this time to open up a coastal 
route among the labyrinth of uncharted isles and rocks which 
endangered the navigation of mail steamers and other vessels 
trading in the north, and which thus formed a barrier against the 
development of this rugged country. 

At Portsmouth, Commander A. G. N. Wyatt took over the 
command of Challenger from Captain Jackson on Monday, 13th 
June, 1932, and preparations went forward in earnest for the 
forthcoming survey in Labrador; on Friday, 24th June, the ship 
sailed for St. Johns, Newfoundland. 


The surface of the ocean is constantly in motion, with many 
great current rivers flowing along their established courses, such 
as the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic, the Kuro Shio in the North 
Pacific and the Humboldt Current in the South Pacific which 
carried the Kon-Tiki voyagers on their way. The British seaman 
Dampier was the first man to carry out a comprehensive study of 
these ocean currents and they are still being mapped today. Their 
speeds and directions can be shown on ocean charts, but beneath 
the surface lies a complex system of currents, always moving, 
with waters of different temperatures and salinities; a system to 


8 CHALLENGER 


which the whole life cycle of the deep sea fauna is completely 
connected, but of which man as yet knows very little. 

As they probed into the depths of the ocean, scientists had 
expected the temperature to decrease and the salinity and the 
pressure to increase; but it is found, in fact, that it is usually onl 
the pressure which increases at a steady rate with depth. The 
different water masses moving beneath the surface cause irregular 
fluctuations in both the temperature and the salinity, and such 
fluctuations in turn affect the speed of sound in the water—and 
hence soundings obtained with an echo sounder. 

Working on the returns of temperature and salinity at depth 
recorded by many of the world’s oceanographic expeditions, from 
the Challenger of 1875 onwards, Dr. D. J. Matthews of the 
Hydrographic Department had divided the world up into a num- 
ber of areas, in each of which he considered the water conditions 
to be similar enough for him to establish tables of corrections 
to be applied to echo soundings to give the true depth; but so 
few and far between were the available data that Matthews was 
anxious to revise his tables, and by 1932 he was actively collecting 
records for this work, which he completed in 1938. In the North 
Atlantic over the next three or four years Challenger was to be 
able to occupy a considerable number of stations to make oceano- 
graphic observations of this nature as she voyaged between 
Portsmouth and her survey grounds in the West Indies and in 
Labrador. 

An instrument known as a ‘reversing water-bottle’ is used to 
obtain this temperature and salinity data. A number of such bottles 
are attached at set distances apart on a wire running from a winch 
on the forecastle. The reversing water-bottle is an open-ended 
cylinder with thermometers attached to the outside. When 
lowered into the water these bottles are set like mousetraps, to be 
sprung later by a small weight or ‘messenger’ which is sent down 
the wire when the bottles have been lowered to the correct 
depth. When thus sprung, the bottle turns upside down and 
closes, trapping a water sample, which may later be bottled for 
salinity analysis; while the temperature at the time of the rever- 
sal of the bottle may be read from the special thermometers which 
are designed to record the temperature at the time of the arrival 
of the messenger. 


THE NEW SHIP 9 


Such observations are somewhat laborious, and in order that 
they may not hold up other survey work, they must go forward in 
any weather, day or night. To keep the ship head to wind and 
the wire vertical the officer in charge needs to be fully alert, and 
it may take up to five hours to complete all the observations at 
a station in deep water of 2500 fathoms or so. It is recorded that 
on 24th November, 1932, a standard series of temperature and 
salinity observations was obtained while a strong west-nor’-west 
wind was blowing, causing the ship to roll up to 25 degrees, but 
that the ship lay very well with main try-sail set and her engines 
turning slow ahead, with an occasional kick of half ahead to 
straighten her when she tended to fall off the wind. Challenger 
carried a fore-sail and a try-sail, probably the last naval vessel to 
carry sail. 

Perhaps it was after such an occasion that a tot of gin found its 
way into one of the samples before they were despatched for 
analysis in England, but the chemist was up to his work, for he 
sent a note back to say that further sampling at this particular 
station should augment the wardroom wine stocks. 

And so Challenger occupied ‘bottling stations’ for many long 
hours during her passages in the Atlantic during the next few years. 

Modifications had been made to the Challenger deep echo 
sounding set, and on passage across the Atlantic soundings were 
obtained with ease at depths down to 2580 fathoms. Even today 
there are very few vessels fitted with sounding sets recording 
more than 600 fathoms; so it is upon research vessels, survey 
vessels and telegraph cable ships that hydrographers rely to obtain 
data on the topography of the ocean bed, the average depth of 
which throughout the world is about 2700 fathoms. When 
obtained, much of this deep sea sounding information is passed 
by member states to the International Hydrographic Bureau at 
Monaco, which maintains a world series of bathymetric charts 
depicting the complex topography of the floor of the world’s 
oceans. It is when looking at the few lines of soundings across the 
vast areas comprising the oceans that one realises how much there 
is to be learnt about such a large part of the earth’s surface. 


Il 


Labrador 


N Tuesday, sth July, 1932, Challengerarrived at St. John’s, 

Newfoundland, and the Captain made the usual calls on 

the Governor and the Prime Minister. Arrangements were 
made for Captain Clarke, Master of one of the Newfoundland 
Government steamers, and well acquainted with the northern 
Labrador coast, to be embarked to act as pilot on the voyage 
‘down north’, as they say in these parts. The coast of Labrador 
is fringed with countless islands and islets and the sea-bed is ex- 
tremely rugged with pinnacle rocks rising to within a few feet 
of the surface. 

No better captain could have been chosen for this survey work 
in Labrador than Commander Wyatt. He was a real seaman in 
the very finest sense, navigation being second nature to him. In 
his leisure moments he might be found sitting on the deck outside 
his cabin sewing canvas or splicing wire rope. Officers and men 
who sailed with Wyatt always had supreme confidence in his 
ability as a seaman and, although a strict disciplinarian, he was well 
loved by his ship’s companies in Challenger. His speech was that 
of a good old-fashioned seaman; one day the Boatswain was 
baffled by the Captain ordering him to remove a mouse from the 
forestay, a ‘mouse’ being a piece of spun-yarn wound round a 
wire or rope to form a thickening. 

The Labrador coast is frozen in from December until the 
spring, when the ice begins to break up. The ice disappears first 
from the inshore areas, leaving icebergs here and there along the 
coast, many of them grounded in the shallower water. The 
melting bergs also ‘calve’ small pieces known as growlers, which 
are very low in the water and are a real danger to a ship navi- 
gating at night. For another six weeks or so the pack ice prevents 
navigation in the waters offshore. 

For a ship to pass up the Labrador coast in late summer there 
are two alternative routes, the open sea route or the inshore 


10° 


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Above: ROUNDING CAPE HARRIGAN. VOYAGE NORTH—JULY 1932 


Below: PAN ICE. VOYAGE NORTH—JULY 1932 


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LABRADOR I! 


route threading between the numerous islands. The inshore route 
is open long before the outer route, but the inshore route was 
only very sketchily charted in 1932, the charts being so much 
in error along some parts of the coast as to be unrecognisable. 
Challenger’s instructions for her work in Labrador were to survey 
a route inside the islands from Indian Harbour in the south to 
Cape Chidley in the north, touching at each port of call, and 
with passages to seaward at selected intervals. 

But first Challenger must navigate northwards along this un- 
surveyed coast route to reach Nain, where it had been decided 
to commence surveying operations. The pack ice to seaward denied 
the use of that route until later in the season and the work must 
be started at the earliest opportunity. 

On Thursday, 7th July, the ship, loaded with stores and fresh 
provisions, and with the mails for northern Labrador, sailed for 
Hopedale. By nightfall the following day the ship was off Belle 
Isle, icebergs and growlers having been sighted during the day, 
which had been fine and clear, with a cloudless sky. Sailing 
northwards off the coast an increasing number of bergs were 
seen, between 25 and 50 being in view at any one time. Captain 
Clarke, the pilot, said that this number was usual along this part 
of the coast at this time of year. He had been navigating these 
waters as a fisherman, as a master of sealers and ice breakers and, 
finally, of the Newfoundland Government steamers, for over 40 
years and was now 60 years of age, although he looked far 
younger. He spoke with the Irish brogue common to Newfound- 
landers, although he was of English stock and had never been to 
Ireland. At times his brogue was so broad that he was difficult 
to follow. 

Bergs were by now becoming so numerous that navigation after 
dark was hazardous and the ship anchored for the night of 
Saturday, 9th July, in Webeck Harbour, passing into the anchor- 
age between two icebergs grounded in the entrance. Inside were 
two fishing schooners, frequently met with along this coast during 
the summer when they fished for cod, which was salted and sent 
to the European market. 

At dawn the ship weighed and stood over to the south side of 
Ragged Islands, passing between them and a small double island, 
thence past Black Bear Island and north-eastward of Mortimer 

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LABRADOR 13 


Shoal, when the wind shifted to the north-east and fog came into 
the land. This being long before the days of radar the ship had to 
look for an anchorage and just found one in a bight at the south 
end of Kidlialuit. By noon the fog had lifted again, and weighing 
anchor the ship passed between the Iron Bound Islands and then 
across between Mokkovik Island and Ulgoklialuit Island. She then 
stood over to Cape Mokkovik and between the Turnaviks, south 
of Striped Island and round Tikkerasuk Light and across to 
Kayaksuatilik, where the passage between the islands and rocks 
is exceedingly narrow though quite deep. The existing chart was 
almost unrecognisable, but from here across to Hopedale was 
nearly a straight run with pack ice visible to seaward. By 7 p.m. 
the ship was at anchor in Hopedale and the Captain landed to 
call on the local missionary belonging to the Grenfell Mission. 

At noon on Monday the ship proceeded again northwards for 
Nain. Close pack ice between Kikkertaksoak Islands and the coast 
islands prevented the route being taken to Cape Harrigan, so 
passage was made through the inner sounds and Windy Tickle. 
Loose pans of ice, some of them very solid, were in all the bays 
and tickles and the ship was continually under helm to avoid 
them. ‘Tickle’ is the name given in these parts to a narrow 
-passage between land, and the scenery coming through them was 
very beautiful; high hills streaked with snow and little copses of 
spruce at the foot of the valleys, bright sunshine with cumulus 
clouds, and deep blue water flecked with white icepans made an 
exciting picture. 

On arrival at Cape Harrigan loose pack ice was found from about 
a mile offshore to the Farmyard Islands but only drift ice inshore, 
so the Captain hoped to round the cape, but fog came down and 
the ship had to turn back to find anchorage behind Nunaksaluk 
Island. 

It was not until 4 o’clock in the afternoon on the following 
day that the fog lifted sufficiently for the ship to get under way, 
but at once pack ice was seen almost in to the coast, with a lead 
of blue water about four miles out. There was a narrow lead 
between the pack and Cape Harrigan, through which the ship 
managed to pass, only about 100 yards off the rocks but with a 
depth of 16 fathoms of water. After passing the cape, however, 
the course across to Wrecked Boat Island was entirely blocked 


14 CHALLENGER 


and the ship had to push her way through loose pack, butting the 
smaller pans end on, rising a little, and then breaking through 
with her weight. After rounding the south-west end of Wrecked 
Boat Island the pack was heavier and the Captain decided to stand 
inshore to pass inside Kutallik Island, the ship finally coming to 
anchor for the night in Davis Inlet. 

On Wednesday morning the ship was under way by 4.30 and 
passed north-eastward of Ukasiksalik Island, but the ice-pack ex- 
tended inside Freestone Islands and it was doubtful whether it 
was best to try and go through it or to take the inner channels. 
The inner route was selected as Captain Clarke thought it likely 
that the ice would become worse towards Spracklings Island. 
The lead in the ice divided into two between Tunnungayualuk 
and the mainland, and choosing one of these leads the ship soon 
passed the wrong side of an island and had a rock awash ahead 
and had to bring up. The two motor sounding launches were 
lowered and with lead and line tried to find a passage but with 
no result. So the ship turned back and tried the other lead, with 
the boats ahead of her running submarine sentries, a simple 
device made of two boards about two feet long and six inches 
wide, secured at right angles, which when towed from a boat 
keeps a steady depth according to the length of the towing line. 
When the depth of water is less than that to which the sentry is 
set it strikes the bottom and rises to the surface to give warning 
of shallow water; a device used by generations of surveyors for 
feeling their way in uncharted waters. 

The sentries soon tripped and the boats then commenced a 
search for deeper water; it was not until 5 o’clock that they 
found a passage with six fathoms of water through it and the 
ship was able to proceed. The boat’s sentries tripped again in 
the Narrows between Tuktuinak Islands and Tunnungayualuk. 
The ship anchored while they searched for a passage, which they 
eventually found, and then went on as far as Achpitok Island 
where, at ro o’clock at night, she brought up in 18 fathoms 
between the island and the mainland. 

By Thursday rainy weather had set in. The ship weighed 
anchor at 4.30 in the morning and stood across to Dog Island 
through a lead in the ice. The existing chart was wrongly orient- 
ated here but a channel was followed between Nochalik and 


LABRADOR iG 


Kikkitavak. With a boat running a sentry ahead the ship passed 
through the Taktok Tickle and then north-westward for the 
channel between Palungitak and Paul Islands, where she came to 
anchor and a boat was sent to sound out and buoy the channel 
through. 

The area where the survey of the coast was to be commenced 
had now been reached, and all eyes on the bridge were alert to 
see any site ashore which would be suitable for the base line 
measurement. 

There are three basic essentials to an original survey. First a 
suitable stretch of land, at least half a mile long, must be found 


Striker € 


The Submarine Sentry 


and levelled. On this a base line will be carefully measured with 
steel tapes to establish the scale of the survey. Next the geograph- 
ical position on the earth’s surface of some point within the area 
of the survey must be fixed by taking star sights, usually with a 
surveyor’s astrolabe. The position of this point in relation to 
the base line can be found by measuring the angles of the triangle 
it forms with the base line. But the orientation of the survey still 
remains to be found. In other words the direction on the earth’s 
surface of the base line (or any other line on the survey) is still 
unknown, and this is established by measuring the angle between 
a line joining any two points and the sun (or a star), knowing 


16 CHALLENGER 


the exact time at which this reading is taken. This is known as 
a true bearing between the points. Stations marked by flags on 
poles, or by tripods boarded up or filled in with calico, are then 
established, usually on the higher ground, throughout the area 
to be surveyed. By measuring the many horizontal angles con- 
tained by the numerous triangles thus established the relative 
positions of all these points are found. The geographical position 
of each can be found by referring all stations to the position fixed 
by star sights and the position where the true bearing has been 
observed. This framework is known as the triangulation and to it 
all the details of the survey, soundings and topography are fixed 
as the work proceeds. 

No really suitable place was found for a base on Paul Island 
and so, when the boats had sounded out the channel, the ship 
went through and came to anchor in Nain Bay at 9.30 at night, 
one week out from St. John’s, Newfoundland. Challenger’s arrival 
at Nain was popular with the few inhabitants of this little Hudson 
Bay trading station, as she was the first steamer to get north 
through the ice this year, and the mail she brought was very 
welcome. Nain lies well protected from seaward by numerous 
islands, the largest of which, Aulatsevik, lies to the north-east- 
ward. A narrow channel, or ‘run’, as it is called, divides this 
island from the mainland and leads to Port Manvers about 20 
miles northward. Local opinion seemed to agree that the ship 
could pass up inside this Port Manvers Run although there were 
two ‘rattles’ to be negotiated. (A rattle is a narrow channel 
through which the tidal stream flows so fast that an appreciable 
noise is made by the water.) Local opinion also agreed that a flat 
expanse of land lay on the south side of Port Manvers which 
seemed suitable for the base measurement. There was no hope 
of reaching Port Manvers by the outside route for some weeks, 
pack ice being solid right into the coast of Aulatsevik. So on the 
morning of Saturday, 16th July, the ship steamed up the Port 
Manvers Run, experiencing no difficulty until the second rattle 
was reached about two miles from Port Manvers. Ice floes were 
drifting through the rattle on the tidal stream, so the ship was 
anchored and a boat sent to investigate. She located a navigable 
passage close to the eastern shore and later led the ship through, 
but on rounding the point it was seen that the whole western 


—— 


LABRADOR 17 


entrance to Port Manvers was jammed solid with ice, and there 
was nothing for it but to turn round and go back down the run 
to an island about eight miles from Nain, which had been noted 
as a possible base measurement site. 

Navigation ‘down north’ by the inshore route has been des- 
cribed at some length to show the risks which had to be run in 
1932, and in the following two summers, in order to get to the 
survey ground as soon as it was sufficiently clear of ice for survey 
work in the very short season, which lasted only from mid-July 
until early November. 

The base site having been chosen, the survey went forward in 
earnest. On the evening before a day of surveying, the Captain 
makes his plans, stating broadly in his surveying order book what 
work is to be done and which surveying officers are to do it. 
The First Lieutenant then assesses how many men and what 
boats will be required for the various tasks, and then, with the 
Coxswain, he details the men for each party; these are not con- 
fined to any particular branch in the ship—seamen, stokers, the 
sick bay attendant, the officers’ stewards or even the ship’s cooks 
may be sent on this work if they volunteer for it. To an outsider 
there appears to be a certain degree of chaos in the early stages 
of a survey; parties go off every morning after an early breakfast, 
taking with them their dinner, together with a quantity of gear, 
such as poles, flags, calico, rope, hammers, spades, mauls, bolt 
staves and axes, maps, charts, binoculars and prismatic compasses. 

A surveying ship usually carries about six or eight boats of 
various types and sizes, and all these may be away on any one day. 
It is an animated scene in the mornings, particularly when a strong 
wind is blowing and the boats alongside are heaving up and down, 
as the assorted equipment is handed down and passed into the 
boats, the petty officer or leading seaman in charge seeing that 
the gear of each party is not irretrievably muddled with that of 
another party. At the appointed hour, 7.30 or 8 o’clock, the 
boats, with their crews clad in many assorted rigs, each man 
wearing what he thinks most appropriate to the weather con- 
ditions prevailing, and towing dinghies or dories for landing on 
the coast, cast off and head away towards different points on the 
horizon. As they become smaller and smaller and finally become 
a tiny dot in a white flicker of foam the Coxswain heaves a sigh 


18 CHALLENGER 


of relief and goes below to stop the rum tots of those who have 
gone off surveying for the day, nothing being more infuriating to 
the sailor than to find when he returns, after a day in the field, 
soaked to the skin and dead tired, that he has a ‘cold’ tot, one 
that has been mixed with water since midday due to the failure 
of those onboard to realise he is away for dinner. 

On this first day of the Labrador survey a large party of sur- 
veying officers and men went ashore to prepare the base for 
measurement, while other parties were marking the proposed 
triangulation stations on the mountain tops, some of which are 
as much as 3000 feet high; such heights take a deal of climbing, 
starting from sea level laden with spars, ropes and iron pegs for 
erecting the mark on the summit. The first few hundred feet of 
the mountains were clothed with spruce and after that the climb 
became steep and rough, the mountain sides being almost 
entirely barren, even moss and lichens being scarce amongst the 
huge tumbled boulders. These same mountains would then have 
to be scaled again, with a theodolite on the back, to observe the 
horizontal angles between the other main stations and the marks 
which will by then have been set up along the coastline; and then 
perhaps again after that if the visibility closes down on the top, 
preventing observations. 

The base measurement party had a formidable task ahead of 
them; part of the proposed base lay over stony, rough ground 
while the remainder of the distance was across a swamp. It was 
the best that could be found in this rugged country. Three days’ 
work was required before the hard ground had been levelled and 
an earth causeway built across the swamp to take the steel tapes. 

The measurement itself must be made with great care; even 
the temperature of the tapes and the tension upon them must be 
taken into account. It is a careful and unhurried process. 

All surveying parties cursed the black flies and the mosquitoes 
which swarmed on the exposed parts of the face and body: head 
nets and gloves were essential but, if the head net was allowed 
to touch the face at any point, that part of the net would soon 
be black with flies irritating damnably. Only when a strong wind 
was blowing was there any respite from these pests. 

Rain fell heavily and steadily throughout these early days and 
sometimes the whole of the base line area seemed to be under 


LABRADOR 19 


water. A portable galley had been rigged ashore to provide a good 
midday meal for the party, and the junior ship’s cook had been 
established in a tent to do the cooking. He had never cooked 
under such conditions before and soon he came out into the 
pouring rain carrying a little billycan: ‘Where do I go for 
water?’ he asked a seaman who was drenched to the skin. 
‘Water!’ shouted the sailor. ‘Why, you just keeps on walking 
till your ruddy cap floats.’ 

How do the men like this kind of work? The great majority 
find it a welcome break from life in the Fleet for it is certainly 
something altogether different, and in the days before the war, 
when the drafting authorities did not appear to be so tied to 
regulations, surveyors were allowed to keep the same men in the 
ship commission after commission if they volunteered to do so 
—which many of them did. Those who really like the work can 
become Surveying Recorders, which means that they will always 
serve in surveying ships. Such men are trained in the simpler 
surveying work and are invaluable leaders, who are able to teach 
the newly appointed surveying crews what surveying is all about 
in the first baffling days of a new commission. 

Through August and early September the work went forward, 
the base was measured, a party in camp observed stars with the 
astrolabe after waiting many nights for clear visibility; and then, 
the position being known, a true bearing with reference to the 
sun was observed between two of the triangulation stations in 
the survey. Two and sometimes three camp parties were estab- 
lished in the Port Manvers Run area and on the barren islands to 
seaward. The pack ice had cleared and the ship was often under 
way among the islands, navigating day after day in uncharted 
waters. 

Apart from the day-to-day organisation of the hill marking and 
theodolite observing teams, there was the welfare of those in 
camp to be thought of, replenishment of the camps with food 
and sometimes water on the more barren islands, and there was 
wood to be chopped on the mainland and carried to camps where 
no wood existed. 

The Doctor Forbes Air Survey seaplane and a party in an 
attendant schooner arrived one day and provided welcome new 
faces; besides which the seaplane took a number of air photo- 


20 CHALLENGER 


graphs which were of considerable assistance in the survey. 
Commander Wyatt was taken up for a reconnaissance flight over 
the area. The day of his flight was fine and clear and he described 
the scene; the islands along the coast were almost literally in- 
numerable and the general appearance from aloft of the relation 
between land and water was that of pieces of a jig-saw puzzle 
scattered over a blue cloth. The country inland was exceedingly 
rough, well wooded in parts, but broken up by many inlets of 
the sea, some running thirty miles or so inland, and with lakes 
and ponds scattered everywhere and at all levels. The immensity 
of the survey task was fully apparent from this height. 

Leaving a camp party at Nain, the ship hurried to Halifax at 
the end of August for fuel and provisions and then down north 
again, now using the easier outside route. 

Back on the survey ground the triangulation was carried sea- 
ward on the chain of islands, and, with all the officers except the 
Boatswain either away in camp or with daily survey parties, the 
Captain was alone all day on the bridge as the ship moved from 
one island to another, picking up parties from one point so that 
they could be landed elsewhere to observe there. The ship moved 
amongst a labyrinth of uncharted islands, rocks and shoals, feeling 
her way, constantly under helm, and sometimes, with breakers 
ahead, having to come astern or turn round and try another 
passage. 

A secure anchorage was found at Ford’s Harbour and thither 
the ship often made her way back as dusk was falling, only to be 
under way again at the first light of dawn. On Friday, 23rd 
September, she weighed and left Ford’s Harbour at daylight and 
steamed northwards at nine knots to land a theodolite observing 
party on an island about eight miles distant. She was taking a 
route which she had followed in safety twice previously and 
where no dangers had been located by echo sounding or by the 
man looking out from the crow’s nest (such a look-out was 
always posted in these waters). The Captain was alone on the 
bridge except for the rating watching the echo sounding machine 
who called out the soundings every 20 seconds. The soundings 
were between 50 and 30 fathoms, but suddenly a sounding of 21 
fathoms was called, and the water then shoaled so rapidly that 
the echo was momentarily lost, and before another sounding 


LABRADOR 21 


could be called the ship shuddered as she struck a rocky shoal. 
The engines were stopped and put to full astern with no effect. 
Abreast the bridge the ship was hard and fast, while at her bows 
and stern soundings showed deep water ; truly this was a pinnacle 
rock. 

This was indeed a serious predicament, the ship firmly aground 
in a remote part of the Labrador coast with the nearest help over 
a thousand miles away and the amount of damage done to the 
ship’s hull difficult to assess. Challenger must now rely entirely 
on her own officers and men and they did not fail her. 

A boat having sounded round the ship it was decided to at- 
tempt to get the ship off stern first at high water, which was due 
in about 43 hours’ time, and might give about two feet of water 
more than when the ship grounded. Time was short and work 
commenced at once. First the damage was inspected as far as this 
was possible inside the ship, and then wooden shores were placed 
against all the adjacent bulkheads, the damaged compartments 
themselves being sealed off by their own watertight doors. It 
appeared that all the forward oil fuel and fresh-water tanks were 
leaking and that the large provision room and canteen store were 
flooded with oil fuel and water, and further, that there was a 
slight leak in the forward end of the boiler room which was 
situated abaft the provision room. This damage must be localised 
as far as possible so that when the ship floated off the reef the 
minimum risk of further damage might be incurred. 

Meanwhile the two ship’s anchors were lowered below the 
water line and slung beneath boats ; this was no mean task as each 
anchor weighed 28 hundredweight. These anchors were discon- 
nected from their cables and when wire hawsers had been secured 
to them they were laid out astern of the ship and the hawsers 
brought to the steam trawl winch on the quarterdeck. An amus- 
ing incident happened at this point, for when the huge anchors 
were slipped from beneath the boats the latter regained their full 
buoyancy with such force that a member of one of the crews was 
catapulted into the icy water. A smaller kedge anchor was 
similarly laid out ahead of the ship to steady her. 

Just before high water, the anchor cables, now without their 
anchors, were lowered onto the sea-bed, 14 tons of fresh water 
and 15 tons of fuel were pumped overboard from tanks in the 


22 CHALLENGER 


forward part of the ship and all the crew mustered aft, so that the 
ship was considerably lightened forward. At about high water the 
stern hawsers leading to the two bower anchors which had been 
laid out astern were hove upon and the engines put to full speed 
astern. It was a tense moment as ever so slowly the ship began 
to move, and very gently came off the rock. The first part of 
getting the ship back to port was achieved, but there were many 
more difficulties to be overcome yet. A hum of eager conversation 
on the quarterdeck was soon quelled by the Coxswain detailing 
the men for the task of recovering the anchors. The hawsers 
running to the bower anchors had now to be led to the forward 
winch and these anchors hauled up into the hawsepipes once again 
and connected to the cables. The kedge anchor had also to be 
recovered before the ship returned to Ford Harbour so that divers 
could determine the full extent of the damage; meanwhile the 
pumps were just holding their own with the water in the 
damaged compartments. 

On the next day, Saturday, a strong easterly wind was blowing 
into the anchorage and it was late in the afternoon before the 
two ship’s divers could be sent down. The whole of Sunday was 
also spent in diving, while the ship’s boats made long journeys to 
recover the three camp parties who were soon alive with bustle 
as they took down the tents and packed the bedding, provisions, 
surveying equipment and a hundred other items that make up 
the detached survey camp. 

The divers had an extremely cold job and they could work only 
in short spells before warming up onboard and preparing to go 
down again ; but encouraged by the Boatswain and the small party 
of men who were working the air pump and attending on them, 
they gradually built up a picture of the damage to the ship’s hull 
and in addition they were able to plug six holes from which 
rivets were now missing. This allowed the pumps to reduce con- 
siderably the amount of water in the damaged compartments. 

At daylight on Monday, 26th September, the ship was as ready 
as she could be to sail for the south, and it was now necessary 
to take the inshore route again, at least until it was certain that 
the plugged rivets were holding satisfactorily. To encounter heavy 
weather such as could be expected in the open sea might cause 
further damage, particularly to the forward bulkhead of the boiler 


LABRADOR 23 


room, which might be flooded with the most serious results. 
Both Challenger’s boilers were in the same boiler room, fitted 
side by side. 

So once more the boats swept ahead of the ship with the sub- 
marine sentries for two long days as the ship sailed southwards 
through the islands to Cape Harrigan. Halifax seemed a very long 
way away to those who were anxiously watching the damage and 
nursing the vessel every mile of the way. The Commander-in- 
Chief of the West Indies Station had been kept informed of the 
ship’s plight and on Wednesday she met up with the naval sloop 
Heliotrope which had come north to stand by. Challenger had felt 
very much alone during these last few days and all onboard were 
glad to know that now they were being looked after. 

The glass began to fall and the wind was freshening from the 
south; such weather might soon increase the damage, so the two 
ships anchored in Domino Run for shelter. There they remained 
weather bound until Friday, when a lull permitted them to go 
on to York Harbour in the Bay of Islands, Newfoundland, where 
again shelter had to be taken. Never more anxiously had those 
onboard watched the barometer and the freshening wind. After 
a false start on Sunday, when the swell in the open sea forced 
them to return, they eventually sailed on Monday and reached 
Halifax on Wednesday without further mishap. Here they were 
received with generous assistance afforded by the Royal Canadian 
Navy, and the ship was docked a few days later for extensive 
repairs to be carried out by Halifax Shipyards Ltd. It was not 
until 18th November that she was ready to sail home to Ports- 
mouth. 

The Lords of the Admiralty considered this case of grounding 
and decided that no blame was attributable to anyone for striking 
an uncharted pinnacle rock in such difficult waters; furthermore, 
they considered that the Commanding Officer had acted in a sea- 
manlike manner in getting his ship afloat and carrying her to 
Halifax, and commended Mr. H. Good, the Engineer Officer, 
and the divers for their fine work. 

The Hydrographic Department placed ‘Challenger Rock’ on 
the charts of the Labrador Coast. 


fil 


Windward Isles and the 


Grenadines 


ITH its 4000 navigational charts, the British Admiralty 

\ / claims to have world coverage; and although a large 
proportion of these are based on original surveys made 

by earlier British hydrographic surveyors, they are kept up to 
date and new charts made from British and foreign government 
surveys. Hydrographers generally are generous in their exchange 
of information and the international goodwill existing in this 
field can be equalled only by the similar free exchange of ideas 
and information among the world’s oceanographers and astrono- 
mers. International politics could profit from these examples. 

All the British Dominions, except Ceylon, now have their own 
hydrographic services, leaving the Hydrographer of the Navy 
responsible for the charting of British Home waters and those of 
the British Colonies overseas. Even today this is a very formidable 
task, difficult to envisage until one realises how much of this 
area is still imperfectly surveyed; in addition much of the earlier 
work requires re-surveying with modern methods and equipment 
to bring it up to the standard required for modern charts. 

The Hydrographer keeps constantly under review those areas 
which require survey, and it needs considerable foresight and 
thought to decide which areas should be tackled next. The 
Hydrographer is responsible that both the Royal and the Mer- 
chant Navies receive the up-to-date charts they require, and to 
a lesser extent he must be prepared to assist the Colonial Office 
with surveys which may be needed to foster new developments. 
For naval requirements an eye must be kept on the future, 
judging which anchorages and passages will be of the greatest 
importance in any emergency or future wartime activity. The 
opening of a new oil refinery in a remote place may mean that 

24 


WINDWARD ISLES AND THE GRENADINES Dike 


there is a sudden call for up-to-date charts of an area which has 
been little surveyed: these eventualities must be foreseen and 
thus the surveyor oftens finds himself working in a little known 
part of the world which within a few years will have become a 
busy development area. It is of no use to build a new commercial 
harbour to handle oil, timber or even ground-nuts if the outer 
approaches are found to have shoal water preventing the use of 
the harbour by the deepest draught ships which can be expected 
in the future. 

With these possibilities in mind and always with more surveys 
to do than there are ships, the Hydrographer juggles on paper 
until the programme for each ship for the forthcoming season is 
decided. Hydrographic Instructions are then drawn up for each 
Commanding Officer, the instructions being addressed to him 
personally and covering the broad outlines of the surveys to be 
carried out during the season, usually leaving all details of admin- 
istration, such as fuelling and provisioning arrangements, and the 
order in which the surveys are to be done, to the Commanding 
Officer. He will make his own plans, suitable to the weather and 
other local conditions prevalent in each area. 

It is interesting to compare the opening sentences of the 
Hydrographic Instructions of a hundred years ago with those of 
today. The following is an example of the language of the earlier 


days: 


Strong representations having been made to H.M. Government of the 
rapidly increasing traffic between our Australian Colonies and the western 
Coast of America, and moreover of the inadequate knowledge we possess 
of the intervening navigation amongst its insulated rocks and intricate clusters 
of islands which extend to the eastward of New Caledonia, and considering 
the great benefit that distant commerce and maritime enterprise would derive 
from a thorough examination of that region, from having its dangers fully 
explored, and from having its harbours so charted and described that the 
Seaman could know where he would either obtain supplies or repair to for 
refit or refuge, or endeavour to fix his whaling or his coaling stations. 

We have therefore thought proper to select you for the purpose of carrying 
out these important objects and have appointed you to the command of 
H.M. Ship Herald, and we have also placed H.M. steam tender Torch, com- 
manded by Lieutenant William Chinnco, under your orders to act as your 
consort and to pioneer you in doubtful ground and shallow waters—both 
vessels being amply furnished with Stores, Instruments and comforts of every 
kind. . . . (Orders for Captain H. N. Denham, R.N., 14th May, 1852.) 


26 CHALLENGER 


The passing of such an explicit and encouraging opening must 
be regretted. Today they read rather more prosaically : 


Having completed your refit and the drawing of the Fair Charts of last 
season’s work, and being in all respects ready for sea, you are to leave 
Portsmouth on Monday, roth April and proceed to the Grenadines, West 
Indies, where you are to take in hand the following survey .. . 


And, in fact, that is how the Hydrographic Instructions for 
Commander Wyatt read when he received them in early Feb- 


ruary 1933. 


Although the Labrador survey was to go forward, it was im- 
possible to get in through the ice much before mid-July and it 
was expected that freezing over would force the survey to be 
discontinued about mid-November. This was a short season in- 
deed and Commander Wyatt had discussed a plan with the 
Hydrographer whereby a winter party would be left ashore in 
Labrador in November until the following July. It seemed that 
such a party might expect to make considerable progress in both 
triangulation work and in coastlining; with the sea completely 
frozen over the theodolite teams would be able to move across 
from one island to another by sledge, and plotting the coastline 
could be done by sledging along the edge of the frozen sea 
rather than by walking over many miles of broken country as 
would have been necessary in the summer time. 

But conditions during such a winter would be extremely 
severe and it would need men of character and endurance if much 
useful work was to be accomplished. Challenger had these men: 
‘Number One’, Baker, would lead the team with Lieutenant 
D. W. Deane as his assistant surveyor. Surgeon Lieutenant Com- 
mander E. W. Bingham had now been appointed to Challenger ; 
he had much previous experience of work under such conditions, 
having been to Greenland with Gino Watkins, and he was known 
to be a good man with dog teams on which the work would very 
greatly depend. These men, together with Petty Officer Stevenson, 
were well suited to lead others under the rugged conditions to 
be expected, which to say the least of it were novel to the 
seamen who were to make up the winter party. 

However, few were thinking of the winter in Labrador as 


SS eee eee 


Ws 


VAVNdAd 


Above: LIEUT.-COMMANDER BAKER AND OFFICER’S STEWARD HOLGATE STARTING OF 
FOR A DAY’S SURVEYING. 


Below : PETTY-OFFICER STEVENSON FEEDING THE DOG TEAMS 


WINDWARD ISLES AND THE GRENADINES Dy 


Challenger steamed into the beautiful harbour of St. George's, 
Grenada, on a steamy morning in early May. The Captain was 
thinking of the call he would shortly have to pay on His Excellency 
the Governor of the Windward Isles, who resided at St. George’s ; 
laying out his white No. 10 uniform which he would be wearing 
for the call his steward was thinking of all the ‘dhobeying’ he 
would have to do now that the officers and ship’s company were 
to be wearing whites for some months ; Number One was thinking 
how hard it was to get Perkins, the coxswain of the motor boat, 
to look neat and clean for such an occasion, as this good seaman 
sat in the stern sheets of the motor boat which was about to be 
lowered into the water at a sign from the bridge; Ordinary Sea- 
man Clarke was thinking of the ‘blast’ he would be getting from 
the Boatswain as soon as he heard the anchor leave the hawse pipe: 
Clarke’s job was to see that the rope ladder, now neatly rolled 
against the guardrail, ran clear when the others hauled out the 
lower boom to which the boats secured in harbour—but it 
always fouled something and held back the boom, ruining the 
whole evolution, as the Boatswain forcefully told him ; and Stoker 
Pierce, sweating in the engine-room, was thinking of the warm, 
earthy smell of the land, and the crunch of gravel under his feet 
as he made his dusty way along the seafront looking for the 
inevitable bar, not knowing on this first night where to find it— 
but once he had found the right joint and had settled down there 
would be rum, happy dusky female company and music stretching 
into the long tropical night ahead. 

The ship’s company were experiencing that excited anticipation 
of visiting a port for the first time, an experience which never 
palls, and which makes seagoing always something ofan adventure. 

The white houses of the town were scattered higgledy- 
piggledy among the palm trees on the lower slopes of the rounded 
hills surrounding the Carenage, while above the town the palms 
gave way to thick dark-green, bosky trees. Seen from the ship 
at anchor the town has a pleasing aspect and the schooners lying 
with their sterns to the wooden quays before the old-fashioned 
warehouses bring thoughts of earlier days. 

The ship had already visited Carriacou in the Grenadines some 
45 miles to the northward along the arc of islands forming the 
Windward group. The work in the Grenadines was to chart a 

4 


28 CHALLENGER 


number of extensive anchorages for large vessels which appeared 
to exist among the smaller islands such as Carriacou, Little St. 
Vincent and Little Martinique. 

The early operations were the same as on other surveys: a base 
had to be measured, astrolabe sights had to be taken, and then, 
a true bearing having been observed, the triangulation had to be 
schemed and carried on to the hilltops, here much covered in 
trees, scrub and cactus. So instead of the cold, rugged, climbing 
of Labrador there were long days here spent clearing the bush 
so that the various triangulation stations should be inter-visible. 
And a camp party were thus engaged at this moment while the 
ship lay in St. George’s and the crew relaxed ashore. After the 
week-end the ship returned to the survey ground and once again 
the ship’s company were in the throes of the activity which is 
attendant upon the early days of a survey. 

During the first week the base measurement was the most im- 
portant work; the day temperatures being too high for accurate 
measurement with the steel tapes, only the early mornings and 
the late afternoons could be used for carrying out this work. Also 
during the first week the star sights were obtained with the 
astrolabe. 

On Carriacou clear starlit skies permitted observing all night 
long and the native people were amazed to see lights flickering far 
into the night on Jack-a-dan Island. Inside the instrument tent the 
chronograph operator cursed the hundreds of tiny flies, moths and 
flying beetles which were attracted by his kerosene light and 
which fell with a click into the back of the chronograph or became 
lodged on the rollers guiding the paper and jammed these in the 
middle of a successful series of observations, to the unreasoning 
fury of the observer at the astrolabe outside. Sometimes in a lull 
between stars the observer would come into the tent for a tot 
of whisky, for there is nothing like this to make the stars twinkle 
in the telescope. 

As dawn was breaking each day, those who had been observing 
through the night turned in on their camp beds in the cool tent 
and slept as the sun rose and the shadows fell away; but later 
the tents became so hot that further sleep was impossible and they 
turned out to meet the fierce glare of noon and to feel the sand 
hot beneath their feet as they went down the beach for a bathe. 


WINDWARD ISLES AND THE GRENADINES 2 


THE GRENADINES 


Scheme of Triangulation 
H.M.S. CHALLENGER 
1933 -35 


LIST OF STATIONS 
BASE TRIANGULATION — MAIN STATIONS 


A East Base G  Mabouya |. 
B West Base H .MtS*Louis 
C Sandy |. I Sister Rocks 
O Jack-a-dan(Obs.+) JI S.W.Point 
D Chapeau Carré K Kendeace P* 
E mMtD'Or L_ Lit. Martinique 
‘A-B, Base measured F High North M Union I. 
along beach. N Frigate /. 
P Bonaparte R‘* 
Q Cannouan Peak 
S One Tree /. 
T Catholic /. 
V Sail Rock 
7 4 Sea Miles 6 


PO Bonaparte R** 


Scheme of Triangulation 


30 CHALLENGER 


When the triangulation was complete the ship and boats com- 
menced sounding the area to the west of Carriacou, the two boats 
working from a camp established at Hillsborough, a village on the 
west side of Carriacou. Twice during May and June the ship had 
to go to Port of Spain, Trinidad, for fuel and on such occasions 
she left the boats working from the camp at Hillsborough, which 
was now well established, having friendly relations with the in- 
habitants of the village where exciting football matches were 
played on a sandy pitch thinly covered in grass, near the seashore, 
these matches being enthusiastically followed by the great 
majority of the villagers. 

Early in July the camp party was embarked, the triangulation 
flags on the hills taken down and the sites of these stations 
permanently marked by brass plates set in concrete. The western 
part of the survey was complete and the ship sailed on sth July 
for Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Nain in Labrador to carry on with 
last year’s survey there. 


Although the ship reached the coast of Labrador on 21st July, 
only about a week later than the previous year, the ice situation 
was much clearer this year and the passage northwards simpler. 
The ship anchored in the Davis Inlet so that the Captain might 
visit the senior Hudson Bay Company trader here to make early 
arrangements for winter clothing and other supplies needed for 
the winter party and required to be sent north to Nain. He was 
not the only visitor to the store as a party of Nascaupee Indians, 
numbering about 80, were camped along the shore making their 
summer visit for trade with Hudson Bay Company and to meet 
the Catholic priest. They appeared filthy and were clad in rags 
of deerskin; their dwellings were of both the ridge and the 
pointed type of tent, covered with any old canvas, with a hole in 
the top from which issued smoke from a fire within. From the 
ship, watching through binoculars, it was amazing to see up to 
a dozen Indians coming out of a tent which one would have 
thought would be crowded with two persons inside. The H.B.C. 
trader was the only white man in Davis Inlet ; he had two or three 
native assistants. There were no Eskimos here. The Indians come 
and go, travelling and hunting the country from Ungava to the 
St. Lawrence River. For travel they used light canoes weighing 


WINDWARD ISLES AND THE GRENADINES 31 


about 50 pounds so that they might be carried easily across land; 
such canoes were built of light laths of larch laid as frames and 
covered with painted canvas, which they obtained in exchange 
for furs in the H.B.C. stores. 

The next day the ship again reached Ford’s Harbour where 
nine months earlier she had been licking her wounds after her 
encounter with Challenger Rock. The poles marking the triangu- 
lation stations, which had been left on the ship’s hurried departure 
last year, were still standing and could be seen on the hilltops. Next 
morning parties were away putting new flags on these poles from 
which the winds of winter had removed every trace of the old. 

A conference was held onboard at Nain to which Mr. Grubb, 
the missionary, and Mr. Clarke of the H.B.C. store were invited 
so that arrangements could be made in good time for the winter 
party, who were to have their headquarters in Nain. It was 
arranged that the party should live in the small unused wooden 
hospital, which appeared sufficiently large to accommodate them 
and to leave room for a chartroom for plotting the survey work. 
Arrangements were made to start collecting the dogs which would 
be required for hauling the sledges or ‘komatiks’, as they are 
called. In summer time the husky dogs are either placed on small 
uninhabited islands where they have to fend for themselves, going 
down to the water’s edge to catch their own fish, or they may be 
incarcerated in the centre of the settlement in square stockades 
made of logs placed vertically to form the walls. Into this com- 
pound cod heads and other fish offal are thrown from time to 
time, and the level inside the stockade and the smell outside it 
rise steadily during the months of summer. When the dogs are 
released with the first snows of winter they are so wild for the 
first few days as to be uncontrollable. Dogs were reported scarce 
this year due to sickness but it was thought that the requisite 
number would be available by November. 

The komatiks which the dog teams pull across the ice and snow 
through the long winters are of the simplest construction, being 
formed of two long fore-and-aft wooden runners shod with iron, 
with cross boards secured between them on the top along their 
entire length to form a platform. 

The marks having been for the most part fixed last season, the 
ship and boats were able to press on with the sounding work, 


32 CHALLENGER 


while parties landed daily to delineate the coastline, all such 
sounding and coastlining work being fixed in relation to the 
triangulation marks. 


One morning when the ship was surveying oft Nain a boat came 
out towards her and a burly man hailed her from a position in 
the bows. He was the Master of the American schooner Minnie B 
lying in Nain. He requested the Captain’s aid in arresting his 
crew who had deserted in Nain and were now in the settlement, 
but the circumstances did not appear to the Captain to warrant 
their arrest. However, it was most undesirable to have a number 
of unemployed white men hanging round a settlement where 
there was no accommodation or any amenities, and it was lucky 
that the Newfoundland steamer Kyle was due in a couple of days’ 
time and arrangements were made with the master of the Kyle 
to take these men to St. John’s, Newfoundland, while the Master 
of the schooner remained onboard his vessel. 

The Secretary of State of Newfoundland and a Customs official 
happened to be travelling onboard the Kyle and the dissatisfied 
deserters must have talked on the passage to St. John’s for a signal 
was received from the Secretary of State ordering the Captain of 
the Challenger to detain the Minnie B on suspicion of illicit trading 
and obtaining customs clearance under false pretences. So on 
Sunday morning an officer from Challenger boarded the schooner 
and, to the consternation of the skipper, removed the ship’s 
papers, her sails and essential engine parts, and he seemed little 
mollified by the offer of the Captain of Challenger for him to use 
her radio to get in touch with his consul. 

The mosquitoes were as bad as ever and three cases of septic 
mosquito bites developed among the ship’s company, one of these 
being the ship’s Medical Officer. As he was unable to carry out a 
satisfactory operation on himself, the ship had to sail south 
to Cartwright, where a hospital was supported by the Grenfell 
Mission. 

Whilst lying at Cartwright the Kyle arrived with the Customs 
Officer for the East Coast of Labrador and a magistrate onboard 
bound north to try the case of the Minnie B. So the ship’s papers, . 
sails and the engine parts were handed over to the Customs 
Officer and Challenger’s police duties were over. 


WINDWARD ISLES AND THE GRENADINES 33 


The ship had left both boats operating from a camp south of 
Nain and was unable to wait for Bingham to recover fully, but 
he made his own way down the coast in a local open boat, being 
storm-bound several days in windswept anchorages whilst on 
passage. It was a good thing that Bingham was used to rugged 
travel, for he was none the worse after this ordeal. He was 
welcomed at Nain with open arms because his boat brought the 
mail, the mail steamer having made her last run north of 
Hopedale for the season. 

At the end of September the ship, leaving a large camp party 
with both sounding boats in a landlocked bay south of Nain known 
as Kauk Harbour, sailed south to Halifax for fuel and large stocks 
of provisions needed for the winter party. By 12th October, in 
the first flurry of winter snow these stores were being disembarked 
at Nain. From now onwards the survey work was much hampered 
by snow and gales; on 2nd November the temperature was down 
to 19°F and spray was freezing as it fell on the canvas canopies of 
the boats which were away placing secondary marks along the 
coastline for the use of the winter party. 

While one of the boats was being hoisted on this day a brand 
new fall parted in one of the blocks: as the whole weight of the 
boats is taken by these ropes it was fortunate that no one was 
hurt and that no damage was done. On examining the fall it was 
found that owing to the low temperature the tarred fibres had 
become frozen and brittle so that, when bent, the rope snapped 
like a stick. So from now on falls had to be unrove after hoisting 
or lowering a boat and stowed below until required again, a most 
unpleasant nuisance in such conditions. 

On 9th November strong westerly winds were blowing the 
snow off the hills like smoke and next day the ship proceeded to 
Nain to establish the winter party. The temperature was down 
to 13°F and ice was forming around the ship’s water line. All the 
stores were ashore and stowed in the old hospital at Nain by the 
evening of 14th November and the party said farewell and went 
onshore. The next day the glass fell very low—to 956 millibars— 
but there was no wind until the afternoon when it began to blow 
from the south-west and gradually increased to a gale at night. 
The temperature fell to 5°F onboard and to zero ashore and, 
when an attempt was made to veer more cable, it was found that 


34 CHALLENGER 


the windlass was frozen solid, and on the morning of 16th Nov- 
ember the sea was ‘smoking’ prior to freezing over; it seemed 
high time to be away. A fire had to be lit under the windlass 
before the cable could be worked, but once that was freed the ship 
was soon heading for the open sea in a fresh gale and a snow- 
storm. There were not many who were sorry to be homeward 
bound for Portsmouth from this inhospitable coast, where nine 
members of the ship’s company were preparing to see the long 
winter through. 


IV 


The Winter Party 


HE old hospital at Nain was to be the base camp for the 

winter party from November until July; it had a good stove, 

and provided sufficient wood could be collected it would 
remain reasonably comfortable throughout the winter.To carry 
out the survey work it was planned to send small survey teams 
into camps in the area. These camps would be housed in light 
arctic tents and occupied for a matter of two or three weeks, 
after which the teams would return to the base in Nain. It was 
realised that life in the camps in the depth of winter would be 
extremely hard and the teams would probably need about ten 
days or so at the base camp to plot the survey work completed 
in the field and to prepare the gear for the next camp party. 

As the ship steamed slowly out of the bay and sailed for home 
the winter party turned to their immediate tasks. The hospital 
was scrubbed out and shelves and hooks were erected to take the 
stores and the winter clothing; the chartroom had to be rigged 
and provided with a table, chairs and racks to take the instru- 
ments; and the most important work of hauling in the firewood 
and stacking it in readiness for use had to be started at once. 
Meanwhile, the ice began to form in the Bay, at first very thin and 
easily broken up by the slightest wind, but on 22nd November 
news came in that the Port Manvers Run was completely frozen 
over except for the rattles, and that people were able to walk 
on the ice there. Sledging would soon begin. 

The population of Nain consisted of a number of ‘settlers’ of 
European extraction and some Eskimo families, some living in 
the settlement and others in huts, built as fishing and hunting 
camps, tucked away in odd corners, at the head of an arm of the 
sea, or close under a sheltering spruce coppice. These dwellings 
were scattered thinly over the empty landscape. Some of them 
had long since been given up as regular dwellings but were found 
to offer some shelter to winter travellers to whom any protection 

35 


36 CHALLENGER 


from the freezing, numbing winds was very welcome. The 
settlement of Nain itself consisted of a number of well-built 
white wooden huts clustering along the shore near the neat little 
church and the Hudson Bay Store, while to the north were a 
number of ruder wooden huts stretching towards the spruce 
woods on the lower slopes of the rocky hills. The hospital was 
one of the more imposing buildings, having two storeys and 
dormer windows in the roof. 


The winter party consisted of Lieutenant-Commander Baker 
in charge, with Dennis Deane as his assistant surveyor, a cheerful 
and amusing person; then there was ‘Doc.’ Bingham, who was 
a Surgeon Lieutenant Commander; and the ratings consisted of 
Petty Officer Stevenson, Leading Seaman Hampson, Able Seamen 
Marshall and Marlowe, and, lastly, Officer’s Steward Holgate, all 
of whom had volunteered for this winter in the north but of 
whom only Bingham had experience of dog team driving, the 
use of snowshoes and of living under arctic conditions. There was 
much to be learnt, and the party were soon making their first 
floundering steps on snowshoes, while they tried out the winter 
clothing, the windproofs and the sealskin boots and the sleeping 
bags. 

a the same time there was hunting to be done, for hunting 
is a necessity of life for all who live in the far north; seals must 
be killed for the feeding of the dogs, which had by now been 
acquired and which lay in the snow around the base camp awaiting 
the first trial sledging journeys. As the ice forms in the bays in 
the early stages of freezing over and is broken up by the wind it is 
driven in towards the beach, these blocks forming a jumble of 
oddly shaped ice boulders, known as ‘billycaters’, and it is by 
crawling through the cover afforded by these that one can some- 
times come within rifle range of the seals lying on the seaward 
edge of the ice. 

Henry Voisey, one of the local settlers, was taken on as camp 
servant. He was a good man with dogs and had his own team, 
and he knew the country well. 

Baker at once decided that he should be ready at any time to 
send out a party capable of living unsupported for at least seven 
days, so a number of ‘camp boxes’ were made up and kept in 


THE WINTER PARTY 37 


readiness to be loaded onto a komatik. These boxes contained 
saucepans, a frying pan, a tin opener, a primus stove and knives 
and forks, etc., sufficient for two persons, while a ‘ration box’, 
which would also have to be taken, contained concentrated 
rations sufficient for two persons for seven days and included 
such items as 6 pounds margarine, 6 pounds pemmican, porridge 
oats, plasmon biscuits, pea flour and cocoa, etc. The seamen of 
the party, used as they were to the loaded plates of roast meat and 
potatoes which they prepared for themselves and the heavy dufts 
which followed when they fed in Challenger, whether the ship 
was on the equator or off the coast of Iceland, looked with dis- 
appointment at the apparent inadequacy of the rations, not 
realising how concentrated they were. 

Buck decided to go with Doc. and a dog team to establish a 
camp for a week so that they might judge what the conditions 
would be in a survey camp and what the snags might be. So on 
29th November, having loaded the komatik with a camp box, 
a ration box, tent and sleeping bags, they set out on their first 
sledging journey, with Buck’s and Bingham’s teams harnessed 
together, to make camp, after four hours’ travelling, on the shore 
of a saltwater lake. And here for a week, shooting ptarmigan for 
winter use, and fishing through a hole in the ice for cod to feed 
the dogs, Buck and Doc. acquainted themselves with the difficul- 
ties and the conditions which would be experienced by those 
occupying the survey camps during the long winter months ahead. 

The tents were of a new arctic pattern, having a double skin 
and a ventilator in the outer canvas which could be opened by 
a cord from inside; but when the primus stove was out it was 
found that hoar frost formed both on the inside and between the 
two skins, making the tent very damp when it thawed on the 
primus being relit. So tubes were sewn from the inside to the 
exterior ventilator, thus reducing considerably the amount of 
hoar frost forming whenever the temperature in the tent was 
allowed to fall. By spreading deerskin rugs between the sleeping 
bags and the ground sheet the bags were kept moderately dry and 
once the sleeper had overcome the sense of suffocation experienced 
when using the hood he was able to sleep warmly and in comfort 
even when the temperature in the tent was down to o° F, as it 
often was. 


38 CHALLENGER 


Driving the dog teams had also to be practised. A komatik is 
normally pulled by seven or so dogs which are harnessed by a 
single bridle which, at some distance ahead of the komatik, has 
short extensions or traces leading to the dogs on either side of 
it. From experience it was found that traces and bridles made of 
3-inch circumference sisal rope brought from the ship were far 
easier to manipulate and were also stronger than the sealskin line 
normally used for this purpose. Little difficulty in the actual 
driving of the dogs was experienced in the early days, although 
much practice was required to get used to handling the 45-foot 
thonged sealskin whips, which, when well manipulated, can be 
used to flick a delinquent dog in exactly the right place from a 
position on or behind the komatik; the inexperienced driver often 
ends up by giving his own cold face a savage cut with the end of 
the thong. 

So the early days passed. The woodpile grew higher and higher, 
camp and ration boxes were made up and canvas was nailed around 
the eaves of the hospital to keep out the smallest ingress of chill 
air. 


On 12th December the advance gear for a survey camp—tents 
and rations, hop poles and flags for survey marks—was hauled by 
komatiks to the first site selected, at the mouth of a small bay on 
the eastern shore of Satosoakkuluk, about eight miles from Nain. 
This gear was cached among the trees at the site and the teams re- 
turned to base. It was intended to come out on the following day, 
but, as was to happen so often throughout the coming winter, the 
barometer fell during the night and it came on to blow hard from 
the westward. The visibility on such occasions is cut down to a 
few hundred yards, which, combined with the bitterness of the 
wind, makes travel impossible. So the dogs huddled on the lee 
side of the old hospital and the men lay up all that day, but hauled 
out to the camp site next day, and having set up the camp carried 
out a considerable amount of triangulation in the area. A week 
later camp was struck and the teams had a hard trip back to Nain 
as the komatik was heavily laden and one dog was sick, leaving a 
team of six dogs to haul across the Bay against a strong headwind 
blowing from the west. As soon as the base was reached the 
party were helped by a number of Eskimos to unharness the dogs 


THE WINTER PARTY 29 


and to unload the komatik. This is a local custom; any komatik 
coming into Nain is always assisted on the last part of the journey 
by anyone who happens to be around, and when all the gear has 
been carried into the house the helpers melt away, expecting no 
thanks for this courtesy, which always made the return to Nain 
seem like a home-coming and was very welcome after hours of 
battling with the elements. 

Christmas was spent quietly in social activity, visiting Mr. and 
Mrs. Grubb of the Moravian Mission, Mr. and Mrs. Clarke of 
the Hudson Bay Post and various friends among the settlers and 
the Eskimos. The local silver band was much in evidence, playing 
on their ‘grandstand’, the roof of the church, where they stood 
precariously as they blew in harmony. 

The 3rd January was spent preparing for the second surve 
camp and, on the morning of the 4th, a small party led by Baker 
was away to establish and occupy the camp. Buck’s spirited private 
diary describes the rigours of the surveying work and the day-to- 
day difficulties of sledging and camping. 


4th January. It looked as though it was going to be a really good day as the 
wind dropped away altogether by 0830, but came in puffs from all points of 
the compass. 

It finally steadied in the S.W. and by the time all the gear was lashed to 
the komatiks by 1000, it was getting up. 

We started off and the wind increased to about force 6 before we had got 
very far, and fairly blew us along. 

We got to the camp site by noon and pitched camp in the same place as 
last time. 

During our absence, however, a spring must have burst its way through the 
snow and ice as Marshall fell through into about a foot of fresh water about 
15 yards from our snow shelter. 

Henry started building a snow house for us to use as a survey office but 
made it rather big and with not enough tumble home so that it was impossible 
to put the roofing on ‘a la Eskimo’. I made him pack up about 1530 and sent 
him back to Nain as I wanted him to get back before dark. 

We settled down comfortably and had all the fresh water we wanted for 
cooking and drinking without the bother of having to melt snow. 


sth January. A cold day with wind from the N.W. but not a strong one. 
We all went away coastlining in different directions. Personally I don’t think 
that I have ever had such a foul day, as the wind, although not strong, was 
darned cold and going against it simply froze one’s head and face. I went up 
wind and coastlined down wind but it was pretty grim as every time one 
stopped to fix and ‘shoot up’, one got beastly cold, the sextant telescope 


40 CHALLENGER 


clouded over and this immediately froze and had to be cleared off with the 
point of a pencil. Taking angles up wind was very trying as it made my eyes 
water and this, of course, froze too, The temperature was —17 degrees all 
day. I got back to camp just about ready to commit murder at the slightest 
provocation. 

As the snow house was not completed, Dennis and I had to plot and ‘ink-in’ 
in the tent and this was about the most trying thing I have done for a long 
time. Only one could work at a time and he had to sit on the ration box with 
the plane table on his knees and tilt it downwards away from him to get 
enough light to see by. Our eyes ached like hell by the time we finished and 


we both vowed we would not try it again. Altogether somewhat of a grim day. 


6th January. It was snowing to start with so we finished building the snow 
house, and set off on our coastlining as soon as it cleared up. We used the 
snow house in the evening for plotting and inking-in and it was simply 
marvellous compared to a tent, The plotting table consisted of a large snow 
block laid on top of a beaten down pile of snow in the middle and the light 
was supplied by two candles lashed to broom handles and stuck in the snow 
either side of the table. The light given was truly amazing and made work 
almost a pleasure! The primus stove kept it fairly warm and we slung the 
bottle of ink on a lanyard to thaw it and keep it thawed. Even so we had to 
hold the ink over the primus flame every minute or so as the ink froze on 
the pen while inking-in. We finished the great work by about 1830, and on 
going out noticed that the spring was quoring up almost into the igloo 
although this was built on the side of a small hill. After supper I went out to 
do the usual chores of filling up pots and pans and so on and went up and 
had a look at the igloo and found the water had risen considerably and also 
that it had broken out at the back and was threatening the tents. I tumbled 
the crowd out and we cut a channel to drain the igloo and cut through into 
a small river which welled up very strongly. I decided to shift camp and we 
made a quick job of it, shifting it about 50 yards away in lee of a small hill. 
The whole camp was shifted and settled down again with all primus stoves 
roaring in three-quarters of an hour. The lads were very cheerful about it 
and picked the tents up bodily and carried them to the new site, singing 
some Salvation Army song that is usually sung when the latter carry large 
banners about. I did not feel too happy about the snow house but, as we had 
tapped the stream below it, it did not look as though anything would occur. 


jth January. It was blowing hard and continued to do so until about 1130 
when the wind appeared to ease somewhat. We all had a quick ‘mug up’ and 
got away by 1230. It was soon apparent, however, that it was only a temporary 
ease up, as by the time I had cleared the land it was blowing hard again. 
Standing up in the komatik with the wind behind me it was strong enough to 
blow the komatik along and keep the bridle and traces slack over hard wind- 
blown patches of ice. By the time we had got to the east end of Kruger 
Island, I could see that we were in for a buster as the snow was being blown 
off the tops of the hills in Nain Bay. I rounded the point and started to come 
back the other side of the island, as I thought we might have a lee of sorts. 


THE WINTER PARTY 41 


I was mistaken, however, for very soon it was blowing so hard and with so 
much ‘drift’ that I could not see my dogs. It was evident that we were not 
going to get back stemming that wind and drift so I got ahead of the team 
and led them up over the top of the hill 180 feet high. They followed like 
lambs and pulled the komatik up like little Trojans. We careered down the 
other side and found it was much better as far as drifting snow was concerned, 
but the wind was so strong that we had to lean against it. We got back to 
camp by 1530, and on getting up to the camp saw two of Dennis’ dogs there 
and so thought he must have got back before me. I could not see his komatik 
anywhere, though, and realised that one of his dogs had slipped its trace and 
run back to camp and that he was out in the gale with only four dogs. I went 
over the crest of the hill to look for him and told Marlowe not to unharness 
my team as, if he was a long way off, I would go out with my team and bring 
him back. I met him, however, just coming up the hill and gave him a hand 
home. He was breathing fire and murder about his leader, Lively, as he 
thought he had gone back to Nain again, as he had done on Friday. He was 
very surprised to find him in camp and forgave him. The other dog, Frank, 
I knew he had left in camp as it was sore under the forelegs. We were all 
glad to get back and get into our tents out of the wind. 


8th January. It was still blowing when we turned out so I decided to wait 
and see what the weather was going to do, as the barometer was going down 
and it looked as though anything might happen. 

On going over to the snow house we found to our horror that the water 
had quored up inside and my guns, harnesses, plane tables, cartridges and 
other odds and ends were standing in about six inches of half-frozen water. 
Dennis crawled in and chipped all the gear out and passed it out. We shifted 
all the surveying gear to a little dip on the opposite bank of the pond that 
we were now camped on. It looked as though the snow was good enough 
to build another snow house so we all set to work and had one up by lunch 
time. It was made more or less in the correct way and was roofed ‘a la 
Eskimo’ and was a great success, thanks chiefly to Dennis who did most of 
the building. 

The wind was dying away so we had a hurried lunch and got away by about 
1300. We had a good afternoon surveying as the wind died away completely. 
I did not get back till dark, and we plotted and inked-in in the igloo again 
and by the time I came out it was snowing. The barometer was falling fast and 
looked as though we should have bad weather in the near future so we 
decided that, if it was not surveyable weather on the morrow, we would 


pack up and go back to the base. 


Sure enough the weather was bad and the party struggled back 
to Nain. 

There was plenty of work to occupy the time of the surveyors 
when they returned to the base camp after a week or two in the 
field. It seemed that whenever it was decided to establish another 


42 CHALLENGER 


camp the weather at once deteriorated ; the barometer would fall 
and the wind and the drifting snow would rise, making travelling 
conditions impossible; and so, with the komatiks loaded and 
everything ready to go, the party sat impatiently day after day 
in the base camp. 


It was during such a period that something happened which 
altered all the immediate plans for the survey. On the night of 
25th January Clarke came to see the party and brought with him 
a certain Mr. Smith, the Hudson Bay trader from Nutak, some 
50 miles north of Nain. After two hours of small talk, when they 
were about to leave, Clarke said that Smith would like to see 
Buck alone and so they went out into the porch together. Here 
Smith came straight to the point, asking for Baker’s help to quell 
disturbances which had been going on at the H.B.C. post at 
Hebron, and which Massie, the trader there, was unable to 
control. The Eskimos at Hebron were said to be a tough crowd 
and were a bit of a mixture of a number of families who had 
settled there. 

What Smith wanted Baker to do was to travel north to Hebron 
with Clarke and himself and arrest an Eskimo named Renatus 
Tuglavina, who they said was the ringleader of the trouble- 
makers. Baker did not like this idea and said so, pointing out that 
he had no authority on the coast and really could not act on such 
vague evidence. He did say, however, that after the next survey 
camp he might travel north to Hebron and see for himself what 
was happening and bade Smith and Clarke good-night. He did not 
sleep well, turning over and over in his mind what should be 
done. He did not wish to arrive at Hebron either with the 
Hudson Bay Company people or with the missionary, although 
he was sure that Mr. Grubb would be willing to go. Baker felt 
that the Navy should not appear to be the power behind either of 
these two, and that if he went to Hebron he should go alone. 

He decided that Dennis, Bingham and Stevenson should 
accompany him and that they should slip away quietly for Hebron, 
where their surprise arrival might do much to steady the Eskimos 
there. The tents had already been pitched for the next survey 
camp and, as these would now be required on the journey north, 
a party was sent out to bring them in, while at the base prepara- 


RE ee 


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aH 
—NoOvuddH 


THE WINTER PARTY 43 


tions went ahead for this formidable journey to Hebron, 150 
miles to the northward beyond the Kiglerpait mountain range 
which is over 1oo0o feet high. But, as so often happened when 
plans had been laid, the barometer fell and high winds prevented 
the teams starting for the next five days. Only the party knew 
where the komatiks were bound when the weather cleared and 
this they kept to themselves, the rest of Nain thinking these 
preparations were for the establishment of a survey camp. Baker 
did not want Renatus to get wind of his intentions as he certainly 
might have done, news travelling fast across these wastes. An 
Eskimo party tried going out to gather wood on the fourth day 
of the gale but had not returned by 8.30 at night with the weather 
as thick as a hedge and with soft snow lying in drifts waist deep. 
The church bell was tolled to give them their direction and, 
leaving their komatiks behind in the woods, they struggled in 
with their teams at 10 o'clock. 

On 31st January the weather at last cleared and it was good 
enough to make a start for Hebron. Three komatiks were taken, 
Henry Voisey with his team, with Stevenson as passenger, Buck 
and Bingham with a team of nine dogs on the big komatik, and 
Dennis with his own team on the small komatik. Smith and 
Gillingham from the post at Nutak had also been waiting for fine 
weather to return to Nutak, and they too set out. 

The route followed was from Nain, past Base Point and Stony 
Island (names given by Challenger to these two places), up and 
over Itilialuk neck and down into Challenger Cove; then straight 
on up Port Manvers Run. Both ‘rattles’ were open water, the 
tidal stream being too strong to allow ice to form, and these were 
skirted by going over the necks of land. Going down the further 
side of the second neck a slight mishap occurred to the team on 
the big komatik, the bridle being cut among some tree stumps 
leaving the whole team to go careering off along the trail; Buck 
stood up on the komatik and let out a loud ‘view holloa’ which 
was heard by Henry ahead on the trail and he ran to stop the 
runaway team and bring them back. Tikkeratsuk, the goal for 
the first day, was not reached until about 8 p.m., 35 miles having 
been covered in 10 hours; for the last hour the party travelled 
by moonlight. The travellers put up for the night in a lonely 
shack belonging to an Eskimo called Ama Panagonjak, whose 

5 


44 CHALLENGER 


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Survey area northwards from Nain, showing first part of sledge journey to Hebron 


THE WINTER PARTY 45 


hospitality included a seal for the dogs. And here the story is 
continued from Baker’s diary. 


While supper was being got ready Ama went out and with the help of 
Nathan (Gillingham’s driver) and Lucas (Smith’s driver) cut up a whole seal 
for the teams to feed off. It was a grand sight, as it was brilliant moonlight, 
and they had hauled the seal out onto the sea ice, and were cutting it up there. 
Grouped round the seal in a semi-circle were all the teams, about 40 dogs 
in all. Henry and I were either side of the cutters keeping the dogs at a 
distance with our whips and Doc and Gillingham were among the dogs. The 
interesting part was to see how the teams grouped themselves, Henry’s was 
opposite him and mine and Dennis’ teams sat opposite me, while Doc’s and 
Gillingham’s teams respectively sat down by their masters’ sides. Smith’s 
team, not having their master there, sat on the extreme right of my team. . . . 
As soon as the seal was cut up into small bits one of the Eskimos gave the 
word and the whole crowd avalanched onto the food and there was surprisingly 


little fighting for so many dogs feeding. 


The next morning the party had to back-track about four miles 
to the mouth of the Man o’ War brook and then they started the 
long trek up and over the Kiglerpaits, a rugged range barring the 
way. The trail led upwards over the brook and a number of small 
lakes, all of course frozen over, with occasional steep climbs up 
small hills and down the other side. The snow was soft and the 
going poor and Baker’s large, heavily-loaded komatik made 
progress very slow. The teams would have to be reorganised if 
they were to reach the Kurukuluk shack by nightfall, this being 
the goal for the day. Dennis’ small komatik was left behind now, 
his team being harnessed with Buck’s while Smith and Gillingham 
each lent two dogs from their teams, giving Buck 14 dogs on the 
big komatik with Dennis while Doc went with Stevenson and 
Henry on the other komatik. 

At last the top of the pass over the Kiglerpaits was reached, 
but the descent on the northern side was almost worse than the 
climb; the snow was very soft and the big komatik kept taking 
charge and overtaking the dogs. On one occasion when the dogs 
were going all out, they went one side of a boulder while the 
komatik tried to go the other, the result being that the komatik 
rolled right over, throwing its riders, and then onto its runners 
again; without a stop Buck and Dennis were on the komatik again 
as it careered madly onwards. There were a number of sudden 
drops of ten feet or more which the dogs saw only at the last 


46 CHALLENGER 


moment and it was with great difficulty that the komatik could 
be swung clear to one side or the other where the slope was more 
gentle. 

Eventually the head of the Kurukuluk brook was reached and 
the teams started working down towards the shack at the foot. 
But the snow here was very soft indeed, a condition known as 
‘mowya’, and from here, time and time again, the big komatik 
slid off to one side or other of the trail into the deep soft snow, 
and Buck and Dennis had to leap off into snow waist deep, and 
sometimes chest deep, in order to get the komatik back on to the 
trail. Their language should have been sufficient to melt the 
snow, and the dogs howled dismally until they could go on once 
more. In this manner the shack was eventually reached, making 
the second stage of the journey 25 miles. The shack was a rough 
old place without so much as a nail to hang the harness on to 
keep it away from the dogs, but it had a stove and a roaring fire 
had been got going before the last komatik got in. 

Overtired from the terrific exertions of the day’s journey no 
one slept much and Gillingham kept the fire going all night. At 
5 a.m. the travellers had breakfast and by 6.30 the teams were 
skimming across the flat sea ice, from time to time passing over 
a neck of land, reaching Udlik Point, where there was a small 
Eskimo house, by 9.30, and here the teams paused for a “mug up’ 
of cocoa. Then on across another neck of land to Nutak Run 
where the going was very good; Nutak was reached by 12.30, 
an excellent run of 24 miles’ really good going. 

Nutak is purely an H.B.C. post with no settler or Eskimo 
dwellings in the vicinity; it is a clean and neat little place and 
here the Smiths made the party really welcome. Stevenson was 
sick with a severe chill so he was left with the Smiths at Nutak. 
As Henry did not know the trail northwards from Nutak, Smith 
urged Buck to take Willie Metcalfe, his Eskimo store servant, 
with him as guide and interpreter. The large komatik was left 
here and a smaller, old one of Smith’s was taken instead. And 
so the party pressed on next day: Buck, Doc, Dennis, Henry and 
Willie Metcalfe, with two smallish komatiks and 16 dogs. At first 
the teams made for the small Eskimo settlement on Parkivik 
Point, and then, after some miles of rough going among the 


‘billycaters’ along the shoreline, a high neck of land had to be 


THE WINTER PARTY 47 


surmounted, the snow being very ‘mowya’ and much time being 
wasted ; it was dark by the time the sea ice was reached on the 
further side of the neck and it was difficult to pick out a trail. 
There was an Eskimo encampment close by somewhere but 
Willie was not quite certain where it was; then, after going a 
mile or so Dennis suddenly saw the lights of the houses behind 
and the teams were turned round. They soon smelt the place 
and away they went, hell for leather, arriving at the huts to the 
complete surprise of the Eskimos. Willie Tuglavina and Ephraim, 
living here with their families, took the party in and made them 
very welcome, everyone enjoying a really good night’s rest. This 
encampment, for this is all it was, consisting of huts of a very 
temporary nature, was called Itibliasuk and was 35 miles from 
Nutak, It huddled under the steep slopes of the Mugford Range 
of mountains, great square blocks of rock 3000 feet high, with 
sheer cliffs falling 2000 feet from the summits and then coming 
down to the sea ice in long scree slopes, a barren and forbidding 
landscape. During the early part of the next day’s run the 
mountains lay to the westward and the going was good along the 
sea ice and over the many low necks of land separating one bay 
from another. About 10 o’clock the party was joined by an 
Eskimo when they stopped for a ‘mug up’; he was hauling wood 
to Hebron. Willie Metcalfe said he was one of the bad men of 
Hebron, but he was a cheerful soul and could handle a primus 
like a good one and as it is best not to make an enemy of such 
a man in those parts, he came on with the party. 

At half-past three in the afternoon the komatiks came in across 
Hebron Bay and Challenger would have been proud of her men if 
she could have seen them racing across the sea ice, with their 
white ensigns flying from each komatik. The Eskimos of the 
Hebron Settlement had never seen sucha sight and, as they watched 
the arrival, there was much discussion as to who they were and 
what they had come for, but suspicions were aroused and soon 
there were few to be seen except Massie, the Hudson Bay trader. 

Hebron consists of a few huts clustered around a great barn of 
a place which is the Hudson Bay store, right next to which is the 
church, denoted by a tiny cupola on the ridge of the roof. 
Despite the church it seemed to the travellers a God-forsaken 
place, but it was the journey’s end. 


48 CHALLENGER 


Massie had a meal all ready for them and it seemed that they 
were expected, which was strange in the circumstances, but 
after they had eaten they realised that Massie was as surprised as 
anyone in Hebron to see them arrive and he had given them his 
Sunday dinner. 

Buck inspected the store on the following day and was shown 
where a small Eskimo had broken in through a window to allow 
the others to enter on the first occasion in November; on two 
subsequent occasions the rascals had entered the store by using 
a key they had cut for the purpose. Renatus was said by Massie to 
be the ringleader and Buck announced that he would interview all 
the Eskimos, one by one, on the following afternoon. This lasted 
from 4 o’clock until 8 o’clock and each man incriminated Renatus 
as being the leader in their misdoings. Then at last it was Renatus’ 
turn to be interviewed and he at once started by being truculent. 
He had been threatened so many times before and nothing had 
happened that he thought he was above the law. This belief was 
strengthened by his faith in an old medal a schooner skipper had 
given him and which he regarded as a talisman, making him 
invulnerable to anything the forces of law and order might do 
to him. These forces found great difficulty in extending their 
long arm quite as far as Hebron and Renatus felt secure. 

Baker thought he had better make his own position clear to 
Renatus. He asked: ‘Do you know of God?’ Renatus replied that 
he did. ‘Do you know of King George?’ Renatus answered that 
he had seen his picture and knew of his power. ‘Well,’ said 
Baker, ‘I come next after him.’ For the first time this thick-set 
Eskimo looked impressed, his jaw dropped and his attitude at 
once became more reasonable. And when Baker said he was 
willing if necessary to lash him to his komatik and take him to 
Nain, Renatus reluctantly agreed to be ready to travel with his 
family on Wednesday morning, anything in the way of clothing 
and gear which he would need for the journey being provided 
by the H.B.C. store. 

Towards the end of the evening meal a deputation of the 
Eskimos arrived and said they wanted to see Baker. When he saw 
them they said they were all very sorry for what they had done 
and asked for orders for their future conduct. Buck told them to 
lead the normal life of the north, to go hunting and to trade their 


THE WINTER PARTY 49 


furs and not to spend their days lolling round the store hoping 
for pickings. One man said that he came on behalf of Renatus 
to say that he heard he was to be imprisoned in Nain, and if 
that was the case he would rather be killed now. Baker said that 
when he got to Nain he would certainly not be put in jail but would 
jolly well have to go hunting for his living and work for the survey 
arty. 

i te of Tuesday was spent by Renatus in going to the store, 
where the party were living, with various objections to his 
travelling south. But it was clearly put to him that he was coming 
south whether his family was ready or not, and so on Wednesday 
morning the journey began, Renatus travelling with his family on 
his own komatik. Good time was made to Itibliasuk where once 
again the hospitality of Willie Tuglavina was very welcome, there 
being quite a crowd sleeping in his hut that night; there were 
Buck, Dennis and Bingham, Willie Tuglavina and his wife and 
two tubby boys, the old mother and Job Allack, an Eskimo who 
had decided to travel south from Hebron with the party. When 
the travellers arrived there was a seal in front of the fire, thawing 
out preparatory to skinning, and after supper Job skinned it, 
removed the blubber, and fed the teams. 

It was blowing like hell on Thursday and the party lay up all 
day in the overcrowded hut, sleeping or cursing the weather; 
but on Friday they were on the trail again, reaching Nutak that 
evening, where a day was spent waiting for Stevenson to be fit 
enough to travel. 

Renatus was proving very friendly and amenable and for many 
hours at a time Buck travelled with Renatus on his komatik. 
The shack at the foot of the Kurukuluk Brook was reached early 
on Sunday afternoon and after a brief ‘mug-up’ in the hut, the 
ascent of the Kiglerpaits began again, the snow being very 
‘mowya’ up the brook. To get through this heavy going one of 
the party had to break trail with snowshoes ahead of the dogs. 
At dusk the highest point of the pass was reached and here a 
camp was made, using the tents, while Renatus made a snow 
house for his family and Dennis. It was a fine clear night, the 
loveliness of which was accentuated by beautiful aurora with a 
delicate pink shade on the edge of the usual yellow bands of 
light ; the night was quiet, crisp and still, as the travellers listened 


fo CHALLENGER 


for the crackling sound that can sometimes be heard when an 
aurora is seen from high ground. But not a sound ruffled the 
immense stillness. 

On Monday the last and best day’s sledging of the trip was 
accomplished. Striking camp by 8 o’clock the descent down the 
Kiglerpaits began, and after a ‘mug-up’ in an old ruined shack at 
3 o'clock in the afternoon, the teams reached the Base Camp 
at Nain at half-past seven, having covered 43 miles in a day and 
completed the round trip of 300 miles to Hebron in nine travelling 


days. 


vi 


Spring in the North 


Hebron, so Baker was anxious to establish the next 

survey camp as soon as possible. Renatus, who was under 
open arrest, had settled down peacefully enough in Nain and was 
given employment by the surveyors when he was not hunting; 
he was particularly good at making snow houses and from now on 
the camps became more comfortable. But life was still hard and 
the entries in Lieutenant Commander Baker’s diary for 25th to 
28th February are typical of the conditions. 


Me surveying time had been wasted during the run to 


Sunday, 25th February. Had a most disturbed night. We turned in about 
2130 and I had been asleep about an hour when I woke up suddenly feeling 
that something was wrong. My first thought was that the dogs had broken 
into the snow house next door and were getting at the seals there. Kwalik, 
Dennis’ new dog, which is always tied up, had been giving tongue earlier on 
in the evening and I remarked that I thought there was some mischief afoot 
among the dogs, but Dennis and J listened and could not hear anything so 
thought all was O.K. 

Dennis was awake by this time and we sat up and listened and soon made 
out distinct noises of crunching. Cursing, we pulled on our boots and 
gloves and jammed our caps on and burst out of our snow house in a rage to 
find seven dogs having the time of their lives in Henry’s snow house, chewing 
the seals. I armed myself with an ice spear handle and Dennis poked them 
out one by one, and accompanied by much lurid language on both our parts, 
I gave each dog a thundering good hammering. Got them all out as I thought 
and then we blocked up the holes and pulled the komatiks up and turned them 
over on top and packed an assortment of gear round and on it and went 
back and started to turn in. We hadn’t been in more than a minute or two 
when we again heard sounds of scrunching and both of us pulled our wind 
proofs on this time as it had been a bit chilly before and dashed out again 
thinking the dogs had broken in again. Nothing had been disturbed and the 
dogs all seemed quiet so I got my torch and pulled away a komatik and looked 
in and found that we had locked Lively, Dennis’ leader, in with the seals and 
he was having the time of his life. He got what the others got and we hauled 
the seals out and stored them in the spare tent. They did not get much off 
them as they were frozen as hard as rocks and were smooth. Turned in and 
brewed a mug of cocoa as we were both very hoarse and thirsty after all 


Ly! 


§2 CHALLENGER 


our vocal and muscular efforts. It was midnight by this time and we spent a 
peaceful night only to wake up and find it blowing like hell and drifting hard, 
cutting down visibility to about 200 yards, 

Blew hard all day. What a country! 


Monday, 26th February, Another wasted day as it continued to blow like 
hell from the west and then veered to the north-west from which direction 
the drift was much worse. Dennis and I spent a lot of the forenoon repairing 
Henry’s snow house and spent the afternoon reading. 


Tuesday, 27th February. A more or less decent day for a change during 
which we managed to do a certain amount of work. Marlowe and I went up 
Noazunaluk and a pretty perilous ascent and descent it was too. I had to cut 
steps on the snow slope which was as hard and as slippery as ice and one 
false step and one would have careened over either side and had a vertical 
drop of about 400 feet. Observing was an infernally cold business and in 
consequence a long one, taking three and a half hours for a job that under 
ordinary conditions would only take about an hour. After every two or three 
angles we had to stop and dance about and fling our arms in order to warm our 
hands and feet. The main trouble is that one gets sweating hot running 
alongside the komatik and climbing up the hills to the different stations, and 
one’s duffles and socks which are by this time damp, freeze in one’s boots 
and until you can get going again your feet are encased in ice. Every evening 
when I take my boots off the duffles are frozen to the soles and take a lot 
of getting out, and there is usually hoar frost in my socks as well, to add to 
the gaiety of nations. Got back to camp about 1730 to find Henry had got 
back from Nain and brought back all the odds and ends sent for as well as a 
nice present in the shape of smoked trout from Mr. Grubb, a delicacy he 
knows I love. 


Wednesday, 28th February. A peculiarly bloodstained day. It was blowing 
fairly hard with a lot of low drift, but as it was beginning to cloud up I thought 
the wind would probably drop, so we made a start. The trip out to Central 
Island was foul, so much snow drifting that we could hardly open our eyes. 
Having climbed the hill we were out of the drift and the wind seemed not too 
bad until Marlowe and I tried to erect the windbreak. It was all we could do 
to hold onto it and when we finally got it up, the guys parted, and they were 
made of brand new stuff too. I gave it up as hopeless and, as the wind had 
increased, went across to the island where Dennis was observing only to 
find that he had been more lucky. His little island was more or less sheltered 
by Aulatsevik and so he had managed to observe. I did a bit of coastlining and 
shot up a few marks but it was a far from pleasant job as we were working 
up wind and it got so bad that I eventually packed up at 1500 and returned to 
camp. I got the snow house cleared out and cut up the floor and re-levelled 
it and put down spruce branches as beds for Dennis and me, as I had had 
to send Henry to Black Island this morning with our sleeping bags and 
deerskins, they having got sopping wet through the snow melting under our 
bodies. He got back about 1900 and now we are most comfortable and the 
beds feel like feather ones with the spruce under us, 


—— 


SPRING IN THE NORTH 53 


A calamity occurred while we were both in the spare tent drying our 
clothes, some of the dogs breaking into the snow house and eating up all 
our smoked trout. In addition they removed my small camera which was in 
a sealskin case and chewed up half the case, but luckily did not damage the 
camera. I could forgive them this everlasting breaking into places to find 
something to eat if they were badly fed, but they are better fed than any dogs 
on the coast and, if I catch one of them at it, and I know the two ringleaders 
in all these peccadilloes, they will rue it for some time to come. 

Good Friday fell on 30th March and, while members of the 
party were attending the Church service, the weather turned 
suddenly mild with heavy rain and soon there was much slush 
underfoot; by Sunday, when the band climbed to the church roof 
to give a concert, all the snow had gone from it. Spring was 
coming to Labrador. The snow storms still came in the following 
weeks, but the snow was soft and wet, making poor going for 
sledging; the komatiks proceeded slowly and the men waded 
knee deep beside them. 

During the long winter months those who did little travelling 
spoke of the spring with delight as one would speak of the coming 
of spring during the dark months of an English winter, but to men 
like Willie and Joe Ford, who spent their lives hunting and 
trapping, the spring held no delusions and they said so. Willie 
Ford said he loathed the spring, the going was nearly always bad 
and one suffered from a blistered face and cracked lips due to 
the heat from the sun being reflected by the snow. Even when 
snow was absent there was water about a foot deep covering the 
ice, through which the dogs had to wade. Baker describes in his 
diary travelling in the spring snow: “The speed of travel was the 
speed of the dogs . . . as the poor beasties were belly deep the 
whole time and they had to lift their feet out of each step as the 
snow was too cloggy for them to push through. Walking along- 
side was no joy, plod, plod, the whole time and nearly always 
knee-deep . . . | found it was 5 p.m. and we had taken 7 hours 
to do 10 miles.’ 

Doc stayed in Nain for the time being as the whole settlement 
were down with sore throats and a mild type of influenza, and 
he had a busy time going from house to house, visiting his 
patients. Falling rain and melting snow now prevented the 
building of snow houses and the tents again became the only 
shelter for the camp parties. Everything got wet, the sleeping 


54 CHALLENGER 


bags, the deerskin rugs and all the clothes they wore. The edge 
of the sea ice came slowly nearer to the coast during April, and 
it was not uncommon to break through the ice when travelling 
along the heads of the coves where fresh-water streams were 
coming down. Occasionally a sharp frost during the night would 
improve conditions for a few hours, but a thin film of ice would 
form over the water lying on the sea ice and through this the 
dogs’ feet would break at every step making them dance like cats 
on hot bricks and laming them for days to come. No, nobody 
who travelled felt well disposed towards the spring. 

The seals were beginning to come up through the holes ap- 
pearing in the sea ice, where they lay close to the openings. The 
dogs had fared badly in recent weeks and whenever these seals 
were seen attempts were made to stalk and shoot them either from 
behind the ‘billycaters’ or by crawling out over the bare ice, clad 
in white and protected by a white vertical screen pushed ahead 
of the crawler. But time and time again the seals became alert 
and dived into the holes, and even when wounded they sometimes 
managed to slither in before the hunters running across the ice 
could get to them. Eventually, however, patience was rewarded 
and, on such occasions, the dogs fed well. 

In early May it became necessary to lash a boat on top of each 
komatik and in this all the camp and surveying gear was stowed, 
so that in the event of breaking through or having to cross deep 
water lying on the sea ice, the komatik and the ‘flat’, as the boat 
was called, would keep afloat. It was a peculiar experience for 
the travellers to sit in the bows of a boat, the surrounding water 
being above the top of the komatik, while they looked ahead at 
the wading dogs towing this amphibian. 

So with their faces covered in vaseline, their clothes sodden 
and their tempers frayed, the party worked on through the spring, 
more coastline being plotted, more topography being mapped as 
the outline picture of the coast grew and grew in readiness for 
the ship’s return, when she would complete the work by sounding 
out the runs, the bays and the deep-water channels leading to the 
open sea. 

On 22nd May the last survey camp of the winter was established, 
this time in a trapper’s hut on Bridges Run. The brooks and the 
runs were opening up and every day detours to avoid open water 


OP eg Fe Se Ree 


SPRING IN THE NORTH os 


became longer and longer and on Monday, 4th June, it was 
decided that komatik travel was no longer economical and the 
final return to Base Camp was ordered. Small paying off pennants, 
such as are hoisted by a ship at the end of a commission, were 
hoisted in the bows of the two flats, and the drivers beat frying 
pans to encourage the dogs. They left Bridges Run shack at 10 
o’clock and the going was surprisingly good after an overnight 
frost, although the komatiks were afloat from time to time. 
Racing down the bay to Nain with the pennants flying and the 
pans beating, the two komatiks made a brave sight to the watchers 
in the settlement. The long sledging season was over, and the 
next few days were spent in disposing of the dogs to their 
original owners or those who wished to buy them. 

At the end of June the ice was breaking up everywhere in 
the bays and in the runs. Every traveller coming in brought news 
of new cracks and openings in the sea ice. A message had been 
received that Bingham was required to go to England at the 
earliest possible date to join an expedition going to the Antarctic, 
and so Doc and Buck now turned their attention to this matter. 
The steamer Kyle would come north as far as Hopedale as soon 
as conditions made this possible but it would be necessary to have 
a boat to get south from Nain to Hopedale. Negotiations were 
commenced with one or two settlers who were known to have 
boats and finally it was agreed that John Voisey’s would be in the 
water by the evening of 27th June, and that Buck and Bingham 
would set out in this boat with Waldo, another of the settlers, 
before high water on the following afternoon so that they would 
catch the tide going out through the runs. 

At first a few floating pans of ice were met, but once clear of 
the Bridges Run the water was quite clear with fine weather. 
The boat party landed on Achpitok Island about half-past eight 
at night, lit a fire and cooked a meal, going on southwards an 
hour later. The boat was an open one with an engine, which, 
as in all other boats on the Labrador coast, was extremely tem- 
peramental, and the hull leaked. Not long after leaving Achpitok 
Island she broke down, and Waldo worked on the engine for 
an hour and a half while the water in the bilge slopped miserably 
from side to side as the boat lolled in the swell and Buck kept 
the hand pump going steadily. Eventually the boat got going again 


56 CHALLENGER 


and passed through Shoal Tickle at midnight as the moon rose 
to light up the bleak landscape, and a cold northerly wind began 
to blow. 

The boat party reached the H.B.C. post at Davis Inlet at 4.30 
in the morning where they went ashore to shake Peters, the 
trader, no time being considered unusual for travellers to call in 
these parts, where each tiny settlement or hut is an oasis of 
warmth and comfort. Peters was away but the post servant’s wife 
turned out, opened up the house and cooked them a good break- 
fast before they went on via Big Bay, Black Point, through Windy 
Tickle and on south to Hopedale, which they reached at 3.30 in 
the afternoon, completely worn out after 25 hours’ travelling 
without sleep and with a bitter north wind blowing for most of 
the journey. 

There was no news yet in the settlement of the arrival of the 
Kyle although the ice was clear and she was expected daily. The 
time of waiting was spent in trout fishing and in kayaking, and 
Buck had a kayak made for him to take north. The Labrador 
summer was beginning, the country was opening up, and visitors 
arriving. First came Macmillan, bound for Baffn Land to watch 
the birds nesting, then an American was landed from a schooner 
to spend the summer in a search for skulls and Eskimo remains, 
and then followed the Fort Garry, the Hudson Bay Company 
schooner, on her way north to collect the winter haul of furs. 
At last, on 9th July, came the Kyle. Bingham could embark for 
Newfoundland and Buck must head north again by boat. 

Baker had left Dennis in Nain to carry on the work from the 
schooner Mary Nolander, loaned by Amos Voisey; she was twin 
masted, with an auxiliary engine. But Dennis had a tale of woe 
to tell when Buck got back to Nain; the engine would not go at 
all, mainly because one of the pistons did not even fit the cylinder, 
she sailed very badly as all the weight was aft and the sails them- 
selves were rotten, and of course she leaked like a sieve. So 
now she was beached again, and while old Amos Fry, a settler, 
caulked the seams of the hull and pitched the bottom, Buck and 
Stevenson struggled to fit another engine, loaned by Mr. Grubb. 
But without cutting away large sections of the engine bedplate 
this could not be done so it was decided to rely upon sails alone. 
There were still a few important angles to be observed at the 


SPRING IN THE NORTH S7 


stations on the outer islands, and a number of stone cairns erected 
and fixed during the winter must be whitewashed in readiness 
for use as marks by the ship. 

Without the assistance of many of the friends made during the 
winter the party might never have completed this last important 
part of the work. Mary Nolander, which became a floating and just 
mobile survey camp, would only sail in half a gale and relied upon 
tows given to her by various settlers who were going out to their 
fishing huts by motor boat. But these boats themselves were often 
in trouble, and it was a common sight to see the schooner under 
way being towed by two motor boats, only one of which ever 
seemed to be going at any one time, while the driver of the other 
was buried deep in her engine. Amos Voisey stood at the 
schooner’s wheel looking, in his peaked nautical cap and heavy 
untrimmed moustache, like some whaling skipper of earlier days. 
Every day was a struggle, either sailing this cranky vessel or as- 
sisting some good Samaritan to extract quantities of sand from 
his carburettor so that he might help to: tow the schooner. But 
the struggle was worth it and the last tasks of the winter party 
were eventually completed before Challenger arrived. 


Challenger had meanwhile spent the lie-up in Portsmouth and 
sailed again for the Grenadines in mid-April, 1934. During the 
time at Portsmouth a number of officers and men who had been 
two years in the ship were relieved, but Commander Wyatt, 
knowing the Labrador coast, stayed on in command. Also during 
the lie-up one of the ship’s sounding boats was fitted with an 
echo sounding machine—the first time Challenger carried such a 
boat; the days of hand lead sounding in boats were beginning 
to pass away. This innovation had far-reaching effects in the Sur- 
veying Service during the next few years: the daily output by 
boats was greatly increased, but so also was the amount of work 
to be done by the officers when they returned to the ship at 
nightfall and had to ‘ink in’ all the sounding work they had 
completed during the day. 

Economy had once again stepped into the life of Challenger. 
The Labrador survey was proving extremely expensive and during 
this winter was under discussion in the Admiralty. The expense 
did not seem to be justified in view of the few ships likely to 


58 CHALLENGER 


visit the area in the foreseeable future, so it was reluctantly 
decided that the survey in the vicinity of Nain should be brought 
to a close during the coming season and only the possible shipping 
routes sounded. This, together with the soundings which had been 
taken during the ship’s passages along the coast, were considered 
to be a very satisfactory addition to the hydrographic knowledge 
of the coast of Labrador. But it was also decided to survey the 
relatively important harbour of Cartwright before the end of the 
coming season. This decision to discontinue the Labrador Survey 
was not easily reached nor was it easily accepted by the authorities 
and others in Newfoundland and on the Labrador coast. 

By early May the ship was anchored off the now familiar village 
of Hillsborough, Carriacou, in the Grenadines, and after a week- 
end there renewing old acquaintances she landed a camp party 
with both sounding boats on Little St. Vincent to carry on to the 
eastward the work commenced last year. The usual routine of 
coast marking and triangulation went forward and ship sounding 
began, the ship visiting St. George’s, Grenada, for an occasional 
week-end’s leave, and Trinidad to take on fuel. 

In July the Grenadines survey was broken off and the ship 
headed once again for Labrador, calling at Halifax for fuel and 
reaching Nain on 23rd July. There was less ice on the coast than 
in former years and the passage north was comparatively simple. 

Buck and Dennis were at their supper on this evening when 
someone rushed in and shouted something unintelligible which, 
on investigation, was found to be news that Challenger was round- 
ing Nuvutannak, and she came to anchor at 7.15 p.m. off Nain. 
Buck and Dennis were out in their kayak waiting for her before 
she anchored, and alongside and onboard the moment she let go. 
There was a great reunion party, but there were many faces new 
to the two who had left Challenger nearly nine months before. 
It was 1 o'clock in the morning when the kayak left for the shore. 

About three weeks later the Kyle arrived at Nain bringing with 
her two large policemen to arrest Renatus. They came to see 
Baker in Challenger and asked where his prisoner was confined. 
To their amazement Buck pointed to a figure peacefully chopping 
wood on the shore. They soon had him under arrest, for Renatus 
had given Baker his word that he would give no trouble, and 
under lock and key in the Kyle. Buck followed a few hours later 


SHISNOHMONS ONICTING SNLVNAYU 


8, 


* < Sg ge ye 


ie o te 
wm, a ae 
s ‘ ‘ae Es - dWVO 
: 7 ET Py , 
wo gn ae e AHTAYUNS V 


ti 


ee 


—e 


Pee rai 


TAAVUL 
AWILONTUdS 


FE6r1 xINL 
“WADNATIVHO 
LadW OL 

NIVN WOW 

INO DNIOD 
ANVAd SINNAG 
CNV WANVA Non 


SPRING IN THE NORTH 59 


to take passage to Newfoundland, for he was bound for home. 
The Nain Band came out in a boat and played farewell tunes as 
they circled the Kyle, finally tackling “God Save the King’ as she 
sailed away. 

There was a Justice of the Peace onboard Kyle and the trial 
of Renatus was arranged. It was expected that Baker would 
prosecute, but to the surprise of the Court Baker elected to 
defend Renatus as he had no other onboard who could befriend 
him. Renatus’ defence was that he had caused the disturbances 
at Hebron as he thought the Eskimos were being badly treated 
by the trader there and he wished to cause an investigation of these 
injustices. He was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment and 
Buck and Renatus parted firm and lasting friends. 

Challenger completed the survey by sounding out a good ap- 
proach channel to Nain from seaward from the vicinity of the 
Hen and Chicken Islands and by sounding the coastal passages 
southward from Nain. She carried out a running survey through 
the Port Manvers Run, and sounded out a narrow route south- 
wards from Port Manvers through the labyrinth of islands which 
had been mapped by the winter party outside Aulatsevik. 

The latter part of the season was spent doing a survey of Cart- 
wright Harbour and approaches, both boats being left in camp 
there to progress the work while the ship visited Quebec for fuel 
and stores, this being a pleasant change from Halifax which the 
ship’s company now knew so well. On 15th November, with the 
survey of Cartwright complete, Challenger sailed away from 
Labrador for the last time, reaching Portsmouth on 24th Noy- 
ember, 1934. 


VI 


The West Indies 


N March, 1935, Lieutenant-Commander Alun Jones relieved 
Wyatt in command of Challenger and Wyatt went to the 
surveying ship Flinders and Deane accompanied him. Jones, 

a Welshman, was well known in surveying circles for his energy 
and great output of work, and there was certainly plenty to be 
done in the next two years in the West Indies. 

The Labrador surveys being finished, the whole of the 1935 
season was to be spent in the West Indies. The anchorages in 
the Grenadines were not yet completed, so once again the ship 
anchored off Hillsborough, Carriacou, on 26th April, the remain- 
der of the month being spent in getting the survey in hand and in 
establishing the necessary camps. There was still some sounding 
and topography to be completed at Carriacou, and a detached 
party was established on Tobago Cays to commence the surveys 
there. During June, both boats were working from the camp on 
Tobago Cays while the ship carried on steadily with the sounding 
in the deeper water. 

Some of the hill marks had been left the previous year, and 
once these had been re-flagged they were used as sounding marks. 
However, considerable trouble was found in making the fixes ‘go’ 
—fixes on different sets of marks gave differing positions. It was 
after some searching and puzzling that the cause of this trouble 
was found and it was due to the good relations which had been 
established with the people of Hillsborough. In the ship’s absence 
a hill fire had swept towards one of Challenger’s marks, which 
the villagers had rescued in time and replaced after the fire had 
passed by. It was only unfortunate that they had not replaced the 
mark exactly. 

To build up the triangulation a theodolite is used. In practice, 
theodolite work is far from simple; the instrument must be 


exactly levelled and a very light touch is necessary, though this 
60 


THE WEST INDIES 61 


is sometimes hard to achieve when panting and sweating on a 
jungle hilltop after a hard climb. The elements also make ob- 
serving difficult on many occasions, a heat haze causing the dis- 
tant mark to dance about in the field of view of the telescope, 
while a high wind will shake the theodolite and throw it off level 
despite the erection of wind-breaks. It is always a satisfactory 
point in a survey when the theodolite observing has been com- 
pleted, and the position of the marks relative to the origin having 
been worked out, they are plotted and ringed with convincing 
red circles on the plotting sheet. Even the plotting needs skill 
and speed, for in the tropics the paper on which the sheet is 
plotted may alter its shape from day to day, owing to the differing 
temperature and moisture of the air. 

One day, Lieutenant R. H. Griffiths was away on Carriacou 
with a theodolite and was being hampered in his observations by 
a crowd of West Indian girls who were peering inquisitively into 
the object end of the theodolite telescope. They thought he was 
taking photographs of them and they were all anxious to be in 
the picture. Griffiths hit upon the idea of letting an intelligent- 
looking male bystander look through the theodolite telescope and 
then got him to explain to the crowd of women and girls that the 
officer could see them all ‘upside down’, as in fact the image seen 
through a theodolite is always inverted. There was immediate 
consternation, and all at once stood aside except for one large 
‘mammie’ carrying a huge basket on her head who refused to 
move, and when upbraided by her fellows for her boldness and 
vulgarity, she said loudly, “I don’t mind; I’m not like you common 
women—I wear drawers.’ 


Once the copies of the various portions of the plotting sheet 
have been made by transferring the positions of the stations on 
to paper pasted on field-boards, the fieldwork itself begins. 
Fieldwork consists of ship and boat sounding and coastlining. 
During all these operations the location of details is done by the 
observer fixing his position by sextant and station pointers, the 
theory of the latter being as follows: If an observer takes a 
horizontal angle between two fixed points he knows that his 
position will lie somewhere along the circumference of a circle 
passing through these two points. If, at the same time, he observes 


62 CHALLENGER 


the angle between one of these fixed points, and a third, then 
he knows that his position will lie at the point of intersection of 
the two circles, the diameters of which are determined from the 
angles which he has observed. 

To fix the coastline the surveyor walks along the shoreline, 
stopping at each alteration of direction of the coast, when he 
fixes his position by observing the horizontal angles between three 
well-selected triangulation stations or secondary marks. He can 
then plot his position with a pair of station pointers, an instru- 
ment with three long metal arms, two of which can be moved 
either side of the central fixed arm to set on the angles observed 
by the sextant; and when the angles are set the station pointers 
can be moved on the field-board until the three arms pass through 
the three selected stations. The observer’s position is then in- 
dicated by a small V cut at the centre of the station pointer. 
When a number of such fixes have been dotted, circled, and 
numbered in pencil, they can be joined up rather as children 
connect up numbered positions on a blank drawing featured in 
children’s papers and find they have drawn an ostrich or a boy 
wheeling a barrow. The surveyor’s less exciting picture will be 
the coastline. 

It was a pleasant enough occupation to go for a day’s coastlining 
on an island in the Grenadines. Accompanied by a surveying 
recorder companion, the surveyor walked the shoreline, the 
turning of each small point of land opening up fascinating new 
vistas—a yellow, sandy, palm-fringed beach; a rocky cove with 
sparkling blue water heaving towards the rocks; the long thin 
white line of breakers on the windward side of the pale green 
reef; a hutted village beneath the trees. From such huts came the 
smiling people to see what strange ‘looking’ and writing was 
going on as the surveyor sketched in his field book the details of 
the shore or the trees and huts behind. The children followed 
for a mile or so and felt well rewarded when allowed to peer 
through the telescope of the sextant, through which they probably 
saw nothing. A halt for a sandwich lunch in a cool palm grove, 
a bathe, and then on and on along the shore the coastliners went 
until the boat came in through the surf to collect them and take 
them back to the ship; onboard the weary pair would plot and 
ink in the day’s work and feel, over an iced whisky or a tot of 


THE WEST INDIES 63 


rum, that they had added some small contribution of their own 
to the vast whole of the world’s maps. 

Every day the ship and the boats were slowly covering the sea 
with lines of soundings. Backwards and forwards they went, first 
running in towards the shore, then to seaward again; the boats 
worked along the coast in the shallower water of less than ten 
fathoms or so, the ship carrying on the sounding to seaward of 
the boat’s limits. The sextant and station pointer method of fixing 
is used in such cases but as the boats and the ship are moving an 
officer and a recorder take the two horizontal angles simulta- 
neously at the word ‘Fix’, which is heard at frequent and regular 


Three fixed marks 


used for fixing. ty, , 
= 


Angle taken 
by second observer 


Angle taken 
by first observer 


Theory of station pointer fixing 


intervals throughout every long day’s sounding. The lines along 
which it is proposed to sound are drawn on the field-board, and 
by steering the appropriate course, and by making small altera- 
tions whenever a fix shows that the ship or boat is being set off 
the line, an endeavour is made to follow the planned lines which 
will give a regular sounding coverage of the area. 


Ocean currents are caused by the friction of wind upon the 
surface of the sea, and the North-East and South-East Trade Winds 
set up westerly-moving currents north and south of the equator 
respectively. These great equatorial currents continue westwards 


64 CHALLENGER 


until they meet the land, when they are deflected to the right 
in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern hemi- 
sphere, setting up great clockwise current movements in the 
North Atlantic and North Pacific, and anti-clockwise movements 
in the South Atlantic, South Pacific and Indian Ocean. These 
movements carry cold water along the eastern sides of the three 
great oceans towards the equator to take the place of the west- 
ward-flowing water, and this does much to account for the lack 
of coral growth in these regions, for the coral polyp does not 
endure in a temperature of less than 20°C. 

The coral polyp, which must be regarded as a sea anemone 
which lives and multiplies by extracting lime from sea water, 
thrives therefore in the western parts of the great oceans, between 
the latitudes 30 North and 30 South, where the water is warm 
enough for its tastes. 

The coral reefs, which are built up of the countless calcareous 
skeletons of coral polyps, will often build out more readily to 
windward of an island where abundant ‘food’ is brought by the 
water of the west-flowing current. Thus in the Grenadines great 
areas of reefs grow out to the eastward, leaving behind them bays 
and passages between themselves and the land; whereas on the 
western side of the islands there are practically no reefs. 

The Trade Winds were blowing strongly on to the reef-fringed 
eastern side of the Grenadines in May and June, and no inshore 
work was possible in this area until the winds eased off about the 
middle of August. As soon as this happened, work on the western 
side of the islands was suspended, a camp was established at Little 
St. Vincent, and both the sounding boats concentrated on the 
weather side of the reefs during a spell of calmer weather. 

So the survey went on, the Captain constantly thinking ahead 
and planning to make the most of changing weather conditions, 
his First Lieutenant putting his plans into practice, arranging for 
men to go into camp, for stores and fuel to be landed, while the 
Engineer Officer seized every opportunity to carry out mainten- 
ance work on his boats, which ceased running only for a few hours 
at the week-ends. 


In June, the Captain was promoted in the Half-Yearly Pro- 
motions to Commander, and after the customary celebrations 


THE WEST INDIES 65 


onboard he ordered a ‘brass hat’ from Gieves, the well-known 
naval tailor of London. It took two months, however, before this 
necessary item of uniform reached the ship in Grenada, and the 
Captain had been wearing it only a fortnight before it blew 
overboard in a sudden squall while the ship sailed from St. 
George’s. For a further two months the Captain had to revert 
to his plain-peaked cap which he had worn as Lieutenant-Com- 
mander. 

About ten days later the Captain was going ashore at Grenada 
when he saw a rascally native boatman wearing the missing 
‘brass hat’, only a little green in places as a result of its immersion 
in sea water. This almost naked boatman proudly continued to 
wear the hat as he plied for hire round the ship during her 
subsequent visits to Grenada, he being the Commander while the 
Captain remained a ‘two-and-a-half’. 

There were other diversions to be fitted in with the minimum 
of delay to the general progress of the survey; His Excellency 
the Governor of the Windward Islands requested a passage from 
St. George’s, Grenada, to Kingstown, St. Vincent, and this was 
carried out with the appropriate ceremony; the ship had to visit 
Trinidad for oil; the schooner Jane Victoria was stranded on a reef 
off the east coast of Carriacou and was refloated by Challenger ; 
the ship’s divers recovered 30 fathom of anchor cable lost by 
S.S. Cornwallis off St. George’s ; four days’ summer leave was given 
to the crew, who billeted themselves in the Quarantine Station 
for the purpose. Her Majesty’s Surveying Ships are, first and 
foremost, vessels of the Royal Navy, and as such expect from 
time to time to carry out duties more normal to General Service 
Ships. 

On Monday, 14th October, the Governor of the Windward 
Islands was once again embarked, and while the boats’ crews in 
camp at Tyrell Bay were completing the Grenadines survey, His 
Excellency visited in Challenger some of the smaller islands of the 
Windward Group. Finally he landed at Kingstown, St. Vincent, 
on 17th October, where he was to attend a Legislative Council 
meeting to put through certain changes in legislation. 


Ever since the commencement of the Italian-Ethiopian dispute, 
feeling had been very tense among the peoples of the Windward 


66 CHALLENGER 


Group and Trinidad. A very great interest had been taken by the 
lower classes in this colonial war, which was seen as a racial 
conflict between Black and White. Employment conditions in 
the Islands were not good at this time and the working-class 
people were only too ready to listen to the street orators as they 
reviled the Whites for doing nothing to stop Mussolini murdering 
Africans. One orator had held up a white and a black fowl, and 
his audience became wildly excited when he struck the head from 
the white bird as a symbol of what would happen soon to all 
Whites who were standing aside in the African War. 

The Governor’s visit to St. Vincent was to introduce new 
tariffs which were not designed to hit the poorer classes but were 
to be a charge on the middle-men. Rumours of these new taxes 
circulating before the Legislative Council met, some of the store 
proprietors at once put up their prices; on some commodities 
such as matches they increased the price by roo per cent, while 
the prices of salt-fish and other staple items of diet of the working 
classes were increased in varying amounts. 

In their present unsettled mood the working-class people were 
thus bitter and hostile before His Excellency met the Council 
to discuss the tariffs. Whilst the meeting was taking place, mur- 
murings were heard outside the Courthouse, and soon a peti- 
tion was sent in, requesting His Excellency to give a personal 
interview to one of the leading members of the Representative 
Government Association which had been formed about three 
years previously, and which had gradually become highly critical 
of all Government actions. The Governor intimated that he would 
meet the petitioner at the conclusion of the Council meeting, but 
by now the murmurings outside had developed into an uproar, 
which the Governor then attempted to quell by going outside 
himself to face the crowds and address them in person. The crowd 
nearest about him began to calm down as he started to speak in 
a steady voice, but as noise on the outskirts of the crowd made 
it difficult for him to be heard, His Excellency suggested that a 
deputation from the crowd should enter the Courthouse with 
him to state their case. As soon as the Courthouse doors were 
opened the mob surged in, and it now became obvious that the 
great majority were well primed with rum and were quite 
unprepared to listen to reason. 


THE WEST INDIES 67 


The reading of the Riot Act by the Chief Justice had little effect, 
and the rioters, now armed with sticks and stones, divided their 
forces into three main bodies, more by chance than by organisa- 
tion. One section went to the prison, broke down the gates and 
released some of the prisoners, severely manhandling one of the 
warders in the process. The second section cut the cables at the 
Cable Offices and the remainder of the rioters commenced 
looting the stores. 

The police were by now armed and they fired a round over the 
heads of the looters. This had no effect and so orders were given 
to fire low at this section of the mob. Most of the casualties 
occurred at this stage, and the looters now began to filter up the 
side streets, taking their booty with them. 

There was sporadic looting and uproar in the outskirts of the 
town throughout the day, when property was damaged and 
stones were thrown. 

The wires leading from the Cable Office having been cut, no 
signal could be sent to the outside world from there. However, 
the A.D.C. to the Governor and a member of the Cable Company 
managed to find their way on foot through the skirmishing on the 
outskirts of the town and along the shore to the cable hut which 
was still intact, and were there able to pass a message to Grenada 
calling for assistance. They were just in time, as the mob cut 
the wires outside the hut only a few minutes after the signal had 
gone out. 

Challenger was carrying out a survey of the harbour at St. 
George’s, Grenada, being anchored in the harbour, with her boats 
and parties away from the ship on the survey. To her came the 
message from Kingstown. The general boats’ recall signal was 
hoisted at the yardarm and the various parties of officers and men 
hurried back to the ship. Such a recall is unusual during the course 
of a fine surveying day, and speculation as to its meaning was in- 
tense among the boats’ crews as they collected the coastline parties 
and made for the ship. Theories ranged from a major error having 
been found in the triangulation to an order having been received 
onboard to return at once to Portsmouth. One lovelorn ordinary 
seaman was already imagining himself meeting his girl on Farewell 
Jetty at Pompey when he was rudely awakened to the fact that he 
should be handling his boat-hook as the boat came alongside. 


68 CHALLENGER 


The ship sailed as soon as all boats were hoisted and a number 
of Grenada police had been embarked. Steaming at her best speed 
she came into Kingstown in the dark and anchored off the town 
by midnight. 

A United States newspaper report of this rush to St. Vincent 
caused amusement onboard when the papers were received: ‘The 
battle cruiser Challenger, travelling at high speed, rushed to the 
Island, with the Marines formed up on the quarterdeck with 
bayonets fixed, ready for landing, and the guns manned and 
trained in readiness for action.’ Challenger’s maximum speed at 
this time was about ten knots, while her armament consisted of 
12 rifles, 6 revolvers and 6 cutlasses. 

The Navy does not exist to do police duties ashore, and on 
occasions such as this when it is called upon to aid the Civil 
Power, it is loathe to take action unless it is clear that the situa- 
tion is beyond the control of the local police. The Navy’s 
strength is more often in the sobering effect which the presence 
of a well-disciplined force always has upon an excited population. 
The Senior Naval Officer must discuss the situation with the local 
authorities and decide the most suitable réle for the Navy to play. 
And so at about 1 o’clock in the morning, Commander Alun 
Jones was reporting Challenger’s arrival to His Excellency the 
Governor, who was conducting operations from the Police Head- 
quarters. It was decided that the men of Challenger would relieve 
the police of guard duties, enabling more police to take action 
against the rioters. Challenger took over responsibility for guarding 
the Police Barracks, the Power Station, the Cable Offices and 
the Telephone Exchange, and parties of officers and men from 
the ship who had been quietly preparing onboard were soon 
marching through the dark streets on their way to take up their 
stations. One party came face to face with a priest who was level- 
ling an old blunderbuss at them; he had thought the tramp of feet 
indicated the approach of a well-organised section of the mob 
coming to loot the treasures of his church. 

A wireless signal station was established in the Police Head- 
quarters which kept in touch with Challenger throughout the 
week, while the ship’s Medical Officer was kept busy assisting 
with the casualties in the hospital. But perhaps Challenger’s great- 
est part in the quelling of the riots was the steadying eftect brought 


THE WEST INDIES 69 


about by the ship’s company being granted leave in the evenings 
and their playing of football and cricket, at first among themselves 
and later against local teams. This was by no means the first 
occasion on which the Navy has employed football and cricket 
to restore a sense of normality to an excited populace. 

The local police, aided by the Grenada police who had arrived 
in Challenger, were now able to turn their full attention to the 
rioters in the outlying country districts. Within a very few days 
all was quiet again and the shopkeepers were taking down the 
boards from their shop fronts and glass and litter were being re- 
moved from the streets. Life became normal again in Kingstown. 

Soon after Challenger’s arrival the Chief of Police had cracked 
up under very considerable strain and the Captain was asked to 
relieve him temporarily. This meant all-night duty at the Police 
Headquarters. 

About 6.30 a.m., a policeman brought in a person accused of 
looting. The night had been a busy one at the H.Q. and the 
situation in the town at the time was very tense. The prisoner 
was one of the aboriginals of St. Vincent, people who live in 
the dense jungle in the highland interior of the island. They 
speak no English and never wear clothes ; they seldom visit civilisa- 
tion; but they had heard vaguely of the riots and a few of them 
had ventured into the towns hoping desperately for food, and this 
aboriginal indicated by signs that it was food he had in the parcel 
he was carrying. The bundle was ordered to be opened in front 
of Commander Alun Jones, and a lady’s pink boned corset was all 
that it contained—little use as food or clothing for this miserable, 
naked man, who stood trembling before his captors. 

Six days after arriving at Kingstown, at 3 o'clock in the morn- 
ing, Challenger crept away like a white ghost, and by ro a.m. the 
surveying boats were being lowered in Grenada Harbour. A day 
or so later, Commander Alun Jones received a letter from His 
Excellency the Governor of the Windward Islands thanking 
Challenger for her valuable assistance to the Administration in its 
efforts to restore law and order, and expressing his sincere ap- 
preciation of the good conduct and discipline of her ship’s com- 
pany and the friendly relations with the people of Grenada and 
the Grenadines which had existed throughout her numerous visits. 

Challenger again acted as policeman at the St. Lucia coal strike 


Jo CHALLENGER 


a month or so later, and then went to Trinidad for oil fuel prior 
to returning to England. At the last minute a survey was ordered 
in Dominica, off a small village called Portsmouth at the north- 
westward end of the island. Commander Alun Jones enjoyed 
sending his final departure signal to the Commander-in-Chief 
West Indies Station—‘ Challenger left Portsmouth for Portsmouth,’ 
it read. But no word came from the C.-in-C. to indicate whether 
he appreciated the coincidence or put it down to a signalman’s 
error. 


Outward bound again after the lie-up in May, 1936, the usual 
water sampling and temperature observations were carried out 
in the Atlantic. The programme of surveys for this season was 
an extensive one in the vicinity of Trinidad. The island of Trini- 
dad lies to the eastward of the coast of Venezuela, enclosing by 
two long arms running to the west a great shallow area between 
the island and the mainland. This is the Gulf of Paria, where the 
depths of water vary from 8 to 15 fathoms and below which a num- 
ber of oil companies were at this time prospecting with a view 
to drilling beneath the sea for oil. 

Challenger still had on the bridge the type of echo sounding 
machine with which the operator listens for the returning echo. 
The shallow floor of the Gulf of Paria is composed of soft, grey 
mud, which made the returning echo impossible to hear. How- 
ever, the new boat’s set which had now been fitted recorded the 
soundings on iodised paper in a similar manner to the deep water 
set carried in the ship. In the boat set the small returning echo 
was amplified on receipt from the sea-bed before the paper was 
marked. So it was decided that the new boat’s set must be in- 
stalled in the ship to get the best results when ship sounding over 
this soft, shallow bottom. The transmitter and the receiver of 
this set, which can be imagined as the speaker and receiver of a 
telephone, are fitted inside the hull of the boat in tanks which 
are filled with fresh water. When the set was moved into the 
ship these tanks posed a problem, until Lieutenant Menzies, the 
Navigating Officer, thought of using upturned buckets welded to 
the ship’s hull which housed the transmitter and receiver 
excellently. 

This echo set worked well and the survey went on apace. 


THE WEST INDIES JI 


Frequent samples of the bottom were taken with special scoops, 
such samples being much in demand by the oil prospectors. 

As the days passed, the ship required more and more propeller 
revolutions to push her along at the speed necessary to carry out 
the sounding work; it was seen that a thick growth of barnacles 
clustered along the water-line. The ship’s divers went down to 
find the whole hull thickly covered with barnacle growth, 
choking the inlets through which water is taken into the ship to 
condense the used steam, and to circulate around the cooling plant. 

Serious boiler defects occurred about this time, first in one 
boiler and the following day in the other. An inspection showed 
that it would be dangerous in the extreme to continue steaming. 
Bermuda was the nearest Naval Base, and arrangements had to be 
made to tow the ship there for the fitting of new furnaces, which 
would be a lengthy business. An oiler of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, 
the Celerol, eventually came to Port of Spain and commenced this 
long tow of nearly 2000 miles. Things went well during the tow, 
the speed getting gradually faster and faster despite signals from 
Challenger calling for speed to be reduced. The passage took just 
over a week, the two ships arriving at Bermuda on 10th November. 
It was rumoured there that the Captain of Celerol had been sick 
for the latter part of the tow and that the First Officer, who had 
taken over, had a girl friend in Bermuda who was thus responsible 
for the very great despatch with which the stricken Challenger 
was hauled to her destination. 

The ship was docked on arrival so that the full extent of the 
growth on the hull could be seen. It was completely composed of 
shell growth, there being no trace of weed of any kind. 

Here at Bermuda Challenger lay, immobile herself until new 
furnaces arrived from England, which was not until 31st May, 
1937. But although the ship may have been idle, her officers and 
men were far from being inactive. There is always surveying to 
be done and here was no exception. The hydrographic surveyor 
is ready to improvise and to take on local craft to expedite his 
labours. Camp parties were established about the Bermuda group 
of islands and with the aid of local boats which had been pressed 
into service to augment the work of the ship’s boats, a great area 
of Bermuda, including the main entrance through the reef and 
the harbour at St. George’s, was surveyed. 


Fi2. CHALLENGER 


On 2oth July, 1937, Challenger sailed from Bermuda for Ports- 
mouth, Commander Baker having returned to the ship to take 
over command from Jones. She re-commissioned in Portsmouth 
and returned to Trinidad to complete the surveys in that area. 
This work in the Gulf of Paria was finished by February, 1938, 
the ship having spent Christmas alongside the new wharf being 
constructed at Port of Spain. 

Surveys at Barbados were left to detached parties, while two 
deep-sea sounding cruises were carried out and a visit made to 
Bermuda for a quick docking to remove the barnacle growth that 
had once more accumulated on the ship’s hull during her period 
of working in the Gulf of Paria. 

The Leeward and Windward Islands form a crescent from 
Puerto Rico to Trinidad through which merchant ships use well- 
known passages; and one of the most popular of these is the 
Sombrero Channel east of the Virgin Islands and lying almost on 
the direct route from England to the Panama Canal. A small, 
low, dun coloured isle known as Sombrero Island lies in the 
north-eastern approach to this channel, and a light upon it, 
maintained by dues paid by British shipping companies, shows the 
way through the island chain. To fix accurately this focal point 
is of considerable importance, and Challenger’s last task in the 
West Indies was to land an astrolabe observing party on this 
island to take star sights to locate its accurate geographical 
position. 

When Challenger sailed from Sombrero for Portsmouth, she 
left a part of the world of which her officers and men had many 
happy memories of bathing picnics, sundrenched beaches, cool 
rum drinks, and cheery parties with the many friends they had 
made there. Life was good in the West Indies in the days before 
the war. It was to be 12 years before Challenger returned to the 
Caribbean where she had spent so much of her early life. 


— ee eee 


ae sa 


Vil 


Sandy Shores 


sheets drawn and forwarded. These are the detailed and 

very minutely drawn charts prepared by hand during the 
lie-up period and carefully stored in the Admiralty for the use 
of future generations of surveyors. 

It is from such sheets that the cartographers in the Hydro- 
graphic Department of the Admiralty compile Admiralty Charts. 
The cartographer is unable to use all the soundings shown by the 
surveyor so he must select with care those soundings which, 
when shown on the published chart, will best indicate to the 
navigator the trend of the sea-bed, the shallows and the deeps. 
Nor must he include too many soundings or the mariner will be 
unable to see the wood for the trees—the cartographer must 
leave the sounding pattern open so that the navigator can plot his 
courses clearly and insert his pencilled fixes. 

A full-stop is thus inserted at the end of the season’s work and 
the Hydrographic Instructions are studied so that the surveys for 
the forthcoming season may be planned. 

Challenger was now bound for the coast of Arabia, where the 
winter months are more temperate than the shimmering summer 
and thus generally more suitable for survey work. On 18th 
October, 1938, she was heading down channel on one of those 
grey, drizzling winter days with the visibility down to a mile or 
so; through this misty curtain appeared from time to time a des- 
troyer at sea on exercises, or an Atlantic liner inward bound for 
Southampton, her passengers eagerly peering for their first sight 
of the Isle of Wight. 

Challenger followed the familiar run to the East so well known 
to the naval man; to Gibraltar with its first feel of a foreign land 
and yet still so English with its army garrison and familiar police 
uniforms ; the sun on the water ; the smell of horses at the gharry 
stands ; the oranges for sale in net bags made of some form of vine 

73 


Te lie-up was completed by mid-October and the fair 


74. CHALLENGER 


which have the habit of bursting and casting their contents upon 
the waters as the sailor, who may have had just one too many, 
gropes his way from the liberty boat on to the gangway; and the 
female orchestras beating out the popular dance tunes of the day 
which are a feature of naval night life at Gibraltar. Then on to 
Malta’s Grand Harbour where Challenger was dwarfed by the grey 
giants of the Mediterranean Fleet as she came in to berth below 
the golden-yellow bastions of Fort St. Angelo; the steep climb 
through the narrow, stepped streets which were thronged in those 
days not only with people but with goats, to Strada Streta where 
a sailor could lose himself in any one of the hundred bars which 
existed only for his particular entertainment, the very names in- 
viting his patronage—the Light Cruisers Bar, the Dreadnought, 
the Royal Marine. On across the sunlight waters of the Mediter- 
ranean until the High Light at Port Said was sighted above the 
low landscape of yellow and white blocks of flats along the sea- 
front; in past the long breakwater which is yearly being thrust 
further and further to seaward in an endless struggle to arrest 
the drift of the sediments carried eastward from the Nile Delta, 
and which constantly threaten to close the entrance to the Suez 
Canal; past the fishermen’s boats moored to the quayside, their 
nets hanging to dry on the tall iron railings of the port area 
whence carries to the passing ship the overwhelming smell of 
fish. 

After a night at Port Said Challenger moved into the canal with 
a French pilot on the bridge. All that sunlit day she sailed steadily 
southward, the pilot yarning with the Captain, giving him the 
latest news of the canal, the changes in administration, the 
difficulties of a recent passage with an unwieldy ship, life in Egypt 
since the 1936 Treaty and above all now, in 1938, the threat of 
war and its effect upon the vital link of the Suez Canal. Quietly 
the orders were passed to the helmsman as each change of course 
carried the ship south past Ismailia, that oasis with the green 
lawns of the French Club running down to the canal bank like 
sward beside an English river ; past the neat yellow signal stations 
surrounded by their green belts of trees, where numbered boards, 
cones and flags hoisted on the masts gave the pilot news of other 
shipping moving in the canal; past Deversoir station into the 
Bitter Lakes, their glassy surfaces stretching away to meet the 


MAIN STREET, HILLSBOROUGH, CARRIACOU, GRENADINES 


SANIGVNAYW9D 
AHL NI ASVL 
OIHdVUOOdOL 

S WOATAUNS AHL 


SANDY SHORES 5 


sandy shores of the Sinai Desert; past gangs of Egyptian workers 
reinforcing the canal banks, who paused in their labours to shout 
ribaldries at the British sailors. Finally after dark the ship was out 
in the Bay of Suez, the pilot was saying good-bye and Challenger 
sailed into what was, for her, a new world—a world of blue seas 
and brown shores, of sandy hills stretching upward and away to a 
distant horizon; these hills have shape and form when the long 
shadows of the morning are upon them but lie dun coloured and 
featureless in the midday heat; a land where yellow land-tint 
replaces green on the fair chart. 


Masira Island, composed of a number of bare, stony brown hills, 
is about 30 miles long and three or four miles wide, and lies some 
8 to 10 miles off the coast of Oman in south-east Arabia, parallel 
to the mainland. Between Masira and the coast is an area of reef- 
studded water where it was hoped to find a channel leading to a 
sheltered anchorage, which could be used when operations were 
put in hand to build an airstrip and air station on the island. This 
station was to act as a staging post on flights to the East, and is 
now one of the loneliest postings an R.A.F. officer or man can be 
offered. 

In 1938 there was only the Arab population on Masira, living 
in a few villages along the western shore and ruled by the Sheikh, 
Khamis bin Hilal, who owed a distant and vague allegiance to the 
Sultan of Muscat, with whom Great Britain has had a treaty of 
protection for many years. So, before commencing the survey 
of the Masira Channel, Challenger proceeded north to Muscat to 
embark the Political Agent, Major Watts, so that he might be 
taken to Masira to explain the proposed work to the Sheikh and 
people of Masira. The Arab of the desert is suspicious, and sur- 
veying vessels in the past have become embroiled in misunder- 
standings with Arabs on remote shores, who have thought that 
the flags erected on the triangulation stations bore political 
significance. 

The town of Muscat lies in a semi-circular bay surrounded by 
rugged and barren mountains. The glaring white houses are 
disposed around the bay like seats in the stalls of a theatre; 
flanking the stage are two old Portuguese forts dominating the 
blue sheltered water—the stage where the ship is anchored. 

7 


76 CHALLENGER 


As it was impossible to locate the Sheikh after anchoring off 
Masira the Captain and the Political Agent made contact with 
the Headman of Dawa, and it was explained to him that the 
survey marks must be left where they were placed until the ship 
recovered them. The islanders were friendly from the beginning 
and the ship’s medical officer, Surgeon Lieutenant Sloan Miller, 
seeing their rheumy eyes, running sores and bad teeth, suggested 
to Commander Baker that he might set up a camp near the village 
where he could dispense medical treatment to those villagers 
who were in need of it; at the same time this would further 
friendly relations between the ship and the local people. This 
relationship is greatly needed in countries where both wood and 
cloth are scarce, as survey marks constructed of these materials 
become a source of great temptation. 

Whenever the Captain made enquiries for Sheikh Khamis bin 
Hilal he had either ‘gone to Oman’ or was ‘away fishing’ ; how- 
ever, Miller, with the aid of his interpreter, Hassan Ramzam, 
gained the confidence of the 400 or so inhabitants of Dawa to an 
amazing degree, being hailed as ‘Hakim’ by all, and one day the 
Sheikh, hearing of the medical camp, arrived there to visit Miller. 

Arrangements were made for the Sheikh to return to the camp 
with his brother and the Head Man of Dawa on the following 
Thursday. The Captain would be there to meet them and all 
would then go onboard Challenger for a social visit. 

At the last moment, however, the Sheikh’s heart must have 
failed him for he arrived at the camp on Thursday with his 
complete army, consisting of about eighty ruffianly looking Arabs 
armed with an assortment of rifles of various ages and calibres, 
and with a banner proudly floating above them as they approached. 
The Medical Officer went out to meet this formidable party, 
shook hands with the Sheikh and his brother and led the army 
towards the tents where Buck, in full naval uniform, was waiting 
to greet them. The Sheikh seemed ill-at-ease and made every 
excuse possible for not coming onboard the ship. His advisers, 
of whom there seemed to be a number, appeared to believe that 
his departure onboard would end either in his drinking poisoned 
coffee or in his being kidnapped. So the proposed visit to the ship 
had to be abandoned, but the Captain was able to thank the 
Sheikh personally for the fact that none of the survey marks 


SANDY SHORES 7 


had been touched during the course of Challenger’s work on 
Masira. 

It is sad to reflect that Sloan Miller, who had done so much 
for these islanders of the Arabian coast, died at the hands of the 
Egyptian mob in the Gezira Sporting Club in the post-war Cairo 
riots. 


Christmas was spent this year in Karachi, and on completing 
the work at Masira, Challenger entered the Persian Gulf and sailed 
into Khor Kaliya, the anchorage close south of Manama. This is 
the seat of the Sheikh of Bahrein, an island having political treaties 
with the United Kingdom, lying half-way up the southern side 
of the Gulf, between the territory of the Sheikh of Qatar and the 
northern coast of Saudi Arabia. 

The California Standard Oil Company were at this time building 
a refinery on the Saudi Arabian coast about 25 miles north-east 
of Bahrein, whence oil was to be exported from the wharves 
now being constructed on the east side of the long, low headland 
of Ras at Tannura. To reach these new wharves it would be 
necessary to navigate in through reefs, out of sight of land, for 
a distance of about 50 miles along a little-surveyed channel. 
Captain Clausing, of the oil company, had laid down some spar 
buoys as a guide to himself when he piloted vessels in through 
these reefs, but the courses he had to steer to clear the dangers 
were not those he would have expected by studying the existing 
chart. Challenger laid a large permanent surveying beacon at the 
seaward limit of the channel and fixed it by star sights. Such 
beacons carry huge flags 30 feet above the surface of the sea and 
are moored with heavy anchors and many fathoms of wire rope. 
They are used by surveyors as triangulation marks when working 
out of sight of land, and the laying and recovering of these 
cumbersome buoys forms a considerable feat of seamanship. 

Surveyors use a taut wire measuring machine to measure ac- 
curately distances at sea by streaming piano wire under tension 
astern of the moving ship, the end having been anchored to the 
sea-bed. Up to 140 miles of wire can be used, and it has startled 
more than one enquiring taxpayer to hear that no attempt is made 
to recover this wire. The thought of steaming stern-first for many 
miles to reel up thousands of yards of kinked and coiling piano 


78 CHALLENGER 


T.W. Reading 


‘Wharves (under 
construction) N°4p oe 


: Noe3\|. 
T.W. Reading | 


-_——--—. 


—— 221M 


-Sketch of the Route first 
used by shipping approaching 
Ras at Tannura in 1939. 


Showing taut wire distances 
and star sight positions used by 
H.M.S. Challenger to fix the channel 
buoys laid by Captain Clausing, of 


the California Standard Oil Co. Me? 
acon (under 
onstruction) 


I 

| 

| 
S 
ln 
® 
3 
2) 
CY) 
) 


Sea Miles 
(1) 5 19 


[SS SS SS SS ES 


N°l -Floating Beacon 
laid by Challenger. 
(Fixed by star sights) 


on \ 
/ Ba \ 


Bahrein ‘Athama; (Believed position) 
abe Tighe Vessel Shoal * 
‘ ‘ 


Z 


Approach route to Ras at Tannura 


SANDY SHORES 79 


wire is indeed a surveyor’s nightmare. This apparatus was now 
used to measure the distance from the anchored beacon to the 
inner end of the channel and the distances between each spar 
buoy, the course to be steered along each leg of the channel also 
being noted. 

Finally, at the inner end of the channel, the ship passed close 
east of a beacon which had been constructed on the southern tip 
of the land. A party was then landed at night on this beacon with 
a theodolite which was used to observe star sights, thus establish- 
ing its position. Both ends of the taut-wire traverse had now been 
fixed, the difference in latitude and longitude of these two posi- 
tions agreeing within reasonable limits with the differences calcu- 
lated by working out the taut-wire run between them. The spar 
buoys were now plotted in their positions relative to the two 
ends of the channel and the correct courses for each leg were 
known. It only remained now for the ship to run a number of 
sounding lines along the axis of this channel, and the approach to 
Ras at Tannura was established as a safe sea lane. 

This was Challenger’s first of many visits to the Persian Gulf and 
her first task in connection with the export of oil from this 
unsurveyed coast, in which she was later to play a not insignificant 

art. It was also her first experience of winter weather in the 
Gulf, which was quite unexpectedly cold. North-westerly gales, 
known locally as ‘shamals’, may blow for many days at a time, 
raising short choppy seas and filling the air with sand until 
visibility is down to half a mile. Surveying comes to a full stop 
on such occasions while the ship tugs at her anchor cable in the 
exposed anchorages off these flat, featureless coasts; only at the 
eastern end of the southern shores of the Gulf are there high 
mountains in sight of the sea, the ranges running south from the 
vicinity of Muscat. 

The ship called again at Muscat before leaving the Gulf on 
22nd March, 1939. Fuelling at Aden, she went northwards into 
the Red Sea and to Muhammad Qol on the coast of northern 
Sudan. 


As well as Admiralty charts, the Hydrographic Department 
produce and have constantly under revision a formidable library 
of over 70 books, known to mariners as the Sailing Directions. 


80 CHALLENGER 


These ‘Pilots’, as their official name is, give world coverage, des- 
cribing the coasts, the approaches to ports and harbours and how 
best these may be navigated, as well as some description of the 
ports themselves and the facilities they provide. The description 
of Muhammad Qol given in the Red Sea Pilot cannot be improved 
upon: 

The Village of Muhammad Qol, consisting chiefly of Arab huts, 
lies on the north-western shore of a bight, about three miles 
south-westward of the western extremity of Sararat; there is a 
conspicuous fort in this village, also a custom house. There is a 
jetty in front of the village.’ 

This, in fact, is a very full description of the extent and 
amenities of this Sudanese seaport. 

Off the jetty were moored two of the dhows which are the 
trading vessels of this part of the world; the anchors of these 
craft had been hooked beneath the coral knobs on the sea-bed 
by a member of the crew who had dived down for this purpose. 
The huts of the village, rudely constructed of driftwood, corru- 
gated iron and sacking, were stifling within; only the thick walls 
of the fort could provide the surveyors with shelter from the 
burning sun at midday. Inside the fort were a few chairs and a 
battered table, and two police camel saddles of complicated 
design which appeared to have been little used in a country where 
an old sack is considered saddle enough for a riding camel. Bats, 
disturbed by the unexpected intrusion as the opening of the heavy 
door admitted glaring daylight, fluttered helplessly out into the 
sun and were easy prey for the black crows which were standing 
about the sandy outskirts of the village. 

The tribesmen had long, woolly, unkempt hair, and carried 
short camel sticks with which to guide their riding camels, great 
light coloured beasts which lay around the well, groaning and 
grumbling. 

The ship herself was much under way while surveying the 
approaches to the port, encumbered as they were with shoals, 
most of which did not appear on the existing chart. Normally, 
such coral patches may be seen from the bridge or by a look-out 
aloft, but a cloudy sky casts shadows upon the water which con- 
fuse the observer. On such an afternoon Challenger was searching 
for a sheltered anchorage on the west side of Mayatib Island ; 


SANDY SHORES 81 


strong squalls of wind were coming from every point of the 
compass and the day’s work had been abandoned. 

The Captain’s intention had been to anchor on the north side 
of a charted rocky patch which was clearly visible from the bridge 
as the ship steamed slowly in, leaving the shoal to starboard. But 
as she neared the proposed anchorage shoals were sighted to port 
and ahead of the ship, leaving but a small channel between them 
and the charted shoal. But this water looked deep and secure and 
the ship, turning slightly to starboard, crept slowly ahead. 

A minute or so later that dreaded, indescribable feeling of a 
ship touching the ground was experienced by those on the bridge 
as she grazed along her port side. The Captain at once stopped the 
engines and ordered an anchor to be let go. He dared not go 
astern, for with but one screw his stern would have been thrust 
over to port and thus moved onto the shoal. 

A change in the light as a cloud shadow passed now revealed 
pale green and yellow coral heads beneath the ruffled surface of 
the water close on either hand, where but a few moments before 
the dark blue of the water had indicated a deep, clear channel. 
Of such a pinnacle structure were the coral knobs that the ship’s 
echo sounder never recorded less than eight fathoms. 

A sounding boat was lowered to lay a small marker buoy on 
each of the coral heads which now appeared to cluster about the 
ship, and slowly the anchor was weighed and the ship turned 
round, This was not an easy operation for the wind was still 
gusting, and from whichever quarter the squalls came there was 
always a coral head dangerously close to leeward. Gusts of wind 
could be seen racing across the water, rumpling the surface and 
flecking it with white-capped wavelets. The wind struck the 
bridge awning, making it thump and rattle, a noise which formed 
a background to the orders given by Commander Baker as he 
stood tense upon the bridge, manoeuvring his vessel in this con- 
fined space—‘Port thirty’, “Stop—half-astern’, ‘Mid ships—star- 
board thirty’. He glanced ahead, peering through his polaroid 
sunglasses which helped him to see the submerged reefs; he 
looked aft to watch how his ship’s stern was swinging into the 
wind as he went astern. He strode purposefully but unhurriedly 
from one side of the bridge to the other, to see how far off were 
the buoys which marked the danger. At last the ship was round 


82 CHALLENGER 


and steaming slowly out the way she had come in, the sounding 
boat feeling her way ahead of the ship. 

Next day the ship’s divers were able to report that it had only 
been a graze and that no lasting damage had been done. It was just 
another of those hazards to which a surveying vessel is exposed 
when searching for an anchorage in uncharted waters. 

The 21st April saw Challenger returning to England, the survey 
of Muhammad Qol completed. She did not know it then, but 


her peacetime surveying was over for many a long day to come. 


Vil 


Iceland 


her refit at Portsmouth, and on 25th August the officers 

and men on leave were recalled from their homes so that 
the ship might sail for her war station on the following day. 
From the Humber to Dover the waters of the east coast of 
England are comparatively shallow and encumbered by numerous 
sandbanks, and it is only by navigating the channels between them 
that ships can safely sail along the coast or enter the Thames 
Estuary and the other ports of East Anglia. With many of the 
navigation lights ashore extinguished or considerably reduced in 
visibility as they would be on the outbreak of war, vessels would 
have great difficulty in navigating those channels. The shallow- 
ness of the waters makes the mining of ships off the east coast a 
comparatively simple task for the enemy, so that in order to 
reduce the amount of water to be swept daily by our limited 
number of minesweepers it had long since been planned to 
restrict navigation to war channels, which were to be marked 
by lighted buoys every three miles or so to ensure that the 
convoys kept to the swept and navigable water. 

The accurate positioning of these buoys was, therefore, of im- 
mediate importance and was an exacting task, many miles at sea 
off the flat, featureless coast of East Anglia. It was Challenger’s 
first war-time duty to sail along the war channels, and, using taut- 
wire measurements and shore fixes where possible, to fix the 
proposed position of each war channel buoy and mark it with 
a temporary light buoy. Trinity House, who maintain the lights 
and the buoys around the coast of England, would later lay the 
large light buoys anchored by their six-ton clumps in each of 
these marked positions. Thus, in these anxious days just before 
the outbreak of war, Challenger, her gleaming white sides and 
yellow funnel now painted a uniform grey, was slipping out of 
Harwich in the dark hours before the dawn, followed by the 

83 


Ti War was very near as Challenger hurriedly completed 


84 CHALLENGER 


Trinity House vessel Patricia, as the two ships worked together 
to mark the narrow sea-lanes of the east coast, which were to 
be more permanently marked by the upperworks, funnels and 
masts of the many vessels which were mined and torpedoed when 
these lanes became so appropriately named ‘E Boat Alley’. 


By the end of September Challenger’s work on the war channels 
was complete and she was at Sheerness carrying out tidal stream 
surveys in the Thames Estuary, At this point Commander Baker 
exchanged duties with Commander W. C. Jenks, who had been 
in command of the surveying ship Scott, now being fitted with 
a 4-inch gun and depth charges to become an escort vessel. 

Commander Jenks was a man to whom surveying was more than 
his job, it was his whole life. He was a man of stern appearance 
and a hard man to cross. If he expected his ship’s company to 
work 18 hours a day, then he himself would work 20, and those 
are the hours that, in fact, he worked during war-time sur- 
veying. 

With the coming of the War a number of bases and fleet 
anchorages were being opened up and protected by the laying of 
booms across the harbour entrances. There was much surveying 
work to be done at such places; large-scale charts of the anchor- 
ages were required; the accurate positioning of the booms and 
the boom gate vessels required triangulated points ashore and 
an exact knowledge of the depth of water where these booms were 
laid; tidal streams had to be measured where these were to be 
placed; range finder testing charts required the accurate fixin 
of the prominent marks onshore; there were a hundred and one 
odds and ends of survey work to be done at these ports and 
anchorages in the early days of the War and the programme was 
delayed by the necessity of sailing in convoy between one port 
and the next. 

It was not until the end of October that there was found time 
to fit Challenger with any armament at all, although on a number 
of occasions low-flying enemy aircraft had been sighted by the 
ship while working in the Thames Estuary. Two Lewis guns were 
all that were fitted and this delayed her sailing in convoy from 
Sheerness to Plymouth, but she was able to overtake the convoy 
before it reached Dungeness at 10 o’clock at night. Challenger 


ICELAND 85 


broke off from this ‘eight-knot convoy’, which was proceeding 
at no more than five knots, when westward of Start Point and 
steamed on to Plymouth, reaching there at 2 o’clock in the 
morning. Her entry into Plymouth was not a success and was 
later referred to as the ‘Battle of Plymouth’. It was necessary in 
war time to flash a code signal to the station ashore before entry 
into the port was granted ; the code word was frequently changed 
and on this particular night Challenger had the wrong signal. The 
Army had established a battery on the hills overlooking the 
harbour entrance and the gunners manning it sat night after night 
longing for the day when they would be ordered to open fre. 
Their communication with the signal station was good and it was 
only a matter of a minute or so before their first round was 
whistling between the bridge of Challenger and the fore stay, to 
the alarm of the officers on her bridge who did not realise what 
was happening; by now a searchlight beam was lighting up the 
whole scene and enabled those on the bridge to see the splash 
of water close on the starboard side as the next round fell short. 
‘Full astern’, shouted the Captain, and soon the ship was at a 
standstill while confused signalling commenced between the ship, 
the shore and the examination vessel now closing her to investi- 
gate. After some delay the examination vessel was satisfied and 
Challenger entered Plymouth Sound, while the gunners sponged 
out their guns and longed for the next of these infrequent 
encounters with the enemy. 

The ship was making for ‘Port A’, a remote natural harbour 
on the west coast of Scotland, which was being made into a 
naval base and where the usual surveying tasks in connection with 
the defences were required. Slow, coastal convoying was a weary 
business in those early days, when officers were inexperienced and 
there was no radar to show where the ship ahead moved in the 
darkness of the winter nights. Hour after hour the officer of the 
watch would peer ahead looking for the small feather of white 
that indicated the ruffled water in the wake of the next ship in 
the convoy; at one moment it would seem far away and he would 
increase the engine revolutions, but within minutes he would 
realise with a tingling feeling in the pit of his stomach that he 
was almost on top of her and would ring down slow speed or 
stop the engines. The geared rods of the engine room telegraphs, 


86 CHALLENGER 


which passed through the Captain’s cabin below the bridge, made 
a churning noise, followed by the tinkle of the engine room 
repeating telegraph. Sometimes the Captain slept undisturbed by 
this, but at other times, when there were many movements, he 
might appear at the back of the bridge, announcing his presence 
by a gruff enquiry as to how things were going. Yes, it was a 
nerve-racking business, this convoy work, for hundreds of naval 
and merchant service officers in these early days of the war. The 
four hours of the middle watch from midnight to 4 o’clock in 
the morning seemed like an unending stretch of worry and strain, 
reaching away almost to eternity. But slowly the hours passed as 
cups of greasy cocoa punctuated the crawling time and then, quite . 
suddenly, the watch was nearly over and another came to take 
on the duty as the convoy concertinaed on its way, up speed, 
down speed, but all the time averaging little more than the speed 
of a man running, as they crept around the coastline. The complete 
and utter feeling of contentment that creeps over the relieved 
watchkeeper as oblivion overtakes him in his bunk cannot be 
described, it must be experienced. 

In such a convoy Challenger left Plymouth for Port A at 3.30 
in the afternoon of Saturday, 4th November, 1939. The convoy 
consisted of Challenger, the oil tanker E/ Alito and the cable ship 
Marie Louise Mackay under the escort of H.M.S. Montrose, an old 
destroyer. Commander Jenks, being the senior naval officer 
present, was in charge of this odd little group. A heavy gale blew 
from the south-west as they rounded the Lizard and headed north- 
eastwards for the Bristol Channel where the cable vessel was to 
be detached. The El Alito was flying light, without cargo, and at 
the height of the gale reported herself out of control ; but at last, 
very slowly, she got her head round into the wind and hove to 
on a course of 240 degrees, making good only two knots. 
Challenger stood by her all through that night in case she should 
drift in towards danger, and as grey dawn broke and the wind 
moderated, the little convoy crawled on through the Irish Sea to 
Liverpool Bay where two more ill-assorted vessels joined up 
and El Alito was thankfully detached. A minor collision between 
Challenger and s.s. Portavogie was the next frustrating little incident 
before the ships steamed slowly on through another night towards 
the Clyde, where Challenger was detached to carry on to Port A 


ICELAND 87 


independently, navigating her way through the narrow darkened 
Sounds of Islay and Mull during the next night. 

A fortnight was spent at Port A carrying out sounding of areas 
along the approach channel, laying buoys and setting up shore 
marks for fixing the boom defences. From here the ship went on 
to Scapa Flow to be met there with demands for a whole series 
of surveys in connection with the defences of this fleet base. 
H.M.S. Royal Oak had recently been sunk by a German U-boat 
which had penetrated the defences and had entered the Flow. 
This had added a great and overpowering urgency to all work 
connected with booms and other defences. Work commenced 
onboard at dawn on Sunday, 24th December, one hour after the 
ship had arrived at Scapa, and continued unceasingly. The weather 
was cold and stormy, with frequent snow squalls, while day after 
day the boats’ crews set out from the ship across the grey and 
white ruffled waters of the Flow. While their fellows in the 
Fleet came and went in cruisers and destroyers, slipping out 
through the boom at dusk on their warlike missions, the men of 
Challenger spent their day in drudgery under the unkindest 
weather conditions; the younger officers particularly, and many 
of the men, longed to be posted to some more warlike vessel, and 
many of them requested the Captain for a transfer. But the work 
was essential and no one could be spared; the surveying went on 
and on and on. 


Work completed in the Flow, the ship steamed round to Kirk- 
wall, where similar surveys were carried out in connection with 
fixed defences to be laid in the various sounds leading into the 
Contraband Control Anchorage at Kirkwall, which was crowded 
with neutral shipping of many nationalities, their national flags 
painted boldly on their sides, waiting for their turn for examina- 
tion, their crews cursing the endless delays. 

Long, bitter days were spent here by the surveyors in the field, 
relieved only by the overpowering kindness of the crofters of 
Orkney. Many a survey party was called into a farmhouse at 
dinner time, where they joined the family round the kitchen table 
to eat a boiled fowl and to enjoy the glow of warmth from the 
hearth after hours spent observing with the theodolite on some 
blustery hilltop. The lie up period was now only a peace-time 


88 CHALLENGER 


memory ; every day throughout the year was now a surveying day, 
come hail, rain or snow. 


The defence of harbours by controlled minefields was now being 
pushed forward at ports throughout the United Kingdom. 
Roughly, these defences consist of mines laid in exact positions 
on the sea-bed, which can be exploded under an enemy craft 
entering the harbour by a watcher in a control station ashore. 
He explodes the mine when he sees, by taking a bearing and 
range of the entering vessel, that she is passing over one of the 
mines. A number of such mines are laid across the harbour en- 
trance and it can be seen that the position of each mine must be 
accurately plotted if it is to be exploded according to plan. This 
means that a triangulation network must be set up in the vicinity 
of the harbour entrance and transit marks connected to this net- 
work must also be set up to guide the mine-laying vessel to the 
correct laying position of each mine. 

So here was a huge programme of harbour defence triangulation 
to be carried out by the three surveying ships which now re- 
mained available at Home. Many of these harbours lay in remote 
areas where existing triangulation stations were difficult to 
locate ; such stations may have been established by the Ordnance 
Survey 7o or 80 years before and the marked stones lay buried 
some two feet or so below the surface of the ground. Descriptions 
of the locations of these survey marks, made by the surveyors at 
the time they were laid down, were available and it was always 
necessary to recover two such stations if the measurement of a 
base was to be avoided and if the network of triangulation being 
set up was to be connected to the Ordnance Survey of Great 
Britain, which was highly desirable. The scene, of course, had 
changed since those descriptions were made so many years ago: 
new woods had grown up and others had been felled, old buildings 
could only be located by the ridge on the ground indicating the 
line of the ruined walls, or new buildings had sprung up to con- 
fuse the issue. Days were spent in digging, like treasure hunters 
on a desert island using a sketch map made by a long deceased 
pirate, but no successful treasure hunter was happier than these 
naval surveyors when at last the scrape of the spade denoted a 
flat stone, and the removal of the last handfuls of earth from the 


ICELAND 89 


trench revealed the triangulation mark (A) cut clearly in its 
surface so many years before, still marking the exact position in 
the survey of Great Britain. 

Challenger worked on at Scapa, Kirkwall, again at Port A and 
at Kyle Akin on the west coast of Scotland. She returned to 
Portsmouth for a refit in March, but while the refit went for- 
ward there was little respite for the surveyors, who were 
occupied with defence surveying in and around Portsmouth and 
Spithead. In early April the Germans invaded Norway and the 
‘hot’ war had begun. This was marked in Challenger by the fitting 
of two pom-poms on the forecastle and the refit was hustled 
forward. Many of the experienced men now left the ship and it 
was with a new crew that she sailed away again, carrying a 
number of men who had joined the Navy for the duration of the 
war only and knew no difference between a surveying ship and 
a destroyer during their first days onboard. The same round of 
harbour surveys in connection with controlled mining defences 
went on—Plymouth, Milford Haven and then to Sullom Voe in 
Shetland, where work was completed by the end of May. In the 
Shetlands the Germans were now only 200 miles away across in 
Norway ; an airborne attack against our northern outposts seemed 
a likely possibility so the boat sounding, coastlining and observing 
parties were armed with revolvers and rifles. It seemed difficult 
to believe, as the surveyors walked the sunlit moors of Shetland 
in glorious summer weather, that in the Low Countries men were 
fighting and dying while the situation grew more desperate every 
hour. Once again the junior officers longed to leave surveying 
and to get to grips with the enemy, but Commander Jenks, 
sympathising with them though he did, also realised more than 
anyone onboard the importance of preparing firm defences of our 
fleet bases and how very soon now they were likely to be tested. 
Sixteen hours of every day, seven days of every week, he kept 
the officers and men to their task. Long days of field work were 
followed by hours of plotting and inking-in the detail, while the 
dawn saw the boats away for more sounding or observing. 

Britain had at last taken a firm course in Northern Waters, 
occupying Iceland and the Faroes, knowing how important it 
would be to use the long, secure fjords of these islands as fuelling 
bases from which her ships could sail out to intercept the raiders 


90 CHALLENGER 


outward bound to harry our shipping on the wide oceans. These 
fjords were little surveyed, and H.M.S. Franklin, another naval 
surveying ship, had recently sailed north with the forces occupy- 
ing the Faroes and was now carrying out a survey of Scaale 
Fjord, the fine landlocked anchorage in those islands. 

It was now thought at Scapa Flow that Lieutenant-Commander 
Prien had entered in his U-boat to sink the Royal Oak by one of 
the four eastern channels. These entrances had been considered 
to be effectively blocked by the sinking of a number of old 
merchant ships both before and since the outbreak of war, but 
now it seemed that there were one or two small remaining gaps, 
through which flowed the swift tidal streams, where there was 
just sufficient room for a submarine to pass if piloted with 
supreme skill. Only a solid causeway across these four entrances 
would absolutely ensure no repetition of Prien’s masterly feat of 
seamanship with disastrous effects upon our Fleet within. But to 
build such a causeway and block the very strong tidal streams 
running here might so increase their force in the two main 
entrances of Hoxa and Switha Sounds that it would be impossible 
to maintain a boom there. To test this possibility before building 
the causeway a tidal model of the Flow was to be built and for this 
an accurate tidal survey of the existing Eastern Channels was 
required, and it was for this purpose that Challenger sailed from 
Shetland to Scapa; but when she reached there orders came to 
transfer these instructions to Franklin, newly arrived from Faroes, 
while Challenger was to proceed without delay for surveys in 
Iceland. Within a few hours of arriving in Iceland the fleet net- 
layer, H.M.S. Guardian, which was to lay the net defences across 
the mouth of Hvalfjord, had struck an uncharted rock and could 
do no more. Good charts of the Icelandic fjords were required 
and Challenger must make them as fast as she could. 


Surveying ships do not often operate in company and seldom 
do they meet each other, but when they do there is much to 
discuss and a reunion party always results; the officers of both 
ships, many of whom will have served together on other stations 
years ago, will speak of the eccentricities of former mess-mates, 
the capacity of their present Captains to force the pace of the 
work, and recall perhaps a hundred amusing incidents of the past 


~ 
ee 
— 


IN THE FLOATING DOCK—BERMUDA 


RS 


NEW FURNACES ARRIVE IN BERMUDA 


ICELAND 91 


from surveying in Labrador to the lie-up in Hong-Kong. Just 
such an evening developed in Franklin when she met Challenger 
in Scapa Flow in that unhappy June of 1940, whilst the two 
Commanding Officers transferred instructions in the ‘Cuddy’. 
Challenger lay at anchor a few cables away across the Flow, 
appearing dull and drab in her war-time coat of grey paint, the 
tiny pom-poms on her forecastle looking hopelessly inadequate for 
the voyage, unescorted, across the grey northern wastes to Ice- 
land on which she was to set out next day. 

These were desperate days; there was the possibility of the 
country being over-run by the enemy and the British were 
determined to fight on even from Canada if need be, whither they 
would take their fleet. In such an eventuality Iceland with its 
spacious fjords would be invaluable as a spring-board for returning 
to the attack in Europe. Surveying has to take account of eventu- 
alities, for the survey must be complete before the harbours are 
required, and such work is laborious and takes months of un- 
disturbed and patient labour. The task in Iceland was to survey 
at once the fine harbour of Hvalfjord on the west coast, after 
which other good anchorages on the east coast of Iceland were 
to be tackled. But all this work lay ahead as Challenger anchored 
off Reykjavik, the crew knowing they would soon be working 
harder than they had ever done in their lives. The scene was new 
and unforgettably beautiful: away to the north-east could be seen 
the towering flat-topped mountain called Esja, and beyond it, on 
the opposite side of Hvalfjord, the equally precipitous Akrafjall. 
Close round the ship and to the southward lay the little rocky 
islets of the bay with their vivid green slopes contrasting with 
the gay red and white houses of the town of Reykjavik. 

The British Naval Headquarters had been set up in the Borg 
Hotel in Reykjavik and Challenger’s Captain was already ashore 
there discussing the numerous surveying requirements for Iceland. 
The Head of Hvalfjord on a scale of 6 inches to the mile and the 
whole of the rest of the fjord on a scale of 3 inches to the mile 
was decided upon. Jenks returned to the ship having added to 
his staff a pleasant-looking student from the University, Bragi 
Kristiansson, who would act as an interpreter when questioning 
the local farmers as to the whereabouts of survey marks laid down 
by the Danish surveyors years before. 

8 


92 CHALLENGER 


Soon the ship was steaming up Hvalfjord, wild mountains 
towering on either hand, all of the same peculiar formation, with 
flattish summits and precipitous rocky sides dropping away for 
about half their height, after which they sloped in great screes 
scattered with boulders until they merged into the green fields 
of the coastal strip. Here and there farm houses lay dwarfed by 
the towering rocks, their small fields, sheep pens and cattle sheds 
with cattle and sheep looking like children’s toy farms. 

As the ship steamed slowly up the fjord, sounding her way in 
these well-nigh uncharted waters, Bragi Kristiansson stood on the 
open bridge with the Captain and Tim Connell, the navigator, 
as he pointed out the chief landmarks and named the farmsteads 
and the rivers, the latter of engaging interest to Tim, an ardent 
fisherman, who had heard of the great salmon fishing to be had 
in Iceland. Perhaps he would be able to fit in just a few hours of 
fishing in the weeks ahead. Gradually the fjord turned to star- 
board and more and higher mountains came into view, their flat 
tops carrying the eye beyond them to the snow-clad peaks of 
Botnsular. 

Rounding the promontory of Hofdi the ship slowed and came 
to anchor. No craft of any kind had been seen on the glassy waters 
of the fjord, nor had people been moving in the fields; it seemed 
to those onboard Challenger that they were steaming alone into 
the heart of an empty, peaceful land beyond this world and far 
from the bloody scenes in France of which they heard as each 
hopeless news bulletin followed another over the ship’s radio. 

But as the rumble of her anchor cable shattered the silence of 
the fjord people came running from the farmsteads to the water’s 
edge to stare at this small grey ship, with a strange flag flying at 
her stern. Challenger was the forerunner of war which was now 
reaching even this remote and lovely place. These people were 
to see more and more ships as the days passed, first naval trawlers 
and boom vessels, then store ships, tankers and hospital ships, 
each with her boats and tenders, and finally the great grey shapes 
of cruisers gliding into the fjord. The clean beaches were soon 
to become sullied with floating refuse, the rusting drums, floats, 
seamen’s caps, lifejackets, boathook staves, and many other ugly 
pieces of flotsam that scatter the shores whenever a great fleet of 
warships is at anchor. Strange sailors and soldiers were soon to 


ICELAND 93 


land to erect guns, hideous buildings, and mile upon mile of 
barbed wire. 

When the surveyors went ashore they found the Icelanders 
pleasant enough and happy to help them in locating the old survey 
marks whenever they could: they would offer them glasses of 
fresh milk and smile and pass the time of day. 

During the long summer days with practically no real night 
Commander Jenks was able to keep his men in the field 18 hours 
a day. In order to get the greatest efficiency he kept the same 
officers on the same work day after day. Lieutenants B. G. O’ Neill 
and G. P. D. Hall were the two junior surveying officers and 
these he kept in the boats, sounding continuously from 6 o’clock 
in the morning, crossing and re-crossing the fjord on their lines 
of soundings, until even the Arctic summer night became too 
dark for them to see to fix; this would be about 10.30 p.m., 
after which they would spend three or four hours in the chart 
room inking-in the day’s work. These two young lieutenants felt 
they should be in destroyers or the Fleet Air Arm, hitting the 
enemy, but they were left little time to ponder on these 
possibilities during the hectic days of surveying. 

Lieutenant D. L. Gordon had a neater hand than even most 
surveyors and Jenks selected him for the drawing of the collector 
tracing. Onto this he transferred details from all the field boards, 
so that on the day the field work was finished there would be a 
complete record of the work on tracing cloth from which copies 
could be printed by a sunprint process onboard for use within the 
Fleet until the Admiralty produced the properly printed chart. 
‘General’ Gordon, as he has always been called in the Surveying 
Service, has a fine sense of humour and can give an amusing 
account even of his employment as a draughtsman for 18 hours 
a day; and he needed his sense of humour as he drew thousands 
upon thousands of minute figures denoting the soundings on the 
many surveys Challenger completed in Iceland. He worked the 
same hours at his chart table as the men in the field, day after day 
throughout the summer and autumn of 1940; vagaries of the 
weather never held him up on his steady plodding work. 

Those working in the boats were often overtaken by sudden 
storms of intense fury. Out of a clear blue sky and without 
warning the wind would come sweeping down the mountainsides, 


94 CHALLENGER 


striking the water of the fjord and whipping it into a smother of 
white foam and lashing spray and stirring up numerous little 
whirling water spouts which raced across the fjord. On such 
occasions the boats hurried for shelter under the lee of the nearest 
island and lay tossing there as the rain came slanting down. The 
Boatswain in the ship ran to the forecastle to let go the second 
anchor and veer more cable as the ship began to tug at her 
moorings. But the sun soon came through, the rain passed off with 
a brilliant rainbow and work began again. 


All through June the survey of Hvalfjord went on; at the end 
of the month it became necessary to return to Reykjavik to land 
a rating for hospital treatment and to take in stores. At the en- 
trance to the fjord the wind was blowing hard and five British 
soldiers from the newly established battery were found adrift in 
a small boat. It was lucky that Challenger found them, for within 
an hour the east wind had developed into a full gale and when the 
ship anchored at Reykjavik at 3 o’clock in the morning it required 
both anchors down with seven shackles of cable on each to hold 
the ship. Soon after 5 o’clock in the morning the aircraft carrier 
H.M.S. Argus was seen to be dragging her anchors and within 
three minutes was ashore to leeward beam on. In such a gale it 
was impossible to render assistance to tow her off, but there was 
no immediate danger to personnel. The weather moderated slowly 
during the day and at ro.30 at night, on the rising tide, Challenger 
and two trawlers began towing operations. Challenger towed from 
Argus’ after fairlead, and the two trawlers from a fairlead amid- 
ships, but it was difficult for them to keep their bows up into 
the wind as they hauled, and gradually they fell off, parting their 
wires. Challenger was assisted by a small local tug to keep her 
head up into the wind and she hauled steadily while Argus worked 
her engines astern, her crew of some hundreds of men jumping on 
the quarterdeck. Such jumping, if done in complete unison by 
the crew, has the effect of lifting, if only slightly and momentarily, 
the bows of even the largest vessel and this sometimes assists in 
refloating a ship grounded forward. Ever so slowly, about mid- 
night, she came free, Challenger continuing to tow until both 
ships were in open water clear of the harbour. 

By next day the gale was blowing again and Challenger lay at 


ICELAND 95 


anchor in Reykjavik Roads surrounded by assorted small naval 
craft—trawlers and a frigate or two, all yawing this way and that 
across the wind. Anchor watch was set in Challenger—an officer 
posted on the bridge to observe bearings of objects ashore to 
detect whether the ship was dragging her anchors—while a small 
party of seamen were huddled beneath the bridge superstructure 
waiting to veer more cable or to work the engine-room telegraphs ; 
down in the engine room all was ready for slow speed. Anchor 
watch is a dreary business which may last for days at a time in 
these stormy seas; but on this occasion it was soon to be proved 
most necessary. A trawler anchored ahead of Challenger began to 
drag her anchors and was soon driving down rapidly towards the 
ship. The officer on the bridge ordered the cable party to veer 
cable, and by going slow ahead with the wheel hard to starboard 
he managed to stop the ship from sheering across the wind for 
long enough to allow the trawler to go careering down the port 
side of Challenger and just clear of her. The trawler went ashore, 
and she could easily have taken Challenger with her. 


It can be seen that the visits to Reykjavik away from the survey 
ground were not as restful as they might have been. One night 
Brian O’Neill and Geoffrey Hall were dining and dancing at the 
Borg Hotel with some charming Icelandic girls when the Naval 
Staff Officer (Operations) came over to their table with a grim 
expression and asked Hall to step outside into the foyer for a 
moment. Arrived there, he handed Hall a letter, saying that it was 
for the Captain of Challenger and that he should deliver it onboard 
as soon as possible. Hall asked what the letter might contain 
that made it so urgent, to be told that it carried news of a German 
convoy which had been sighted off the south-east coast of Iceland, 
steaming in a westerly direction and heavily escorted. The convoy 
was expected to reach Reykjavik about noon next day. 

Hall signalled to O’ Neill and both made excuses to their party, 
saying they had been ordered back to the ship, and took their 
hurried departure. As they made their way to the landing stage 
the seriousness of the situation came home to them, giving them 
a feeling of excitement mingled with fear. There were very few 
offensive ships in Iceland at this time and Challenger carried only 
two small pom-poms. Signals by torch from the jetty to the ship 


96 CHALLENGER 


eventually resulted in a boat’s coming inshore for them and by 
midnight Hall was in the Captain’s cabin giving him a shake. He 
sat up in his bunk, wearing his pyjamas, and read the letter, an 
expression of fury slowly spreading across his face. “My God,’ he 
said at last, ‘if they think that’s what we’re going to do while 
the enemy carries out an invasion they’re very much mistaken. 
Have a boat alongside for me at 0530. Good-night.’ The letter 
had, in fact, carried the news which the Staff Officer had told 
Hall, and had further instructed Challenger to carry on with her 
survey of Hvalfjord. 

At 5.30 in the morning a little group of officers saluted as the 
Captain, grave faced and tense, descended the ladder into the 
waiting boat. Meanwhile all preparations were being made on- 
board to get under way, and for action; the two small guns were 
being provided with ammunition. The officers and men moved 
around with a curious sinking feeling in the pit of their stomachs ; 
‘lone survey vessel goes down fighting against supreme odds’— 
some imagined their obituaries to read in the papers at home. 
Half an hour later the Captain was back onboard, coming up the 
gangway with a half sheepish, half furious expression on his face. 
The little group of saluting officers awaiting desperate orders saw 
a ghost of a smile pass over his face. ‘A bloody Army Exercise,’ 


he said. 


The following months of July and August were also spent in 
and around Hvalfjord, surveying for the boom and the controlled 
minefield near the entrance. Their old friend the Trinity House 
vessel Patricia arrived to lay the navigational buoys in positions 
indicated by Challenger. But at last these surveys were all com- 
plete, and by 1st September the ship lay at Reykjavik awaiting 
further orders. These soon arrived and gave instructions for the 
carrying out of surveys of three fjords on the east coast of Iceland. 
H.M. Ships Hood and Repulse had recently been lying in Reydar- 
fjord, but now it was desired to use three of the smaller fjords, 
all of which were incompletely surveyed; these were Seydisfjord, 
Akureyri in Eyjafjord and Hrutafjord. Secure anchorages in Ice- 
land were invaluable, for ships based there could dominate the 
Denmark Strait and the Iceland-Faroe Channel through which the 
enemy raiders had to sail to reach the high seas. The survey of 


ICELAND 97 


each fjord followed a similar pattern: the entrances for the booms 
and the controlled minefields, and on a large scale the anchorages 
within and the narrow parts of the fjords where navigation was 
in any way difficult. 


More and more members of the crew were called on to give 
the surveyors assistance in the field and large parties of men were 
landed to search for and mark the existing triangulation stations. 
On one occasion the Chief Boatswain’s Mate was in charge of 
such a party. Many attempts had been made to find an essential 
survey point but without success. Commander Jenks had said that 
it must be found, and even that the eventual finder would be 
rewarded. As night fell the Chief Boatswain’s Mate returned 
triumphant and was ushered into Commander Jenks’ presence. 
But the smile on the Captain’s face quickly vanished when he 
saw that the Petty Officer was holding in his hand the iron plate 
which once had marked the position of the triangulation station 
to within an inch upon the earth’s surface. 

Friendliness was met with from the country people of Iceland 
as the parties worked through the perfect autumn days; cold 
misty mornings with cloudless skies gave way to glorious after- 
noons and evenings as the sun’s rim touched the line of the 
western hilltops, illuminating the cliff-sided fjords with a soft 
rose light reflected from the silver surface of these long arms of 
the sea. 

The vast programme was completed by 22nd October, when 
the ship returned once again to Reykjavik. The great areas sur- 
veyed, combined with the impeccable accuracy upon which 
Commander Jenks always insisted, will undoubtedly make sur- 
veying history, and his work here in Iceland ranks with that of 
the great surveyors of earlier days. 


IX 


War at Sea 


N October of 1940, with the surveys of Iceland complete, 
| Challenger sailed southwards for a refit period in England. 

Almost as soon as she put to sea the winds began to blow 
and a gale harried the ship the whole way across the grey wastes 
of ocean between Iceland and Scotland. The wind howled relent- 
lessly in the rigging, the ship heaved, pitched and rolled, the seas 
thumped against her side and blanked the portholes with green 
and white as the waves rose towards the upper deck. The men 
below in the mess decks cursed with rage as they wearied of 
constantly bracing themselves against the rolling of the ship. 

In the Pentland Firth on the forenoon of Sunday, 3rd November, 
the ship joined a convoy bound for the east coast across the 
Moray Firth and round Kinnaird Head. The Senior Officer of the 
convoy escort, sailing in the anti-aircraft cruiser Curacao, ordered 
Challenger to take up station as rear ship of the port column; at 
about 6 o’clock that evening a merchant ship named Eros joined 
the convoy, having come from Invergordon: she had recently been 
torpedoed and the repairs made temporarily to her bows were 
plain to see. She took up station astern of Challenger. 

As dusk closed in, the convoy crawled on at six knots on a 
south-easterly course about seven miles off Kinnaird Head. Soon 
the sound of aircraft could be heard and gunfire was seen from 
Curacao, who had moved out to a position about three miles on 
the port side of the convoy. A few minutes later the men at their 
A.A. defence stations in Challenger saw a twin-engined float-plane 
coming in low on the port beam. The two pom-poms on the port 
side were soon in action; seconds later there was a thud, and 
looking astern those on the bridge saw a huge column of water 
and smoke rising on the port side of Eros to the height of her 
masthead; the plane passed out of sight astern in the gathering 
darkness and grey, low cloud. 

Soon the attacking aircraft was in sight again, coming in on 

98 


WAR AT SEA 99 


Challenger’s starboard quarter at a height of s0 feet. The guns 
opened fire when the plane was about 400 yards away, the tracer 
bullets appearing to travel right into her; she banked steeply and, 
passing between Challenger and Eros, disappeared to the eastward. 

It had been assumed at first that Eros had suffered a near miss 
by a bomb, but in fact the float-plane had launched a torpedo, 
which had passed narrowly astern of Challenger as it went on its 
way to hit Eros on the port side. Although Eros did not as yet 
appear to be taking on a list, she was dropping astern quickly into 
the darkness, and just before losing sight of her Commander 
Jenks decided to go back and investigate. 

It was pitch dark when Challenger got back to Eros and it could 
only be dimly discerned that the two lifeboats were gone from the 
starboard side of her boatdeck. She appeared utterly deserted, 
the lifelines and boats’ falls trailing in the water as she moved 
sluggishly to the gentle swell. She had a slight list to port and was 
down by the stern about five feet. 

The whaler was lowered, with the seaboat’s crew and 
Lieutenant O’Neill in charge, to cross to the stricken vessel and 
investigate the possibility of taking her in tow. As the seaboat 
pulled across to Eros those on Challenger’s bridge heard quite 
clearly the cries of a demented being coming, apparently, from 
somewhere within the deserted ship. 

O’Neill climbed the jumping ladder which had recently been 
used by the crew to abandon the ship. He then walked along the 
empty decks, calling out to see if any man remained onboard. 

He neither saw nor heard any living thing except the ship’s cat 
which he carried down to the boat; all he had heard was the 
dismal slopping of the sea water that had entered the engine room 
and stokehold. 

Whilst awaiting the return of the whaler Commander Jenks 
had sighted the two lifeboats from Eros, which could be seen 
dimly about a mile away in the direction of the shore. They were 
hailed strongly and they turned back towards Challenger. 

As O’Neill reached the bridge to report to the Captain that 
there appeared to be no life onboard the damaged vessel, the 
desperate cries came clearly over the water again, so back went 
the seaboat. Accompanied by Able Seamen Harry Barbour and 
Charles McKenna, O’Neill started to search the crews’ quarters, 


Ioo CHALLENGER 


shouting continually and inspecting every compartment until the 
engine room was reached, where the noise of sluicing water was 
now very great every time the ship rolled to the swell. The small 
party then worked along the narrow well deck passage, their 
thoughts turning to the flooding water and the possibility of the 
ship’s foundering at any moment as they got further and further 
from the clean air of the upper deck, which now seemed one of 
the most desirable places imaginable. At the end of the passage 
tappings were heard from the stokehold below. It was not pos- 
sible to enter from the port side so that it was necessary to work 
round to the starboard side before the stokehold could be reached. 
In the darkness somewhere below the voice of the trapped man 
could be heard, crazy with fear; he called desperately for help, 
but could not be persuaded by the searchers to tell them how 
they could get down to him through the darkness; all that he 
could tell them was that flood water prevented his reaching the 
deck by the usual ladder. 

The rescuers worked their way round the base of the funnel 
and got onto the steel gratings above the boiler casing ; from there 
with a torch the trapped man’s head could be seen, above the 
top of the end of the boiler casing but below the gratings on which 
they were standing. These gratings were formed of narrowly 
placed steel bars, imprisoning him like a rat in a cage as the water 
rose below him. There were two rungs of the grating rather more 
widely spaced than the others, and slowly, bit by bit, the hysterical 
man was encouraged to crawl along between the top of the 
boiler and the gratings to this opening. He was covered in water 
and oil fuel and was being burnt on the boiler casing as he made 
his way along. But once he had squeezed wildly through the gap 
he recovered quickly as he poured thanks on his rescuers and 
shivered in the stern of the whaler. 

O’Neill reported that Barbour and McKenna had no thoughts 
for their own safety and had to be restrained from entering the 
dark, flooded stokehold of the ship which, as far as they knew, 
might sink suddenly at any moment. McKenna had served in 
merchant ships and his knowledge of their layout was invaluable 
as the rescue party groped their way through the darkness guided 
only by the cries from the stokehold. 

By now the lifeboats had come alongside and as Eros appeared 


WAR AT SEA Io! 


to be settling very slowly Commander Jenks intended to take her 
in tow and hoped that he would be able to get her into Aberdeen 
before she foundered. The Captain of the Eros persuaded a number 
of his officers and men to go back to the ship with him to make 
fast the tow. Some considerable delay occurred before a 7-inch — 
manila rope was roused up from aft in Eros; this rope was 90 
fathoms long and was secured, with the help of the Fraserburgh 
lifeboat which had now arrived, to Challenger’s 31-inch wire 
hawser of 250 fathoms. This work had to be done with the 
minimum of torchlight as enemy aircraft could still be heard in 
the offing, flares were being dropped in the distance and anti- 
aircraft firing was continuous ashore. It seemed that the tow 
would never be ready, but at last all was secured and Challenger 
moved slowly ahead. 

Anxiety was felt by both Captains as to the possibility of towing 
such a large vessel with this light gear; the soft eye of the manila 
was shackled to the wire hawser which gave a sharp nip where 
considerable chafe might develop. But in fact the ship was got 
under way with ease and she followed steadily at a speed of 43 
knots. The tow continued southward through the night and at 
daylight off Aberdeen Eros was handed over to the tug Sabine, 
who took her safely into harbour to sail the seas another day. 


The Royal Naval Dockyards had long since been working to 
capacity and now it was commonplace for naval ships to be re- 
fitted by commercial ship repairers ; and in early November, 1940, 
Challenger was taken in hand for her annual refit in the East India 
Dock, Blackwall. 

However clean a ship may be at the beginning of the refit, 
and however comfortable, there is a rapid deterioration as soon 
as the refit gets going. The water system is taken apart, the lava- 
tories are closed, the galley is torn asunder—it is like having one’s 
house completely rebuilt and yet trying to remain living in it. 
Gradually the amenities disappear; portable galleys, shore wash 
rooms and lavatories never satisfactorily replace those of the ship. 
Above all, in winter time the shore supply of power is invariably 
inadequate for the needs of the vessel, giving but a dull red glow 
to one bar of the electric radiator and a depressing half-light 
throughout the ship. In the winter of 1940-41 Challenger suffered 


102 CHALLENGER 


all these discomforts, with nightly bombing by the enemy as 
well. 

Conditions were so uncomfortable that arrangements were made 
to keep only the minimum number of men onboard at night; an 
officer and ten men formed the fire party to deal with the incen- 
diary bombs which fell nightly over London. Except for this small 
party the ship was deserted from 5 o’clock on these winter after- 
noons until 7.30 the following morning. As the bombs crumped 
and the ack-ack guns thumped away around the docks the fire 
party gathered in the ill-lit galley to cook a communal supper. 
Alone in the cold wardroom sat the duty officer, huddled over 
the tiny glow of the radiator—perhaps the loneliest man in all 
London. He longed for the pale watery morning and the arrival 
of the workmen and his relief. 

Amidst the hammering and rattling of the rivetters in the un- 
heated chart-room, the surveying officers daily worked on their 
fair sheets of Iceland; true, prints taken from the collector tracings 
had been used to make the charts which had already been sup- 
plied to the Fleet, but the fair sheets were required for the 
permanent record of this important work. The days of the warm 
drawing office ashore and the leisurely pace of draughtsmanship 
were gone; it was hustle, hustle all the time with two or some- 
times three officers taking it in turns to work on the same chart. 

But there were days of leave, quite a number of days, to 
compensate for the dreariness of the ship at this time. The officers 
and men packed their suitcases, and taking a last look at the grey 
ship with the frayed ropes’ ends from the dockyard stages blowing 
in the keen wind, they walked out through the formidable dock 
gates into the bustling, mean streets of the East End of London, 
where daily they saw more signs of ruin and destruction. Four 
who walked ashore so happily for leave never returned to their 
ship; they were killed by a direct hit from a bomb on an East 
End milk bar. 

General Gordon paused in his drawing of the Iceland charts, 
upon which he had now been employed for so long, and went to 
the makeshift mortuary where the dead sailors were lying with 
over a hundred other mangled bodies. It had been a terrible night, 
and when he had done his dreadful duty of identifying the sailors 
he stood outside the building; his legs shook, he felt sick, and 


WAR AT SEA 103 


for a few minutes was unable to walk away. A young doctor who 
had been working through the night came out of the mortuary— 
‘Just like a butcher’s shop, it’s ghastly,’ he said. 


By the end of January all was ready for sea, and Vice-Admiral 
Edgell, the Hydrographer of the Navy, paid a visit; this was all 
he was able to see of his ships in these days, and these visits were 
always appreciated as they made everyone onboard feel that the 
Chief still gave much thought to the ships despite his over- 
whelming occupation with chart production and supplies which 
had by now reached enormous proportions. 

The new internal degaussing coils had been run round the ship 
as a protection against magnetic mines. These were calibrated by 
taking the ship over the degaussing range at Tilbury before she 
sailed down river and into the Medway at Sheerness, where she 
arrived during an air-raid. Enemy aircraft were flying low through 
broken cloud, and the ship’s guns were in action; as she stemmed 
the strong tidal stream so that the men on the forecastle could 
secure her to the buoy a barrage balloon came drifting down on 
the wind in flames, narrowly missing the ship as it struck the 
water. 

The first big survey of 1941 was that of Lough Foyle where 
Challenger arrived in mid-February. With bases in Eire denied to 
us, Londonderry was our nearest port to the Battle of the Atlantic 
and was growing daily in importance as a base for anti-submarine 
vessels, frigates and corvettes as the battle gained in intensity. 
Many of these vessels were having difficulty in navigating the long 
channel through the lough and up the river to Londonderry. 
Whether this was bad navigation or a change in the channel itself 
was not readily apparent: it is natural for many seafarers to 
question the chart before questioning their own navigation. How- 
ever, in view of the ever increasing importance of Londonderry 
and the plans that had been formulated in the Admiralty for wharf 
construction in the river at Culmore, the Hydrographer was taking 
no chances and ordered a re-survey of the whole channel and 
river approach to Londonderry. 

This was a formidable survey and Commander Jenks tackled 
it with the same determination with which he had tackled Iceland 
in the previous year. Every boat onboard was pressed into service 


104 CHALLENGER 


and men found themselves away in the whaler, sounding under 
sail with lead and line, to augment the work of the echo sounding 
launches. Such methods of sounding had probably not been prac- 
tised for over 40 years, but as long as results were accurate Jenks 
cared nothing for appearances or discomfort. 

The channel as far as Culmore, where it enters the river, skirts 
the north shore of the lough, and passes within a few hundred 
yards of the Eire shore in some places. Although main triangula- 
tion stations were recovered on the south shore of the lough on 
which basis the survey was built up, it was still necessary to 
include some fixed points along the Eire shore. Theodolite parties 
who landed on this coast were nervously looking over their 
shoulders and expecting to be interned at any moment, but when 
a Civic Guard did eventually appear he was only interested in 
discussing the progress of ‘our’ war with the English surveyors. 

Once the survey entered the river the scale was greatly in- 
creased. The reason for this was unknown to those in Challenger 
at the time; it was only later, when the large United States Base 
and fuelling wharves for their escort vessels were built at Lisa- 
hally on the south bank of the river, that it became clear why this 
survey had been ordered by the Hydrographer in the early part 
of 1941. 


By early May the Londonderry surveys were complete and the 
ship was in Lough Larne, for this too was to play its part as an 
anchorage for escort vessels employed in the Atlantic battle. The 
officers and men of Challenger had now served together for some 
considerable time and many had served under Commander Jenks 
in Iceland; by now they were well practised in the arts of rapid 
wartime surveying and quicker results were being obtained as each 
new survey was taken in hand. But at Larne there was considerable 
trouble with the triangulation in the upper part of the lough: 
the triangles observed between the stations which had been erec- 
ted along both shores refused to close within reasonable limits 
of 180 degrees. At low water this part of the lough is composed 
of acres of mudbanks through which winds a narrow boat channel, 
and across these soft flats it was necessary to walk to reach the 
triangulation stations on the foreshore. After two or three muddy 
surveyors had returned with angles which did not add up to the 


WAR AT SEA 1o¢ 


magic figure, the Captain announced his intention of going him- 
self the next day to complete the work—‘And I shall want a pair 
of mud pattens, Number One,’ he said to Lieutenant-Commander 
Henry Menzies, who was already carrying in his head a list of the 
instruments and other gear which the Captain had ordered ; Num- 
ber One looked puzzled: ‘Surely you know what mud pattens are 
—like a cross between snowshoes and skis with which you can 
walk dryshod over soft mud,’ said Jenks. Busy with his other 
preparations the First Lieutenant forgot all about the pattens until 
he reported that all was ready to the Captain in the morning, 
who enquired if they were in the boat: ‘They will be down there 
in a minute or two, Sir,’ said Number One, who rushed down 
below to see the Shipwright. ‘Chippy, for heaven’s sake make a 
pair of mud pattens full speed.’ Chippy’s face was as puzzled as 
Menzies’ had been the night before. Number One described the 
pattens as quickly as he could, and very shortly two small boards 
with four holes drilled in each and a piece of cord attached were 
passed down into the boat. It was all there was time for, and 
Menzies reported to the Captain that all was ready. 

For Number One it was a long day of waiting, and at 6 p.m. 
there was still no sign of the Captain returning, but an hour later 
the boat was sighted on its way back and even when she was still 
half a mile away it could be seen that the Captain stood in the 
sternsheets covered in thick black mud from head to foot. Not 
only had the mud pattens been too small in area to support Jenks 
on the mud, but once he had sunk in they anchored him securely 
despite all efforts of the boat’s crew to remove him. 


Orders for tropical service were now received and the ship 
proceeded to Greenock, where all efforts were devoted to em- 
barking stores and awnings and generally preparing the ship for 
service in tropical waters. Only the Captain knew where the 
ship was bound, but some clue was given to her destination when 
information was passed to the officers that Challenger was to escort 
a 10,000-ton troopship to a West African port. Challenger had 
relied in the past for her safety in her insignificance on the high 
seas, and her armament of four two-pounder pom-poms seemed 
ill suited to this task. However, three corvettes were also to form 
the escort—H.M. Ships Lavender, Starwort and Petunia—with 


106 CHALLENGER 


Commander Jenks as Escort Commander. The trooper was s.s. 
Anselm, said to be sailing in this special convoy as she had proved 
too slow to sail with an earlier one which had just left. She 
carried 1400 troops, the greater proportion of whom were R.A.F. 
personnel. 

At midnight on Sunday, 29th June, this little convoy sailed out 
of the Clyde, bound for Bathurst in the Gambia River. A Welling- 
ton bomber joined as air escort off the north coast of Ireland, but 
this heartening support had soon to leave as they steamed west- 
ward towards mid-Atlantic. 

Commander Jenks had organised his force as follows : Challenger 
in the centre with Anselm following astern; ahead and on either 
flank a corvette formed an effective screen as the little ships 
searched with their asdic equipment for any contact with a sub- 
marine. When well out into the Atlantic the leading corvette 
signalled that her asdic had broken down and could not be re- 
paired with the resources available; this was disastrous news and 
meant a complete re-disposition of the force as the van was no 
longer protected from submarine attack. This corvette was 
ordered to the rear and the remaining two corvettes moved further 
forward on the flanks to cover each bow. 

The Battle of the Atlantic was now moving rapidly towards its 
peak. By obtaining radio bearings of U-boat transmissions and by 
other intelligence methods the Admiralty were able to form quite 
a good idea of the whereabouts of a number of the U-boats at 
sea in the Atlantic, and twice daily they issued a coded situation 
report known as the ‘Sitrep’, which gave convoys this vital in- 
formation. Spread out in the surveying chartroom below the 
bridge was a chart of the Atlantic showing the position of the 
vulnerable little convoy and the suspected positions of the U- 
boats as given in the ‘Sitreps’. Never was any chart on this table 
scanned as keenly as it was by the small group of officers as each 
‘Sitrep’ was being plotted; the little swastikas, which represented 
U-boats, came nearer and nearer to the course of the convoy as 
it crawled its way southwards across the Atlantic. 

There was no avoiding action to be taken at a speed of 10 knots, 
nor was it certain that the ‘Sitreps’ could be relied upon as highly 
accurate. There was nothing for it but to keep going, zig-zagging 
by day and urging the asdic operators and bridge look-outs to 


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WAR AT SEA 107 


ever greater vigilance. All onboard were conscious of the vul- 
nerability of the convoy, the low speed, the corvette with the 
defective asdic gear, the great bulk of the Anselm—it was like 
walking naked through a huge room full of people; the eyes of 


every U-boat must be upon them. 


On the night of sth July the little convoy was right in the 
middle of the North Atlantic; the night had been one of varying 
visibility, fog sometimes cutting off from view the escorts and 
the troopship. The Captain had been on the bridge nearly the 
whole night, but shortly after daylight at 6 o’clock the visibility 
cleared and he went to his cabin to rest and in a few minutes was 
dozing in his armchair. Just under an hour later he was awakened 
by the impulsive jarring ring of the alarm gong, the worst 
awakening known to a naval man, and one which remains in the 
memory. He ran to the bridge, jostling as he did so the men who 
were hurrying up the ladders to their action stations. As he 
reached the bridge he saw Anselm astern; she was down by the 
head with a slight list to port, moving slowly ahead through the 
water. The Officer of the Watch said that she had been torpedoed 
—he had heard the detonation and had turned to see a vast column 
of brown coloured water falling onto the upperworks of the 
troopship. 

Jenks ordered the two leading corvettes to hunt the U-boat 
while he turned Challenger so that she came round astern of 
Anselm where already men were in the water stringing out behind 
her like a trail of refuse cast overboard, while alongside the 
troopship boats were being lowered. Slowly Jenks manoeuvred 
his ship ahead through the drifting men, lowering his seaboats as 
he went and with the ship’s company hauling onboard those men 
who were able to hold onto the ropes thrown to them. Eventually 
he was able to put Challenger’s forecastle head alongside the 
troopship’s port quarter. Though it was calm there was a swell 
running and the relative movement of Challenger’s bow and the 
troopship’s stern was considerable. Although hammocks were 
got up to break the fall of those who jumped from the Anselm 
onto Challenger’s forecastle, the troops preferred to step across 
to welcoming hands each time the Challenger’s bows came level. 

It was a difficult job for Commander Jenks to keep the bows 

9 


108 CHALLENGER 


well up to Anselm’s stern, more particularly as he was thinking 
of the future. He hoped to rescue a very large number of men and 
it was vital that he should not damage Challenger so much that it 
might prejudice the carrying of them many miles across the 
Atlantic to safety. 

The Captain was utterly cool, giving his orders calmly to the 
Coxswain in the wheelhouse as he manoeuvred his engines to 
keep Challenger in position—his calm bearing was infectious, and 
all, rescuers and rescued, were behaving magnificently as the 
numbers of men onboard Challenger increased minute by minute. 

All this time Anselm’s bows were settling slowly and steadily but 
after about 125 men had stepped across onto Challenger’s fore- 
castle the stern began to rise into the air as the bows submerged 
more rapidly and the sea began to flow in over her foredeck. It 
was obvious now that she was about to plunge. Only a hemp rope 
held Challenger to Anselm and when Jenks saw that she was about 
to go he shouted to the troops to jump for it as he slowly moved 
astern, parting the hemp rope as he did so. The stern of the 
troopship reared vertically into the air, men leaping offall the time 
in a great fan-shaped mass of humanity. Many landed on the fore- 
castle of Challenger, breaking their ankles and legs as they landed, 
despite the layers of hammocks laid out to break their fall. The 
trooper’s stern was now 200 feet above Challenger’s bows and the 
rudder and screws looked strange in such a position, yet still men 
were jumping off, hitting the sea with a great splash. 

As Challenger went astern Anselm reached a completely vertical 
position as her funnel met the water; then she slid down like 
a giant lift to the accompaniment of the noise of crashing gear 
and bursting bulkheads. No vortex was created on the surface of 
the sea—she was there one second and gone the next, leaving 
the heaving surface littered with a mass of human and material 
debris. 

All Challenger’s boats and those of the third corvette were now 
in the water collecting and bringing onboard many of the hundreds 
of survivors who were clinging to the wreckage. The other two 
corvettes were hunting the submarine far away on the horizon: 
the shudder of their distant depth charges being felt from time to 
time. The calmness of those in the water was almost unbelievable: 
many who were on rafts or clinging to substantial pieces of 


par 


WAR AT SEA 109 


wreckage waved the rescue boats away and pointed to survivors 
more in need of immediate attention. Discussing the scene after- 
wards, many realised that they had seen one survivor who had 
been sitting on an upturned table calmly reading a book and 
apparently oblivious of the scenes of chaos all about him. 

Challenger and Starwort became fuller and fuller and the counting 
of survivors became difficult as the men climbed onboard up the 
scrambling-nets hung along both sides of the ships. Over 800 men 
were definitely embarked in Challenger, making, with her own 
ship’s company, almost a thousand men onboard the little ship ; 
the even smaller Starwort had rescued nearly 300. By 9 a.m. no 
further survivors could be seen among the flotsam, and it had 
reluctantly to be assumed that the four hundred or so now missing 
must have gone down with the ship. There was no longer any 

oint in remaining stopped in this area, a sitting target for U-boats, 
and so both ships set off with their human cargoes, slowly at first 
because of the gross overloading and tenderness of the vessels, 
but gradually increasing speed as confidence was gained, until 
12 knots was reached. Any undue movement of the steering wheel 
caused the ships to heel alarmingly. That the weather should con- 
tinue calm was vital to survival. 

The scenes below in the ship, now packed with wet, bedraggled, 
wounded humanity were indescribable: every hole and corner 
held its party of shivering men as they waited patiently for clothing 
which Challenger’s crew provided from their personal belongings, 
and for hot food from the galley where the ship’s cooks were 
working with a will. 

Many were injured and the ship’s Medical Officer, Surgeon 
Lieutenant W. A. B. Cooper, R.N.V.R., aided by Squadron 
Leader Monro, a survivor from Anselm, worked unceasingly for 
the next 24 hours. Only two men died onboard, and Cooper 
earned a Mention in Despatches for his great night’s work. 

A few lines from Commander Jenks’ report made soon after 
the sinking of the troopship are well worth quoting: 


Crammed into every inch of space between decks and on the upper deck, 
the survivors settled themselves down patiently and quietly for some 24 
hours of discomfort and by their ready obedience greatly assisted the ship’s 
officers and company in their endeavours to provide sustenance and warmth. 
Particularly admirable was the conduct of the Royal Marines detachment who 


I1o CHALLENGER 


had been picked up, they took pains to sort themselves into a regular unit 
and took over a section of the food distribution duties from the ship’s 
company, and throughout behaved as if on the parade ground. 

It was a source of great personal satisfaction that Captain Elliott, Master of 
s.s. Anselm, was among those rescued by Challenger. This fine officer was swept 
from his bridge as the ship plunged under, but arrived on the bridge of 
Challenger after his rescue completely unshaken and physically fit despite his 
years. He was most anxious to be of any assistance possible and his cheerful 
bearing was a great asset. 

Captain Elliott was 73 years of age.* 


Commander Jenks’ immediate task must be to rid the ship of 
her great burden of humanity before bad weather made her 
unseaworthy. He hoped to rendezvous with the armed merchant 
cruiser Cathay that night, but overcast weather had precluded the 
convoy getting their position by sights during the last two days, 
and to rendezvous on the high seas when one’s position is doubt- 
ful is a chancy business. When approaching the position of the 
rendezvous towards dusk a momentary sight of Cathay was ob- 
tained about four miles away to the south-east. Spirits soared but 
it would have been dangerous to pass a signal either by wireless 
or by flashing lamp in these U-boat infested waters, nor was it 
known if Cathay had sighted the little convoy. Jenks knew 
Cathay’s course and it soon became obvious that there was nothin 
to be done but to follow through the night, hoping to find the 
merchant cruiser at dawn; occasional traces of Cathay’s wash 
meeting the prevailing rel assured the Captain that she was still 
ahead, and at daylight contact was made with her. 

Whilst the three corvettes circled round, Challenger went 
alongside the armed merchant cruiser and discharged her human 
cargo, the 35 seriously injured men being hoisted in a cradle 
worked from one of Cathay’s cargo derricks. A swell was still 
running and Challenger’s external boat davit supports ground and 

rumbled hideously against the great liner’s side despite the mass 
of tattered fenders that were constantly thrust between the two 
ships. However, no serious damage was done and when the last 
survivor had been routed out from the remotest corner in the 


* Captain Andrew Elliott, O.B.E., served a life-time at sea, He survived 
two World Wars afloat and retired to Woodcombe in Somerset in 1949. He 
died in February 1957. 


WAR AT SEA III 


little survey ship she joined the circus with the other two 
corvettes while Starwort disembarked her survivors. 


With the survivors out of the ship a great weight seemed to 
have been shaken off. Challenger no longer seemed to those on- 
board to be the No. 1 target. It was absurd, of course, but 
everyone felt that the enemy would know that Challenger had 
snatched these survivors from their grasp and that every U-boat 
in the North Atlantic would be closing in on her. But, as always 
in the war at sea, the passing of one worry is soon replaced by 
another ; fuel now became the important factor. With the delay 
and much extra steaming necessitated by the sinking of the troop- 
ship the corvettes and Challenger needed fuel, for who knew how 
many more diversions and emergencies might overtake the little 
convoy before they sighted the shores of Africa? Distances were 
measured on the charts, calculations of fuel consumption made, 
and a decision reached to fuel in the neutral Azores. So while 
Cathay steamed on to Freetown, Challenger made for Punta 
Delgada in the island of San Miguel, where the ships could fuel 
two at a time while the other pair patrolled outside the three- 
mile limit. 

The lights shining from the neutral towns and villages and 
from the isolated homesteads high on the mountainsides seemed 
lit to welcome the sailors from the horrors of life on the Atlantic, 
which now seemed neutral no longer but hostile and bristling 
with death. Foolish jokes brought easy laughter—the tension 
which had existed onboard was broken in a moment. The ship 
would be in harbour for only 24 hours, there was no chance of 
going ashore, and rumour had it that a U-boat was fuelling at the 
nearby island port of Horta; but all were living in the present. 
The green hills, with here and there the red soil of the ploughed 
land, reminded the men of the West Country at home ; the white, 
yellow and even pink houses scattered on the sunny hillsides gave 
the country an exciting look and remained long afterwards in 
the memory of many as a heaven that was reached but which 
it was forbidden to enter. 

For three at least of Challenger’s crew there was no time to 
lie on deck and drink in the sunlit scene. Lieutenant J. M. 
Sharpey-Schafer, the ship’s Electrical Artificer and the Leading 


Te? CHALLENGER 


Torpedoman had work to do. The corvette with the faulty asdic 
gear lay alongside ; a corvette’s resources are small and everything 
possible must be done to have her anti-submarine equipment in 
order by next day, when the ships would face the U-boats again 
together. Sharpey-Schafer had a talent for anything mechanical or 
electrical, his name being a byword among surveyors for his many 
inventions; once before during the war he had worked at sea in 
an asdic compartment for 36 hours to repair an asdic set to such 
good effect that a successful attack was made on a U-boat the 
very next day. His knowledge and initiative in this matter resulted 
in the corvette’s equipment being put right, and it was a more 
confident little party that set sail for West Africa after dark that 
evening. 


x 


Gambia River 


Atlantic changed to brown as the ship entered the mud-laden 

water from the Gambia River spreading far out over the sea. 
Later in the day the low-lying, dark green mangrove forests 
could be seen stretching away to miraged vagueness on either 
bow. The ship steadily closed the land and threaded the shallow 
channels of the estuary before she turned southwards into the 
river itself and came to anchor in the swirling brown waters off 
the town of Bathurst. 

With the Mediterranean virtually closed, our convoys to the 
East were taking the long route round the Cape. Bathurst lay on 
the very flank of this route, an ideal base for escort vessels and 
aircraft. But Dakar, which we had failed to capture from the 
Vichy French nine months before, lay less than roo miles to the 
north and at any moment the Germans might have flown in air- 
borne troops and built up the defences of Dakar so that this 
former French base, and not Bathurst, would dominate the 
convoy route to the Cape. The defences and facilities for vessels 
and aircraft must be built up at Bathurst so that she could meet 
any threat from Dakar. 

There were no surveys whatsoever of the colony except the 
old Admiralty chart ; hydrographic surveys were urgently required 
for laying the controlled minefields, booms, navigational buoys 
and beacons, while land surveys were needed for planning the 
siting of the guns, airfields and barracks. Challenger had therefore 
to pay as much attention to the topography as to the soundings. 

Short-cut base measurements were unacceptable in sucha survey 
where an extensive triangulation would have to be built up across 
the wide estuary and onto the off-lying islands and up the winding 
creeks through the mangrove swamps. So a base of 12,311 feet, 
or just over two miles, was measured on the flat road leading 
north-westward along the shore from the town. The two measure- 

lj 


] ss before the African Coast was sighted the blue of the 


Il4 CHALLENGER 


ments, one in each direction using steel tapes, differed by only 
13 fe aha, which even Commander Jenks considered good 
going, for it was the longest base measurement in hydrographic 
history. 

The seaward approach to the river was the first area to be 
surveyed so that the light floats and navigational buoys could be 
moved to mark the route that carried the deepest water across 
the sandbanks of the estuary, where little more than 26 feet of 
water at low tide was found. Some of the surveying marks erected 
along the shore-line were made into permanent navigational 
beacons so that a vessel could more easily fix herself when closing 
this featureless coast, and so that the light floats and buoys could 
be re-laid with ease and certainty at any time. The proximity of 
the Vichy French was brought home when one of these shore 
beacons had to be erected right on the border between Gambia 
and Senegal, only five miles northwards along the coast from 
Bathurst. On two or three occasions Vichy planes came in low 
over the surveying boats, or circled the ship outside gun range, 
apparently looking to see what was going on. Sometimes an 
enemy plane would fly high over the anchorage off the town and 
every ship would bang away with her guns until the pilot decided 
to return northwards, 

On completion of the work outside the river entrance the 
survey moved into the river itself, where every square yard of 
deep water was required to be known so that anchor berths 
could be planned and mooring buoys laid with the maximum 
economy of space. Here the real difficulties began. Up till now 
the surveyors had been concerned with the estuary, the shores of 
which were solid earth, where marks could be erected and angles 
observed with ease. The river, however, which was several miles 
wide, had no clearly defined banks and on either hand flowed 
through vast areas of unexplored mangrove swamp. Along the 
fringe of the mangroves there might be from two to eight feet 
of water over the soft muddy river-bed, depending on the state 
of the tide. 

It was at points along the fringes of the mangroves that triangu- 
lation marks had to be erected; they had to be over 60 feet in 
height so that they would be visible up to 10 miles away, and at 
the same time a firm wooden observing platform had to be sunk 


GAMBIA RIVER 115 


into the mud beneath the mark to support the surveyor and his 
theodolite. 

Much thought by the Captain and hard work by the shipwrights 
and the survey recorders resolved these difficulties. A standard 
survey mark of giant proportions was designed and a number were 
pre-fabricated onboard. Three long, heavy spars formed the basis 
of each mark, erected in a tripod; the heads of the spars were 
held together by passing them through an iron triangle having 
holes designed for this purpose, while their heels were weighed 
down into the mud by heavy concrete sinkers. A tall mast was 
passed up through a fourth hole in the iron triangle and a large 
flag hoisted upon it, while the sides of the tripod were boarded 
up and painted white. This formed strong resistance to the wind, 
and as fierce squalls were frequent, wire guys were run from the 
mast and the head of the giant tripod to further concrete sinkers 
which were laid out as holdfasts. 

The many components of these marks were taken to the 
selected site in a pulling boat known as a ‘whaler’ by a crew of 
eight men or so; but once in position it was necessary for the 
team to wade, sinking into the ooze well above the knee at every 
step. To lay out the concrete sinkers in their correct position 
for securing the guys was a herculean task; once dropped, they 
sank beyond recovery into the soft mud. Staggering with these 
concrete blocks, wrestling with the heavy tripod, feeling beneath 
the muddy water to reeve the guys through the eyes in the sinkers 
and to sink the observing platform, the workers floundered and 
fell on all fours or got stuck while rescuing one another. They 
returned to the ship at nightfall covered in mud from head to 
foot, every one of them, as their Captain had been on that fateful 
day when he had taken the mud pattens away. 

When the officers returned to take the theodolite observations 
at these stations a man with a rifle was posted high on the tripod 
mark itself to ward off the crocodiles which lay not far away, 
watching the observer hour after hour as he made his six rounds 
of theodolite angles, with all the care that this task requires. 
Steady nerves were needed and a blind faith in the marksmanship 
of the protector above. 

Lieutenant Jack Paisley and his surveying recorder have good 
cause to remember these survey marks in the Gambia River. 


116 CHALLENGER 


On this occasion they were left at one of the marks to 
observe in the early afternoon. It had been arranged that another 
survey party returning to the ship by boat would collect them 
before dark, but something went wrong with the planning and 
as night came on the two men could see no sign of a boat on 
the broad river. 

They climbed up to the cross spars and looked longingly at the 
distant twinkle of light which marked the ship at anchor some 
five miles downstream. ‘The fall of night had made the crocodiles 
very active and several were in the water directly beneath the 


[ 
SaaS Wi wih =f. iN nN — 


racemninene EN in a Gb River 


mark. One lashed with his tail against one of the main spars and 
the whole structure shook terrifyingly. It grew bitterly cold, and 
to keep themselves warm, clad as they were in their tropical rig, 
they cut calico from the guys to wrap around themselves, and 
with rope from the mark they lashed themselves to the spars 
lest they should fall as sleep overtook them. 

Hours later, it seemed, they saw a finger of light searching 
the mangroves along the river bank. It was the rescue boat using 
her Aldis signal lamp to search for the lost surveyors. 

It was a happy moment for Paisley and his assistant when the 
light at last picked out the dazzling white of the mark against 


GAMBIA RIVER P17 


the dark trees and the boat moved slowly in on the high tide 
to rescue them. 

The survey parties shot one or two crocodiles and when they 
did so they towed them to one of the riverside villages where 
the menfolk came out of their mud-and-thatch houses and with 
knives and hatchets made quick work of skinning the beasts and 
chopping up the meat which they appeared to relish. Parts of the 
tail were most sought after as making excellent steaks. The 
surveyors took the crocodile skins and hoped to have handbags 


made later for those at home. 


Crocodiles were not the only dangers to be encountered when 
mapping the maze of creeks winding through the mangrove 
swamps to the bush beyond; there were deadly black and green 
mamba snakes, and every man carried a razor blade to cut open 
a snake bite, and potassium permanganate crystals to rub into it, 
the only efficient antidote. The anopheles mosquito present 
almost everywhere in the area necessitated mepacrine being 
included in the daily diet, while the tsetse fly was said to carry 
germs of sleeping sickness, and one member of the ship’s com- 
pany had soon to be invalided home with this disease. 

The sick list had risen steadily until in October the average 
daily number was nine. Abscesses and infection of the ears, 
ulcerated legs, and septic wounds, malaria and dysentery were the 
complaints, perhaps not surprising when the officers and men 
spent so many hours wading and working in the mangrove swamps 
on either side of the river. 

The climate was hot and very humid, with frequent torrential 
rain squalls and occasional fierce tropical storms. The powerful 
tidal streams, strengthened on the ebb by the fast flowing waters 
of the river, made the steering of the boats along the sounding 
lines a difficult task. 

But as the officers and men worked on under these difficult 
conditions no one forgot that ‘there was a war on’, and Com- 
mander Jenks, reporting on the behaviour of his men on com- 
pletion of the survey, said: 

I cannot mention too highly the continued cheerful and willing spirit of the 


Ship’s Company as a whole, and their exemplary behaviour during their short 
spells of shore leave. These men have endured six months, four of which were 


118 CHALLENGER 


at a trying season of the year, of very continuous, and to them monotonous, 
hard work over long hours each day and with little opportunity for recrea- 
tion, with unfailing loyalty and response to all calls made for further efforts. 
It is submitted to be particularly to the credit of each individual rating that 
the work has no appeal in war-time when most of them desire more positive 
and exciting service. 


Fixing the coastline can often be done in the way that has 
already been described, that is by walking along the high water 
line and fixing oneself at frequent and regular intervals by a 
sextant and station pointer fix using three of the visible surveying 
marks; however, this cannot be done when a twist of the tree- 
fringed coast cuts off the surveying marks from view, nor when 
mapping inland roads, villages and jungle tracks. To do such 
work ‘traversing’ is used, and there was much of this going on 
during the surveying of the country on both banks of the Gambia 
River. 

A traverse starts from a known position on the survey and 
consists of a number of ‘legs’ at the end of each of which a peg 
is driven into the ground. The direction of the first leg is found 
by observing a reference angle at the starting point between it 
and another mark in the survey, while the direction of each 
subsequent leg is found by observing the angle between the leg 
already traversed and that which lies ahead. The length of each 
leg is also measured so that the positions of the pegs may be 
plotted. This is done by the surveyor standing at one peg using 
a theodolite to record the distance to a stave held by a seaman 
over the next. Such a method is well known to the surveyor, 
being called “tacheometry’, while the curiously marked stave 
which makes such measurement possible is known generally as 
the ‘tack’ stave. 

Such a traverse can be progressed along winding roads or 
tracks, the surveyor obtaining subsidiary bearings and distances 
of features such as houses, conspicuous trees or streams, etc., so 
that topography is built up along either side of the traverse. 
Traverses eventually terminate on another of the main triangu- 
lated marks of the survey, or even the original one from which 
the traverse was begun. The less important topography such as 
the remoter jungle tracks are traversed by measuring the legs 
by pacing them out and finding their direction by pocket compass. 


GAMBIA RIVER 11g 


Such secondary traverses were started from a peg of known 
position in one of the major traverses, and perhaps closed on a 
peg some two or three miles distant. In this manner the details 
of the hinterland were gradually mapped as the network of 
traverses was threaded through the thick jungle, or across the 
open parklike land where villages abounded and small black 
children ran out to stare at the sweating sailors carrying their 
strange apparatus. 

Commander Jenks was following his usual war-time routine 
of employing the same teams of officers and men on the same 
tasks each day, finding this most conducive to speed with 
accuracy. By 8 o’clock in the morning they were in the field in 
their khaki tropical rig, trudging through the long forenoon as 
the day got slowly but steadily hotter. By 1 o’clock the little 
party would be ready for their sandwich dinner beneath a shady 
tree; a short sleep was usually terminated by an African centipede 
or perhaps red ants crawling over the face or arms, and then the 
party would work on till sundown. 

To an able seaman carrying the stave who had never trained 
as a surveyor, nor yet had ever imagined himself on duty outside 
a ship at all, this endless tramping through the African jungle 
seemed the last thing that he would ever find himself doing when 
he joined the Navy. Being on ahead he never saw the field board 
and lost all sense of direction, his only duty being to walk on 
and place the next peg where he was directed. It never ceased to 
be a source of wonderment to him when the little party came 
from the bush suddenly out onto a familiar road—‘Blimey,’ said 
one of the stavemen to his officer on such an occasion, ‘I reckon 
there’s no one knows Africa like you do, Sir!’ 


There were two rulers on the north bank of the Gambia River 
who were anxious to see the ship which had now been moving 
up and down the river and excited their curiosity. So, anchoring 
off Essau near the river mouth, Nomandu Sonko, Seyfu of Lower 
Niumi, was entertained onboard. He was most interested in 
all he saw, Challenger being the first ‘warship’ he had ever 
boarded. Commander Jenks furthered the survey by obtaining 
from the Seyfu a great many place names for his chart—Kunku- 
della, Latra Sibige, Mandinari, Kinkujung, Willingara—a surveyor 


120 CHALLENGER 


pencilled them in on the chart as the Seyfu pointed them 
out along the river banks. The morning terminated with the 
Captain’s hiring a number of canoes from the Chief so that even 
more surveying parties could be put into the field to explore and 
map the numerous creeks and waterways. 

Hearing of Nomandu Sonko’s visit, the Seyfu of Upper Niumi, 
who lived 20 miles further up river, expressed his desire to come 
onboard and the ship anchored off Albreda on a Saturday so that 
this could be arranged. He came onboard accompanied by a 
number of his headmen, and before leaving expressed his wish 
that the ship should visit Albreda again on the following Saturday 
so that he could entertain the Captain, his officers and men in 
a way befitting them. 

Accordingly the next Saturday the Captain and his officers, 
accompanied by 30 men, landed at Albreda and took up their 
position around the Seyfu. A great many dances were performed 
to the accompaniment of music played on drums and reed in- 
struments. When at last the dances were ended the Captain was 
presented with an embarrassing number of gifts. It was a strange 
sight, Commander Jenks sitting rather self-consciously in his neat 
white tropical kit surrounded by a crowd of colourful Africans 
interspersed with the white-clad sailors, while boys, old men and 
girls carried in baskets of fruit and eggs, and live poultry tied by 
the legs, or led in goats and finally a huge grey bull. After the 
bull came two fine young girls, lightly clad and bearing no gifts, 
but walking boldly towards the Captain while the Seyfu held out 
his hand in a gesture towards them. Commander Jenks’ embar- 
rassment overcame him and he rose, turned and started to thank 
the Chief, while the girls hesitated, looked baffled, and suddenly 
fled into the crowd of onlookers. No one onboard eyer really 
knew whether or not these girls were to have been the final 
gift. 

i On Christmas Eve the Seyfu of Lower Niumi was appropriately 
in a giving mood and the ship called again at Essau to receive a 
fine cow. 


The idea of an attack on Dakar from Gambia was never far 
from the planners’ minds at this time. Aerial reconnaissance 
showed a deal of open parkland north of the Gambia River in 


GAMBIA RIVER 121 


French Senegal, the boundary of which lay little more than five 
miles from the river bank in many places upstream. 

However, it was only in a few places that it would be possible 
to land troops on the north bank and these must be investigated 
before any plan to attack Senegal from inland was developed. 
Native hearsay indicated a number of small landing places which 
might be suitable between Albreda and Kuntaur, a township about 
150 miles upstream. 

In 1826 Captain Owen, during his famous four-year survey of 
the coast of Africa, had sent his nephew up the Gambia River as 
far as Kuntaur and his chart was the only existing information in 
1941. Much could have changed in the past 100 years. So 
Challenger was ordered to survey the river up to the limit of 
navigation and at the same time to carry out inspections of the 
landing places on the north bank, said to exist at Salekine Point, 
Mendora Creek, Kasban Creek, Devil Point, Bombale Kaua and 
Nianmaru. 

This expedition would serve a double purpose as the ship was 
by now heavily covered with growth below the water-line and 
her speed was down to 74 knots when steaming at her normal 
revolutions, instead of 10. Challenger would require 12 knots 
steaming at full speed if she was to keep up with the convoy when 
she set out for England again. Commander Jenks believed that 
if he spent a week at Kuntaur in the fresh water the ship would 
shake off the heavy growth which had accumulated in the brack- 
ish water of the lower reaches of the river. In fact this proved to 
be the case. 

Off Albreda there was a small island, composed mainly of the 
ruins of an old fort, and on this had been placed the furthest 
upstream triangulation station. St. James Island was to be the 
fixed point of departure for the long river survey. Here both 
echo sounding motor boats were lowered and took station 45 
degrees on either bow of the ship, keeping their distance by 
maintaining a constant vertical sextant angle between the ship’s 
masthead and her water-line. The ship streamed the taut wire and 
on every occasion on which she altered course a sinker was slid 
down the wire to anchor it on the turn. By steering gyro compass 
courses and using the taut wire distances the length and direction 
of each leg of the long, long traverse were obtained. 


Ti CHALLENGER 


An African who had navigated these waters in small craft came 
to indicate the passages through the sandbanks which the ship 
followed, sometimes having as little as two feet of water beneath 
the keel, but often as many fathomis as she entered the deep water 
close off the downstream bank on the river bends. 

Every half mile the taut wire measuring dial was read and a 
simple flag signal indicated to the boats that this was a fix so 
that they marked their echo sounding records accordingly, for 
both ship and boats were sounding continuously. On the bridge 
an officer was obtaining the width of the river at frequent intervals 
by using a light rangefinder, while cross bearings by the gyro 
compass were being used to intersect the position of any topo- 
graphical feature. This was a ‘running survey’ and there was no 
time for mistakes and oversights as the little fleet pressed relent- 
lessly on upstream. It was a blessed relief for those on the bridge 
when one of the landing sites was reached. The ship came to 
anchor, and while relief crews manned the boats to survey the 
approaches to the landings a quick meal was snatched onboard. 

It took four days to reach Kuntaur, 122 miles from St. James 
Island, for there was thankfully no chance of furthering the work 
by night. At Kuntaur the ship came to anchor with barely room 
to swing, further up the Gambia River than any modern ocean- 
going steamship had been before. 

And while the fresh water did its work cleansing the ship’s 
bottom the surveyors took astrolabe sights ashore on New Year’s 
Eve to fix the Kuntaur end of the long river traverse, and con- 
tinued the drawing of the surveys of the lower river in order 
that copies could be left in Bathurst before the ship sailed for 
the United Kingdom. 

The taut wire traverse from St. James Island was plotted on a 
sheet of drawing paper over 6 feet long, and the final position of 
the landing at Kuntaur differed less than half an inch on the paper 
from the position found for Kuntaur by astrolabe sights. Thus 
the traverse was satisfactorily closed, but the various landing 
places inspected during the passage up river were shallow and 
backed by mud and were of no use for landing transport or even 
infantry if they were to take many stores with them. They could 
not be recommended as beach-heads over which to pass a con- 
siderable military force. 


ee a aN ee 


PASSING THROUGH THE SUEZ CANAL 


LVOSNW ddO GAWOHONV 


GAMBIA RIVER 123 


The headmen of Kuntaur had heard much of the great warship 
working in the river and were delighted to welcome her and 
demanded that they should be allowed to come onboard. 
Challenger’s reputation as a man of war was so well established 
in these parts, from hearsay carried upstream by canoe, that it 
was felt in the ship that something special must be done during the 
headmen’s visit to uphold the reputation. 

A member of a local trading firm brought the desired answer ; 
he asked Challenger if she would demolish an old warehouse which 
stood in a state of decay beside the river bank a little downstream 
from where the ship was lying. This gave the Gunnery Officer 
an excellent idea. He arranged to send the Boatswain ashore to 
set demolition charges below the building on the day of the visit 
by the headmen. Ata pre-arranged flag signal the Boatswain would 
light the time fuse behind the warehouse and make his retreat 
into the jungle. Just before the time fuse was due to ignite the 
demolition charges the ship’s pom-pom crews would open fire on 
the building, and, if all went well, the small two-pounder shells 
would appear to demolish the warehouse with an incredible 
explosion. 

The guns’ crews were as tense at their posts as if the warehouse 
had indeed housed the enemy as the seconds ticked away on the 
Gunnery Officer’s stop watch. A few yards behind, the headmen 
of Kuntaur watched with eagerness as ‘Open Fire’ was ordered 
and the two guns stuttered into action. The tracer bullets had 
hardly reached their target when there was a deafening explosion 
and the shed itself was completely obscured by smoke. The head- 
men began to talk excitedly, the guns’ crews smiled at each other. 
It was only as the smoke drifted away revealing the warehouse 
much as it had stood for years that the smiles passed from the 
faces of the guns’ crews and the Gunnery Officer hustled the 
headmen off to see the chartroom. 


Returning to Bathurst, copies of the surveys were turned over 
to the local naval and military authorities, and copies also sent 
off to the Hydrographer in case Challenger should meet her end 
in the Atlantic, taking her valuable surveys down with her. 

Despite the fact that the ship’s bottom was now clean, 
Challenger’s best speed was not quite good enough for her to 


) fe) 


124 CHALLENGER 


maintain her position in Convoy S.L. 98, which she had joined 
for the voyage home. She therefore asked permission of the Senior 
Officer of the 40th Escort Group escorting the convoy to ‘make 
all plain sail’, and this granted, she hoisted her fore and mainsails. 

At sea in war-time the afternoon watch was often the most 
peaceful and the younger officers were usually on watch through- 
out the convoy and in the escorts. Finding time heavy on their 
hands their eyes would turn to the strange sight of Challenger 
with her well-filled sails and they would decide to send funny 
signals to her Officer of the Watch.—'I see the spirit of Nelson 
is not dead’—‘Have you got your screw up?’ But they little knew 
that it was a strict rule of Commander Jenks that he should see 
every signal that came into the ship, however paltry its import 
might be. At this time of day he would often be snatching much 
needed rest after a night shattered by the alarm gongs and illumi- 
nated by snowflake rockets. By the time the signal reached the 
cuddy this humour was definitely misplaced! 

Fuelling at Londonderry, the ship passed north and east about 
and reached Sheerness, where she paid off her well-tried crew, 
who had served Commander Jenks throughout two years of hard 
surveying, and who had become welded into a great surveying 
team. They went on their hard-earned leave, their crocodile skins 
in their kitbags and a fine set of sailor’s yarns from darkest Africa 
to tell in their homely ‘local’. 

Challenger was taken into Dockyard control for a major refit 
for further service overseas. 


XI 


The Eastern Fleet 


threadbare, the pictures of spas and resorts had long since 

disappeared from their frames above the seats; a dubious 
drawing and a bawdy suggestion scrawled with untutored hand 
replaced them upon the exposed cardboard backing. Three Royal 
Marines—a sergeant and two corporals—sat in the compartment 
gazing out across the flat, featureless marshlands of the Isle of 
Sheppey, their kit in bags and suitcases stowed upon the racks 
and the empty seats before them. The train crawled across the 
forbidding landscape as dusk fell and the last light in the western 
sky turned the mudflats of the Medway to sheets of lead. 

The Marines had had a busy day for they had been turned from 
civilians to members of this fine corps in eight hours, a process 
which normally takes as many months. They were the chart 
production staff of Challenger travelling to join her at Sheerness 
on her commissioning day, the rst of May, 1942. 

The ship was preparing to sail to join the Flag of the Com- 
mander-in-Chief, Eastern Fleet. She was to be employed in making 
surveys and charts of the bases and anchorages that the Fleet 
would occupy during the course of the fluctuating battle being 
fought in the Indian Ocean. To eliminate the delays that would 
be occasioned by sending each survey back to England for re- 
production as charts, the ship had now been fitted with a flat-bed 
printing press. This same press had been used onboard the old 
surveying ship Endeavour for reproducing her surveys during the 
Dardanelles campaign in World War I. 

Challenger was to produce her charts by a process of lithography 
adapted to the equipment which it had been found possible to fit 
into this already overcrowded ship. It was planned to draw each 
chart upon tracing paper, and then, by placing this against a 
specially coated zinc plate in a glass fronted vacuum frame exposed 
to an arc-light or the tropical sun, to transfer the image to the zinc. 

12¢ 


Te railway carriage was old, the upholstery worn and 


126 CHALLENGER 


The zinc is coated with an emulsion said to contain egg-yolk 
and is a pleasing pale yellow in colour. The light makes the 
emulsion exposed to it soluble in water while those parts covered 
by the design remain insoluble. The soluble parts can then be 
removed by washing and by a series of processes the plate can 
be made to take bitumen where the image is required and the 
plate is ready for use as a printing plate. The zinc plates are 
manufactured in suitable sizes for reproducing charts and are made 
with a distinct grain in their surface which retains moisture. This 
in turn repels greasy substances such as printer’s inks; thus if the 
plate is moistened, ink rolled over it will adhere only to the 
bitumen-coated image. A piece of chart paper placed in pressure 
contact with the printing zinc can then be made to accept the 
image. The old proving press in Challenger did just this; the plate 
and the paper were placed face to face on the flat bed and by 
turning a handle a pressure roller was made to move across the 
press to transfer the image. The plate had to be inked up by 
hand after each copy of a chart was printed. There was little 
mechanical and nothing swift about the method. 

The most suitable persons to operate this equipment were 
members of the civil staff at the Hydrographic Supplies Estab- 
lishment at Taunton. Volunteers from this branch of the 
Hydrographic Department were not lacking and a lithographic 
draughtsman, a printer and a photographer had been selected for 
this duty in the ship. But what naval rank or rating should these 
men hold? Authority had searched for a precedent and found one 
at last in the Royal Marines who had, for some long forgotten 
purpose, employed a printer in their ranks. So the men from 
Taunton must become Marines, but time was short and they could 
only be spared for one day to make this startling transition. 

Sergeant Crowford, tall and with a fighter pilot’s moustache, 
was the draughtsman, cheery Cockney Laws was the printer, and 
Corporal Lyons the photographer. They felt more like over- 
harnessed and overladen beasts of burden when at last they 
reached the ship lying at her berth in Sheerness Dockyard. In 
their unfamiliar uniforms, webbing equipment and heavy field- 
boots they stumbled under their loads of kit. For were they not 
going overseas? The Royal Marines must be ready for anything 
from ceremonial parades to commando attacks in any climate 


THE EASTERN FLEET M7 


from the tropics to the polar regions. Besides their bulging kit- 
bags each carried a linen bag containing a white tropical helmet 
and catching on every projection as they made their way up the 
gangway to the ship. 

All was last-minute bustle at Sheerness; the old well-seasoned 
surveying crew who had been with Commander Jenks in the 
Iceland and West African surveys were now scattered throughout 
a hundred ships of the Royal Navy. The new crew were curious 
as to their réle in this ship armed with but two Oerlikon guns, 
which had now replaced the even more inadequate pom-poms. 

The ship had been painted in camouflage, giving her a novel and 
unusual appearance, mattresses had been hung around the outside 
of the bridge to protect the personnel from attack from the air ; 
new boats had been built to Captain Wyatt’s specifications, 
modelled on the Labrador dories he had used when on that coast 
in Challenger years before; they were designed for landing survey 
teams through surf on the open coasts of the Indian Ocean. Still 
the boom and gaff for the spanker remained, for the Captain 
considered that his sails would be needed for that extra knot 
during the long ocean voyages which lay ahead. 

The ship had been fitted with a new asdic set and a small outfit 
of depth charges. Lieutenant-Commander Robin Bill, short and 
dapper, was the new First Lieutenant and was to take the ship 
with her green crew to the famous anti-submarine working-up 
base at Tobermory where evolutions and drills at all hours of 
night and day were designed to ‘shake down’ the ship’s company 
and weld them into a useful body. After that they were to go 
on to Heysham where Captain Wyatt was to take command of 
Challenger again and a trial survey, including the printing of the 
chart, was to be completed before sailing for the East. 

On the long lonely voyage to the Cape the crew spoke of the 
unusual work ahead; they turned to the surveying recorders like 
Petty Officer Charles Long with his pleasant smile and quiet 
explanations or to Leading Seaman Jimmy Greenshields who knew 
that the finest thing they would find at the Cape was the brandy, 
for he dearly loved his run ashore. 

There were many of the crew who were free with their advice 
to the Marines as to what to do at sea and what not to do. The 
Canteen Manager explained his theory that eggs should always be 


128 CHALLENGER 


placed in a net at sea and hung from the deckhead as anywhere else 
in the mess they would get broken. Each night he set up his camp 
bed beneath his precious cargo, but finally the cord holding the 
net chafed through with the rolling of the ship and two dozen 
eggs fell upon the sleeper’s face—like a scene from a custard pie 
film. 

On the afternoon of Friday, 28th August, 1942, Challenger sailed 
into Table Bay and berthed alongside in the harbour beneath 
glorious Table Mountain. But she did not dally long here, for 
orders were awaiting her to go on to Kilindini to join the Fleet. 


The British Eastern Fleet had at the beginning of April 1942 
been composed of the aircraft carrier Formidable and two other 
aircraft carriers, Warspite and four old ‘R’ Class battleships, seven 
or eight cruisers and about twice that number of destroyers. 
These ships were based on Trincomalee in Ceylon, Colombo and 
Addu Atoll, a remote fleet anchorage on the equator south of 
Ceylon. Very heavy Japanese forces were at sea in the Bay of 
Bengal at this time, including a force of five aircraft carriers, four 
fast battleships, cruisers, destroyers and tankers; but it was not 
until this force had delivered heavy air attacks on Colombo and 
Trincomalee and had sunk the British cruisers Dorsetshire and 
Cornwall and the carrier Hermes by air attack that the size of the 
Japanese Fleet in the Indian Ocean was apparent. The old ‘R’ 
Class ships were slow and with low endurance, and until greater 
British forces were available it was reluctantly decided that the 
Fleet could not be based again in Ceylon. Meanwhile the Eastern 
Fleet established itself at Kilindini on the East Coast of Africa 
so that the vital sea route from Britain to the Middle East by 
way of the Cape would at least be protected. 

Although the asdic apparatus was primarily developed as an 
anti-submarine device, relying on the returning echo of a sound 
impulse to detect and then range upon a submarine, the surveyor 
also uses it as a deep echo sounding machine. A baffle placed 
within the dome below the ship’s hull directs the out-going sound 
vertically towards the sea-bed. By fitting an echo sounding recorder 
to the asdic receiving apparatus soundings to the greatest depths 
may be taken, as the sound signal emitted is a very much stronger 
one than that issuing from the normal sounding machine. For 


THE EASTERN FLEET 129 


much of the long journey out to East Africa Challenger had been 
sounding with her asdic apparatus, for, despite the war, surveyors 
such as Captain Wyatt followed the tradition of the Surveying 
Service that no opportunity be lost of increasing man’s knowledge 
of the depths of the oceans. Shortly before reaching Kilindini the 
asdic dome, the ear of the apparatus one might say, was struck 
from the bottom of the hull by the ship hitting some submerged 
object. The Captain’s remarks when reporting this matter were 
as follows: ‘Apart from the lack of submarine look-out involved 
by this loss, it was particularly annoying as it prevented my 
carrying out a line of soundings past Europa Island and various 
shoals in the Mozambique Channel.’ 

When the ship arrived in Kilindini nearly the whole Eastern 
Fleet was in harbour and the port was very congested. Captain 
Wyatt waited upon Admiral Sir James Somerville, the C.-in-C., 
and also upon the local Flag Officer. He discussed the surveys and 
the future use of the port asa Fleet base and decisions were reached 
with the officers on the various naval staffs as to what work should 
be taken in hand. Two surveys, each on a large scale, were to 
be made covering Port Kilindini and Port Reitz to allow the 
closest possible berthing of ships. A survey of the entrance was 
further desired on half the scale of the port surveys. The existing 
chart was not considered adequate for approaching the harbour 
from the eastward so a survey of a considerable area on a scale 
of 1/75,000 (1 inch to a mile) was planned to take in those 
features along the coast which would first be sighted by ships 
making a landfall; the sounding on this chart would have to be 
carried seaward for a distance of about 15 miles to embrace the 
whole of the mineswept channel approach. 


The survey of the Port of Kilindini was completed in the first 
month. As in West Africa, the work was arduous indeed, and 
sandfly fever and the effects of long exposure to sun and glare 
brought about many cases of sickness. A daybreak start and an 
earlier finish to the day’s work when the glare from the westerly 
sun was at its worst curbed the rising sick-list. The new crew 
were getting into the swing of things; camp parties were being 
detached to progress the triangulation here or to watch the tides 
there; the boats were away sounding and the ship herself was at 


130 CHALLENGER 


work outside the harbour. At night the surveyors had an immense 
amount of work to ink in before they fell, wearied, into their 
bunks for the short night’s sleep. But the pace of the survey did 
not constrain the Captain to lower his standards of ship cleanliness ; 
the regular weekly rounds of the mess-decks were carried out and 
the upper deck was inspected on Sundays with the same attention 
to detail as he had shown when inspecting the ship on her West 
Indies commissions in those far-off peaceful pre-war years. The 
white of her hull, the yellow of her funnel and upperworks, 
were no more, but the Captain expected even a camouflaged 
vessel to be ‘ship-shape and Bristol fashion’. A war-time habit of 
plastering the decks with lime to whiten them had replaced, 
in many ships with wooden decks, the age-old holystone, but 
only once did the Chief Bosun’s Mate attempt this short-cut to 
cleanliness. 

As one of H.M. ships comes to anchor the Union Jack is hoisted 
at the flagstaff on the forecastle head, the gangway is lowered and 
the lower booms to which the boats will be moored are swung 
out; all should happen in one synchronised movement as the 
first rumble of the anchor chain is heard. This was not always so 
in time of war but it certainly was so in Challenger. Despite a 
week’s arduous work behind her, if the booms did not go out 
instantly as the ship let go her anchor, then she weighed and came 
into anchor again. Not only did she thus earn for herself a reputa- 
tion as a ‘tiddly’ ship within the Fleet but the seniority of her 
captain was soon widely known. 

It is the custom in the Service that when one of H.M. ships 
passes or is passed by another, the ship having the junior com- 
manding officer pipes the ‘Still’ upon the boatswain’s call and 
the crew stand to attention. The ‘Still’ is then piped in the senior 
ship, followed a minute or so later by the “Carry On’, when the 
junior ship may then do likewise. Captain Wyatt was by now a 
very senior captain in the Navy List. One day a cruiser coming in 
from seaward passed Challenger working at the harbour entrance ; 
it never crossed the mind of the cruiser’s captain or the members 
of his signals staff that such a small craft could be senior to their 
own great ship, and no piping took place in either vessel. With- 
out further thought the cruiser’s captain sent a sharp signal ad- 
monishing Challenger for her failure to pay the traditional marks 


THE EASTERN FLEET I31 


of respect, but he received an even sharper signal in return, 
drawing his attention to the Navy List. 


One day Captain Wyatt, who was reconnoitring onshore for the 
scheme of triangulation, came to a 100-foot high water tower 
situated in a sisal plantation. Thinking that this would make a good 
position for a triangulation station he climbed the fixed ladder to 
the top of the tank where he began to make notes of what he 
could see from this vantage point. He noticed bees swarming 
round the top of a vent pipe on the tank and soon one of these 
stung him. He killed it and was at once attacked by the whole 
swarm. He beat a retreat down the ladder and ran through the 
plantation to a house about a quarter of a mile away. The good 
people let him in and plucked 30 stings from his head alone and 
dozens of others from his arms and legs. 

Swollen-faced in the wardroom that night he asked if anyone 
was game for a go at making a theodolite station on the tank. Sub- 
Lieutenant J. E. Moore said that he had kept bees and was willing ; 
so next morning he and the Doctor set off with a Flit-gun filled 
with chloroform and a mail-bag. They doped the bees inside the 
vent pipe and tied the bag over the end, and returned to the 
ship to report that all was ready for observing. Next day the 
Sub-Lieutenant climbed the water tower confidently, his theodo- 
lite on his back. But he had reckoned without the keeper of the 
sisal plantation ; the wild bees were this man’s tribal totem and he 
had removed the mail-bag so that the entire swarm was ready for 
the Sub as he reached the top of the tank. When he got back to 
the ship some hours later his head was in a bandage and his arm 
in a sling. 

Shortly after this incident the Sub volunteered and was accepted 
for service in submarines; perhaps he thought enemy depth 
charges preferable to African wild bees. 


Those in the field had worked hard, but now the Royal Marines 
were also busy. The chart of the Port of Kilindini was too large 
for Challenger’s printing outfit, so that it had to be produced in 
two halves, and two plates had to be made. After many difficulties 
due to the high temperatures and the humidity of the atmosphere 
both plates were ready on the 22nd November, only 12 days 
after the survey was completed. 


132 CHALLENGER 


The Wardroom ante-room had been taken over ruthlessly dur- 
ing the refit for use as a printing office and there were sinks, 
vacuum frames, arc-lamps and a whirler for coating the plates all 
packed into this small compartment. This left no room for the 
press itself, which had been fitted on the upper deck, close for- 
ward of the Captain’s cabin; when in use a canvas tent was rigged 
around the press. 

The day temperatures were far too high and fluctuating to 
permit good printing, for the inks became too liquid and spread 
over the surface of the zinc, so all-night printing was ordered. 

The ship of course was darkened, and no glimmer of light 
must emerge from the printing tent. Inside, stripped to the waist, 
were Corporal Laws and a seaman from the duty watch. Laws was 
rolling up the printing plate time and time again with the hand 
roller like a pastry cook, while his seaman assistant turned the 
handle of the press at required intervals like a housewife at her 
mangle. The hours of the night slid by, the thudding of the 
printer’s roller, the creak of the press and the murmur of con- 
versation between the two men a background to the light sleep 
of the Captain in his bunk only a few feet away through the open 
square port. Any pause in this rhythm would awaken him and 
he would come out to the printers’ shelter in his pyjamas and 
bedroom slippers to see what the hold-up might be. Perhaps it 
was a brief pause for tea, but more often it was a halt to clear the 
hand roller, the ink-slab and the printing zinc, which had all 
become hopelessly covered by invasions of flying beetles which 
were struggling in the morass of sticky printer’s ink. 

After seven days 56 copies of Eastern Fleet Chart No. 1 had 
been printed and as each chart had to be printed in two halves 
there was also the difficult job of joining them together. Paper 
is very sensitive to differing temperatures and soon absorbs 
moisture in a damp tropical atmosphere. This makes the paper 
change its shape by contracting or expanding, and it often be- 
came necessary to dry out the two halves of the chart in the 
baker’s oven in the ship’s galley before they would fit exactly 
together. 

Printing under all these difficulties meant that some copies of 
the chart were better than others but there was always a keen 
demand for the new charts in the Fleet. The King’s Harbour- 


THE EASTERN FLEET 133 


master, whose job it is to organise the running of a naval harbour 
and arrange the berthing of the ships, had an insatiable appetite 
for the charts and every time a sub-standard chart came off the 
press it was placed on what became known as the ‘Harbour- 
master’s pile’. 

E.F. 2, Manza Bay, surveyed by Lieutenant-Commander Cole, 
R.N.R. before Challenger’s arrival, was next printed, and this 
also required two printings, for a land tint was inserted in the 
second printing and added greatly to the appearance of the chart, 
although it was a difficult job, with the paper constantly altering 
its shape, to make a good registration on the second printing 
so that the land tint would fit exactly along the coastline in the 
original print. So much had the printing technique now been im- 
proved by experience of the difficulties onboard that the 60 copies 
of E.F. 2 were completed in two nights’ work. 

However, with the temperatures as they were in Mombasa at 
this time, the difficulties of coating the plates in the whirler were 
found to be almost insuperable, the only alternative being for 
Sergeant Crowford, the lithographic draughtsman, to draw the 
printing zinc completely by hand. So for E.F. 3, Port Mombasa 
and Approaches to Kilindini, a zinc plate was sensitised with a 
weak solution of nitric acid and alum and then, bit by bit, da 
and night, Crowford drew on the plate with a brush and litho- 
graphic ink the complete details of the chart. On a flat bed print- 
‘ing press the printing image on the zinc must be reversed as the 
contact between the chart paper and the plate is direct; so every 
sounding and every letter in this chart had to be drawn back to 
front. 

On sth January 1943, 60 days after the start of the survey of 
Port Mombasa, 125 copies of E.F. 3 had been printed from the 
direct drawing on the plate made by Crowford. This, despite all 
climatic difficulties, was war-time surveying as it should be done, 
and Captain Wyatt and his surveyors were pleased with their 
progress. Then E.F. 4, Approaches to Mombasa, was drawn direct 
on to zinc, which took only 1¢ days. 

In 44 months since the ship arrived in Kilindini she had com- 
pleted four detailed surveys and produced five charts in quantity 
sufficient to meet the immediate needs of the Eastern Fleet. 
Orders to sail for a refit in Cape Town were received with 


134 CHALLENGER 


jubilation onboard. The following letter from the Flag Officer, 
East Africa, speeded Challenger on her way to the Cape. 


Office of the Flag Officer 
East Africa 
Royal Naval Base, Kilindini. 
The Commanding Officer, 
H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 


On your leaving Kilindini I wish to express to you, and the Officers and 
Men serving under you, my appreciation of the work carried out by H.M.S. 
Challenger during recent months. 

2.—The survey work carried out during this period will be of the utmost 
value to ships of the Eastern Fleet, and the expeditious manner in which so 
many charts have been produced is worthy of the highest praise. 

3.—I hope that your forthcoming refit period will provide an opportunity 
for Officers and Men to take leave which has been well earned. 

4.—The numerous survey marks in the vicinity of Kilindini Harbour will 
probably remain a constant memorial to your activities. 

C.Stuart, 
Rear Admiral. 


A few were left behind under Lieutenant Gordon to form the 
Kilindini Surveying Unit, for dredging and the building of new 
wharves would necessitate many corrections to the E.F. charts 
as time went by. (General Gordon was once again serving in 
Challenger, in which ship he finally spent seven years of his life 


as a naval surveyor.) 


There had been frequent U-boat scares when on these lone 
voyages and while the ship was steaming down from Kilindini to 
the Cape the Commander-in-Chief attempted to divert her as, 
according to sinking reports, she was sailing right into a pack of 
submarines ; but this diversion signal never reached Challenger who 
at that very moment was busily attacking a whale which she had 
located with her asdic gear and had mistaken for a U-boat. 

Later she passed right through the centre of a cyclone in the 
southern end of the Mozambique Channel. It was late at night and 
the trucks of both masts and yardarms were sizzling with St. 
Elmo’s fire. There was no wind at the cyclone’s centre but the 
ship rolled drunkenly in the huge confused seas which came at 
her from all directions. Suddenly the wind rose again and with 
a swishing sound the lashings at the bottom of the protective 


THE EASTERN FLEET aig 


mattresses outside the bridge parted and the mattresses flew up 
and inboard on the bridge like leaves of a calendar, narrowly 
missing those huddled on the bridge, and making a noise like a 
clap of thunder. 

The mattresses were pushed outboard but flew in again with 
renewed ferocity, first one side and then the other. The anemo- 
meter, which normally emits buzzes at diminishing intervals as 
the wind rises, was now making a continual noise indicating that 
the winds were not far short of 100 knots. But the ship came 
through unscathed, and reached Cape Town in good order. 

The hospitality of the good people of the Cape is too well 
known by every serviceman who passed that way during the war 
for a further description to be given here. No better place could 
have been found for the ship’s company to relax while their ship 
was being repaired. Miss Lucy Bean was in charge of the hospit- 
ality, and she had a delightful home planned for every member of 
the crew when his leave became due. Men were asked whether 
they preferred rural or city life and their hosts were chosen 


accordingly. 


Information was already coming in from the Kilindini Survey 
Unit about new buoys and navigational beacons and many other 
changes taking place at Mombasa, which meant correcting the 
plates of the E.F. charts and printing new editions to be packed 
and sent off to the Chart Depot at Kilindini. So the Royal 
Marines could not take their leave until all this work was behind 
them. But daytime printing was possible in this cooler climate 
and they were able to spend many a long night in the famous Del 
Monico, drinking beer and listening to the orchestra under the 
domed and star-studded ceiling. 

The zinc plates were now getting worn smooth and the im- 
portant moisture-retaining grain had to be re-imposed. This is 
done by putting the zinc in a trough full of marbles which is then 
agitated mechanically. The constant rolling of the marbles this 
way and that imposes the grained surface. No apparatus of this 
nature was carried in the ship but the Marines found one in the 
printing offices of the Cape Times and approached the Manager. 
He was delighted to help them in this matter, more particularly 
as his ambition at that time was to be invited onboard a naval 


136 CHALLENGER 


ship. The Marines said that they would arrange for the Captain 
to invite him onboard for luncheon. This had seemed easy at 
the time, but somehow the Marines never plucked up the neces- 


sary courage to tell the Captain that they had issued an invitation 
on his behalf. 


By the time the refit was completed at Cape Town in April 
1943 the tide of war was turning in the Indian Ocean and the 
Japanese Fleet were never again to range freely in these waters. 
The naval base at Trincomalee was coming into its own as the 
land forces moved into Burma and our naval forces moved east- 
wards in support. 

So when the ship sailed from the Cape only a brief visit was 
paid to Kilindini, to collect the Survey Unit which had been left 
there, before she sailed onwards across the Indian Ocean, and 
in early May she was surveying in the Palk Straits between India 
and Ceylon. Preparations were already being made for the Allied 
invasions which were eventually to take place in Burma and 
Malaya; the first requirements for large-scale combined operations 
are spacious anchorages in which the convoys can assemble, and 
well-surveyed sea training grounds where the combined operations 
exercises may be carried out in realistic conditions without en- 
dangering the numerous craft taking part. Such exercises will 
include bombardments and the landing of troops over beaches, 
Charts of such remote and spacious locations are unlikely to 
exist on anything likea large enough scale for these purposes ; such 
areas must first of all be selected and then surveyed and operational 
charts prepared at an early stage. 

The surveys in the Palk Straits were followed by a visit to the 
Seychelles, the incredibly beautiful group of islands which forms 
the British Crown Colony far out in the Indian Ocean. It was to 
be used as a fleet oiling base and it was required to survey three 
approach channels across the reef plateau upon which the islands 
stand. On 25th June the ship anchored off Port Victoria, the 
capital, situated on the island of Mahé, and a triangulation scheme 
for the Seychelles group of islands was being vigorously planned. 

A month later Captain Wyatt left the ship to travel to Colombo 
to discuss with the Commander-in-Chief the future hydrographic 
organisation of the Eastern Fleet Command, Great moves by the 


THE EASTERN FLEET 137 


Fleet were now being planned, and as well as surveys to be made 
there was an expansive programme of operational charts to be 
produced and the re-printing of existing charts on the Station, 
for to send to England for every chart requirement at this stage 
meant endless delays. Although Challenger, with sufficient small 
craft acting as tenders, would probably be able to handle the 
surveying side of the work, her small press was quite inadequate 
for the chart printing requirements which were now growing 
day by day. What was now wanted was a shore organisation to 
cope with the printing, distribution and correction of locally 
produced charts. Captain Wyatt was the Fleet Hydrographic 
Officer and he was ordered to prepare such an organisation which 
would serve the Fleet as the war crept down the Straits of Malacca 
and into the China Sea. 

How Captain Wyatt organised the Hydrographic Office in 
Colombo and arranged for the printing of chart maps by the 
Survey of India and the Survey of Ceylon and how he set up a 
Chart Production Unit working first at Dehra Dun and later at 
Kandy is not really the story of Challenger. But from now on his 
attentions were divided between his Colombo office and the ship, 
which carried on under her temporary captain, Lieutenant-Com- 
mander Bill, during his long periods of absence. Some of 
Challenger’s men, including Petty Officer Long and the Royal 
Marines, were landed to assist with the production work which 
was now carried on with the more modern equipment available 
there, while the faithful old flat-bed press lay shrouded in canvas 
covers and forgotten on the ship’s forecastle. 

The work in the Seychelles had been going forward steadily, 
with brief periods for recreation ashore in Mahé, where the 
officers and men were welcomed by the friendly people. Cricket 
matches became a weekly feature of life, after which iced beer 
was served from the pavilion. The prisoners from the gaol were 
usually there and watched the matches although they were sup- 
posed to be cutting the long grass around the field, but there was 
a war-time shortage of warders and they were in charge of a 
charming rascal who was himself a prisoner, but who used to sit 
and drink beer with the sailors. 

One evening, when the work for the day had been completed 
onboard, a sing-song developed in the wardroom, the songs getting 


138 CHALLENGER 


louder and bawdier as the evening progressed. No news of Cap- 
tain Wyatt’s return had been received and it was a surprise to 
the coxswain of the boat which went inshore at 10.30 p.m to 
pick up the libertymen to see his Captain, who had just arrived 
from Colombo by flying boat, pacing up and down the jetty 
awaiting a passage off to the ship. 

As the coxswain brought the boat alongside the gangway of the 
ship the sound of a well-known naval song issued from the ward- 
room portholes where every singer was trying to outdo the next. 
To the amazement of the Officer of the Day the Captain came up 
the ladder from the boat, and even before the coxswain had 
shoved off from the gangway he heard the song cease with a 
startling suddenness and silence reign. 

One day when Lieutenant-Commander Tripp was ship sounding 
off Seychelles he saw to his horror the brown, ominous shape of 
a dangerous rock only a few feet below the surface and a few yards 
from the bows. As he watched aghast the pinnacle of rock passed 
down the port side. What could he do? Guy Wyatt, who happened 
to be on the bridge at the time, soon told him. ‘Fix, man!’ said 
he. 

A month later the work in the Seychelles was completed as far 
as it was now desired to carry it, and Challenger sailed north- 
eastwards. She called briefly at the lonely atoll of Fadiffolu to 
appraise its value as a Fleet anchorage, but in haste as he was, the 
Captain found time to run a line of soundings through and away 
from the atoll on the other side, fixing his position with reference 
to the centre of the atoll by running taut wire. In this manner 
he obtained an excellent profile across an atoll, that strange coral 
structure which rises so abruptly from the depths of the true 
oceans. 


Challenger had always sailed alone in the Indian Ocean, for she 
was really too slow for the ocean convoys. Her armament of two 
Oerlikon guns was quite inadequate for these long, lonely voy- 
ages; true, the First Lieutenant had rigged a most convincing 
looking gun on the forecastle using canvas for the gunshield and 
a beacon pole for the 4-inch barrel, but once that bluff was called 
there would be little left with which to fight a well-armed sub- 
marine or raider, and Challenger’s speed would not help her escape. 


Above: SHEIKH KHAMIS BIN HILAL APPROACHES WITH HIS ‘ARMY’ 


Below : COMMANDER BAKER WITH SHEIKH KHAMIS BIN HILAL AND HIS BROTHERS 


of61 ANn( ‘auolaIVAH JO GV4H AHL LV ANOITV GAWOHONV 


THE EASTERN FLEET 139 


About half an hour after daybreak on the day following her 
departure from Fadiffolu, and when the Captain had just gone 
down to have his morning bath, a submarine was sighted on the 
horizon. The Captain rushed to the bridge with only his bath- 
towel about his waist, and even this was in imminent danger of 
slipping off. He sized up the situation: with no guns larger than 
Oerlikons and the low speed available there was no hope of a 
successful action, and all that could be hoped for was that the 
submarine would see the mock gun on Challenger’s forecastle and 
reach a similar decision. All eyes were on the low, ominous, 
distant shape. The minutes ticked by and the submarine made no 
move to close the range. For a whole hour the ship’s company 
awaited the attack that never came. When the masthead look-out 
had at last lost sight of the submarine the Captain made a large 
alteration of course and broke W/T silence to report. On arrival 
at Colombo, it was learned that the submarine was a British one. 

The First Lieutenant’s gun must have been very realistic, how- 
ever, for one of the first persons to visit the ship on her arrival 
was the Port Gunnery Officer who had been passing the ship and 
had come onboard to inspect the 4-inch gun which he saw she 
carried. 

One day the Fleet Royal Marine Officer passed a Sergeant and 
Corporal of Marines in a Colombo street. There was something 
unusual in their salute which drew his attention to them and 
he called them over. They had never had one day’s training since 
that first day in the barracks at Chatham and it was an easy task 
for the officer to find faults with their uniforms and the way they 
were wearing them. He questioned them as to their unit and said 
that in all his days as a Royal Marine Officer he had never seen 
two such unorthodox Marines. They would be called in for guard 
and drill duties forthwith. Captain Wyatt got wind of this painful 
interview and saw that unless he acted swiftly he would lose his 
lithographic draughtsman and his printer. Consequently he sent 
for the Fleet Royal Marine Officer and the two Marines were 
spared the guard duties which they had not been relishing. 

Two more sounding boats were on their way out from England, 
and a motor launch was allocated for survey duties. Extra men 
were recruited from the Fleet for training in Challenger to man 
these craft. By now the ship was at Trincomalee, where there 

II 


140 CHALLENGER 


were floating dock berths, dredged areas and anchorages to be 
sounded. 


At the end of 1943 the British XV Corps held Cox’s Bazaar 
on the Arakan coast and a survey to locate the channel over the 
bar was required to admit supply vessels to that port. The enemy 
was close at hand and it was decided that a detached party should 
be sent from Challenger to do this work, taking with them one of 
the ship’s echo sounding launches. 

Volunteers for this expedition were quick to come forward 
from the ship’s company once they heard that Charles Grattan 
was to be their leader, for he had earned a fine reputation for 
cool deliberation in such enterprises. Leading Seaman Jimmy 
Greenshields was to be the surveying recorder and second-in- 
command of the small party of five ratings. 

They left Trincomalee in November 1943, sailing with their 
boat to Chittagong in a merchant ship. On arrival there Grattan 
did some hard talking before he found himself in possession of 
a base ship. She was the old river steamer Esther, her captain a 
British Army sergeant and her crew twenty Indians, one of whom 
was a cook who could disguise corned beef a hundred different 
ways. 

Things went smoothly, there was no interference by the 
Japanese and the channel was surveyed and marked within 
a week. Fast going, and Lieutenant Grattan flew direct to Delhi 
with his work, there to have it printed as a chart. 


On 19th January, 1944, the British 5th Division commenced 
an advance southwards along the coast and Tek Naaf, on the 
western bank of the Naaf River, was occupied. A small bridge- 
head was also established on the eastern bank but the Japanese 
continued to hold the remainder of that bank, and the coast south- 
wards from the river mouth. The Naaf River flows southwards 
parallel to the coast and but a few miles inland from it. Inside 
the river was deep and easily navigated, but to enter it supply 
vessels would have to thread their way along the shifting channel 
through the breakers and shallows of the Cypress Sands, which 
stretched five miles to seaward. 

This channel had to be located and marked and Grattan’s party 


TE) EAS TE RUN SEE BET Aa 


moved forward nearer the enemy. Escorted by a motor launch 
of the Royal Indian Navy, the survey boat steamed from Cox’s 
Bazaar southwards 50 miles through the night to St. Martin’s 
Island, which lay close south of the Naaf River entrance and five 
miles off the enemy-held coast. 

Luckily there were no Japanese on St. Martin’s Island, only a 
few Burmese, and Grattan took possession quietly, anchoring his 
boat off the casuarina lined shores and taking over a native hut for 
his headquarters. No lights or fires were permitted on the island 
by night, whilst the sky to the eastward was illuminated by the 
flash of artillery and falling bombs. 

Close as the surveyors were to the enemy, the base had to be 
measured with the usual care, and this was done on a low sandy 
spit at the west side of the river entrance. Then the triangulation 
had to be observed, which meant landing by day on the enemy’s 
shore. Sometimes Zero fighters flew so low over the party that 
they could plainly see the pilot in his cockpit, and they were 
happy to think they may have been mistaken for Japanese. Once 
ashore Charles Grattan used his theodolite and Jimmy Green- 
shields booked the angles ; the other two members on shore stood 
guard with the entire armament, a stripped Lewis and a Tommy 
gun, peering fearfully into the thick jungle. But for some strange 
reason they were never discovered until they were once again in 
their boat and bullets sung past them as they made off; on one 
occasion they had only just left a Burmese village when the whole 
place went up in flames, presumably as a reprisal for the slight 
assistance that had been given to the surveyors by the villagers. 

After about a week, when it seemed that the Japanese had 
overlooked the activity on St. Martin’s Island, Esther arrived with 
her helpful captain, gifted cook and comfortable bunks. However, 
Esther did not distil her own water, nor was there any on the 
island, so that every two or three days she must sail at full speed, 
with all guns manned, into the river and upstream to a muddy 
pool on the western bank where fresh supplies were taken onboard. 

The surveyors got to know every yard of the coast south of the 
river, and when the channel through the Cypress Sands had been 
surveyed and marked for shipping the little party were delighted 
to find themselves asked to guide in the commandos landing on 
the coast to make a right hook. Charles Grattan led the landing 


142 CHALLENGER 


craft in a motor launch, while Jimmy Greenshields, happily com- 
manding a massive American diesel craft, brought in the second 
wave, a fitting ending to the Challenger’s activities on the Arakan 
coast. 

On 6th March the first large vessel, s.s. Engby, entered the river 
by the new channel and berthed at the military base at Tek Naaf. 

Lieutenant Grattan received a Mention in Despatches for the 
fine work done by his team, and the Supreme Commander South- 
East Asia wrote to the Naval Commander-in-Chief as follows: 


My Dear Commander-in-Chief, 


I wish to express my deep appreciation of the splendid work recently 
carried out by the Naval Survey Party which surveyed the Naaf River Entrance. 

By locating and charting a deep water channel the Survey Party has made 
it possible during the monsoon season for seagoing ships to enter the Naaf 
River and reach Maungdaw. The alternative, if no action had been taken to 
locate the channel, would have been for vessels to discharge at Cox’s Bazaar 
and for stores to proceed from there by road, thus placing a great additional 
burden on Road Transport during the difficult monsoon season. 

I shall be glad if the Officers and Men of the Survey Party can be informed 
of the great value their work has been to the soldiers fighting in the Arakan. 


(Signed) Yours sincerely, 
Louis Mountbatten. 


On Christmas Day, 1943, Captain Wyatt was once again in 
Challenger on his way to Palk Strait to take in hand more surveys 
of that area, which was required for use as operational training 
grounds. The area entailed over 300 square miles of sounding. 
Much of it was out of sight of land so that a triangulation scheme 
had to be established using moored beacons, instead of the usual 
landmarks, connected to the shore survey. This work was com- 
pleted between the sth and 25th January, 1944. The surveyed 
area was tinted in red on the existing small-scale chart of the 
area and forwarded to the C.-in-C. to show him what good pro- 
gress was being made ; his comment was that it did not look much 
for three weeks’ work! 


About this time the strategic importance of the Cocos-Keeling 
Islands was realised, lying as they did utterly alone in the Indian 
Ocean, about 600 miles from the Japanese-occupied territory of 
Sumatra, 


THE EASTERN FLEET 143 


It was planned to survey the islands, the lagoons and the reefs 
with a view to using the anchorages and laying down an airfield. 
A party was assembled for this purpose at Colombo and consisted 
of Lieutenant E. E. Croome from Challenger with a Petty Officer 
Surveying Recorder, and three A.B.s to do the hydrographic 
survey; there were also Royal Engineers and a Flight Lieutenant 
to site the airfield. The party sailed in a fast minelayer, complete 
with every item from Bren guns to tin-openers. They were to 
be left some weeks on Cocos and it was by no means certain that 
they would not be visited by the Japanese during the period. To 
make their presence less conspicuous from the air they took no 
survey boat but relied on ‘local resources’, a familiar and dreaded 
term to the ears of any hydrographic surveyor. 

It was upon these atolls that Mr. Darwin wandered with 
Captain FitzRoy from the British naval survey ship Beagle in 1842 
and pondered upon the construction of these low islands lying 
around a shallow lagoon; whilst outside the lagoon Captain Fitz- 
Roy had showed by his lead line soundings that the bottom fell 
away precipitously to very great depths which he could not plumb. 

Darwin and FitzRoy had met Captain Ross, who had settled 
in the islands about 1835 with his family and a former ship’s 
mate who had served with him. Soon Ross was employing as free 
labour the Malay slaves whom a Mr. Hare had imported a few 
years before. The islands have remained in the Ross family ever 
since and the descendants of these Malay slaves are the inhabitants 
of Cocos-Keeling today. The surveyors found the natives leading 
an orderly and pleasant life, and despite the lack of outside 
provisions and many articles of daily use, due to their remote 
position and war-time difficulties, their standard of living appeared 
to be above that of many dwellers in the East, based as it was 
upon coconuts and pigs. 

Almost on arrival Croome’s crew went sick with some form 
of dysentery and he had to search the village alone for a boat and 
a Malay crew to man her. The craft he finally found was a hard 
chine boat, with a high freeboard and an unpredictable engine. 
In this he went to sea for the hydrographic survey, first within 
the lagoon, then through the entrance channel and along the 
outside of the wave-battered reef. A Malay steered while his com- 
panion coaxed the engine and a very brave and seasick R.E. 


144 CHALLENGER 


Sergeant, who had come as the geologist of the team, struggled 
alongside Croome to take sextant angles with the unfamiliar in- 
strument as the boat bobbed like a cork or drifted broadside 
with the wind. The Flight Lieutenant (Radar) wrote down the 
angles and recorded the leadline soundings being taken by the 
two A.B.s who still remained on their feet. The Major (Airfield 
Siting) was pressed into service to record the rate of tidal streams 
through the entrance channel of the lagoon, anchored there in 
a native canoe. 

There were one or two occasions when the engine broke down 
while they were working outside the reef; luckily the wind 
was blowing towards the reef, or the craft and its oddly assorted 
crew would have been borne away to the middle of the Indian 
Ocean. So steep were the sides of the reef that the anchor failed 
to hold the boat until she lay pitching and plunging a few feet 
from the breakers pounding upon the edge of the reef itself. 
There, in this perilous position, praying that the anchor might 
continue to hold, the surveyors remained while the Malay engine- 
man coaxed his unwilling charge into action again. 

On returning to Ceylon Croome handed in his completed 
survey. He was quite worn out with improvising and was happy 
to be back. The bill for the hire of his boat at Cocos and the crew 
that went with it came to about £200, and this was paid without 
comment by the Naval Supply Staff, but a few days later Croome 
received a bill for 14s. 3d. in respect of crockery he had failed 
to bring back with him from those distant isles. 


In April the approaches to the Naval Base at Trincomalee 
were taken in hand for survey with H.M. Yacht Nguva, Motor 
Launch No. 1248 assisting. Eastern Fleet charts had now reached 
well over twenty in number. These, like all charts, need constant 
revision and correction and Notices to Mariners had to be estab- 
lished to correct them. The Admiralty Notices to Mariners have 
been published for many years and go forth weekly to all holders 
of folios of Admiralty charts, bearing the corrections which 
Mariners should make to keep them up to date. Local Notices to 
Mariners supplied by the Hydrographic Office at Colombo carried 
to users of the E.F. Charts such corrections as became necessary 
week by week and the first copies of these notices were printed 


ee 


on 


Pe 


———_— 


ELE EASTeE RIN (Bi Eee I4g 


by Petty Officer Long on a Gestetner duplicating machine in early 
May 1944. 

By the end of June the shore Hydrographic organisation was 
well established. The Admiralty had taken over a large yacht in 
England called the White Bear, which was being fitted out with 
the latest in chart printing and production apparatus, and she 
was shortly to sail to become the hydrographic vessel with the 
Eastern Fleet. Captain Wyatt, although still the Fleet Hydrographic 
Officer, was now able to return to his ship and to sail in her for 
Sydney, where she was to undergo a refit which was well overdue, 
and where she arrived on 26th July. 


XII 


Torres Straits 


under Quiros was in the South-West Pacific. The ships be- 

came separated and eventually one of these, commanded by 
Luis Vaez de Torres, passed through a reef-encumbered passage 
between that part of Australia now known as the Cape York 
Peninsula, and New Guinea. The second European to pass through 
these straits was Captain Cook, who landed with Mr. Banks upon 
a small island which he described as ‘mostly barren rock fre- 
quented by birds such as boobies’. It was as he returned to the 
ship on this occasion that he noticed the south-westerly swell and 
realised that he was now ‘westward of Carpentaria’ and that he 
had passed through Torres’ strait. Cook named this bare island 
‘Booby Island’. 

In 1944 the thoughts of both the British and the U.S. Navies 
turned upon Torres Straits. The remaining passages between the 
Indian and the Pacific Oceans were closed by the Japanese and 
there was no other way open except by the long passage right 
round the south of the Australian Continent. It might be neces- 
sary at any time, as strategy required, to pass battleships and air- 
craft carriers rapidly from one of these two oceans to the other. 
More particularly at this time was it likely that the British Eastern 
Fleet might be required to move rapidly to the Pacific from the 
Indian Ocean to join the U.S. Fleet. 

A navigable channel through Torres Strait had been surveyed 
by Captain Blackwood in the survey ship Fly in the years 1843 
to 1845, and it was his charts which were now investigated. His 
channel was well used, lighthouses now marking some of the vital 
turning points along the tortuous route. The channel throughout 
its entire length of 100 miles from Booby Island in the west to 
Dalrymple Island in the east seldom exceeds 100 feet in depth 
and so it may be seen what a potential danger an undiscovered 
coral head might be to a fleet of ships requiring a depth of water 

146 e 


I" 1606 a Spanish Expedition which had set out from Peru 


Cg a ge ee ee 


TORRES STRAITS 147 


of 35 feet. Away from the channel itself the reefs still remain 
practically uncharted. Such remarks as are still on the chart— 
‘Reef seen by Mr. Ashmore in 1811 (not surveyed)’ and ‘Fly 
entered here (dangerous)’—do not inspire confidence. 

Much more recently Lieutenant-Commander Karl Oom, 
R.A.N., who had served in Challenger in Labrador, had completed 
a survey of the western end of the channel and H.M. Australian 
Ships Moresby and Vigilant had sounded and swept a portion of 
the Great North East Channel ; two former Challenger officers were 
also serving in these ships, “Tancred Pass’ and ‘Lowry Islet’ 
bearing witness to their efforts. 

It was now decided to sweep the entire channel for obstructions 
and widen it wherever possible, the survey to be given utmost 
priority. 

Challenger’s Captain was placed in command of Task Unit 
jo.5.2. under the operational control of the Commander U.S. 
gth Fleet. The Unit consisted of the ship herself, the Royal Aus- 
tralian Naval Trawlers Goolgwai, Samuel Benbow and Durraween, two 
seine net fishing vessels, Polaris and Winter, and a motor launch. 
All these vessels were fitted with echo sounding equipment and 
an assortment of sweeping gear. 

Lieutenant-Commander R. T. Tripp and General Gordon were 
posted from Challenger to the Goolgwai and Samuel Benbow respec- 
tively, and these two ships, forming the advance guard of this 
strangely assorted unit, sailed from Sydney for Torres Straits on 
13th September, 1944. Challenger was to hasten after them in early 
October at the conclusion of her refit. 

Captain Wyatt had time only to see this operation getting under 
way before his orders came to return to England. In the following 
year he was to take over as Hydrographer of the Navy from Vice- 
Admiral Sir John Edgell. This meant that he had reached the 
highest post it is possible for a naval surveyor to hold, but in spite 
of this knowledge it was a sad day for Captain Wyatt when he 
had to leave Challenger knowing that she was his last sea-going 
command. He had always been a man of the sea. He loved the 
ship and her company and there were tears in his eyes when he 
said good-bye. He was going, he told the men, to become a ‘nine 
o’clock sailor’, and so the First Lieutenant, Bill, took over com- 


mand of the ship. 


148 CHALLENGER 


Challenger and the trawlers were fitted with gear called the 
Oropesa sweep, normally used for the sweeping of moored mines, 
but also used by surveyors to sweep for obstructions at various 
depths below the surface of the sea. The merit of the apparatus 
is that by means of steel ‘otter boards’ the sweep runs out to 
port and to starboard of the sweeping vessel at a set depth and 
thus the ship does not need a partner to sweep a wide swathe of 
the channel. Challenger worked in the somewhat deeper water to 
the eastward using this gear, but so shallow was the water of the 
Prince of Wales Channel in which the trawlers were sweeping 
that the otter boards themselves, which hang five or six feet 
below the sweep wire, were fouling the bottom. So the trawlers 
worked in pairs, dragging a chain bottom sweep between 
them. This could not be done however where the sea-bed was 
rough and so in such areas a wire sweep was rigged between two 
vessels. The light wire used for the sweep is held down below 
the stern of each ship by passing it through a block secured to 
a heavy weight suspended from the stern of the sweeping craft. 
Wires with floats attached to them are secured at intervals along 
the sweep to keep the whole 1000 feet of sweep wire at the 
correct set depth. Such work had to be taken very slowly: the 
vessels did not sweep at random, for in one of these craft, each 
swathe cleared was plotted upon the sounding boards by a sur- 
veyor who repeatedly fixed his own ship by reference to the 
survey marks which Challenger had now erected and co-ordinated 
on the numerous small islands and reefs along both sides of the 
channel. The second trawler maintained its careful distance of 
1000 feet from the fixing vessel. Thus was the progress of the 
work recorded day by day and gaps in the sweeping filled. 

Challenger’s work consisted of the erecting and fixing of the 
marks, the sounding out of the more intricate parts of the straits 
with her echo sounding boats in order to locate the deepest 
passages, and, together with the Royal Australian Naval mine- 
sweeper Echuca, which had now joined the Task Unit, sweeping 
the North-East Channel with Oropesa gear. Each time this equip- 
ment fouled an obstruction the ships would have to be hauled 
back and every effort made to salve as much of the sweep gear as 
possible. There were many obstructions and the supply of sweep 
gear arriving at Thursday Island barely kept pace with these un- 


| 
| 


TORRES STRAITS 149 


avoidable losses. Each time an obstruction was thus located it had 
to be fixed and a search with the echo sounding boats made to 
find the shortest way around it. 


Soundings on charts show the depth of water the mariner can 
expect at Spring Low Water, being as low as the tide is likely 
to fall. Whenever the surveyor is sounding therefore he must have 
a tidepole erected so that every sounding may be corrected to 
the height of the tide above sounding level (or ‘datum’) before 
it is inked in upon the sounding boards to become part of the 
future chart. 

The height of the established level ashore above sounding datum 
is recorded, together with a full description of the fixed mark 
which establishes the level; this mark is known to the surveyor 
as a ‘benchmark’, formerly ‘bankmark’, then being a mark cut 
in the bank of a river so that flood waters might be gauged, If 
any future survey is undertaken in the same area at a later date 
a tidepole can be erected, and as soon as it is levelled down from 
the fixed mark the height of sounding datum can be established 
on the pole without the necessity of re-observing the rise and fall 
of the tide for the complete period of a lunar month. 

So it is that in all the larger ports of the world benchmarks 
have been established. In many remote native villages or in shel- 
tered coves and bays on uninhabited shores such a mark is known 
by the Hydrographic Department to exist and its description and 
height above sounding datum may be found in the records and 
supplied to the captain of a ship sailing to survey in the area. 
Every one of these benchmarks shows the site of a tidal camp 
where a small party of naval ratings has lived for at least a month 
to watch the rising and falling of the tide throughout the lunar 
cycle. Sometimes in recent years, sometimes well over 100 years 
ago, these simple men, by performing their tide-watching duties, 
have established a quantity of solid data for the study of the earth’s 
tides. When recovering an old benchmark it is interesting to 
visualise the party of men who established it 50 years before, to see 
their camp and imagine them sitting with their clay pipes and 
sennit hats as they converse with their native neighbours in that 
form of pidgin English in which the sailor communicates freely 
with those of other tongues the world over. There are many 


CHALLENGER 


150 


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TORRES STRAITS ISI 


stories of tide-watchers who are left for long periods to their own 
resources, sometimes on uninhabited islands, sometimes in com- 
munities far from what the sailor would call civilisation. Before 
the days of radio they often had to nurse one of their fellows 
through malaria or other ailments or deal with snake bites and 
accidents ; today the ship can be called in such emergencies. 

A tide-watcher had been established in the Wyre Lighthouse 
to read a tidepole during the period when Challenger was surveying 
at Heysham at the beginning of the commission. This man was 
taken ill with severe stomach pains and a party from the ship 
arrived by boat at the lighthouse to collect him. It was necessary 
to lower him into the boat from the balcony of the lighthouse by 
placing him in a Neil-Robertson stretcher, which is supplied for 
just such a purpose. When secured inside this stretcher the 
patient is incapable of moving hand or foot. The tide-watcher, 
thus helpless, was being lifted over the parapet of the lighthouse 
by the rescue party when he slipped from their grasp and fell 
like a stone. The officer who was in charge caught a quick turn 
with the rope with which it had been planned to lower the man, 
and it was just in time, for the rope brought the stretcher up 
with a sickening jerk a few feet above the waiting boat. The 
lighthouse keeper was later heard to say that he had never seen 
such a fine feat of seamanship ! 


A complete new crew were now arriving at Thursday Island 
in dribs and drabs to relieve the men who had served a full com- 
mission in Challenger. Commander Sabine took command and with 
him came a number of surveying officers who were new to the 
old ship. Among these was a young lieutenant, John Thomson, 
and one of his first duties was to land on Cook’s Booby Island to 
locate the benchmark established there in 1843 by the men of 
H.M.S. Fly. It was said to be cut in ironstone rock at the mouth 
of a cave known as the ‘Post Office’, which had been used as 
such in former times, vessels going eastwards leaving their mails 
in the cave for collection by vessels homeward bound. It was 
many years, however, since this pleasing idea had been abandoned, 
for even when the earlier Challenger visited the cave in 1875 there 
was only one letter there, and that was a treatise addressed ‘to 
whom it may concern’ describing the navigational difficulties of 


152 CHALLENGER 


the Torres Strait as the master of the vessel Banda had found them. 
But although Thomson found no letters, he located the benchmark 
and saw the name of H.M.S. Fly beautifully carved upon the walls 
of the cave. 

The tides of the Torres Straits are extremely complicated, for 
the strait connects two areas in which, as the Admiralty Tide 
Tables say, ‘the tides differ remarkably’. Sometimes it is high 
water in one area when it is low water in the other, which causes 
strong tidal streams to rush from the higher level to the lower. 
Challenger, measuring the rate of these streams at frequent points 
along the channel, found them to flow at times at speeds up to 
eight knots, so that it can be imagined how difficult this made 
the dragging of the sweeps along the channel. 

To find the tidal reductions hour by hour throughout each day 
so that the sweeps could be set to the required depths it was 
necessary to establish a whole chain of tide-watching camps, for 
the time of high and low water differed considerably along each 
leg of the route, Starting with a camp on Booby Island, parties 
were landed to make camp on Goods, Round and Hammond 
Islands, Ince Point, Twin and Sue Islands. 

Round Island is small and covered with dry scrub. It is only 
about 400 yards across in any one direction, and this was one of the 
places where two men were to camp for a month to watch the tide- 
pole. A team from the ship helped to land their stores and to pitch 
their tents, and then with much talk about Robinson Crusoe and 
Man Friday the helpers manned their boat and headed out for the 
ship, waiting impatiently offshore. The two men were left in their 
own little kingdom, and after a brief look around they decided 
to fall back upon the sailors’ stand-by and to make themselves a 
cup of tea while they thought of the long days ahead and what 
they would do when they were not actually reading the tidepole. 

As Round Island was sinking below the horizon astern of the 
ship the Officer of the Watch happened to look back. A billowing 
cloud of smoke rose above the island; if atomic bombs had been 
known at this time it would have been assumed that this was one 
of them. The ship turned and made her best speed back to the 
island while those on the bridge looked anxiously through their 
binoculars to see what was happening. The whole island was 
furiously on fire, and no sign of camp or campers could be seen. 


TORRES STRAITS 153 


A boat was lowered and hurried in towards the beach where 
so recently the campers and their gear had been landed. As the 
boat neared the shore the tide-watchers were seen standing up 
to their necks in the sea off the blazing coastline. There was no 
place on the island where they could have remained, and here 
they were braving the sharks and the venomous sting rays. 

Their paraffin cooking stove had exploded and this had ignited 
the tent, and the dry scrub soon followed. It was a fortunate thing 
that the ship had not been further away when the fire started, 
for with the radio and all their food supplies gone the two campers 
would have been in a desperate position. 

The islands in the Great North-East Channel are small and 
featureless apart from the usual clumps of coconut palms, which 
so obscured the view that in many cases it became necessary to 
build survey marks over 60 feet in height. The Admiralty Manual 
of Hydrographic Surveying includes a set of instructions for erecting 
such marks, and as Thomson had not built one of these before, 
he took this book with him when he landed. ‘With resources 
normally available’, reads the manual, ‘pole marks up to a maxi- 
mum of seventy or eighty feet in height may be erected without 
difficulty.’ Thomson followed the directions as they went on to 
describe the procedure, using such resources as barlings, bamboos, 
tail-blocks, mast-ropes, heel-ropes, smiting lines and five iron 
stakes—‘nine if the ground is soft,’ said the manual. However, he 
felt that the phrase ‘without much difficulty’ was perhaps an 
understatement. By late afternoon the mark was up, towering 
proudly above the palms, but unfortunately so was the gantline 
and a boatswain’s chair with a sailor in it all lashed to the top 
of the mark. 

After a further hour or so this sailor had been rescued from his 
pole-squatting position and the party were ready to return to the 
ship. On the beach they found the coxswain of the motor skiff, 
which they had left anchored offshore, shivering with fright. He 
had got bored in the boat as she lay tossing gently beyond the reef 
and had swum to the shore. The man swore that he had been 
chased by a shark, and sure enough there was the beast in the 
shallows waiting for his supper. With much splashing the shark 
was frightened away into deeper water, and then of course some- 
one had to go and get the boat. The men’s eyes turned meaningly 


154. CHALLENGER 


upon their leader; there was no option, and young Thomson 
struck out for the skiff. Never had a 200-yard swim seemed to 
him so long, and never had the difficulties of climbing into a 
boat from the water seemed to him to be so insuperable. But 
when he reached the boat he found that he was into it in a flash. 


There was little social activity apart from the visits to Thursday 
Island, where there was an open-air cinema. Here also was the 
Pilot House, the headquarters of the pilotage service. Sunday 
morning here was washing day and one or two Torres Straits 
pilots and a few naval officers from the sweeping trawlers could 
be seen on such occasions, clad in shorts, bending over enormous 
bubbling cauldrons full of khaki ‘dhoby’. The heat and the sweat 
of this work brought on a fine thirst for the Sunday forenoon gin, 
for there were enough supplies to permit this weekly relaxation. 

At this time there were no women on Thursday Island, except 
for one Army nurse, so that it had become habitual for the men 
from the trawlers and those stationed on the island to bathe in 
the nude. Sometimes it would be rumoured that the nurse was 
walking in the direction of the bathing beach, and this news would 
send a hundred naked men running up the sands to reach their 
shorts. 

Friday Island, nearby, was swarming with deer. In normal times 
these were protected, but there was usually a meat shortage in 
the sweeping trawlers and it was extraordinary how often the 
surveying mark on the summit of Friday Island fell down and had 
to be re-erected by a party from these ships. 

The ship anchored for a few days off Coconut Island in the 
North-East Channel and the King came onboard. ‘King of Coco- 
nut Island’—what a remote and romantic figure this title conjured 
up! But when he came onboard he proved himself a man of the 
world. When asked if he would take refreshment, he answered 
without hesitation that he would have a gin and orange. The party 
who landed from the ship at his invitation to take part in a feast 
found that they were expected to go to church first. 


The operation of sweeping the channel had begun in October 
1944 and was completed at the end of April 1945, when the Task 
Unit was disbanded—a good job done despite the fantastic tidal 
streams and the very boisterous weather that had endured during 


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March, when for days at a time the smaller vessels of the team 
were forced to remain at anchor in the channels waiting for the 
winds to moderate. U.S.S. Mesquite arrived in March and, as a 
result of the survey, laid buoys and erected navigational beacons 
along the selected route. 

Challenger returned now to Trincomalee in Ceylon and it 
proved to be a nightmare passage across the Indian Ocean. The 
main boiler room fan broke down, and the auxiliary fan was not 
found to be up to the work. The temperature in the boiler-room 
rose to 160 degrees and the stokers working there were able to 
do tricks below of only about half an hour’s duration before they 
had to be brought on deck to cool off. The ship’s speed was down 
to about 31 knots and it often seemed to those onboard that they 
would never cross that stifling ocean. However, at Colombo, 
which was at long last reached, these defects were made good 
and the ship once again returned to survey off Trincomalee. 

V.J. Day found the ship in Singapore, bringing the charts up 
to date by fixing the numerous wrecks and obstructions that had 
accumulated during the time of the Japanese occupation and by 
re-surveying those parts of Keppel Harbour and the approaches 
to the Naval Base that were likely to have altered during the war. 
Relieved at Singapore by H.M.S. White Bear, which had been serv- 
ing with the Eastern Fleet during the recent Burma and Malayan 
landings, Challenger sailed with the minesweepers to carry out 
what was termed a ‘rehabilitation’ survey of the river bar and 
approaches to the port of Saigon. From there she went on to 
Hong-Kong for similar work, and a complete new survey of the 
whole of that port was made. In January, 1946, she was re- 
surveying the approaches to the North Borneo and Sarawak ports 
of Jesselton, Brunei Bay, Labuan, Muara and Kuching. Many of 
these places had been the recent scenes of fierce fighting and were 
cluttered with wrecks, while the river approaches to others had 
changed during the war years. Such surveys facilitated the import 
of food and clothing, which at this time was a vital necessity in 
this part of the world where the local populations had suffered 
so badly and for so long at the hands of the enemy. 

These were the last surveys of the commission, and in March, 
1946, the ship once again reached Portsmouth with her paying-off 
pendant flying. 

12 


XII 


The Persian Gulf 


of Sheikhs who ruled territory stretching from Muscat at 

the entrance to the Persian Gulf westward along the south- 
ern shores of the Gulf as far as and including the Sheikhdom of 
Qatar, which covers an extensive peninsula running northwards 
from the Arabian shore. To the west of the northern tip of Qatar 
lies the island Sheikhdom of Bahrein, and it is on this island that 
Great Britain, by arrangement with the Sheikh of Bahrein, main- 
tains a small naval establishment housing the shore headquarters 
of the Senior Naval Officer in the Persian Gulf. The British 
Political Resident for the Gulf area has his residency within the 
naval base. 

Our agreement with the so-called Trucial Coast Sheikhdoms 
bind us to protect them from outside interference, and a small 
naval force is stationed in the Gulf for this purpose. Under the 
Political Resident there are a number of Political Agents who are 
stationed in the various Sheikhdoms and who keep in touch with 
political matters in those states. The Royal Navy and the Political 
Resident thus find themselves working very closely together in 
this interesting area. 

The great bay which lies between the Qatar peninsula and the 
entrance to the Persian Gulf, and which is bounded on its 
southern side by the Trucial Coast, was, in 1946, little surveyed. 
It is studded with a mass of shoals and coral reefs interspersed 
with a labyrinth of deep navigable channels. Sand suspended in 
the water after the storms which are frequent in the winter 
months gives the appearance, when the sun is shining, of shoal 
water, which adds to the general difficulties of navigation in this 
area, where it is desirable that our naval ships should be able to 
move swiftly and safely when the occasion arises. 

The area was already on the post-war survey programme when 
urgency was further added to the task by the decision of the 

156 


\ CENTURY ago Great Britain signed truces with a number 


THE PERSIAN GULF sy) 


Petroleum Development Qatar Ltd., an associate of the Iraq Pet- 
roleum Company, to develop the oil field which their prospectors 
had proved in the Qatar peninsula in 1940, but which had remain- 
ed unexploited throughout the war. Now, with the approval of 
the Ministry of Fuel and Power, it was hoped to export crude oil 
at an initial rate of 1,000,000 tons a year at the earliest opportu- 
nity. 

The oil field had been discovered in the south-west of the 
peninsula and the company had carried out a preliminary survey 
at the time to find out how best the oil might be shipped from 
this difficult area. The Dohat as Salwa, the bay which lies between 
Qatar and the Saudi-Arabian coast running northwards towards 
Ras at Tannura, was far too shallow and reef-encumbered to permit 
the approach of tankers, although barge routes were found later 
in this area through which the equipment for sinking the wells 
was shipped from Bahrein. So the company surveyors looked to 
the eastern shores of Qatar and found two or three places where 
deep water came fairly close to the shore, and where there 
seemed to be some hope of the deep draught tankers approaching 
the coast sufficiently close to permit them to embark oil through 
pipelines led out to the buoys at which the vessels might lie 
secured. 

The north-west winds, which blow frequently in the winter 
months and are known as ‘shamals’, have already been described, 
and it is these winds, often prevailing for days at a time, which 
raise short, choppy seas that would seriously interfere with the 
embarkation of oil through these loading lines. 

Of the various east-coast sites investigated by the oil company 
surveyors, the place where the deep water came nearest to the 
shore was about 15 miles south of the town of Doha, the seat of 
the Sheikh of Qatar. Here deep water had been found within 200 
to 300 feet of the shore, with a long reef known as Fasht al Arrif 
running to seaward close north of the position which gave that 
vital protection from the north-westerly shamals. If only this 
anchorage had suitable access for ships through the maze of reefs 
which could be seen offshore, then it might prove the ideal 
position, to which the oil could be piped overland from the west- 
coast wells, a matter of 50 miles distant. 

But this offshore surveying was beyond the capabilities of any 


158 CHALLENGER 


but a large sea-going hydrographic unit, and the Iraq Petroleum 
Company applied to the Admiralty for assistance in this matter 
at just about the time that the Hydrographer, now Admiral Wyatt, 
was completing his post-war survey plans for this area. Challenger 
was in fact on her way to the Gulf and was at this time carrying 
out a survey of the Daimmiyat Islands before proceeding to carry 
out surveys off the Trucial Coast ; so that it only needed a directive 
to her to give priority to that part of the coast directly south of 
Doha where it was hoped to find a channel leading into the 
sheltered deep water south of Fasht al Arrif reef. 

Captain Sam Southern was now in command of the ship and 
he had with him several old Challenger officers. The First Lieut- 
enant, who had been in charge of the ship during her recent refit, 
was responsible for the great amount of useful additional gear the 
ship now carried, for he had found a simple way of obtaining 
such things in the dockyard at Chatham. He had carried a piece 
of chalk with him and had put the ship’s name on anything useful 
he saw lying in the yard, and sooner or later this resulted in its 
being delivered onboard by the authorities. Charles Grattan was 
the Navigator and he was proud of the fact that he had been in 
the Gulf in Challenger before the War; this led him to remark to 
a junior officer on the bridge, as they approached Bahrein and 
saw the oil flare at the refinery at Sitrah, that he had sighted this 
on occasions at a distance of 100 miles. The Captain, who always 
enjoyed a leg-pull, at once said, without a smile on his face, that 
he had seen it 101 miles distant, and turning on his heel left the 
bridge and Grattan in a fury. 

A visit was first paid to Bahrein, where the Captain obtained 
a letter for the Sheikh of Qatar from Sir Rupert Hay, the Political 
Resident, so that the Sheikh should know what this strange white 
ship was doing, and that her men who would come ashore in the 
wastes of Qatar were not evilly disposed but would be hastening 
the day when the first barrel of oil would be exported and the 
first royalties become available to the Sheikh, who had ruled his 
barren lands for so long and was about to see his desert flower 
indeed. 

The ship came to anchor off the crumbling stone township of 
Doha, which is scattered along the shores of a lagoon protected 
by off-lying coral reefs. A shallow channel through these reefs, 


THE PERSIAN GULF 159 


marked by a stone beacon long since fallen into decay, and used 
for centuries past by the trading dhows and vessels sailing to the 
pearling banks, permitted the entry of the ship with only a foot 
or so of water below her keel. The letter was carried to the 
Sheikh in his cool dark quarters in the town and to it he gave 
a verbal and unenthusiastic acknowledgment. 

Next day the ship sailed southward and anchored off the Fasht 
al Arrif reef to appraise the situation and commence the work 
which would prove whether or not there was access for shipping 
to this place, otherwise so well suited to become the oilport of 
Qatar. 


The unsurveyed sand dunes of this desolate place stretched awa 
to the westward like waves of the sea; to seaward patches of blue 
and light green water showed the complexity of the work in 
hand. The low, bare island of Al Bushirya was to be the site of 
the base and the starting point for a triangulation which was, 
during the next five years, to be carried right up the east coast 
of Qatar, around the end of the peninsula to Fort Zubara, and 
thence across the shallow reefs to the Island of Bahrein, where it 
would close on a position, long since fixed by an earlier surveying 
vessel, in the garden of the Political Agent in the town of Manama. 
However, in December, 1946, that day of closure was very far 
distant, and by the time this was achieved other more modern 
vessels would have taken over the task from Challenger. But 
thoughts onboard were on the job in hand and the little recreation 
that was available to officers and men. 

Sam Southern was an enthusiastic fisherman and at the week- 
ends he usually went off on an expedition with a small party of 
officers to the Hat Islands, which lay to the southward, girdled 
by steep-sided coral reefs, along the edge of which the motor skiff 
slowly made her way as the fishermen trolled over her stern with 
home-made lures. The Engineer Officer was always encouraged to 
come upon these trips, for motor skiffs are temperamental things 
and a fishing party lost much of its pleasure if the fishermen spent 
the heat of the day churning the starting handle instead of 
watching their lines trailing into the green waters astern. Often 
the catches were good but sometimes the biggest fish were at- 
tacked even while they were being played on the line and a huge 


160 CHALLENGER 


head was all that was taken aboard. It was even more difficult to 
persuade the Engineer Officer to come on these trips after an 
unfortunate incident which occurred when the skiff had returned 
one night. He was standing on the gunwhale of the boat and 
holding onto the ship’s side; slowly the boat began to leave the 
ship and slowly the figure of the Engineer became more horizontal 
and less vertical until the big splash came. All the onlookers were 
highly amused and Sam Southern’s well-known smile spread across 
his face until it was realised that his cherished fishing rod had been 
in the Engineer’s grasp and it had sunk beyond recovery. 

The ship’s Medical Officer, Surgeon-Lieutenant P. T. Ruther- 
ford, R.N.V.R., tall, athletic and red haired, was also a great 
sportsman and was in on all the fishing trips to the Hat Islands. 
He specialised in making his own lures, which lay about his cabin 
in differing states of completion together with his home-made 
tools for their construction; here and there hung a bird’s wing 
which had been collected for making lures but now lay rotting 
and forgotten. His desk, which was stained from much use and 
spillage of photographic materials, was piled with the wardroom 
wine accounts, of which he was the custodian. Fishing rods and 
gun tackle were slung up here and there and stowed in the corners 
of the cabin. In his washbasin lived two small turtles. 

One day when the Medical Officer was sitting in this crowded 
compartment busy at his lures the Petty Officer Steward brought 
onboard some peculiar looking domestic ducks which he had 
bought in the souk (market) at Doha and he was busy despatching 
them on the forecastle. One of these was taken down to the doctor 
freshly killed and he was told that there were hundreds of such 
birds passing over the ship. He seized his shotgun and forcing two 
cartridges into the barrels as he ran up the ladder, he raced here 
and there about the decks searching the skies in vain for a ‘right 
and left’. 

Ship’s sports were organized to take place one week-end on a 
sandy expanse ashore and Rutherford won each event steadily until 
he decided to cancel his entry for the later events so that some of 
the others should have a chance. Tug-of-war, that most barbarous 
of all sports, was on the programme and the Wardroom team 
struggled and heaved their way into the final against the stokers. 
They might even have won this, but whenever they looked like 


THE PERSIAN GULF 161 


winning the supporters of the stokers’ team got carried away and 
clapped onto the rope to save the situation. Finally this idea caught 
hold, and despite the protestations of the referee, the whole 
Ship’s Company were soon on the rope pulling the Wardroom 
away across the sands. 

This was an uninhabited part of Qatar; not even the ruins of a 
village were to be seen, but upon the reefs were built long low 
stone walls which formed a crude type of trap to catch the fish 
on a falling tide, and to these would come the solitary fishermen. 
They wore a loincloth pulled up between their legs and a cloth so 
casually wound about their heads that it was difficult to under- 
stand how it remained in place as they waded about the reefs 
inspecting their traps and occasionally bending down to effect 
repairs to the walls. They paid little or no attention to the survey- 
ors nor did they interfere with the tempting marks which the 
surveyors were now erecting upon the shallows. 


At first it was very difficult to use the ship for sounding at all, 
for there were indications of shoals on every hand. On more than 
one occasion the ship was pulled up or turned within feet of a 
coral outcrop, and once the log, which protrudes below the hull, 
was bent as the ship grazed over a shallow area. Charles Grattan, 
the Navigating Officer, considered this technically a case of 
grounding and ostentatiously filled in the necessary official report 
forms which he submitted to Sam who cast them into the waste- 
paper basket as often as they were handed to him. On the field 
boards the boats were slowly drawing the complex picture of the 
reefs with the deep channels between them and indicating areas 
where the ship could safely work. Most interesting of all, a deep 
channel was found running northwards between Fasht al Arrif reef 
and Fasht al Odaid through which it would be possible for tankers 
to pass when its narrow limits had been marked with buoys. 

The oil company had a survey launch of their own to which 
Lieutenant Trapper Croome was now sent to assist with the 
positioning of the buoys along this channel. On the first morning 
of his stay onboard the launch he was surprised to be offered 
brandy for breakfast, and on his protesting that the sun was not yet 
over the yardarm the Captain of the launch went on deck and 
lowered the offending obstruction to the sun’s steady progress. 


162 CHALLENGER 


And so the winter months of 1946-47 passed in the Persian 
Gulf with occasional visits to Bahrein, where the officers found 
a welcome at the charming home of Sir Rupert and Lady Hay. 
Here they met many interesting personalities, for the Hays kept 
open house every evening between 6 and 8 p.m., and here came 
all men of interest who were travelling through Bahrein, oil 
prospectors, oil company executives, sheikhs’ advisers, and 
Arabian travellers. Sharp at 8 o’clock one took one’s leave, for 
the evening meal was served at exactly quarter past and on this 
Sir Rupert was very firm. He was a man of majestic stature and 
healthy appetite. He had served many years in India and on 
one occasion had attempted to bring hostilities between two 
warring tribes to a halt. It was said that he first visited the chiefs 
of one tribe, with whom he took a meal of considerable propor- 
tions. He then crossed the valley to the camp of the opposing side, 
and again had to take hospitality in a similar form. Two hours later 
he reached his home and was at once anxious to know if luncheon 
was ready. 

Sir Rupert himself was in touch with every aspect of the 
complicated political life of both shores of the Persian Gulf; a 
visit to the Residency was refreshing indeed and sent one away 
with a new interest in the ramifications of life on the coasts of 
Arabia. 

Occasionally a visit was paid to Basra to fuel. This meant enter- 
ing the Shatt el Arab through the dredged Rookah Channel, for 
although Basra once lay on the shores of the Persian Gulf it is now 
situated 70 miles upstream. The silt-laden waters of the Shatt are 
still thrusting a sandy shelf out into the gulf and the adjacent 
coastline creeps steadily out to sea, while at the entrance Man 
toils unceasingly with dredges to keep open this vital river 
serving the three oil ports of Basra, Abadan and Fao. 

The river flows between banks which are clothed with forests 
of date palms which support a great industry in Basra, and for 
many hours the ship steered her twisting course among this un- 
familiar green. Berthed at Basra, the men were able to enjoy the 
amenities of the small R.A.F. Station and the doubtful pleasures 
of the tawdry cabarets which serve the vilest of ‘Scotch’ accom- 
panied by the most dismal of floor shows. The artistes who have 
travelled eastwards across the Mediterranean have reached their 


THE PERSIAN GULF 163 


nadir and final resting place, for there is nothing for them any 
further to the east. 

The officers spent their time at Basra in an orgy of buying 
Persian rugs. This is a pleasing pastime, if somewhat expensive. 
They sat for two or three hours in the cool high room of the 
carpet shop, sipping the hot black coffee which burned the tip of 
the tongue as the merchant and his assistants pulled down from 
their shelves carpet after carpet which they unfolded upon the 
ever-increasing pile. A small boy was constantly on the run to the 
nearby coffee shop, hurrying with the small hot cups and the 
glasses of iced water to go with them. 

Then there were the never to be forgotten duck shooting 
expeditions in the boundless marshes around Hammer Lakes, 
conducted by Mr. Angoorli, the King of Iraq’s game warden, who 
is well known to every naval officer addicted to this sport who has 
served in the Persian Gulf. 


By May the weather had become too hot for surveying and 
the ship moved to Cyprus. Then, after a refit at Gibraltar, she 
returned in December, 1947, to continue the survey of the 
Gulf. 

There had been a number of changes among the ship’s com- 
pany at Gibraltar, for by now many of the men who had been 
called up for the war were being demobilised, with the result that 
the disturbed post-war conditions were rendered even more 
unsettled by constant changes throughout the Service; General 
Gordon was once again in the ship, having relieved Trapper 
Croome, and Charles Grattan had been invalided home. His relief 
was Lieutenant-Commander Bill Ashton, joining the ship for the 
first time—bluff and jolly, this most likeable of fellows brought 
life and good humour with him to the ship. 

The voyage was delayed at Aden, where the ship arrived on 4th 
December, 1947, to find serious disturbances had broken out 
ashore between the Arabs and the Jews following the partition of 
Palestine. There were many Jewish merchants and shop-keepers 
in Aden and their shops had been broken into and set on fire. 
About too people altogether had been killed in the subsequent 
rioting. 

H.M. destroyers Contest and Cockade had arrived the previous 


164 CHALLENGER 


day and had already landed armed patrols to which Challenger’s 
modest party was now added. 

Captain Southern, as the senior naval officer present, conducted 
the naval side of the operations ashore, where the Navy were 
assisted by the Royal Air Force and the Aden Protectorate Levies. 

Gradually the situation began to come under control and it was 
not long before the sailors on the barricades in the Crater area 
were receiving coffee and tea from both Arab and Jew, the very 
people upon whom they had been firing, without, it must be said, 
much lethal effect, only 24 hours before. 

One night, however, one of the naval sentries saw a figure 
moving stealthily towards him through the darkness. He called 
to the figure to halt, but this order went unheeded. A shot rang 
out in the night and the figure stumbled and fell. The officer in 
charge of this section of the town hurried to the spot and, with 
the sentry, went forward to see whether Jew or Arab had fallen. 
The figure which had ignored the order to halt, and had moved 


unconcernedly during the hours of curfew, proved to be a goat. 


The survey off the coast of Qatar was being continued north- 
eastwards in order that a route might be located from the centre 
of the Gulf into the port of Umm Said, which was already under 
construction in the lee of the Fasht al Arrif reef. 

A new ship’s Medical Officer was on his way as relief for 
Rutherford, who was to return to England. This was Surgeon- 
Lieutenant F. S. Preston, R.N.V.R., who was travelling in 
H.M.S. Wren—one of the frigates forming the Persian Gulf 
squadron—and Challenger made a suitable rendezvous with Wren 
so that Preston might be transferred. As none of the officers was 
known to Preston, it was decided that they should exchange 
uniforms before he came onboard. The Paymaster became Doc. 
Rutherford, awaiting relief, while the others exchanged uniforms 
as they could; General Gordon was too small and the Boatswain 
too large to wear anyone else’s clothes. Bill Ashton was in civilian 
clothes and represented an American oil man who was taking 
passage to Doha in the ship. 

Preston came onboard before lunch and at once felt that he 
was amongst a jolly but somewhat peculiar crowd of officers. 
Doubtless they were suffering from too long a period stationed 


ae 


THE PERSIAN GULF 165 


in the Gulf and there would be good material for psycho-analysis 
later when he settled down. It was not long before the Sick 
Berth Petty Officer, who was also in the game, reported to Mike 
Harvey, the Paymaster, dressed as the Medical Officer, that a 
stoker had broken his arm. Harvey rounded on the petty officer 
and gave him a thunderous blast for disturbing him: ‘You know 
my hours. Tell him to report at 9 o’clock in the morning,’ he 
concluded. The new surgeon’s eyes goggled and he made mental 
resolutions to change this amazing procedure as soon as he took 
over. 

Meanwhile the Sub-Lieutenant, who was dressed in the Pay- 
master’s uniform, was twiddling with the safe combination in the 
Paymaster’s cabin and to his surprise and delight it came open. 
Taking a wad of notes from the safe, he walked into the wardroom 
brandishing the money and asked who required a ‘casual’ pay- 
ment. The real Paymaster was horrified at this and shot out to 
change the combination under the guise of drawing his casual. 

Ashton was all the while telling tales—in the broadest American 
accent—of life in the oil fields of Texas, and Preston wondered 
how far it was to Doha and how long it would be until this 
insufferable bore was landed. 

When the officers put on their own uniforms for dinner, 
Preston was even more baffled.* 


Doha would grow in importance as the oil fields in Qatar 
developed, and so Bill Ashton was landed with a camp party on 
Jazirat Safliya, an island on the north side of Doha harbour, to make 
a chart of this area. As well as the usual stores of food, survey 
marks and tents, water was a serious problem when planning any 
camp in the Gulf, and many drums of water had to be landed with 
the party. Everything went well, the stores were landed and 
stowed, the moorings for the sounding boat were laid and the 
tents were rigged. All was hustle and bustle; in fact, in Bill 
Ashton’s phrase, ‘everyone was as busy as bird dogs’. By nightfall 
the camp was a blaze of light powered by the portable generator, 
but this was short lived, for in expectation of heavy dews a 


* The removal of coloured distinction cloth from officers’ uniforms by order 
of Their Lordships on 1st January, 1957, has robbed high-spirited officers of 
the joy of inflicting this hoax on newcomers. 


166 CHALLENGER 


canvas sheet was laid over the generator for its protection which 
succeeded in cutting off completely its air supply and it burnt out 
and the lights faded. If there were heavy dews there must also 
have been heavy evaporation, for the following evening the water 
in the drums had shrunk alarmingly and discontinuance of shaving 
by all hands was ordered. The campers at once began to assume 
that scruffy appearance which comes to all beard growers in the 
early stages. 

Bill Ashton was soon friendly with the few dhow crews that 
passed that way, and as he wished to have everything possible laid 
on, he returned late from surveying one evening to say that he 
had been arranging the camp fish supplies. At about 2 a.m. 
Ashton’s assistant heard a gentle scraping on the canvas of the 
tent, and lifting the flap saw in the light of his torch an Arab of 
uncommonly evil appearance. He had but one eye and a few 
straggling hairs for a beard and in his scrofulous hand he held a 
coarse, grey sting ray. Its skin was dry and cracked, and here and 
there it was coated with sand, which had adhered to it when it 
had been set down upon the ground. ‘Fish, Sahib, Fish,’ said the 
fisherman, holding up the ray into the full light of the torch. 
Ashton was informed that the fishmonger had arrived and a long 
conversation then took place outside the tent between Ashton 
and the seller of fish. ‘Fish, Sahib, Fish’—again and again came 
the dismal chant to which Ashton parried, ‘Yes, my dear fellow, 
but I didn’t say at 2 o’clock in the morning.’ The fishmonger only 
left the camp in peace for the night when he had been given some 
tinned rations in return for the inedible fish which he left behind 
upon the sand. 

If water had been scarce in the early days of this camp it came 
in abundance one night when a shamal of unprecedented ferocity 
began to blow. At first the campers ignored the wind until the 
tents began to flap and pull at their pegs, uprooting them from 
the loose sand. The men then had to gather large stones to keep 
down the edges of the canvas, and as soon as they retired again 
into their camp beds the rain began to pour down ina way they 
had not believed possible in the desert. It flooded every tent, 
carrying sand with it into the bread supplies, the cooking 
utensils and the bedding. And still the wind blew harder, till it 
became a full-time job for every man to keep his tent from blow- 


THE PERSIAN GULF 167 


ing into the sea. It was a long night, and the campers were not 
the only sufferers, for at daybreak they saw dhows and other 
smaller craft, which had lain at anchor in Doha, scattered hither 
and thither along the reefs, their crews struggling in the shallows 
around them in their efforts to lay anchors and prevent their 
craft being forced even further onto the reefs by the gusting 
north-west shamal. 

Far out off the Qatar coast lies the small island of Jezirat Halul, 
named after the she camel, perhaps on account of its high, 
humpy aspect. It is utterly bare and the party who were established 
in camp here to take astrolabe sights and watch tides found it 
strange that the tents were soon overrun with rats which scuttled 
across the sleepers in the night and nibbled at the hard flesh on 
the soles of the men’s feet if these happened to be exposed. 
But they were soon to know how these rats lived where not even 
a blade of grass grew. A dhow drew near the island one day and 
white-clad Arab sailors landed from it in a small canoe they had 
towed astern. They brought with them the body of a dead crew- 
mate to bury upon the island, for this was the graveyard of the 
dhow sailors of the Gulf. 


In April the ship once more sailed thankfully for Cyprus, and 
in July was refitted at Gibraltar, where fair charts of both Qatar 
and Cyprus were drawn by the surveyors. 

Sam Southern had been appointed to England as Assistant 
Hydrographer and thus the time had come for him to leave his 
last sea-going command. This was a sad day, for all liked Sam; 
he loved a good leg-haul and he loved a good ‘run ashore’, as 
the sailor says. On his last night a party of officers from the ship 
took him over the border to La Linea, the little Spanish town 
where many a good night had been spent during the ship’s visits 
to Gibraltar. There was a fiesta on in the town on this occasion, 
and after taking sherry in the different bodegas the party visited 
the fairground. Bill Ashton, always in great form on these 
occasions, was here there and everywhere, now borrowing the 
microphone from a seller of raffle tickets and whipping up more 
custom by touting for him in English, now taking over a barrel 
organ from its operator, and all the while shaking hands with 
everyone and welcoming them to the fair. For Bill was well known 


168 CHALLENGER 


over the border and a great follower of the bullring. At 2.30 in 
the morning the party had bacon and eggs at the Rock Hotel 
while Sam declaimed the ‘Hunting of the Snark’. 

Commander J. M. Sharpey-Schafer was the new Captain; this 
was to be his third and last commission in the old ship. 

The United States Hydrographic Office were now to take a 
hand with the surveys in the Gulf for they were interested in the 
coast of Saudi Arabia lying to the west of Bahrein, where American 
oil companies had been operating for a number of years. So it 
was that the U.S. Survey ship Maury arrived in Gibraltar with her 
three tenders on her way eastwards. Calls were, of course, ex- 
changed between the Commanding Officers of the two survey 
vessels. It was Maury’s captain’s first visit to the Gulf, and when 
he visited Sharpey-Schafer he was anxious to hear as much as 
possible about conditions there. Talk turned to tides in the Gulf 
and Sharpey-Schafer, in his serious way, began to describe the 
tidal complications of the area in considerable detail. He paused 
from time to time to enquire if Maury was still following the 
gist of this complicated discourse, to which he was able to say 
Yes, Captain’, until at length, when the complexities of ebb and 
flow, spring and neap and range and mean tidal level had become 
really abstruse, he changed his stock reply. “Well, Captain, I 
guess I’ve just about lost you now.’ Meanwhile, as it was early 
in the day, tea had been made by the Captain’s steward and had 
been set in its pot upon a tray in the cabin, becoming steadily 
stronger during the course of this lengthy discussion. As Maury’s 
Captain sipped the dark brown brew he remarked, “Well, Captain, 
I’ve seldom drunk tea before. When I came through New York 
I bought some as I knew I had to entertain the British. I guess 
that it should be made much stronger than I was told.’ 

On completion of the refit the ship went to sea for full power 
trials, these being so arranged that the ship visited Tangier for 
a few hours, and a number of Dockyard officials were taken on 
this day’s jaunt. When the ship came to leave Tangier in the 
afternoon, a different pilot from the one who had boarded the 
ship in the morning offered his services. He was a strange-looking 
little man in a well worn Palm Beach suit and battered brown 
topee. He did not inspire confidence, but as pilotage was only 
a formality here he was accepted. By the time the ship passed 


THE PERSIAN GULF 169g 


through the entrance the pilot boat which was following had 
broken down and was far astern. As the ship lay-to and waited for 
the boat to come out, one of the officers said to the pilot in a 
joking manner, ‘Why don’t you swim for it, Pilot?’ Without fur- 
ther word the little man jumped overboard fully clothed and, 
swimming shorewards on his back, waved good-bye to the ship. 

In the Red Sea—at Tor in the Sinai Peninsula, at Suakim in 
the Sudan and at Kamaran, a group of islands off the coast of the 
Yemen—there are quarantine stations at which pilgrims journey- 
ing to Mecca in the season are housed long enough to isolate those 
with infectious diseases before they travel on by ship to Jeddah. 
On her way south Challenger visited Kamaran, which is under 
British control, so that the beacons and buoyage provided for the 
navigation of the pilgrim ships might be improved. Here was 
Colonel Thompson, who had been the Administrator for 18 years, 
with a staff of Indian doctors and a company of Somali soldiers. 
The whole station was run on the smartest military lines and was 
frequently visited by persons of importance, for it was also the 
calling stage for the Aden and East African air routes. At this 
time the only such person present was a relation of the King 
of the Yemen, who, fearing assassination for some reason, had fled 
to Kamaran for a while, and was enjoying his stay, for he kept . 
demanding the best brandy—only that which came out of the 
‘three star bottle’, said he. 


In the Gulf the survey was taken up where it had been dis- 
continued earlier in the year. The first job was to carry the 
triangulation northwards along the desert coast from the vicinity 
of Doha. The ship carried two jeeps for such work. The country 
north of Doha is more populated than elsewhere, a road of a kind 
running from here to the northern tip of the peninsula, and for 
about the first twenty miles or so this road passes through sub- 
stantial villages built of stone and sunbaked bricks clustered 
around the residence of a minor sheikh. Twenty-five miles north 
of Doha, Khor is reached, a township formerly of some impor- 
tance in the pearling trade, for it is situated at the head of the 
landlocked harbour of Khor Shaqqiq. But of recent years this inlet 
has become extremely shallow and the perimeter of the town has 
tumbled into decay, its few inhabitants using the stones from these 


170 CHALLENGER 


ruins to bolster up the few habitable houses at its centre. To travel 
the road to Khor is a slow business, for at each village the sheikh 
or headman welcomes the traveller; his coffee maker is awakened 
and is soon hustling round with his battered coffee pot and a 
handful of cups no bigger than egg-cups. Into these he pours the 
dark brown liquid, which is strained as it leaves the spout by 
some fine vegetable fibre lodged there for the purpose. The coffee 
is strongly flavoured with cloves and bears little resemblance to 
coffee as the westerner knows it. But it is refreshing, and one is 
apt to forget that it is customary to refuse a third cup. 

Air photographs of the Qatar peninsula indicated the high 
knolls and ridges that were the only features in the desert upon 
which triangulation stations could be raised. The triangulation in 
the form of quadrilaterals lay between the road and the sea, and 
to reach these stations it was necessary to leave the road and 
strike out across the stony desert ; sometimes the going was crisp 
and fast, sometimes boulders the size of a football littered the 
sand as far as the eye could carry and it was only possible to 
cross this type of country in a jeep by going dead slow or at full 
speed. Full speed too was needed to cross the areas of soft sand 
into which the vehicle would sink axle-deep if speed was reduced. 

The inshore sounding and triangulation camp was set up this 
year on the shores of Khor Shaqgqiq, and so it was that two motor- 
boats from the ship were feeling their way into the Khor one 
sunlit day in January, 1949. The channel was narrow and tortuous, 
with only about four feet of water. On either side coral heads and 
amber-coloured coral flats lay shivering beneath the shallow water 
in the light northerly breeze, which was blowing sufficiently only 
to form the smallest waves upon the surface of the sea. Low cliffs 
about five feet in height bordered the dun-coloured headlands, 
which lay about half a mile to north and south of the channel. 
Two porpoises moved with the boats, rising time and time again 
just ahead and disappearing with short snorts like a man gasping 
for breath; a solitary tern wheeled above them uttering its wild 
shrieking cry. There was no other sign of life ashore or afloat. 
Soon the channel bore round to starboard and led, between the 
mainland and a somewhat higher island, into a landlocked har- 
bour. The boats began to work along the south side of this bay 
searching for a landing, but so shallow was it that they kept having 


Sen ee 


aa) 


URVEY 


S 


LAYING A MOORED SURVEY BEACON 


THE PERSIAN GULF 171 


to go astern to avoid hitting coral heads just below the surface of 
the water. At last the shore was reached and the unloading of the 
equipment began. A mile to the westward lay the township, 
barely distinguishable at this range from the brown desert itself. 
As the party worked at erecting the tents a group of boys were 
seen coming along the shore; arrived at the centre of the camp 
they sat upon their haunches, where they appeared to remain for 
the following six weeks. 

Bill Ashton was again in charge of the camp, which this year 
was of a greater size. Four officers and 25 men were housed in 
three double-canvas marquees and five ridge tents. Two motor- 
boats lay at moorings off the site, and both jeeps had arrived from 
the south bringing with them a water distilling plant borrowed 
from the oil company. Fuel to operate these craft and vehicles 
had been landed in large quantities in chartered dhows. 

North of Khor the road becomes less used and is harder to 
follow; no more villages are encountered. The area is populated 
thinly by beduins who move with their flocks and live in tents. 
They are not always on the move, however, and they spend much 
of the year camped in the vicinity of their wells, which are few 
but good, and by employing donkeys for about six hours in every 
day to haul up the water in goatskins from the bottom of the 
wells, these small communities, under the guidance of their head- 
men, are able to cultivate a small garden where green vegetables 
and a few dates can be grown and sometimes even a small grove 
of trees to give shelter. The water, once hauled from the well, 
is precious and is guided by small runnels to every corner of the 
garden as each plant requires. 

The first day’s work in this area entailed the erection of a large 
number of flags upon hop poles which were guyed in position. 
These were placed on the knolls which had been chosen as 
triangulation stations, each about three miles distant from the 
next. At the end of the day the party were pleased with their 
progress for they were ready to start observing the main angles 
the next day at sunrise so that the main part of the work would 
be completed before the daytime shimmer of the desert made 
observing impossible. 

As the teams motored across the sands in the cold morning air 
they were surprised to find no trace of the marks which they had 

13 


172 CHALLENGER 


laboriously set up the day before. So Ashton, with some members 
of the camp, went that evening to see the Sheikh at Khor. The 
township seemed deserted, but as the little party walked through 
the ruins towards the centre of the town they caught an occasional 
glimpse of the black-clothed figure of a veiled woman scuttling 
for shelter like a nocturnal animal surprised away from its lair 
before sunset. However, a small boy was headed off as he ran for 
cover, and he was persuaded to lead the party to a wooden door 
in the high, brown stone wall surrounding the Sheikh’s residence. 
The party were admitted by a man of negroid appearance and con- 
ducted to a cool, high room with whitewashed walls. The slave 
at once began to pull down bundled rugs and laid them one upon 
another on the floor, and then the Sheikh shuffled in. He may 
only have been a headman but he was always referred to by the 
camp party as the Sheikh of Khor, and it seemed a flattering title. 
With sign language, a dictionary and the little Arabic he knew, 
Ashton told his tale to the Sheikh of how all his marks had 
vanished overnight. The old man seemed both surprised and dis- 
tressed by the news; for he had heard from Doha that the survey 
was connected with oil and he had hopes that in some way part 
of the oil royalties would eventually reach him. In fact he planned 
to spend much time in Doha when the oil began to flow, for he 
was a relation, perhaps a little distant, of the Sheikh of Qatar 
himself. 

It was agreed that the old man would accompany Ashton on 
a jeep next day when they would make a whole day’s round trip 
visiting the beduin communities to the north of Khor. As each of 
these sparse communities was visited the headmen would at once 
deny knowledge of the stealing of the marks, but Ashton usually 
caught sight of some piece of naval bunting or wire rope lying 
unhidden outside the tents. With his cheerful approach to this 
matter and his readiness to take coffee with those who had so 
recently stolen his marks, Ashton made a good impression on these 
people, who slowly produced the missing equipment, which was 
loaded onto the jeeps. The day spent in travelling from beduin 
encampment to beduin encampment was a considerable success, 
for never again did these people interfere with the marks. 

The Sheikh of Khor also supplied a small party of ruffians, 


armed with an assortment of muskets, to guard the camp and they 


THE PERSIAN GULF 173 


were established in a naval tent on the perimeter. Their guard 
duties did not lie heavily upon them and consisted of huddling 
round a fire inside their tent over which they were attempting 
to make Arabian coffee from the tinned variety provided by naval 
stores. Two or three times during each night they would cast 
back the flap of their tent sufficiently to poke a rifle out and fire 
a shot into the night sky. This caused alarm in the camp on the 
first night and much running hither and thither by the party to 
ascertain whence they were being attacked, but it soon became 
a matter of routine which did not even wake the sleeping 
surveyors. 

The Sheikh of Khor often came to visit Bill Ashton in the camp 
and they became very friendly over cups of coffee which Bill made 
over his small primus stove, which he had brought into camp for 
this very purpose. In turn he was invited to take roast mutton 
with the Sheikh. Two whole roast sheep were laid upon a great 
dish of yellow saffron rice four feet in diameter, and around this 
the party were seated upon the carpeted floor. With the right 
hand pieces of meat were torn from the carcasses and eaten with 
small balls of rice, which were moulded with the fingers. The 
stomachs of the beasts were stuffed with eggs which the Sheikh 
pulled out with his hand and tossed to the party; often he and his 
fellows would tear delicious morsels from the backbone and, 
sampling them themselves and finding them excellent, would 
pass them to their guests. 

As the mutton cooled it became greasier, and the merit of the 
coffee which followed was apparent in the cleansing effect it had 
upon the palate; the wreckage of the feast was then carried to 
the next room where the so-called slaves and the boys picked it 
over before it passed to the women’s quarters. 

Shortly before the camp party packed up to leave, the Sheikh 
came one night to present a carpet to Ashton. He brought with 
him two of these, and as it was after dark they were inspected 
both by lamplight within the tent and by moonlight, so that Bill 
might choose between the two. When he had made his choice 
the chosen carpet was slung upon a pole before the tent. In the 
morning, as Ashton looked out to the eastward he saw the light 
of the rising sun showing clearly through the several holes that 
were in his gift carpet. He packed the carpet on the jeep and 


174. 


CHALLENGER 


eee ert 


c 


oo 
o 
PEE ARE NAT ST OS etre oy 


ONT at tied 
top 


Sandy 


plain 


at High 
Naga\abu Anfus 


2 


(ee 
1K in “ 


Portion of Fair Chart ‘ Approaches to Umm Said’, as surveyed by H.M.S. 
Challenger. Drawn by Lieutenant P. J. D. Hayter, Royal Navy. 


THE PERSIAN GULF 175 


Portion of Admiralty Chart 3787, published 9th April, 1948, from the survey 
by H.M.S. Challenger. The pipeline and mooring buoys at the oil export 
terminal of Umm Said are shown. 


176 CHALLENGER 


travelled to see the Sheikh and over coffee the offending holes 
were pointed out. It was with some reluctance, Bill thought, that 
the Sheikh exchanged the carpet for the other, which by day 
appeared infinitely superior in that it was intact. 


Throughout Challenger’s three surveying seasons in the Persian 
Gulf there had nearly always been one or two men in the sick 
bay suffering from what was known onboard as coral ulcers. There 
was much walking upon the coral reefs to be done, both while 
erecting the triangulation marks and when wading along the 
reef’s edge to delineate it as one would the coastline. On such 
occasions those who had been walking i in the shallows might com- 
plain within 24 hours of severe pain as they stood. Soon a deep 
ulcer would form, usually in the vicinity of or a little above 
the ankle. Such persons might for weeks be incapacitated and be 
in considerable pain on setting foot on deck. Surgeon Lieutenant 
Preston made a study of this ailment and wrote up his findings 
for the British Medical Journal. He found little literature upon the 
subject although he found the condition well known among the 
local fishermen and those who had been employed in pearl diving 
in the Gulf. Wyville Thomson, the scientific leader of the 
Challenger Expedition of 1872-76, had referred briefly to the 
condition, which had been contracted by sailors from that vessel 
walking upon the reefs without wearing stout boots. 

The corals which form these extensive, almost vertically sided 
reefs are attached creatures living in great colonies, built up of 
calcium extracted from sea water and feeding upon small marine 
organisms. Preston found that in order to secure its food each 
coral polyp possesses specially adapted outer cells known as 
nematocysts ; these stinging organs contain a coiled thread ending 
in a dart-like silica head which is filled with powerfully toxic 
fluid. The whole apparatus is developed in a cell called a cnido- 
blast which is at one point elongated into a so-called cnidocil or 
trigger-hair. When this is broken by a passing organism or body 
the cnidoblast ejects the dart with considerable force into the 
victim, which is completely paralysed by the rapidly spreading 
poison. 

These darts are probably unable to penetrate the human skin, 
but when this has been lacerated by contact with the sharp 


THE PERSIAN GULF 89, 


coral, and even when the cut is too small to be noticed, then these 
poisoned darts enter the flesh and the ulcer soon follows. Stout 
boots alone were insufficient to arrest the complaint: stout leg- 
gings would also be required by the surveyors if they were to 
remain immune while working on the coral reefs. 


On 2nd May, 1949, Challenger left Bahrein for the last time, 
having spent three surveying seasons in the Persian Gulf. She had 
surveyed an area of many hundreds of square miles and had located 
a new deep-water oil port and the necessary approach channels 
leading from the centre of the Gulf to the desolate shores of 
Qatar, which, owing to the development of the oil wells, were 
moving rapidly from obscurity to the limelight of strategic im- 
portance as each month passed. In addition her boats had surveyed 
the harbours of Umm Said, Doha and Khor Shaqgqigq as well as 
assisting in surveying the barge routes from Bahrein to the oil- 
fields through the Dohat as Salwa, along which the mass of 
material for the building of the refinery and the oil township was 
now being carried. 

Much of the offshore work in the last Gulf season was completed 
with the use of radar, for a suitable set had been fitted during the 
ship’s last refit at Gibraltar. Radar targets affixed to the floating 
beacons allowed fixes to be obtained regardless of the visibility. 
But it was still the early days of radar surveying and there were 
many frustrations and breakdowns of the apparatus and then the 
traditional methods once again came into their own. 


XIV 


Cyprus Interlude 


Challenger was rapidly becoming old fashioned and life on 
the mess decks was far from comfortable. As the years had 
gone by more and more equipment had found its way into the 
little ship and less and less space was consequently available for 
purely recreational purposes. The men were messed on an old- 
fashioned system known on the Lower Deck as “Canteen Messing’, 
in which each mess plans its own menus according to the meat 
it has received as its ration from the butcher, and the delicacies 
it is able to buy at the ship’s canteen. The dishes were made up 
by the amateur cooks in the mess, the only duty of the two ship’s 
cooks being to see that they received the correct treatment when 
they reached the galley. Life was always something of a picnic as 
these dishes were served out on the mess deck to the members 
of the mess. The men longed to get ashore from time to time to 
eat and drink in more spacious surroundings, and with different 
company from that of their shipmates with whom they jostled 
day in and day out in the narrow passages or on the minute 
quarterdeck which formed their recreation space. In the Persian 
Gulf this was almost impossible, for Bahrein was the fortnightly 
port of call, and this being a strictly Moslem state, the men could 
only get beer, and that only in the little canteen within the naval 
area where the laws against alcohol were relaxed to this extent. 
But each spring, as the weather began to warm up, the last 
floating beacon was weighed, the camp parties with their jeeps 
and tents were embarked, and to the delight of every man on- 
board the ship’s bows turned eastwards, barren, humped Jezirat 
Halul sinking below the western horizon as the ship headed for 
the Indian Ocean and the long route to the Mediterranean. 


A° new vessels with modern amenities joined the Fleet, 


The survey of the coasts of Cyprus had been pushed forward 
slowly for a number of years before the War, this work being 
178 


CYPRUS INTERLUDE 179 


thoughtfully kept as a summertime task for the ship which was 
toiling in the Gulf or the Red Sea. 

There are many who love the land of Cyprus with her wealth 
of ancient buildings, her history, her rocky hillsides darkened by 
the olive trees, her sparkling blue sea, her snug golden-ringed 
harbours, her monasteries upon the pine-clad mountains and her 
independent people ; but none could have watched the twin spires 
of the old cathedral, now a mosque, in the ancient city of 
Famagusta rising above the horizon with such joy as did the men 
of Challenger as their ship drew nearer to this green oasis, which 
meant refreshment to them after months spent in the sandy wastes 
of Qatar. 

In spring of 1947 and again in 1948 Sam Southern took his ship 
into Famagusta. She steamed in past the golden, sun-drenched 
walls of Othello’s Tower, turned to starboard and berthed along- 
side the ancient, stone quay where lateen-rigged caiques lay with 
their anchors down and their sterns to the wall as they had done 
for a thousand years. 

To beer-starved sailors Famagusta is a paradise. Cyprus does 
not appear to be trammelled with licensing laws and the numerous 
bars and drinking gardens along the main street of Famagusta are 
ready at any hour to serve cool, quenching brandy sours made 
from the excellent Keo and Hadjipavolou brandies which are the 
delight of the sailor. With each round of drinks, plates of ‘mezzi’ 
are set before the drinker—tit-bits of goat’s milk cheese, onions, 
cucumber or octopus and a hundred other appetising and thirst- 
provoking morsels. There the men sat as the warm evening closed 
in and the kebab merchants set up their crude street stalls and 
impregnated the night air with the exciting smell of their grilling 
meat. At this hour the streets were full of people, stepping from 
the pavements to avoid the family groups seated upon chairs about 
their doorways, their backs to the street; or stepping back onto 
the path to avoid the horse-drawn gharries which passed with a 
gentle jingle of bells and a clap of hooves, or to make way for 
the overloaded buses which are always on the move in Cyprus, 
their passengers leaning from the windows and their drivers bent 
over the wheel as if driving for their lives. 

Famagusta made all these months in the Gulf worth it, for the 
men had saved money there and could now spend at will, and so 


180 CHALLENGER 


they moved on with the night to the small, friendly, almost 
homely cabarets, so different from the garish rooms with their 
grasping harsh-voiced women which passed for entertainment in 
Basra. 

When the jeeps had been landed and the crew had enjoyed a 
few nights ashore in Famagusta the work began. For this the ship 
was based on Limassol in the south-west of the island, and the 
search for Cyprus Lands and Survey triangulation marks began in 
the brown cornfields and the olive groves which sloped steeply 
to the sea. 

Enosis never seems to have affected the personal feelings of the 
people towards us, and surveyors have always found them, both 
townsmen and villagers, overwhelming in their hospitality. The 
first day that the Sub-Lieutenant went away coastlining he returned 
with his board as virgin white as when it had left the chartroom. 
Sam Southern searched in vain for any indication of the shoreline. 
‘What the hell have you been doing all day?’ asked Sam. 

‘The villagers where I landed were so hospitable with their 
wine and food, Sir, that I dared not move off until the boat came 
back for me in case I hurt their feelings.’ Sam’s smile was not 
evident on this occasion. 


General Gordon is a serious philatelist, to whom not only is 
the stamp important but also the postmark it bears; it appeared 
that the postmarks placed upon the stamps by the rural post 
offices in the villages of Cyprus were exceedingly valuable. Each 
officer who landed and set off in the jeep for a day’s work with 
his theodolite in the mountains carried also with him a packet of 
letters addressed to Gordon. One of these was handed in at each 
small post office along his route; the General was particularly 
pleased if his “‘postman’ would supervise the franking, ensuring 
that the name of the village appeared as clearly as possible upon 
the stamp. This game of ‘General Post’ reached such proportions 
that it was decided to pull a hoax on Gordon. 

The Limassol Post Office conveniently kept a pile of old 
headed stationery available as scribbling paper so that the less 
literate could compose their message upon it before committing 
it to the official telegraph form. A piece of this paper was thus 
easily obtained and a letter purporting to come from a Mr. 


CYPRUS INTERLUDE 181 


Papadopoulos of the Postal Department was written upon it and 
sent through the post to the philatelist. Mr. Papadopoulos wrote 
that he had noticed an increasing volume of letters addressed to 
Lieutenant-Commander Gordon from the western districts where 
Communism was taking some hold. This, he went on, aroused 
suspicions and he reminded Gordon that it was illegal to use 
His Majesty’s Mails for seditious purposes. 

There were several officers in the mess when the letter was 
opened. Gordon read it in silence and his expression became more 
sullen as his eyes cast down the page. Bristling with rage, he 
bustled off to his cabin to write a stinker to Mr. Papadopoulos in 
reply. He told officialdom at Limassol that theirs was a case of 
unwarranted interference with the freedom of the individual and 
that if there were any more such accusations he would write to 
the Postmaster General in Nicosia. 

The Postmaster at Limassol was equally indignant and replied 
that there was no Mr. Papadopoulos on his staff and that as far 
as he was concerned Gordon could write as many letters as 
he liked to himself, if that was his particular form of amuse- 
ment. 

Gordon realised now that his leg had been hauled well and 
truly. But he said nothing, except that the postal authorities sus- 
pected a hoax and were instituting police enquiries. A few days 
later a chance for sweet revenge fell right into the General’s lap. 
He thought that the Medical Officer had been the ringleader of 
the hoaxers and so when he saw the Limassol Police launch making 
its way out to the ship at anchor he said, ‘Hullo, Doc, here come 
the police to investigate the postal hoax. I’ve told them I think 

ou were the instigator.’ Doc tried not to appear alarmed, al- 
though his heart was thumping, and he sneaked from the quarter- 
deck before the two policemen came up the gangway. They said 
they wished to see the Captain and after Gordon had taken them 
up to the cuddy he went down to tell the Medical Officer where 
they had gone and inferred that things looked pretty black. The 
minutes ticked slowly by; Doc said nothing and became paler. 
At last the Quartermaster came to the wardroom door, “The 
Captain wishes to see the Medical Officer in his cabin,’ said he. 
Even Gordon was surprised by this move and the Doctor moved 
off to face the police. 


182 CHALLENGER 


‘Now, you’re the Sports Officer,’ said Sam as Doc entered the 
cuddy; ‘the Police want to take us on in a shooting match.’ 


From the heights along the north coast of Cyprus the Turkish 
mountains may be seen on a clear day. The Hydrographic Depart- 
ment at this time was anxious to fix the position of the Island of 
Cyprus with reference to the Turkish coast, and this could be 
satisfactorily achieved by observing angles between the various 
Turkish peaks from the survey stations along the Cyprus heights. 
General Gordon was despatched with Geoff Simeon, one of the 
junior surveying officers, to attempt this task while the ship went 
down to Port Said to refuel. Geoff was a quiet young man, with 
a fine sense of humour and an easy-going personality. Later, when 
Simeon became First Lieutenant of Challenger and she re-visited 
Canada, a friend told the author there that ‘Geoff is the most 
relaxed guy I ever saw.’ He had been one of the postal hoaxers, 
but now he and General set off together from Pyrgos on the jeep 
with a packet of letters as usual to post by the wayside. They 
first of all went to Nicosia to visit the Police Department, who 
made arrangements for them to stay in the police station guest 
rooms which are provided for visiting government officials, for 
there are no hotels in the remote villages. Then they motored on 
across the great dusty plain to the mountains towering beyond 
and commenced zig-zagging up the hillside roads, which left the 
cornfields and melon farms behind and passed upward through 
the olive groves, crossing and re-crossing the mountain streams 
which were at this time of year no more than a trickle. Rizo- 
Karpaso on the tip of the long peninsula which forms the north- 
east end of the island was the first objective, and there they arrived 
to be welcomed by the constabulary and what appeared to be the 
whole population of this large village. They entertained the sur- 
veyors until an early hour on the roof-garden of the local cinema- 
restaurant. The staff of this establishment had all at one time or 
another served in a Soho café or a London night club, and the 
person who set himself up as the interpreter had only recently 
returned to this distant sunny village after two years’ service in 
the half-light of the Embassy Club. 

In the police guest rooms their companion was Peter, the 
Customs man. His greeting on arrival in the village had been 


CYPRUS INTERLUDE 183 


somewhat different from that which the villagers had given to 
the two surveyors. He had been showered with stones and abuse, 
for it was known that he had come to assess the tobacco crop and 
it was further rumoured that he had invented a machine for ex- 
tracting small pebbles and other dross from the wheat crop before 
it was weighed by the government buyers. But such a reception 
was only that which he had come to expect and he accepted it 
as a normal part of the Customs officer’s life. 

For many days a haze lay across the waters dividing Cyprus 
from Turkey and there was nothing to do but sit in the beautiful 
garden at the police station which had won first prize in an island- 
wide contest the previous year. It was tended by a man who was 
under open arrest and awaiting trial for stealing some poles. The 
local chief of police prayed that the garden judges would reach 
Rizo-Karpaso before the visiting magistrate. 

The mist did not lift, so the little party decided to move 
westward and the village turned out to see them on their way. 
They were made to promise that they would send a message if 
they were returning so that a sucking pig could be prepared for 
the occasion. They travelled to Yialousa and then on to Acanthou. 
There is no police station at the latter place, which has a very 
great and magnificent church to which pilgrims come from all 
over the island. The surveyors spent the night in the pilgrim’s 
rest-house in company with a host of bed-bugs. Next day, with 
little hope of visibility increasing over the sea and with a longing 
now for comfortable, uninhabited beds, they journeyed on to 
Kyrenia and moved into Catselli’s luxurious Dome Hotel, the 
bedroom windows of which look conveniently out towards the 
Turkish mountains. 

A slight improvement in the weather a day or so later en- 
couraged the General and Geoff to take to the mountains once 
more, and after a brief visit to Nicosia to buy more stamps for 
the letters, and send a message to Rizo-Karpaso that they were 
on their way, they motored on with the certain assurance that 
they would have sucking pig for supper. 

Unlike Gordon’s many letters, the telegram failed to reach its 
destination and the villagers stared in consternation as the two 
dusty travellers drove unannounced into the village square. The 
lack of the sucking pig must be made up for with wine, and the 


184 CHALLENGER 


alcoholic reception was soon under way. To this day Geoff 
Simeon swears that he spent the evening drinking one star brandy 
and that the General drank ouzo, while the General avers that 
the reverse was the case. 

Perhaps it was not surprising that the mists were still upon the 
waters when the two surveyors reached the observing station on 
the mountain next morning. The joining of Turkey to Cyprus had 
failed but it had been an honourable attempt. 


XV 


World Voyage Begins 


by the end of 1949, saw her end in sight. Four new sur- 

veying vessels had been completed since the War and 
now there was talk of one or even two newer ships being planned 
for the Surveying Service. Challenger was by far the oldest sur- 
veying ship and her end could not be far distant. It must have 
been pleasing for the old ship to realise, on her return from the 
Persian Gulf in 1949, that she was to be prepared for something 
unusual. This was to be a world cruise, and how better could she 
complete her career than following in the track of her famous 
predecessor ? 

It had been planned that Challenger should carry out a two- 
and-a-half-year sounding cruise, visiting the three main oceans 
and the Mediterranean. 

The great number of charts maintained by many of the countries 
of the world are devoted almost entirely to depicting the depths 
of the inshore waters on the continental shelf, such charts having 
navigational value. But since the end of World War II interest 
in the topography of the deep ocean floor has been growing. 

For long such areas had been considered, by those who thought 
about them at all, as having a flat and featureless sea-bed, carpeted 
with sediments. But the earlier Challenger’s soundings, although 
she was able to obtain only about 400 of them with her laborious 
methods of rope and sinker, already showed that there were many 
features, hills and valleys, on the ocean floor. With the laying of 
the first trans-ocean cables at the end of the last century there 
came a steadily increasing knowledge of the features forming the 
ocean bed, and such knowledge was rapidly augmented by the 
introduction of echo sounding machines in research and sur- 
veying vessels in the early 1930s. 

During World War II the neutral Swedes had time to think 
about oceanographic research, but their practical experiments 

185 


N LTHOUGH not an old ship by many standards, Challenger, 


186 CHALLENGER 


were restricted within the Baltic; however, soon after the War 
was over they were ready to take the field of world-wide oceano- 
graphic exploration, and, under the enthusiastic guidance and 
leadership of Professor Hans Pettersen, the now famous Albatross 
expedition set out. 

This expedition was following many lines of investigation, in- 
cluding continual echo sounding of the ocean areas to be crossed, 
but perhaps the most interesting part of the work to the layman 
was the proposal to obtain cores, or long vertical samples, of 
the sediments lying on the ocean bed. This was successfully 
achieved by using the Kullenberg piston corer. The device is 
lowered on a wire hawser from a winch to the sea-bed, and if the 
ship is properly handled, a small pilot weight reaching the sea-bed 
first releases a larger weight which drives the coring tube into 
the sediment. A piston within the coring tube is attached directly 
to the wire from the winch, which has been braked as the bottom 
is reached. The piston thus remains still while the tube goes into 
the sediment. The partial vacuum so formed assists the sediment 
to enter the tube. The resulting core samples of the ocean floor 
sediments can be seen in plastic containers giving a cross section 
view, the sediments seen at the lower end of the tube having 
been laid down hundreds of thousands of years before. The dif- 
fering colours of the predominant sediments, whether it be fine 
wind-blown sand or the calcerous skeletons of countless plankton 
forms, when viewed as it were in cross section give the im- 
pression of looking at a layered cake having an infinite variety of 
cream fillings. 

The Challenger cruise being planned in 1949 aimed at taking 
a very considerable number of soundings in the oceans, as well 
as carrying out searches for a number of shoals reported in such 
areas, particularly in the latter years of the War when thousands 
of ships were running their echo sounding machines—many of the 
operators interpreting their sounders correctly while others 
‘discovered’ shoals which never existed. 

At the same time it was arranged to take a small party of 
scientists from the Department of Geodesy and Geophysics, Cam- 
bridge, to explore the structure of the ocean bed itself. This was 
to be done by using seismic refraction methods already in use 
on land but now adapted for use from a ship with over 2600 


‘NUL W ITT 
‘mauqty A *[ *D 
5 030Yd 


ANV1ISI 
WAANOONVA 
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WALNIM 
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WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 187 


fathoms of water separating her from the ocean bed. To carry out 
such experiments a ship must be fitted with special apparatus. 


———— 6 To 20 miles 
SONO-RADIO BUOYS 


en LZZ2 


A seismic refraction experiment, showing the paths by which various sound 
waves travel from explosion to the hydrophones 


A comparatively flat area of the ocean bed having been found, 
four sono radio buoys are laid about half a mile apart. Each buoy 
has a hydrophone slung beneath it in the water and within the 
buoy itself is a receiver and transmitting wireless set, with bat- 
teries. An aerial is carried on the buoy’s mast. Having laid the 
buoys, the ship moves off to a distance of eight miles or so and 
fires a depth charge. This forms a source of sound which travels 
out in all directions in the sea. 

One path of sound travels horizontally through the water to the 
hydrophones below the buoys whence it returns to the ship as a 
radio signal. An accurate timing device in the ship records the 
time of the firing of the depth charge and the returning signal 
from the buoys. The speed of sound in sea water is known (5000 
feet per second) so that a range of the buoys has now been found. 

Other paths of sound lead towards the sea-bed and then hori- 
zontally through the layer of sediment. As this sound passes 

14 


188 CHALLENGER 


beneath the buoys it can be picked up through the water by the 
hydrophone and again a signal is sent to the ship. The depth of 
water both beneath the buoys and beneath the ship has been found 
with the sounding machine, and the time of the passage of sound 
from the ship to the sea-bed and from the sea-bed to the buoy 
hydrophone can be calculated. This time is subtracted from the 
total time for passage of sound, the resulting time being that taken 
by the sound to pass horizontally through the sediment layer for 
a distance of eight miles, so that the speed of sound in the sedi- 
ment layer has been discovered. 

Yet other paths of sound pass through the sediment layer to 
the harder, more compressed layers beneath, in which sound 
travels more quickly. The time of the passage of sound through 
these lower layers is also timed, and a speed of sound for these 
layers found. When the speed of sound in a material is known 
then geophysicists get a pretty good idea of the type of rock 
forming this material, relating it to their experiences on land 
where borings can be made and samples of the material inspected 
after measuring the speed of sound by seismic methods. 

By carrying out these seismic refraction experiments at a num- 
ber of increasing ranges from the sono radio buoys, and knowing 
the speed of sound in the material forming the layers, the vertical 
thickness of the layers may be measured. 

Thus a picture is built up of the types of material which form 
the layers of the earth’s crust beneath the oceans, and such ex- 
periments, carried out at a number of different positions in the 
various oceans, can be seen to be complementary to the researches 
of the Albatross regarding the sedimentary layers. 


In the winter of 1949-50 Challenger lay in Chatham Dockyard, 
enduring the usual discomforts of a refit and preparation for an- 
other voyage. The crew were joining in twos and threes as they 
were appointed from Portsmouth Barracks. They were living in 
Chatham Naval Barracks and marching to the ship both morning 
and afternoon, never a popular part of the commission, more 
particularly on this occasion, as the men were from Portsmouth 
Division, where Challenger’s crew always came from: so that after 
a day spent in the unheated store-rooms and in offices with scuttles 


missing and rain dripping through the empty rivet holes, and after 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 189 


being maddened by the roar of pneumatic riveting hammers and 
the general frustrations of working in a ship ‘in dockyard hands’, 
the men had no prospect of home comforts at the end of the day. 

The crew for this world voyage were volunteers and were 
anxious to be away, but the inevitable delays took place and week 
after week the sailing date was postponed. Soulsby, the Leading 
Sick Berth Attendant, who proved to be quite a wit during the 
voyage, requested to see the Captain for a ‘foreign service draft’. 
Petty Officer Greenshields was once more onboard Challenger, 
this time as the Senior Recorder. 

When one reads the accounts of voyages of scientific explora- 
tion it is seen that naval officers and scientists do not often see 
eye to eye on all things, particularly at the beginning of a voyage. 
This is not really strange, as the naval man’s ideals are usually a 
definite programme to work to and a ship of a smart and seaman- 
like appearance. A concession on both these points has to be made 
to the scientist if the advantages of good weather and of locating 
an interesting area are to be seized, and if scientific equipment, 
assembled with labour and enthusiasm, is to remain in position 
despite its unseamanlike appearance. 

Tom Gaskell and John Swallow, the scientists who sailed in 
Challenger, were both outstanding in their way, although com- 
pletely different in outlook. Tom was hard-working in the ex- 
treme when he had work to do, but when his experiments were 
complete and his records made up, then he would enjoy life as 
few others can; his enthusiasm for every new project was un- 
bounded and carried others along with him. Whenever one did 
anything with Tom he made it seem really worth while doing. 
He was an inveterate sightseer in the scientific field or any other: 
as the voyage went on his cabin became fuller and fuller of 
souvenirs which he picked up at every port of call. John Swallow 
was serious, never happier than when he was working on the 
results of his experiments, and he was intensely interested in all 
forms of science and in natural history. John could relax, how- 
ever, and when he started mixing highballs a good evening la 
ahead. He was a good trencherman and was to uphold the ship’s 
reputation when faced with giant steaks in the restaurants of 
Victoria; B.C. 

John Swallow’s arrival did not portend good relations between 


190 CHALLENGER 


the naval and scientific staffs. It was the week-end, and the First 
Lieutenant had given leave to a large number of the crew, leaving 
only a small fire party of about half-a-dozen men onboard. He had 
also decided that on that Saturday it would be appropriate to give 
a small farewell luncheon party onboard for a few of his friends. 
The gin had been enjoyed and the party were about to be seated 
around the luncheon table. The calm of a ‘make and mend’ had 
settled on the ship, when the quartermaster announced the arrival 
on the dockside of a Mr. Swallow, who had driven up in a huge 
vehicle loaded with about a dozen sono-buoys and associated equip- 
ment. So what was to have been a quiet and pleasant afternoon 
was busily employed in embarking the scientist’s apparatus. 


By May all was ready and Challenger set out from Chatham on 
the first leg of her journey. Bermuda was the first port of call, 
and was in fact used as a base for three cruises into the North-West 
Atlantic. On the last of these cruises Challenger ran for her life. 
The author had only recently joined the ship and this was his first 
voyage in command, for he had taken over in Bermuda from 
Commander Bill who had been taken ill there and had returned 
to England. Challenger sailed northward over the Great Newfound- 
land Bank and on into the North Atlantic. She was intending to 
stay at sea as long as possible to carry out investigations before 
returning to Bermuda for fuel. This is a risky business in a low- 
speed ship in the hurricane season, and after steaming southwards 
for some days on her way back to Bermuda a hurricane warning 
was received. Before the last war, the first a ship often knew about 
a hurricane was the falling of the barometer and the presence of 
an ominous calm. Today, at the suspicion of a circular storm 
forming in the hurricane breeding area, which lies eastward of 
the West Indies, United States ’planes search for and locate the 
storm, which, if it proves to be a hurricane, is given a girl’s 
name and assumes a personality. The storm is followed daily by 
the patrol ’planes, which often fly boldly through the storm, 
fixing their position and estimating their course and speed, until 
the hurricane enters the mainland of the United States or peters 
out in the North Atlantic. 

Such storms usually set out in a north-westerly direction and 
if they do not reach the mainland turn slowly northward and then 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS I9I 


north-eastward, when they are said to have ‘recurved’. Bermuda 
often finds itself in the hurricane area at the time of recurving. 

Some ships have of course passed right through the centre of a 
hurricane, experiencing winds of well over 100 miles an hour 
and mountainous seas. Such ships have often lived to tell the tale, 
usually with calmness and much understatement, one feels, when 
reading these accounts in the meterorological journals. But well- 
found vessels have gone to the bottom as the result of meeting 
with a hurricane or a typhoon at sea, often as a result of a giant 
wave pouring down the funnel, as the ship is tossed madly in 
a confused and towering sea. So it is well to avoid these circular 
storms if one can, and this is difficult of accomplishment in a 
low-speed ship. 

On this occasion the hurricane was reported coming north- 
wards between Bermuda and the coast of the United States. Her 
name was Doris. A little later she was reported to be recurving 
and then to be moving in a north-easterly direction. Challenger 
was just south of the Grand Banks and the Captain and Navigator 
had decided to head due westwards and later southwards towards 
Bermuda, getting round behind Doris. But as the next 12 hours 
wore on the feeling of ominous calm became gradually apparent, 
and by evening, as the ship sailed westwards into the setting sun, 
it was unmistakable. Cirrus clouds stretched in wispy bands right 
across the sky, and lower cumulus clouds cast leaden shadows on 
the glassy surface of the gently heaving sea. A flock of storm 
petrels fluttered in the wake of the ship, which was flanked by 
the waves caused by the ship’s bows rippling outwards on either 
quarter as far as the eye could see. 

Those on the bridge were not surprised therefore when a signal 
was passed up which said that the last report of Doris’s movements 
had been in error and that in fact she was still proceeding north- 
wards. A simple sum in relative velocity showed that ship and 
hurricane would eventually meet. 

The course was altered to the south-east and Challenger began 
to run a little faster, at her maximum speed of about ten knots. 
For two or three days Challenger hustled south-eastwards and was 
by now approaching the latitude of Bermuda, and she began 
edging to the westward in heavy seas in Doris’s wake. 

About this time the Wardroom invented a game called ‘Ships 


192 CHALLENGER 


and Hurricanes’. It was played on a squared board with the goal, 
Bermuda, in the left-hand bottom corner. One player, repre- 
senting the ship, dodged this way and that, being countered in turn 
by the hurricane, the other player. A thrown dice gave the 
number of squares which could be moved. The Captain, when 
he visited the Wardroom to play the game, was depressed by the 
number of times that the hurricane was able to keep the ship 
from reaching Bermuda until the ship’s fuel, represented by a 
certain number of dice throws, ran out. The game seemed more 
and more like the efforts being made on the bridge to reach 
Bermuda—a tiny speck in a vast ocean defended by a hurricane ; 
and when a second hurricane was reported and it too was repre- 
sented by a counter on the game board, the Captain’s visits to 
the Wardroom abruptly ceased. 

The second hurricane, Effie, was travelling northwards to- 
wards Bermuda at a steady ten knots and a course alteration was 
required in Challenger to come into Bermuda from the south 
behind Effie. But about 150 miles south of Bermuda Effie came 
to a grinding halt, and Bermuda signalled that conditions were 
unsuitable for a ship to enter through the reefs owing to the 
strong winds and high seas caused thereby. 

Challenger’s fuel was now very low owing to the great amount 
_ of dodging this way and that, and now Effe’s action in pulling up 
seemed almost human in its malevolence. The seas were very high 
as the ship steamed slowly into them, playing for time. The small 
party on the bridge gazed upwards with awe at the oncoming 
wavetops towering above them: some said the waves were 60 
feet high, some 70, but waves are deceptive and now that a wave 
recorder is fitted in a British Weather Ship it seems that waves 
are often over-estimated. A wave of 50 feet in height would be 
an exceptionally high one in the North Atlantic. 

After three weary weeks the oil fuel tanks were nearly empty; 
they were filled with sea water to maintain the ship’s stability. 
Challenger fought her way on, using the fine oil supplied for the 
lighting diesel. 

At this point the Captain sent a signal describing his plight to 
the Commander-in-Chief of the Station, who was at the time 
visiting a South American port in his flagship: there was nothing 
that he could do, but before a hurricane caught Challenger with- 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 193 


out fuel and toppled her over it seemed that someone should be 
told. But the C.-in-C.s reply, which simply said ‘Good Luck’, 
produced quicker results than many a longer operational signal. 
Almost at once Effie began to move northwards, and as signals 
reporting this movement came in Challenger moved slowly for- 
ward in her wake. Effie’s influence gradually cleared from Ber- 
muda and Challenger steamed in on the very last of her fuel. 
The beach felt good that night as the men stepped ashore for 
a run). 

Sounding and seismic work had gone on whenever the weather 
allowed it during the ship’s cruises from Bermuda, but once the 
winds reach Force 4 on the Beaufort Scale so much ‘water noise’ 
is caused by the sea slapping against the buoys that the signals 
cannot be distinguished and seismic experiments are discontinued. 
This is a frustrating business; the buoys laid in calm weather 
may have to be lifted in an hour or two as the wind increases. 
There are other frustrations too, such as the day a shark swallowed 
and made away with the scientists’ favourite hydrophone as it 
was being hauled onboard. Further dropping of charges must have 
caused the shark considerable indigestion. 


A visit of five days’ duration to Kingston, Jamaica, was memor- 
able for the heavy and incessant rain which fell throughout the 
stay. As at so many other ports visited, the local people said that 
it was the worst weather they had known for years. It is ever thus. 

The visit was also memorable for four inexpensive nights of 
pleasure at the ‘Glass Bucket’, the swellest joint in town. Here 
Kitty, a dusky beauty, was prepared to roll dice against the 
patrons on a semi-circular green table behind which she sat with 
inscrutable expression. The game consisted in the patron backing 
a certain number to come up twenty times during ten throws of 
five dice. Seeing that the numbers on the dice were scalloped out 
of the surface the philosophers stated that it was likely that, as 
the sides bearing the higher numbers must be lighter as a result, 
then five and six would be good bets. And so they proved to be, 
giving the Challenger’s men a pound back for five shillings on 
nearly every occasion on which they played. But on the last night 
Kitty sat, inscrutable as ever, before a brand new set of dice on 
which the numbers were painted and not scalloped. The manage- 


194 CHALLENGER 


ment of the ‘Glass Bucket’ had found the flaw in their system 
but the ship had had a good run. 


Passing through the Panama Canal in October, 1950, Challenger 
sailed northward in the Pacific towards San Diego. For the last 
five days’ steaming before reaching San Diego the “deep scattering 
layer’, as it is called, was seen at dawn and dusk on the echo 
sounding machine. This is a common phenomenon in the oceans 
and appears on the echo sounder as a false sea-bed echo. The 
layer spends the day at about 200 fathoms, ascending steadily 
through the water at sunset until it has reached a depth of 20 
fathoms or so, where it spends the night, and whence it returns 
again just before sunrise to 200 fathoms. 

The layer may be caused by countless millions of tiny animal 
plankton forms, hard-shelled, and known as euphausiids. These 
animals, which, with many similar types, abound in the oceans, 
are known to migrate towards the sea surface at nightfall. But 
the echoes seen on the sounding machine may be coming from 
vast numbers of fish which live in the deep ocean and are feeding 
on the migrating plankton: such fish have air bladders and may be 
a cause of the echoes being reflected. This may be the answer, 
possibly combined with other, unthought-of, factors, and as one 
watches the unbroken layer hour after hour on the sounding 
machine one thinks of the wealth of life within the oceans. 

At San Diego a very brief visit was paid to the Scripps Institute 
of Oceanography, a department of the University of California. 
From here, under the leadership of Dr. Revelle, the Director, 
four great oceanographic expeditions have sailed out into the 
Pacific since the close of the last war. 

At Scripps the recent scattering layer records were being 
discussed and one of their biologists investigating the cause of this 
layer suggested that Challenger should take one of his depressors, 
which, attached to a plankton net, would keep it at a constant 
depth as the net was towed through the layer to capture specimens 
of the plankton. The depressor was of brass, heavy, and of an 
intriguing curvaceous shape. The inventor said that the inspira- 
tion had come to him when contemplating his attractive secretary. 
The party from Challenger, looking across the room to where she 
was sitting, saw what he meant. 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 19f 


Three months were spent working off the British Columbia 
coast, using many of the small anchorages along the coasts of 
Vancouver Island and the Queen Charlotte Islands. 

For two or three days the ship lay at anchor in Heater Harbour, 
a little fjord-like anchorage lying between steep wooded hills, on 
the east coast of Kunghit Island at the southern end of the Queen 
Charlotte’s. Deer abounded on this island and could often be seen 
on the beaches in the afternoon and early evening. They appeared 
to be feeding on the seaweed. Small parties of the ship’s company 
would land in the afternoon to try to get fresh venison, and on 
such occasions were warned not to enter the bush. Thick forests 
of sitka, Douglas fir and hemlock came right down to the water’s 
edge. Beneath these stately trees lay a jumble of fallen trunks and 
boughs, rotting stumps and thick undergrowth. 

At 5 o’clock one evening, when the boat went ashore to collect 
four stokers who had been ashore on such an expedition, only 
two of the men were on the beach. The other two were said to 
have entered the woods and had not been seen again. Until dusk 
cries of ‘Hope’ and ‘Abel’, the names of the missing stoker 
mechanics, rang out from searchers along the shore. 

Although snow lay on the ground, the afternoon had been mild 
and these hunters from the boiler-room were lightly clad. The 
wind increased in the night, snow was falling and the temperature 
was well below zero. All thoughts onboard were with the two 
lost in the Canadian forests, and it was long before dawn when 
the first men were ‘wetting tea’ in the galley and preparing to 
land as search parties. 

A full gale was blowing when a party of over 40 men, with the 
First Lieutenant in charge, were landed to search the woods; 
this was now Geoff Simeon, ‘the relaxed guy’, who like so many 
others in this tale had returned once again to the old ship. By 
noon he was back onboard to report that the woods were so thick 
that he was in danger of losing members of the search party. 
Without a compass, one lost all sense of direction in these forests, 
and what was needed was a number of small parties, each in 
charge of a leader with a compass. 

The lost stoker mechanics had landed on the north side of the 
harbour, the land here being a peninsula about half-a-mile wide, 
the northern side of which looks out across a broad sea channel 


196 CHALLENGER 


between Kunghit Island and Graham Island, the next land to the 
northward. The northern coast of the peninsula was searched by 
boat, while small search parties, keeping only a few yards from 
their leader, fought their way across the peninsula at maximum 
speeds of about 400 yards an hour, so tangled and matted was the 
undergrowth and so frequent and deep were the potholes left by 
old decayed tree-stumps. 

The second day ended without results and by now all onboard 
were seriously worried as to whether their two shipmates would 
survive a second night, ill clad as they were in light overalls, with 
freezing temperatures, high winds and falling snow. 

There is on Kunghit Island an abandoned whaling station, shown 
on the charts. It lies on the north coast of the island but consider- 
ably to the west of the limit of the north shore already searched 
by boat. On the third day it was decided to send a boat to the old 
whaling station, in the faint hope that the wanderers had found 
shelter there. Meanwhile the search parties returned to the 
woods, searching to the westward. 

About noon the wireless operator ran into the Captain’s cabin. 
A message had been received from the boat by R/T—Hope and 
Abel had been found, and the boat was on her way back to the 
ship. 

The First Lieutenant had been in charge, and as soon as he 
landed on the ruined jetty at the whaling station he saw footprints 
in the snow and called out the now familiar names. A thin 
answering cry came from one of the tumbledown huts, and there, 
too cold and weary to stagger out to meet their rescuers, were 
the two men. 

They spent about a week in the sick bay and after a painful 
interview with the Captain, who took the odd view that they 
had been absent over leave for two days, they told their mess- 
mates of their experiences. They had entered the woods for only 
a few yards before losing their sense of direction. They spent the 
first night huddled under a fallen tree, scared by the howling of 
wolves; as no wolves are known in these islands, it must have 
been the ship’s siren that they heard, which was sounded at 
intervals to assist them to locate the ship. Hope was interviewed 
by Soulsby on the ship’s internal broadcasting system. When 
asked if they had considered eating berries to nourish themselves, 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 197 


Hope replied: ‘No—I gets my food at the shop on the corner.’ 
So answered an English townsman after being lost in the Canadian 
backwoods. 


Among other places visited in British Columbia was Port 
Simpson in the extreme north. This is a fine but little-used 
anchorage, with a township inhabited by Indians of the Tsimpsean 
tribe. A Hudson Bay Company store is run by two white men, 
and one or two other white families live close about the store in 
wooden frame houses. A white minister serves a somewhat 
difficult flock. 

About 30 of the men of Challenger enjoyed this place and 
quickly made friends among the Indians, who arranged dancing 
and games in the local hall almost nightly. There were no other 
amenities in Port Simpson except the ‘diner’, which consisted of 
the living room of a house with ‘B.C. Diner’ painted on the front 
door; within this room was a wood-burning stove which was 
always red-hot, and coffee was brought from the back room to the 
customers clustered round it. Outside all was crisp and crunchy 
with snow. 

A sacred concert in the village hall was the highlight of the 
ship’s visit. A silver band played hymns and sacred songs, some- 
times on their own and sometimes accompanying soloists or 
mixed choruses. Many of the hymns were dedicated to the men 
of the ship, and finally an elderly Indian woman dedicated “Into 
Battle’ to the ship herself, a somewhat inappropriate hymn for 
unarmed and peace-loving Challenger. 

A small band of beautiful young Indian girls hung over the rails 
of the balcony, but the Chairman whispered into the Captain’s 
ear that at least two of the girls had been run out of town for 
their moral lapses and should not now be gracing such a solemn 
occasion. 

As the evening came to an end a finely painted wooden paddle 
was presented by the Indians to the ship. This paddle had magic 
properties—if the ship broke down or ran short of fuel, no 
matter how far from land, the magic paddle could be used to take 
her to port. This was a source of comfort to the Engineer Officer 
for the rest of the voyage. 

In 1908 the British surveying vessel Egeria had surveyed the fine 


198 CHALLENGER 


bay at Port Simpson, and Challenger’s Captain heard that Sam 
Bennett, an old Indian, who had acted as a local pilot in the 
Egeria, was still living at Port Simpson. With the Minister’s help 
a meeting was arranged in old Sam’s wooden house by the shore. 
Sam Bennett had been blind for many years, but he remembered 
the happenings in the old days in Egeria and described them as 
if they had occurred yesterday. He told his visitors where to find 
his Bible and guided them to an old ship’s company photograph 
still between the pages. There was Captain Learmonth, the officers 
grouped around him in their old-fashioned small-topped uniform 
caps, the men ranged behind them. The inevitable small dog lay 
on the deck in front of the group, and at one side pune stood 
Sam Bennett, the local pilot. 

Things hee changed little in many ways in the routine of a 
surveyor’s day. Sam described the early start in the mornings, 
the boats going off from the ship in all directions, the climbs 
through the woods, the clearing of the hilltops, fe erection of 
flags and the long Hone spent around the theodolites. In those 
days, as now, the ship’s doctor found time heavy on his hands 
as the fit men manned the boats or climbed the hills, and Sam 
Bennett told how he had taken the Medical Officer deer-hunting. 
He described how he had led him unerringly to a fine coast deer, 
the breathless minute as the doctor took aim, and how he had 
skinned and carved up the deer, packing it in its own skin and 
carrying it onboard on his back. 


Coming south from Port Simpson the ship travelled down the 
long fjord-like passage between Vancouver Island and the main- 
land, which at its narrowest part passes through Seymour Nar- 
rows. These are made more hazardous by having a dangerous 
submerged rock in the channel and strong tidal streams swirling 
past it. A vessel of Challenger’s modest power must wait for slack 
water to make this passage between the hidden rock and the 
steep snow-clad mountainside. 

Whilst navigating the inner route the ship spent a night at Alert 
Bay, a trading port on one of the small islands lying in the channel ; 
a fine forest of Indian totem poles and a processing works for 
turning herrings into fertiliser are the two most memorable 
features of this little place. There was also, of course, a beer 


WORLD VOYAGE BEGINS 199 


parlour, and it was here that the Petty Officer Steward and three 
shipmates made arrangements to get some herring. When the boat 
went off to the ship that night at midnight all that had to be done 
was to take the boat underneath a shute which overhung the water 
and their new-found friend, who worked in the herring factory, 
would release a small quantity of herring into the boat. As the 
evening drew on, the idea seemed a very excellent one to the 
four P.O.s and they thought how much the whole ship’s com- 
pany, from the “Old Man’ downwards, would enjoy their meal 
of fresh herring. They collected a number of cardboard beer 
cartons to carry the fish. 

The coxswain of the boat seemed strangely unenthusiastic and 
the P.O.s had to assert their authority to make him take his boat 
under the shute. The new-found friend had also indulged in the 
parlour and having once released the stream of herring he was 
unable to stem it despite the shouting of those in the boat below 
this fishy waterfall. The fish poured into the open compartments 
of the boat to a depth of two feet or more before the coxswain 
could cast off and get his boat clear. When the boat reached the 
gangway, the Officer of the Day could hardly believe his eyes, nor 
could the Captain, who was roused from his sleep by the shouting 
and argument which accompanied the inefficient methods the 
P.O.s were employing to bring the fish up the gangway in the 
slippery cardboard cartons, which were collapsing and showering 
herring in every direction. The bowman stood disconsolately in 
the forepeak, knee deep in herring, while he held the boat’s 
bows in to the ship’s side. 

It was a difficult morning for the First Lieutenant, who had to 
‘forget the three fresh herrings he had enjoyed for breakfast when 
he confronted the four P.O.s and ordered them to scrub out the 
boat which hung miserably at the davits, so covered with fish 
scales that she appeared to be under snow. 


Christmas 1950 was spent in Victoria, where this festival is 
celebrated in the old-fashioned way. The trees are easy to get 
from the woods and on Christmas Eve everyone is out visiting 
everyone else, carrying gifts to the Christmas trees. 

A ‘friend’ of the ship put a personal advertisement in the local 
paper to the effect that Challenger, whose badge is a challenging 


200 CHALLENGER 


stag, wished once again to have antlers on the fore side of her 
bridge as she had had in her Labrador days. There are many 
hunters in British Columbia, amateur and professional, and a new 
and better pair of antlers replaces from time to time the pair 
hanging in the front hall. The relegated pair goes into a back 
room. Hunter’s wives could hardly believe their eyes when they 
read of the opportunity to be honourably rid of their junk. For 
a week around Christmas time, with the spirit of giving in the 
air, every car and every van that pulled up on the quayside along- 
side Challenger carried a load of antlers. 

With a fine pair of caribou horns in front of the bridge, with 
every member of the ship’s company possessing a pair of antlers, 
and with the biggest stuffed stag’s head over Tom Gaskell’s 
bunk, the ship sailed southwards towards the islands of Hawaii. 


XVI 


The Pacific 


what one might have expected. Instead of the drab figure 

who boards a ship for this purpose in most parts of the 
world, this man was colourfully dressed in a gay aloha shirt, 
palms and hula girls entwining themselves against an orange back- 
ground. He wore a cap more suitable to a jockey than a man of 
the sea and he leapt from his fast-moving launch with the agility 
of a trapeze artist. Once on the bridge he said, “Let’s go, Captain.’ 
and soon the ship was steaming at her best speed through the 
man-made passage in the coral reef which leads into the extensive 
lagoons which now form Pearl Harbour, the greatest naval base 
in the Pacific. She passed giant aircraft carriers and fleets of 
destroyers moored alongside. The sound of orders, oddly phrased 
to British ears, carried across the water as the boatswain’s mates 
passed them over the loudspeakers. 

It is fashionable for travellers to say that Honolulu is over com- 
mercialised and that there is little pleasure to be had there, but 
with its delightful climate and colourful people there is still much 
of interest and enjoyment. 

The ship was welcomed alongside by a party of Hawaiian girls 
dancing the hula on the dockside and accompanied by a small 
orchestra playing the music which is so much a part of life in 
these islands. That this entertainment was laid on by the ULS. 
Naval Welfare Services and that the girls danced where they could 
among the thickly parked automobiles detracted little from this 
Island Welcome and the sailors’ eyes were not upon the berthing 
wires which they were handling. 

The Captain’s first task was to call upon the U.S. Admiral 
Commanding the Hawaiian area and so he landed in full white 
uniform, buttoned close up below the chin, as British naval tradi- 
tion demands. On this warm day he envied the Admiral in his 
open-necked khaki uniform shirt and his rolled sleeves as he sat 

201 


Ts pilot who boarded the ship off Pearl Harbour was just 


202 CHALLENGER 


at his desk. “Sit down and relax, Captain,’ said he. ‘Why, you 
sure look all trussed up in that outfit.’ 

Hot sun tempered by cool breezes endured throughout the 
week’s visit. The days were spent in visiting the Bernice P. 
Bishop Museum where Sir Peter Buck, the Maori anthropologist, 
presided over the finest collection of Polynesiana; or in attending 
a scientific symposium to which the Captain and the Senior 
Scientist went smartly dressed in their Palm Beach suits only to 
find that from the Chairman downwards the delegates were at- 
tired in aloha shirts. It was refreshing to see an elderly scientist 
of serious aspect dressed thus as he propounded his theories 
relative to the height of the water-table on the Island of Oahu. 

It is on the Island of Oahu that both Honolulu and Pearl 
Harbour are situated. A party of scientists and officers flew from 
Honolulu to the Island of Hawaii to visit the volcano observatory 
on the rim of the crater of Kilauea. This was following in the 
footsteps of the earlier Challenger, from which a similar party had 
landed at Hilo, the capital of the Island of Hawaii, and from there 
had ‘a tedious and monotonous ride’ on horseback across ‘a 
weary expanse of open country devoid of any fine trees’ to reach 
Kilauea, taking the whole day to get there. Challenger’s party, 
alighting from their plane, soon crossed this gently rising land- 
scape in a hired car, belonging to Mr. Ducky Goo. They did not 
see the lava fountains in the crater which their predecessors had 
described, but they were able to see the lava flows from the 
eruption on the slopes of the higher Mauna Loa which had occur- 
red about nine months previously, and which had lasted for 22 
days, when 600,000,000 cubic yards of lava, the largest quantity 
recorded in historic times, was disgorged upon the mountainside. 

There are today a volcanic observatory and five stations around 
the crater at Kilauea, which are fitted with apparatus to determine 
the tilt of the ground in both north/south and east/west directions, 
and these, together with seismographs which record both small 
and large earthquakes, give indications of impending trouble. As 
a result of increasing tilt and a number of daily earthquakes a 
warning of volcano eruption was published in the local paper on 
the day before the outbreak of lava on the slopes of Mauna Loa. 

Even nine months after this eruption the lava was too hot just 
below its surface to handle for long, and warm pieces of so called 


2 
Joe 


OWIOVd HLYON 
—YFAHLVAM AAVAH 


OWIOVd 

HLYON 

—dIHS AHL 
ACISONOTYV 
SSOULVATV 

Gi LOOA-AOVTA 


—  * 


THE PACIFIC 203 


‘Ah’ lava were carried back to the ship. Six different flows had 
poured down the mountainside and the party were amused to see 
that a house which had been missed by only 50 yards was now up 
for sale. 


Fine weather endured for some days after leaving Pearl Har- 
bour, and the ship’s philosophers, refreshed by their scientific 
and social contacts in Honolulu, turned to their seismic experi- 
ments with renewed vigour. But the course was northwards for 
Adak, a U.S. Naval Base in the Aleutians, and after a week or so 
the weather grew more stormy daily until the ship passed through 
the chain of the Aleutian Islands in a gale of great ferocity, cold 
northerly winds shrieking in the rigging and over the top of the 
bridge where the Officer of the Watch huddled in his corner and 
peered over the windbreak at the cold white scene of countless 
breaking seas joined by wind-blown streaks of foam which 
stretched away on either hand to the snow covered mountains 
of rugged aspect. Two or three Black-footed Albatross, still at- 
tendant upon the ship, were sweeping across this seascape like 
leaves in the gale, the only dark coloured objects in a grey-white 
scene. 

Although the country was bleak and snowbound the U.S. Naval 
hospitality made up for everything, the few days spent at Adak 
passing quickly, and once again the ship was at sea on her way to 
Japan. 

Day after day, week after week, as the ship sailed in the North 
Pacific the sky was overcast, the visibility was down to a mile or 
so and winds of gale force kept the seas high and the ship’s 
motion violent. Ocean sounding was all that could be done on 
such days although water temperatures and samples at depth were 
taken with the reversing water bottles whenever the weather 
moderated. But the sono-buoys lay snugly in their stowage and 
the scientists cursed their luck and once again went over their 
records made on calmer days. 

There was one activity, however, which never ceased by day 
_ and that was the watching of birds. Except in the tropics one 
cannot sail for long unaccompanied by seabirds. In the more tem- 
perate zones there are always birds in attendance or to be seen 
flying past from time to time. At regular intervals the birds in 

15 


204 CHALLENGER 


sight were logged and as the cruise progressed sub-arctic, sub- 
tropical and tropical avian communities were encountered. There 
are many seabirds which, unlike the coast-loving gulls, spend the 
whole of their lives, except for the nesting season, at sea far 
from land. Such are the Black-footed and Laysan Albatross which 
attended the ship throughout her time in the North Pacific, al- 
though they never followed Challenger west of the Nanpo Shoto 
Islands which lie in a chain running southwards from the vicinity 
of Tokyo Bay. The Black-footed Albatross were very numerous 
and very curious. They insisted in clustering daily about the 
wooden float which supported the 14-pound charge the scientists 
drifted astern. When exploded, this charge gave a signal which 
penetrated the sediment layer of the sea-bed, and returning after 
the bottom echo, gave a thickness of the sediment on the ocean 
floor beneath the ship. Despite considerable patience in waiting for 
the birds to lose interest in the float it was sometimes necessary 
to fire the charge while they still clustered round and inevitable 
casualties resulted. 

There are three species of albatross known to the North Pacific 
as against about a dozen species known in the Southern Hemi- 
sphere. The birds have only been known to cross the Equator on 
very rare occasions, and even these may have been carried across 
as captives in ships, for they are fairly easily caught at sea with 
a fishing line and hook baited with a piece of fat. The albatross, 
like most other oceanic seabirds, is very susceptible to the 
changing temperature of the sea, and does not follow a ship far 
outside the zones of his preference. It is probably the type of 
plankton food living in such waters that limits the bird’s travel 
rather than the change of sea water temperature itself. 

Oceanic birds can therefore be regarded as tell-tales for the 
changes of temperature, and hence ocean current boundaries, thus 
systematic watching of the birds while travelling across the oceans 
forms a useful type of oceanographic observing. It is a pleasing 
occupation to watch the petrels as they skim endlessly and effort- 
lessly between and over the wave crests to windward of the ship 
and to try and pick out this or that peculiarity of colour or profile 
which will serve to identify the species. Alexander’s Birds of the 
Ocean, well thumbed and whitened with salt spray, lay to hand 
on the bridge chart table. 


THE PACIFIC 205 


One day in the North Pacific, when the ship was about 250 
miles eastward of the coast of the main Japanese Island of Honshu, 
an albatross of unfamiliar appearance circled the ship and settled 
upon the water, folding its long wings, which, so graceful when 
the bird is in the air, appear unwieldy and out of proportion as 
it gathers them to it after landing. The bird was white above and 
below but with brown wings and a white back, and, most notice- 
able, a yellow-tinged head and neck. There was no doubt in the 
observers’ minds that this must be the Steller’s Albatross, named 
after Behring’s naturalist. John Swallow was sent for with his 
camera, but before he was on deck the bird had taken wing, 
waddling at first across the surface of the sea, wiggling its stern in 
a most laughable manner. But once the last wave top was cleared 
the legs were snugged away, the wings set, and the bird became 
at once a thing of effortless beauty as it sailed away into the mist. 

Experience with albatross told the watchers it would probably 
return again to the vicinity of the ship, so Swallow stood by with 
his camera, and two hours later the bird was sighted coming in 
low over the wavetops like an enemy torpedo plane. This time 
the bird circled the ship again and again, never very near, but 
close enough for John with his telescopic lens; his photos show 
sufficient evidence for ornithologists to say that Challenger had 
undoubtedly sighted this rare bird which had been thought ex- 
tinct by some authorities for fifteen years or more. The story 
goes that the Japanese fishermen had been in the habit of killing 
these birds while they were at their nests on the Izu Islands. Here 
they were easily caught, for they need a long run to become air- 
borne. Their downy feathers brought a good price in Japan in 
those days for use as stuffing for pillows and mattresses. Hearing 
that legislation was being prepared to protect these fast vanishing 
birds the fishermen struck first and cleared the few remaining 
birds once and for all, it was thought, from the face of the earth. 
Perhaps there is still a hope of revival for this much persecuted 
lovely, lonely bird of the North Pacific. 

The hundreds of fishing and other small craft met during the 
day’s steaming through the Inland Sea to reach Kure, on the 
island of Honshu, made the Challenger aware how much Japan is 
dependent upon fisheries and how much inter-island traffic is re- 
quired for the every-day running of the country. Kure is a former 


206 CHALLENGER 


naval base; the wrecked shipyards and the giant graving docks, 
then fouled with wreckage, bore witness to the former great- 
ness of this port where Japan’s largest battleships were once 


built. 


Tom Gaskell, the inveterate sight-seer, was soon active in 
Japan and he and the Captain crossed the Inland Sea in a local 
ferry boat for a few days’ holiday at the watering spa of Dogo, 
near Matsuyama, the capital of the Island of Shikoku. Here they 
lived in the luxury of a small Japanese hotel, being truly waited 
upon hand and foot. The duty of one small girl was simply to turn 
their slippers, discarded at the bedroom door, in a direction 
suitable for stepping into when moving off again on leaving the 
room. Each morning was spent in the hot sulphur bath, where 
fellow bathers carried out their daily ablutions around the edges 
of the tank which fell away so that the soapy water drained clear 
of the bath and a fresh pannikin was taken from the bath itself, 
and wherein a number of patrons were wallowing in the well- 
nigh boiling water, constantly added to from a pipe jutting from 
the side of the bath. Rest rooms were provided in the vicinity 
of the baths where the bather could relax in a kimono, sipping 
the small cups of tea and watching the coming and going in the 
busy little shopping street which ran beneath the windows. 

Their evenings were enlivened by the company of geishas, sum- 
moned as a matter of course from the local geisha house by the 
hotel manager. The geisha’s duty is to look attractive, tell stories, 
play parlour games and assist her temporary employer to raise 
his rice and sake to his mouth. How well established is the com- 
fort of the male in Japan! It would be pleasant indeed if, benighted 
at the Railway Hotel in one of Britain’s drearier Midland towns, 
the traveller could summon a decorative companion and pay her 
some trifling sum per hour to amuse him while he took his high 
tea in the Commercial Room. 

The Emperor has a private bath at Dogo and this empty tank 
the visitors were shown with considerable reverence by a tooth- 
less old man who was in charge of it, guarding it and cleaning it 
in readiness for the infrequent visits of his Emperor. 

One day Tom took a party with him to Hiroshima, where, from 
the roof garden of a seven-storied departmental store which had 


LHE PACIERIC 207 


surprisingly survived the blast of the atomic bomb, they looked 
down upon the dwarf city which had sprung up over the whole 
area so recently laid waste. At the supposed centre of the devas- 
tated area, a few small stalls existed for the sale of photographs 
of the scenes of horror and the human wreckage which the bomb 
had left behind. There were also more material relics on sale, 
such as bricks and roof tiles, which showed signs of scorching 
from the heat of the blast. Tom was surprised when the Captain 
declined to buy one of these to add to his souvenirs, while he 
himself bought two tiles, the glazing of which was blackened and 
had air bubbles beneath its surface. At sea again, Tom came to 
the cuddy with a tile saying that he still thought the Captain 
should have one and he had bought this one for him; he knew 
that the Captain would regret for ever having failed to get one in 
Hiroshima. This tile survived the buffetings of the remainder of 
the voyage in the Captain’s cabin, but although it had come 
intact through the holocaust, it was fractured into a dozen pieces 
with ease by his three-year-old son a few days after it had been 
set upon a shelf at home. 


From Japan the ship sailed southwards into the warmer 
weather, encountering upon her way a most rugged sea-bed topo- 
graphy, with mountain ranges interspersed with extensive plains. 
The sounding and the seismic work went forward steadily with 
the better weather. Hour after hour the deep sounder was 
running, the ‘ping’ of the outgoing signal ringing and reverberating 
from the loudspeaker on the bridge. There were few places on 
deck where this could not be heard and the metallic and regular 
sound formed a background to every shipboard activity. The echo 
returning from the greater depths had to be listened for by the 
Officer on Watch, for such a signal was often too weak to record 
a mark upon the echo sounding paper. It was absorbing to listen 
for the little click which represented the return of the robust 
signal sent to the depths, and to note how its time taken to 
return lengthened or became shorter as the valleys and mountains 
of the ocean floor fell away or rose up beneath the ship as she 
steamed southward towards the Equator. 

A brief pause at Manus off the coast of New Guinea was made 
to take in fuel from the Royal Australian Naval Base; then 


208 CHALLENGER 


onwards again and southward past New Caledonia to Auckland in 
New Zealand where the ship was taken in hand for refit, for half 
of her world voyage was now over and she had encountered weeks 
of rugged weather. 

Challenger was in New Zealand for seven weeks. It is, above all 
else, a hospitable country and invitations were showered upon 
the officers and men to stay on farms and sheep stations. Nearly 
the whole company went for such country holidays and all made 
friends. Two of the men even got married within the short spell 
of time available. The author was invited to Te Aute Station in 
the prosperous sheep-farming district of Hawke’s Bay in the North 
Island. This station is owned by an old New Zealand family whose 
great-grandfather was an officer in the Royal Navy, forsaking the 
life to become one of the first Christian missionaries to settle in 
New Zealand. His son, also a missionary, was bidden by the 
Maoris of Hawke’s Bay to travel from Otaki on the West Coast 
on foot and by canoe through the precipitous gorge and turbulent 
waters of the Manawatu River to bring his religious teaching to 
them. In Hawke’s Bay, 100 years ago, he founded a school which 
became the famous Maori College of Te Aute, where many great 
leaders have been educated. 

It was now springtime, and all was green, except the golden 
willows, delicate and beautiful, by the creeks. The lines of macro- 
carpa trees forming the windbreaks showed dark against the lush 
and vivid grass of the paddocks and the rounded, rumpled hills 
beyond. 

The whole country was uniformly dotted with sheep and their 
lambs, and across every acre, twice each day, rode the shepherds 
on their rough, unshod horses to see that all was well with new- 
born lambs and mothers. Their teams of dogs followed the riders, 
alert for a command to head or drive the sheep. 

With one of these shepherds rode the author, a sailor on horse- 
back, his ship forgotten. Sailing the sea seemed a dull business 
when compared with these happy spring days on the sunny hills. 
For the first time during the voyage the ship seemed unimportant, 
the return to sea a dreaded undertaking. But the stocky Maori 
tractor driver, the Maori boys fishing for eels in the creek, the 
carved village meeting houses and the students at the college, all 
were reminiscent of the Pacific, calling one back. Slowly the mood 


ee — 


THE PACIFIC 209 


of discontent passed—there was yet so much to be seen in that 
great ocean. 

The author was asked to talk to the college boys about charting 
the seas. The Headmaster welcomed him with the news that he 
had been a prisoner of war in Germany with Buck Baker, and 
thus knew something of naval surveyors. During the lecture the 
author nearly committed a faux pas, but checked himself just in 
time. He had been about to refer to the discovery of New Zea- 
land by Captain Cook when he became aware of the dusky faces 
of those whose ancestors had reached the Land of the Long White 
Cloud some hundreds of years before Captain Cook set sail. 

The real discoverers were depicted on the red-ochre pillars of 
the school hall where the boys were gathered ; curvilinear carvings 
showed them with lolling tongues, three-fingered hands and 
flashing eyes of pawa shell. These forebears had sailed on a great 
oceanic expedition long before Columbus was born. 


The half-way break was soon over and the ship was at sea again 
investigating the shoals on the western side of the Kermadec 
Trench and the depths of the great trench itself. 

The waters about New Zealand are a delight to the watcher 
of ocean birds from the Northern Hemisphere, for he encounters 
a new world of birds. The ship was usually attended by at least 
half-a-dozen Wandering Albatross in their various plumages, 
ranging from the scruffy brown youngster, through the brown and 
white spotted ‘leopard stage’ to the magnificent old birds almost 
white from wing-tip to wing-tip. There is also, in fewer numbers, 
the smaller dapper Black-browed Albatross and the black and 
brown Giant Petrel who tries, without success, to emulate the 
soaring albatross; but where they have grace the petrel is un- 
gainly, its wings being short and broad rather than long and 
tapering. Other types of petrels abound, the most striking being 
the Cape Pigeon with its wings spotted white on black, like a 
domino, and the small Cook Petrel which reveals in its cart- 
wheeling flight an under-wing surface of startling whiteness edged 
with black. 

As the ship journeyed northwards the birds became fewer until 
quite suddenly one morning, in latitude about 25 degrees south, 
Challenger’s men realised that they had seen their last Wandering 


210 CHALLENGER 


Albatross and not a bird moved in an empty sky. Later that day a 
white flash against the distant blue above proclaimed the flight of 
the first Tropic Bird and the ship passed into a new avian world; 
the world of the Boatswain Bird, as sailors call the Tropic Bird, 
of the Booby which crashes clumsily onboard at nights, and the 
stately Frigate Bird which sails slowly above the atolls waiting for 
the Boobies to return from fishing, when he will swoop from 
above towards them, instilling such fear into these stupid birds 
that they cast up their food to be caught in mid-air by the 
attacker. 


As they sailed in through the coral reefs which form the harbour 
of Suva, in Fiji, this was for nearly all of the company their first 
visit to the Islands of the South Pacific. The ship berthed on the 
King’s Wharf and they smelt for the first time the rich sweet 
copra which had been unloaded from the schooners and lay in 
untidy heaps or in sacks alongside. The schooners themselves were 
loading mixed cargoes and in their rigging were small blackboards 
upon which were chalked the times at which each vessel would 
depart for their romantic sounding destinations—Rotuma, Kata- 
fanga, Levuka, Taveuni, Lakemba. The author has returned again 
to the Suva wharf since those days to watch the schooners loading, 
and has longed to stow away onboard. Despite the obvious lack 
of facilities for either hiding below or for modest comfort on 
deck, the destinations remain as romantic as ever. 

Challenger’s arrival in Suva coincided with the festivities being 
arranged by the Fijians to honour the Governor on his departure 
from the Islands. These included the formal and colourful kava 
ceremony and dances by large parties of men and women known 
loosely as a “‘meke’. Such ceremonies may pall after many years 
of life in the Islands, but to see them for the first time is a thrill 
indeed. The leisured skill with which the group seated around 
the kava bowl make the precious mixture from the roots of the 
yanggona shrub, the drawing and the re-drawing of the hibiscus 
fibre through the kava to extract pieces of solid matter, the rustle 
of the leaves which form the green and brown skirts of the men, 
the hollow rhythmic clap and the grunt which issue from the 
seated elders to denote satisfaction with the words of their up- 
standing spokesman, all these are but the preliminaries to the 


THE PACIFIC Pag i 


reverent serving of the kava. Before the mixing of the kava was 
started, a grass rope encrusted with cowrie shells was led from 
the bow] itself to the feet of the Guest of Honour, who was served 
first. The other guests, seated within a green arbour, were served 
next. The Captain was among these and watched the inscrutable 
faces of seasoned kava drinkers for any indication of the taste he 
might expect, pleasant or ill. The ‘bilo’, or cup, in which the 
‘yanggona’ is served is made from the lower half of a coconut 
shell, highly polished; it is smooth to the touch. Soon the 
Captain was draining the brown coloured liquid. Its taste is hard 
to define; unattractive at first to the European palate, it soon 

rows on one, for it leaves a sharp clean taste in the mouth. It 
is drunk by Europeans and Fijians alike in the mid-morning in 
many of the offices in Suva. 

As the Captain came off the ship next day onto the wharf an 
old Fijian in khaki shorts offered him kava. Feeling that he was 
now a hardened kava drinker he readily consented to enter the 
temporary shelter where, he found, this old man made kava for 
the workers upon the wharf. Instead of the smooth, well-worn 
kava bowl made from a solid tree trunk, the old man’s mixture 
was swilling in the rusty interior of a battered half kerosene 
tin. A brown chipped plastic bowl floated upon its surface, and 
soon this was in the Captain’s hands. Fijians are nature’s gentle- 
men, so he had been told, and thus there was now no turning back 
unless he risked giving offence. Luckily yanggona should be drunk 
at a single draught and soon the Captain was throwing back the 
empty little bowl and clapping his appreciation. But his friend 
did not end his generosity here, for every time the Captain left 
the ship after this, whether dressed in plain clothes or in full 
white Number ro uniform with sword, and to the shrill of boat- 
swain’s calls, to call upon His Excellency, nature’s own gentle- 
man tottered out with his rusty offering of kava, and the crew 
paused on deck to watch the skipper in his embarrassment. 


But if the formal dancing of ‘mekes’ on the green turf of Fiji 
was thrilling, the impromptu dancing at Rotuma was the real 
thing—the South Sea Island dancing one has dreamt about for 
years. The anchorage off the village at Rotuma is exposed, and so 
after landing the stores, which had been carried from Fiji, the 


U2 CHALLENGER 


ship weighed anchor and steamed to the bay known as Foviung 
Emua at the eastern end of the island. There the boats were 
lowered and, after dark, on a night of perfect calm and of white 
moonlight, the keels grated gently on the coral shore and a party 
landed to find two trucks waiting in the dark shadows of the palms 
to take them along the rough road which wound between low 
lava-stone walls to the village. Doctor Evans, the Administrator, 
was the only European living on the island and with him the 
Captain and members of the crew sat down beneath a palm-leaf 
canopy that had been rapidly constructed in front of the general 
store. The orchestra consisted of men seated around a pile of 
rolled grass mats upon which they beat a vigorous rhythm with 
their short sticks. The dancers were arranged in a rectangle, 42 of 
them in rows of six, three men and three women in each row. 
As the dances progressed without pause the front row would 
from time to time turn and go to form the rear rank and the 
second row of dancers moved forward into the limelight. The 
whole dancing team sang continuously. Clad in bright red and 
white lava-lavas, wearing the traditional grass skirts, with 
wreaths of green interspersed with white flowers and the crushed 
red fruits of the pandanus tree in their hair, the dancers made an 
active and all absorbing scene. They went on and on; the rhythm 
changed from slow to fast; men and women now began to come 
forward singly or in pairs to perform some particular variation 
of their own, hips swinging, arms moving, knees bending with 
acrobatic agility. Sweat poured from foreheads and formed in 
beads upon bronze chests, but still the ranks kept coming forward 
as the music, now enlivened with an electric guitar, became more 
and more insistent. The ship, the sea, the distant homecoming, 
all were forgotten by the sailors as they watched, utterly absorbed, 
wishing this Rotuman night to go on for ever. 

At last the music stopped, as abruptly as it had started three 
hours before. The singing ceased and the dancers sank where 
they were to the ground. A moment’s complete silence reigned 
and then Dr. Evans leant over to the Captain and whispered that 
a few words were now expected of him. He rose, and speaking 
slowly through the Government Clerk, who interpreted, he 
thanked the people of Rotuma for this glorious evening. Never 
had he seen dancing to equal it nor a setting so lovely, for the 


————- 


THE PACIFIC 2in 


moon was now above the mountainous little island that lay in the 
sea but half a mile from the village. These utterings, as they 
were interpreted, were hailed with appreciative mumblings 
from the exhausted dancers and the Rotumans who were sitting 
round them. Then an elderly male dancer spoke to the inter- 
preter, who turned to the Captain. ‘They ask if you have talcum 
powder with you,’ he said. The Captain looked baffled, and the 
interpreter explained that to sprinkle such scented powder upon 
the dancers at this stage would have been the highest praise the 
ship could have showered upon them. The surprised Captain re- 
covered himself and said that next time he sailed to Rotuma he 
would bring a cargo of such powder from Fiji instead of the 
Public Works Department water tanks that he had brought on 
this occasion. This caused a roar of applause and the speeches 
were over. 

Hours later the sailors reached the coral beach to embark again. 
The sleepy boat’s crew who had been waiting on the shore were 
surprised to see their messmates, grass skirts about their waists 
and leis about their necks, being farewelled by the girls of 
Rotuma as if they had been Rotumans themselves going out on 
a journey to the world beyond the reef. 


XVII 


Atolls 


uNAFUuUTI in the Ellice Islands is a classic coral atoll; shaped 
fins a gigantic pear, the lagoon is 13 miles long in the north 

and south direction and 9 miles from east to west. The 
lagoon is about 25 fathoms deep and is surrounded by a thin line 
of reef which is broken here and there, mostly upon the leeward 
or western side; such channels permit vessels to navigate from 
the deep ocean outside to a safe and secure anchorage within. 
Time and the battering of the waves on the reefs have thrown 
sufficient coral debris above sea level for floating coconuts and 
other seeds to have established themselves as trees and bushes 
from which organic matter has in turn fallen to form soil upon 
which Man, travelling south-eastward into the Pacific some 2000 
years ago, was able to settle, being guided by land birds such as 
the Golden Plover on their migrations through Micronesia. 

There is one village on Funafuti, and that lies on the main 
island of Fongafale, which is about seven miles long but only about 
S00 yards across at its widest part from the lagoon to the white 
breakers pounding the eastern shore. It is here that the village is 
situated; the cooking huts along the shore of the lagoon, and the 
houses, widely spaced, among the tall coconut palms behind 
them. 

Challenger spent the night anchored precariously on a shallow 
spit outside the lagoon, for it was inadvisable to navigate the 
narrow channels through the reefs until the sun was well up in 
the sky and illuminating the amber-coloured coral flats and the 
pale green of the shallows between which the ship had to pass 
in the deep blue water, turning this way and that as the channel 
twisted its way into the safety of the lagoon. Once inside the 
atoll the run across to the village was simple enough, and even 
before the slip was knocked from the cable a little party were 
seen in their boat well on their way off from the village to board 
the ship. 


214 


ee 


ATOLLS KG 


It is always an exciting moment for the sailor when he makes 
his first contact with people he has not visited before. The boat 
brought Chief Clerk Kofe, the Assistant Medical Practitioner and 
the island’s only policeman. There were no Europeans in the 
Ellice Islands at this time and the Gilbertese District Officer was 
far away on the other side of the world studying at Oxford. But 
the local Native Magistrate, assisted by Kofe, was doing a fine 
job of quiet, efficient administration. The Chief Clerk was now 
making his official call in true Colonial tradition, neatly attired 
in his white duck suit. 

Whilst Kofe and the A.M.P. took tea with the Captain and 
spoke of the activities in their little-visited territory, the police- 
man on deck was subjected to many interested questions, for all 
three men spoke English. The Supply Officer was interested to 
know whether there was much crime in such an isolated com- 
munity of 350 souls, and asked the policeman if there were any 
prisoners in gaol. ‘Yes, we have one man in prison,’ he replied. 
‘What for?’ asked the Paymaster, to which the policeman replied 
in one word, common enough in a sailor’s vocabulary but not 
looked upon as a crime in itself in the western world. 


This was by no means the first visit to Funafuti of a ship carry- 
ing enquiring scientists, for between 1896 and 1900 4 series of 
expeditions had reached this atoll under the auspices of the Royal 
Society's Coral Reef Committee; at first they had come in the 
naval surveying ship Penguin and later in a number of other craft 
to make deep borings below the islands around the lagoon. 
Darwin’s theory of atoll construction was being challenged at this 
time. He believed that the atolls had begun their life as fringing 
reefs about the coast of high islands, which having been raised up 
by volcanic action from the deep ocean floor had for millions of 
years been sinking slowly back into the earth’s crust. As the 
highest peaks had at last sunk beneath sea level there remained 
a void at the centre of the reef where food for the polyp was 
scarce and which became a lagoon floored with coral debris. 
Murray, who had been on the earlier Challenger expedition, sug- 
gested that the atolls were formed by coral growing upon clay- 
like sediments covering submerged seamounts, which lay at a 
depth less than 200 feet below the sea surface, enabling the 


216 CHALLENGER 


shallow reef-building corals to grow; for at greater depths these 
polyps cannot remain alive, and in Darwin’s theory they are pre- 
sumed to continue growing upwards on a platform of dead and 
dying coral. 

The Coral Reef Committee during their various visits to Funa- 
futi made a series of borings, the most successful of which had 
reached a depth of 1114 feet on the main island, not far from the 
village. Borings to any great depth within the lagoon itself had 
proved technically too difficult. 

Analysis of the cores obtained from these borings showed coral 
rock of a shallow water type to their greatest depths. At first 
this seemed to support Darwin’s theory, for if Murray was correct, 
rock other than limestone would have been encountered at com- 
paratively shallow depths. The borings were, however, near the 
seaward edge of the whole atoll structure, and followers of the 
new theory claimed that such borings were almost entirely 
through the talus or slope of coral debris which was being con- 
stantly broken from the edge of the reef by the unceasing pounding 
of the breakers. Such material would certainly fall down the steep 
slopes towards the ocean floor and would form a sort of coral 
rubbish dump to great depths. 

What was needed to clinch either theory was a boring in the 
centre of the lagoon, a wildly expensive and technically difficult 
task. However, the seismic apparatus in Challenger was well suited 
for this work, for it had been used successfully to measure the 
thickness of the sediment layers upon the floor of the ocean and 
could be used similarly in the lagoon at Funafuti to measure 
the thickness of the coral limestone, overlying something 
harder. 

The technique was similar to that which the ship had used at 
sea, but within the lagoon she lay at anchor using her photographic 
device to record the times of the returning sound signals from 
the floor of the lagoon initiated by the firing of charges from the 
ship’s boats at varying distances from the anchored ship. These 
returning signals were picked up by the sono-buoy hydrophones, 
the buoys themselves being anchored on a line between the ship 
and the far-away boat. . 

The Captain went ashore to see the village and to tell the people 
of Funafuti what was happening. An old man remembered the 


\ 
} 


ATOLLS 217 


coming of the scientists of the Coral Investigation Committee 50 
years before, and he led Dr. Gaskell to the site of the deep bore- 
hole, the mouth of the hole being still visible but choked with 
vegetation. Apart from the Native Magistrate, who was absent 
from the island, there were two other important personalties to 
call upon—the Pastor, and the keeper of the Government Store, 
Mr. Reher, who sold cloth and bicycles and other commodities 
whenever they became available to him on the occasional visits 
of the government store-carrying ship. The Pastor was away work- 
ing upon his taro patch, it was said, but the visitors must sit 
down while he was sent for; and while they waited, the Pastor’s 
daughters gave them green coconuts, their tops neatly cut off like 
an egg at the breakfast table, so that they might drink the refresh- 
ing, cold liquid which such immature nuts contain. Like many 
London Mission Society pastors, he was a Samoan, massive of 
build and cheerful of nature. He invited the Challengers to his 
church the following Sunday, a service that everyone on the 
island attended and where the singing was vigorous. The church 
at Funafuti has two floors, the main part of the chapel bein 
upstairs. Women with very small children stay below, but the 
remainder of the little ones sit at the front of the congregation, 
girls on one side and boys upon the other. There they are under 
the eyes of two elderly sidesmen who, from time to time through- 
out the service, walk among them to distribute a hearty bare- 
footed kick to those who are misbehaving. 

The Pastor had a blind brother who played the harmonium in 
church and was also led to the meeting house in the evenings 
during Challenger’s visit so that he might play for the hulas which 
were danced in the intervals between the Ellice Island dances. 
The women and girls invited the sailors to hula with them, much 
of this dance here being done in a crouching position known in 
physical training parlance as ‘full knees bend’, and somewhat 
painful to untrained Europeans. A hissing noise between the teeth 
is emitted by both dancers from time to time. 

The local dances are acted by a line of seven or eight perfor- 
mers, male and female, and consist of numerous actions which 
become more vigorous as the dance gathers momentum, 
accompanied by the rhythmic banging of sticks upon upturned 
boxes. Eventually the dancers are exhausted and they sink to the 


218 CHALLENGER 


mat-strewn floor for a brief respite before the singing and the 
insistent thumping starts again and the dancers rise once more. 
The author asked an elder what the actions in these dances 
represented, imagining that the actors were re-living great battles 
or canoe voyages in their distant past. The elder replied, however, 
without much conviction, that they were Bible stories, but failed 
to put a satisfactory name to any one of these. 

On the last night in the meeting-house at Funafuti, when all 
were utterly exhausted after taking part in the many action dances, 
the island girls began to lay a great quantity of shell ornaments, 
necklaces, belts and hat bands as well as hats and fans at the 
Captain’s feet, where he sat with one or two of the Kaubures, 
or members of the Island Council ; it seemed that the presentation 
would never end as more and more girls appeared and re-appeared 
loaded with gifts. There were enough of these articles for every 
one of the ship’s company to carry away some memento of the 
glorious days and nights they had spent at Funafuti among its 
charming and happy people. 

There was time for much sport as well as science. A cricket 
match, an outrigger canoe race and a sailing race were all con- 
tested between the islanders and the sailors. The sailing boats at 
Funafuti are of European design, doubtless introduced into the 
island by some long-forgotten District Officer. There are about 
fifteen of these boats now, all built on Funafuti, and as well as 
taking a dozen or so of a crew they carry a great deal of canvas. 
On the British Sovereign’s Birthday and on Boxing Day, a sailing 
race is always held on the spacious waters of the lagoon. Such 
a race was now arranged, Challenger’s own surf boat taking part. 
These races are started in a novel manner. The prevailing wind 
blows in over the village from the east and across the lagoon; 
the boats, fully loaded, with whole families forming enthusiastic 
sailing crews, are lined up off the village beach; the sails are fully 
rigged and filled with the wind while one member of the crew, 
knee-deep in the water, holds the boat’s stern. At the word ‘go’ 
each thrusts off his boat and leaps in and the whole fleet is quickly 
running before the wind in a spectacular and even start. 


While the scientists and their naval assistants became daily more 
sun-tanned during their long days exploding charges from the 


a 
- 
a) 
I 

nl 


DANCE 


7 


TIOLV ILNAVNDA 
NO NAYCTIHOD 


ATOLLS 219 


boat, the Medical Officer and the author went away in the small 
motor skiff to collect living shells and seaweeds around the peri- 
meter reefs of the atoll. Such collections had been requested by 
the Museum and the University in Auckland and proved a fascin- 
ating occupation. Different islands around the atoll had to be 
visited each day so that the different molluscae and algae might 
be sampled, both inside and outside the lagoon, to windward and 
to leeward of the reef, for each had a different environment and 
each would have its different communities. 

To cross the lagoon on these expeditions might take two hours 
and the small, palm-clad islet for which the party were bound 
would be below the horizon for many miles of the voyage. It 
sometimes appeared to the Medical Officer, Leading Sick Berth 
Attendant Soulsby who accompanied them, and the author, that 
the three of them were bound westward into the open Pacific 
in their small, inadequate craft; but slowly the palms on their 
objective would creep up over the horizon, and an hour or so 
later they anchored off the reef and waded through the shallows 
to the glaring white coral beach beneath the towering trees in 
which beautiful White Terns fluttered like pigeons or sat re- 
garding the intruders with one small black-ringed eye. Landing 
thus on the first occasion Soulsby was reminded by the familiarity 
of the scene, tall trees fringing the shore, of an earlier incident 
in the commission and to the party’s amusement began to chant 
the once familar call ‘Hope, Abel!’ 

The collectors then split up and walked the reefs, finding fre- 
quent treasures. Shells there were of many types, and small 
coraline seaweeds of brilliant green and red hues. Gradually, the 
saltwater and formalin containing jars onboard became full of 
specimens. At Fongafale the assistance of the children was ob- 
tained, for they knew where to find the shells, which they 
required for the making of necklaces and hatbands. The author 
went with Reher, the storekeeper, on an expedition along the 
shore in search of living cowries. They had chosen a time of low 
water at dark midnight and Reher flashed a torch beneath the 
large overhanging coral boulders for he knew where the cowries 
would be, clinging like great slugs to the underside of the 
rocks. He guided the author on as they filled the specimen 


bottles, his gentle voice barely audible above the sound of the 
16 


220 CHALLENGER 


breakers on the seaward side of the island a few hundred yards 
away. 

Although Challenger was at Funafuti only about a fortnight her 
men became a part of the place; they spent their evenings in 
the scattered, palm-thatched homes along the ‘main street’, 
while Tom and the Captain, at the invitation of Chief Clerk Kofe, 
occupied the empty District Officer’s house for a night or two 
and imagined themselves administering these lovely atolls. It was 
a sad moment when the ship’s boat left the wharf for the last 
time, carefully navigating through the children splashing in the 
water and leaping from the jetty into the sea ahead of her. Reher’s 
big straw hat and the massive figure of the Pastor could be seen 
above the group that stood watching on the wharf till the ship 
had weighed and turned to the westward. 


The Ellice group is formed of nine islands, the local name for 
them, ‘Tavalu’, denoting this number. Nukufetau was the next 
of the group visited, 60 miles to the north, and it appeared over 
the horizon at first like the two masts of a ship, which resolved 
themselves into towering trees as the island gradually took 
shape. As at Funafuti, the ship was able to anchor within the 
lagoon, which is enclosed by an almost perfect rectangle of 
reefs and low islands, with the village situated at the south-west 
corner. 

A ship had been lost on the northern part of this atoll some 
months previously and it was the surveyor’s task to fix the island 
by star sights ashore, using the theodolite, as the wreck enquiry 
had thrown some doubt as to the exact position of Nukufetau. 
The scientists were delighted to visit another atoll similar in con- 
struction to Funafuti, and they were soon at work with their 
charges verifying the doubtful points which still remained after 
their work at Funafuti. 

Here there was no convenient wharf and, except at high tide, 
those landing had to disembark from the ship’s boats at the edge 
of the reef and either wade or be pushed in a narrow and shallow 
draught canoe across the half-mile of shallows to the village. A 
tried and trusted surveying recorder was landed to find a suitable 
location for the taking of the sights and to find accommodation 
for the party who would be observing throughout the night, and 


ee ee 


ATOLLS 221 


therefore must live ashore. When the Captain landed next day 
everything was in perfect order. The brass plate marking the 
observation spot had already been cemented into position in the 
open space before the court house, while camp beds and mos- 
quito nets had been set up within; the chronometer which was 
to play such a vital part in the sight-taking was ticking away snugly 
in its case alongside the radio to be used for the time signals, 
and which was now playing Hawaiian music to the delight of the 
considerable crowd that had taken up its position around the 
entrance to the palm-thatched court house to await developments. 
Staff had been taken on and consisted of massive, bronze Toma, 
who was busy in a nearby cooking hut preparing a meal of roast 
chicken and taros for the party, and a girl of extremely comely 
appearance, with a flowered garland in her hair, who was sweep- 
ing the bare ground around the observation spot with a sort of 
hand besom made of the mid-ribs of coconut leaves. A small 
group of chickens lay tethered in preparation for the following 
meal and a sucking pig secured by one hind leg was close-by. 
Almost at once on the arrival of the surveying party some of the 
crowd began an impromptu dance while the remainder made way 
for them, and soon the dancers were screaming with delight as 
the Captain walked among them scattering talcum powder, for 
on this occasion he had come prepared. 

Shortly after sunset on the second night ashore it became neces- 
sary to signal off to the ship to send a battery in by boat, and the 
shore party set out wading to the edge of the reef to meet it. 
There was a strong north-easterly breeze blowing straight from 
the ship towards the village, and as they felt their way in the dark- 
ness of the cloudy night the waders could see the lights of the 
motor skiff appearing and disappearing as she rose and fell on the 
waves on her way inshore. The waders were unaware however 
that a fleet of unlit sailing canoes was bearing down upon them, 
speeding on their way before the wind towards the village. As 
they neared the breakers at the reef’s edge they saw first one and 
then another of the canoes, and there they stood, now waist deep 
in the water, shouting to make their presence known as the 
canoes swept past on either side. As they came in over the shallows 
many of the male members of the crews leapt out to lighten their 
craft that they might continue onwards towards the village. It was 


222. CHALLENGER 


a tense moment as the canoes came in, for those sailing them did 
not notice the waders in the general excitement of coming 
through the breakers, and it was lucky that they were not mown 
down. The greater part of the island’s population had spent the 
afternoon onboard buying, at the ship’s canteen, chocolates, 
tinned fruit, cigarettes and, of course, talcum powder, of which 
there now remained no tins whatsoever. 

The inevitable dance took place in the meeting house on the 
last night ashore, a party of youngsters being employed throughout 
the evening alternately erecting the thatch screens on the wind- 
ward side of the building, for it was a wild night, and taking them 
down again as the dancers called for air after their labours. 

When the campers returned to the court house in the early 
hours the surveying recorder was absent, but by morning he was 
with them again. It was many months afterwards before the events 
of this night reached the Captain’s ears. As the Paymaster had 
been told, sleeping with someone other than one’s husband or 
wife is a punishable offence in the Ellice group, and the attractive 
girl who had been laid on to sweep the court house was in fact 
such a prisoner doing her daily prison tasks. The missing man 
had fallen for the girl and had asked the jailer if he might release 
her from prison on the night of the dance. This he had absolutely 
refused to do, fearing retribution from the Kaubures; however, 
he saw no harm in locking the sailor up inside the prison with the 
prisoner for the night, releasing him again as dawn crept over the 
island. 

The scientists had finished their work in the lagoon, the 
surveyors were content with their sights, farewells were said 
once again, a frequent and oft-recurring duty on this voyage, and 
the ship sailed out and away for Manus in the Admiralty Islands, 
2000 miles to the westward. 


Tom Gaskell and John Swallow turned to their mass of seismic 
records—long, narrow sheets of paper with long steady lines, 
here and there violently interrupted, showing the vital time of 
returning sound waves from the floor of the lagoon, There was 
much drawing of graphs in the chartroom, making of computa- 
tions, gloom as pieces of scientific evidence failed to fit in, 
excitement and renewed efforts when the data began to dove- 


OO eee 


ATOLLS B33 


tail like pieces of a jig-saw to form the picture of the atoll 
structure. 

Doctor Gaskell has described this work in scientific papers and 
has voiced his propositions at learned symposiums with a wealth 
of detail which baffles the layman, but a few weeks after the visit 
to the Ellice Islands he gave the Challengers, in an article in the 
ship’s magazine, a simple account of the results of these experi- 
ments. At Funafuti, he said, they had found a depth of 1800 feet 
of rock in which the velocity of sound was 6000-8000 feet per 
second, such a velocity being much as one would expect in coral 
limestone. Below this lay material with a velocity of sound of 


Old Borehole 


| Lagoon 


Coral limestone 


--— Sea /evel 


Speed of Sound 
12,000 Feet per 
Second. 


Speed of Sound 
6000 - 8000 
Feet perSecond. 


Volcanic hump 


Speed of Sound 
22,000 Feet 
per Second 


Hard Volcanic core 


Structure of Funafuti Atoll as deduced from seismic experiment 


12,000 feet per second, which could either be hard limestone or 
volcanic rock. To clear up the matter he had carried the explo- 
sions in Nukufetau right up to the edge of the reef and these 
showed that the border between these two layers fell rapidly 
away as the perimeter was reached, which gave a picture of a 
supposed volcanic hump within the heart of the atoll structure. 
Deeper again an even harder material was located, probably the 
true volcanic core of the original volcano which had formed the 
island. 

Thus, on the seismic evidence obtained by Challenger it would 
seem that as the coral cannot live at a depth greater than 200 feet 
below the surface of the ocean, the atolls forming the Ellice 


224 CHALLENGER 


Group at least, are being built up gradually upon old, sinking 
volcanoes as Darwin had proposed. As Gaskell and Swallow 
concluded that there was 2500 feet of coral below Nukufetau, a 
considerably greater depth than that under Funafuti, it would 
seem perhaps that while Funafuti still remained an island about 
500 feet high, Nukufetau as a volcanic island had passed from the 
face of the oceans. 


XVIII 


The Deepest Depths 


said that he wished to carry out one of his seismic experi- 

ments in a deep trench in order to find out something of 
the structure of the sea-floor in such an area. So, as the ship moved 
into the Marianas Trench between Guam and Ulithi, John 
Swallow was active with the seismic gear, using it purely as a 
reflection or sounding machine to record the time of the double 
passage of sound from the small charge he exploded until it 
returned as an echo from the sea-bed to his hydrophone, thus 
giving him the depth. The soundings rapidly increased and soon 
Swallow was reporting over s000 fathoms and finally 5663 
fathoms. 

This was an exciting report, for it was known to be nearly as 
deep as any sounding so far recorded. But unfortunately it was 
about 1000 fathoms beyond the scope of the deep echo sounding 
machine at this time. But using the taut wire machine, with 140 
pounds of scrap iron attached to the end of the wire, as a sounding 
machine, a depth of 5899 fathoms was recorded. This was a new 
deep record for the world. 

The history of deep sounding in the ocean is not a long one. It 
was during Lord Mulgrave’s expedition to the Arctic in 1773 
that some of the earliest attempts at deep sounding were made, 
the greatest depth sounded being 683 fathoms, from whence a 
sample of sediment was obtained. 

In 1817-18 Sir John Ross, during a voyage to Baffin Bay, made 
some deep sea soundings using a ‘deep sea clamm’ on the end 
of his rope which brought up several pounds of greenish mud 
from his deepest sounding of roo fathoms. 

Sir James Clark Ross led an expedition to the Antarctic in the 
ships Erebus and Terror in the years 1839-43, during which time 
he really started systematic deep sea sounding. He had a line 3600 


fathoms long made up onboard, and this he allowed to run out 
225 


()- the way south from Japan to Manus Dr. Gaskell had 


226 CHALLENGER 


from a large reel fitted in one of the ship’s boats. The line was 
marked every 100 fathoms and while the line ran out the time 
was noted as each mark left the reel. When the time interval 
between two marks appreciably lengthened the weight at the 
line’s end was assumed to have reached the bottom and the 
amount of line out taken to indicate the depth. 

The procedure in the boat was necessarily one for calm weather 
and this restricted the number of successful casts made in the 
open sea; with this apparatus, however, the first ‘abysmal’ sound- 
ings, as the oceanographic text-books call them, were taken and 
2425 fathoms was plumbed in the South Atlantic in 1840. 

One of the early snags of deep sounding was that a heavy weight 
was needed to take the line down, but to recover such a weight 
with the bottom sample adhering to it a very bulky line was 
required. There was in the United States Navy at this time the 
now famous officer, Lieutenant Maury, who had produced num- 
erous wind and current charts and sailing directions for mariners. 
Working under him was a Midshipman Brooke, who about the 
year 1859 constructed an apparatus which took a sample of the 
sea-bed and then detached the bulk of the heavy weight which 
had taken it down, leaving only a light tube, inside which the 
sample was retained, to be hauled back to the surface. This in- 
vention speeded up the sounding of the oceans and in 1854 
Maury was able to make the first bathymetric chart of the North 
Atlantic. This apparatus, modified by Lieutenant Baillie, Royal 
Navy, and named after him, is still in use today. 

The earlier Challenger Expedition is said to have carried wire 
for sounding purposes, but for some reason this was not used and 
the method of using marked rope and time intervals was em- 
ployed for taking the many ocean soundings which this vessel 
made. Her deepest for the voyage was 4500 fathoms, recorded 
in the Marianas Trench where the recent Challenger found her 
deepest sounding referred to above. 

The U.S.S. Tuscarora was also at sea employed upon oceano- 
graphic work at the time of the Challenger Expedition and it 
was from her that piano wire was first used for sounding great 
depths. With this wire she sounded 4655 fathoms just east of the 
Kuril Islands in the northern part of the Japan Trench. 

The first ship to sound at a greater depth than 5000 fathoms 


THE DEEPEST DEPTHS 227, 


was the British surveying vessel Penguin in 1895. Her Captain was 
Andrew Balfour, who had been a sub-lieutenant in Challenger 
during the Expedition and ever since had been fired with en- 
thusiasm to find a great depth. He took two soundings with piano 
wire on a steam sounding machine which had by then come into 
use ; these soundings were taken in the Kermadec Trench, in the 
South Pacific, north-east of New Zealand. On the first occasion, 
as so often happens, the wire parted while the Baillie rod was 
being hauled to the surface. As the rod is comparatively light, 
the parting of the wire is not readily apparent and it is only as 
the hours pass that the surveyors, constantly feeling the wire, 


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begin to suspect that the worst has happened, for it takes over 
four hours to haul in the sampler from s000 fathoms. It took 
Andrew Balfour far longer, for when he recorded a sounding of 
5155 fathoms he insisted that to avoid parting the wire again, 
watches of two seamen at a time hove in the whole five miles of 
wire by using the manual handles on the machine, so that no 
undue strain of an unfeeling steam engine would be imparted to 
the thin wire as the ship rolled in the heavy swell. He never left 
the winch himself throughout the whole long day, and thankfully 
and excitedly he ladled the sediment from the sampler onto a 
plate he had kept beside him in readiness for this supreme 
moment. 


228 CHALLENGER 


The German ship Planet shifted the scene of greatest depth 
once again to the northern hemisphere—in the Philippine Trench 
close eastward of the islands which give it the name. And here 
some years later the Dutch vessel Willebord Snellius subsequently 
found 5539 fathoms, using early audio-frequency sounding 
methods. 

The U.S.S. Ramapo moved the scene once more to the Japan 
Trench with 5673 fathoms, using audio-frequency methods, but 
the German Emden, returning to the Philippine Trench, found 
just a few more fathoms to make it 5686. 

This was the state of great depth sounding when World War 
II came. But at the close of the Pacific War the United States was 
once again to take the lead in the friendly rivalry of deep ocean 
discovery. Dr. H. H. Hess, a University Professor, had studied 
the shape of the ocean floor for many years and had produced the 
best bathymetric chart of the North Pacific available before the 
war. Like so many others of his calling, he joined the Services and 
his knowledge of the sea took him into the Navy, where he 
eventually commanded a large Fleet oiler, the U.S.S. Cape Johnson. 

Commander Hess’s crew was composed of reserves and he had 
no difficulty in persuading them that it was normal in the Navy 
to carry out standard oceanographic observations as the vessel 
proceeded upon her naval duties across the oceans. Thus this 
ship was able to add much to the knowledge of oceanography and 
eventually sounded with her echo sounding machine in the Philip- 
pine Trench, recording there a depth of 5740 fathoms, now 
known as the ‘Cape Johnson Depth’, from which the Danish 
research ship Galathea later dredged up forms of life including 
small sea anemonies, a number of worms and some living 
bacteria. 

The scene of the greatest depth having once again shifted to 
the Marianas Trench, Challenger was determined to make a survey 
of the deep area and to get a sample of sediment from the depths. 
During the visit to New Zealand the ship enjoyed great assistance 
from knowledgeable technicians in the Royal New Zealand Dock- 
yard at Devonport who managed to boost the echo sounder to 
record at the greatest depths; here also extra wire for the 
sounding machine was obtained. 


It was an exciting moment as Challenger steamed back into the 


TEED hE RE Sie PEs 229 


trench on the way northwards from Manus to Japan, for this time 
she was not restricted to spot soundings here and there; enthus- 
iasm rose as the water became deeper and deeper, and still the 
officer with headphones sitting before the sounder could hear the 
small answering signal returning from the depths first eight, then 
slowly nine, ten, eleven, twelve and finally fourteen seconds after 
the metallic sound of the outgoing signal had been heard. For 
such is the time the sound takes to reach the sea-bed and return 
from 5900 fathoms. 

Sounding lines were run at right angles to the east-west axis 
of the trench thus obtaining profiles across this giant crack on the 
surface of the globe. Such trenches do not have spectacular slopes 
as one might find in a canyon on land, but descend slowly and 
steadily to meet in a small flat expanse at the bottom of the trench 
from which the echo returns more loudly and clearly than from 
any other part. On completion of the mapping it appeared that 
there was a considerable area of a depth greater than 5900 
fathoms and that a sounding of 5940 fathoms existed. But the 
6000 fathom barrier remained inviolate. 

A sample from the trench was obtained with the Baillie rod 
after three attempts. It is difficult when using the steam sounding 
machine in such depths to know just when the sampler has 
reached the bottom, and during the short delay between realising 
that the bottom has been reached and the application of the brake 
to stop more wire running out, a certain amount of the wire will 
have coiled itself upon the sea-floor beside the sampler. When 
the winch begins to heave, these coils become kinks, and often, 
perhaps hours later when the sample seems to be almost on deck, 
the wire finally parts at the kink and the six-hour task has to be 
done all over again. This difficulty was finally overcome by laying 
up the whole of the last 100 fathoms of piano wire within a piece 
of rope which obviated the kinking as the superfluous wire coiled 
onto the sea-bed 63 land miles below. 

Excitement on deck was tense when, at long last, the ceaseless 
chugging of the winch was slowed and Petty Officer Greenshields 
grasped the rope and hauled in hand-over-hand. Even before the 
sampler could be clearly sighted a brown cloud was seen spreading 
from it, indicating that the rod must contain a sample of what 
the surveyor has termed ‘red clay’, the deposit of the great depths. 


230 CHALLENGER 


Very considerable areas of the ocean floor are composed of 
ooze formed by countless millions of calcerous skeletons of micro- 
scopic and macroscopic plankton which has lived its brief life near 
the sea’s surface, and having died there, sunk slowly to form this 
deposit. At greater depths than 3000 fathoms or so the calcerous 
deposits are no more and only the skeletons of silicate forms of 
plankton remain, for the calcerous forms have been eroded away 
during their long slow fall and have become once again an integral 
part of sea water. But the silicate forms continue unscathed to the 
great depths, where are found the skeletons of diatoms, the plants, 
and radiolarians, the animals, which, with red volcanic dust which 
has fallen upon the sea surface miles above, form the really deep 
ocean deposits. 

Such a sample now lay secure in a pickle jar, and this the author 
took home with him when he left the ship a month or so later 
in November, 1951. Back in London, he made his way to that 
ormolu building of many turrets which houses the British Museum 
of Natural History in the Cromwell Road. It was the first of many 
visits to this treasure-house, and he was taking the cherished deep 
bottom sample to Dr. J. D. H. Wiseman, who is an expert in 
such matters. To reach his lair a guide was followed who took 
the author at once from the main hall, where stuffed elephants 
stand with oversized statues of Darwin and Huxley, down to the 
cellars beneath. Here they passed along a maze of corridors lined 
with racks on which are stacked spare, and forgotten stuffed 
animals, their horns, their hoofs, their heads and their bones, 
like some nightmare Aladdin’s cave. At last the guide reached a 
locked door upon which he rapped with a conspiratorial air, and 
they were admitted to Dr. Wiseman’s presence. 

The small pickle jar looked insignificant as it was placed upon 
the table among many other jars of more imposing size and con- 
tent. But Dr. Wiseman’s enthusiasm made up for this, and soon 
he and his companions were inspecting the sample through micro- 
scopes, searching for the skeletons of the planktonic animals and 
plants which it contained, and which had once floated near the blue 
surface of the far-away Pacific Ocean. 


The search for greater depths still goes on and the Marianas 
Trench may not remain for long the deepest known part of the 


THE DEEPEST DEPTHS 2aey0 


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232 CHALLENGER 


globe. Even as this is being written there comes a report from 
the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California that their 
research vessel Horizon has sounded in 5814 fathoms in the Tonga 
Trench, where she has carried out a considerable survey. A study 
of their sounding records leads them to believe that depths of 
at least 5900 fathoms probably exist here.* 

Ever since Andrew Balfour brought up his cherished bottom 
sample from the depths of the Kermadec Trench in 1895, the 
deep places in the oceans which have subsequently been dis- 
covered have exceeded in depth the height of Mount Everest. 

Nor are those who will one day actually visit these deeps so 
far behind the discoverers, for Professor Auguste Piccard recently 
dived in his bathyscaphe to 1722 fathoms in the Mediterranean. 
This record was later broken by the two French Naval Officers, 
Lieutenant-Commander Nicolas Houotand Engineer Henri Willm, 
who descended in their submarine-shaped craft to 2215 fathoms 
off Dakar. They were confident that their bathyscaphe would have 
withstood much greater pressures; so that in the not too distant 
future Man may actually visit the great Pacific depths in the 
Philippines, Japan, Marianas and Kermadec and Tonga Trenches. 


* In July, 1956, it was reported that H.M. Submarine Telemachus had, whilst 
on a gravity survey and carrying American and Australian scientists, sounded 
with sonic methods to a depth of 5675 fathoms in the Tonga Trench. Her. 
Commanding Officer was Lieutenant-Commander J. E. Moore who had had 
the battle with wild bees on the water tower at Mombasa in 1942. 


XIX 


Homeward 


who returned for a second commission in the Challenger, 

this time as her last Commanding Officer. Almost at once 
he took the ship to Ominato, at the northern end of the main 
Japanese island of Honshu. This was not the Japan of green valleys 
and blossoming cherry trees, for it was winter time and Ominato 
lay deep under snow. It was a town of slushy streets, whose in- 
habitants in padded coats and fur-lined caps hurried home to their 
charcoal stoves and sukiyaki. 

Ominato had formerly been a minor Japanese naval base and 
at this time there was a proposal, since dropped, that the British 
Fleet might visit there in the heat of Hong-Kong’s summer, much 
as they had visited Wei-Hai-Wei before the War. 

There was an interpreter here called Hamaya who assisted the 
ship and introduced the various local figures. As the weeks passed 
the ship became a part of the local landscape moored at her buoy 
in the harbour while the boats were away on the survey, and her 
men had many acquaintances in the township with whom they 
drank sake, ate sashmi (raw fish) or learnt judo. 

Tom explored the barren hinterland on skis, worn, as the locals 
wore theirs, by pushing his feet into rubber boots which were 
roughly secured with string to the skis. 

During the visit the Wardroom were invited to Hamaya’s 
wedding. Some discussion took place onboard as to what would 
constitute a good wedding present. It was finally decided to give 
him and his bride a ship’s crest painted on a shield, an item of 
which Number One kept a large stock for all manner of gift- 
giving occasions, a bottle of Scotch and a few odds and ends 
from the canteen. Having checked their stockings for holes they 
landed and made their way to the house where the wedding was 
to be celebrated and where they found that the normal wedding 
gifts were beautifully decorated envelopes containing money 

233 


Bu in Kure, Bill Ashton became the last one of those many 


234 CHALLENGER 


heaped upon a plate before a small shrine together with symbols 
representing the various aspects of marriage. Rice cake to in- 
dicate the domestic work which the wife would have to do; two 
fish for the husband’s task as family provider; a painted scroll 
with cranes and tortoises for patience and long life; a bowl of 
fruit for fertility, two ceremonial sake flasks and two minute cups 
with which to seal the marriage. Magnum-sized bottles of sake 
formed the background of this display. 

The bride’s dress is traditional and is often hired for the 
occasion in these days. It consists of a black kimono and red obei 
which is passed many times around the waist and finally made up 
around a former or core at the back somewhat like a knapsack. 
The back of the bride’s neck had been shaved and she wore a 
gigantic wig of black hair set above the head in the traditional 
Japanese style. Her face and neck had been liberally powdered, 
only her faintly orange cheeks and scarlet mouth relieving the 
whitewashed appearance. A silver-coloured shade with pendants 
dangling from it hid her eyes from view. 

The ‘matchmaker’ is an important personage at a Japanese wed- 
ding, being the go-between for the groom and the bride up till 
the time of their marriage. Although the guests wore Japanese 
dress, the matchmaker wore tails. 

An old member of the bridegroom’s family performed the 
wedding ceremony, after which both bride and groom had to 
drink nine cups of sake handed to them. The circulation of sake 
then became general and relations and guests were each handed 
the small cups which were drained in three noisy gulps. Then 
each in turn had to offer a cup of sake to the groom with the 
word ‘dozo’, well known to those who have visited Japan, for it 
means ‘Cheers’ or something rather more forceful, urging one’s 
companion to drink also. Then dozoing too became general, 
everyone toasting everyone else in a flurry of sake drinking from 
the thimble-sized cups. 

While this was going on, others were preparing beautiful- 
looking food on brightly coloured trays, for to the Japanese the 
appearance of the food is equal in importance to the taste. 
Eight colourful dishes were placed on each tray, ranging from 
two rice cake ducks, representing the bride and groom and to 
be taken away rather than eaten, to a bluey-green uncooked sea- 


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ARRIVING AT PORTSMOUTH FOR THE LAST TIME. COMMANDER ASHTON POSES FO) 
THE PRESS WEARING ONE OF CHALLENGER’S MANY ‘TROPHIES’ 


HOMEWARD 2316) 


food. Twenty-six people attired in gay kimonos, each with one 
of these well-provisioned trays and a bowl of fruit, sat cross-legged 
on the soft tatami matting, a satisfying sight. But soft as the mat- 
ting floor of a Japanese house is, it soon becomes painful for 
Europeans to sit cross-legged, and after about three hours sitting 
thus the party from the ship could bear it no longer, cramped legs 
were stretched to the good-hearted amusement of their fellow 
guests. Then the singing and dancing began and limbs could 
really be relaxed. At 11 p.m. Challengers had their last glass 
of sake, said farewell and left to find their boat. Forty-eight 
hours later someone from the ship met Hamaya, who said that 
some of his friends were still keeping the party up and drinking 
sake. 

Night after night, when work was over for the day, those of the 
crew who were studying judo landed and made their way through 
the snow-covered streets to the house of their instructor. At last 
came the great day when the Anglo-Japanese Amity Judo Meeting 
was held in the Assembly Hall. The Mayor was there, also the 
President of the Shimoseki Judo Association, and certainly the 
whole of the junior population of the town. 

Dressed in judo kit—loose jacket and trousers—the members 
of the ship’s company looked strange and unfamiliar as they formed 
up with their Japanese opponents on the grass judo mats. 
Speeches were made by all the personalities present, an oath of 
sportsmanship was taken and the bouts were on. The first item 
was a match between two Japanese, one a very small man, the 
other very large. Time and time again the small man hurled his 
opponent to the floor with a resounding crash, but each time 
the giant picked himself up and came slowly back for more, 
searching for the hold he never got. 

Then followed the serious business of the evening, bouts be- 
tween Challengers and the locals in which the sailors held their 
own, winning as many contests as they lost. Lastly one of the 
Japanese, a veritable champion, took on five Challengers one after 
the other, casting each in turn to the floor, all except the last 
man, Kirsopp, the officers’ cook. He and one of the electricians 
were classed as ‘4-kyu’, a high distinction for Europeans, and they 
received beautifully-illuminated certificates to prove it to those 
who were capable of reading Japanese. 

17 


236 CHALLENGER 


Soon the ship moved more rapidly to Hong-Kong, Singapore 
and into the Indian Ocean through the Sunda Straits. Here good 
weather allowed a feast of seismic experiments, and scientific 
morale onboard rose accordingly. By now a considerable num- 
ber of seismic experiments had been made in the Atlantic, Pacific 
and Indian Oceans, and still there were some more to be made 
in the Mediterranean. Tom and John had found much of interest, 
but possibly the fact that the earth’s structure beneath the true 
oceans is radically different from that beneath the continents is 
the most striking result of seismic experiments at sea. In Challenger 
they had measured with refraction shooting the thickness of the 
sediment carpet on the ocean floor composed of the calcerous 
or silicious skeletons of countless millions of planktonic animals 
and plants finding a great difference in thickness from one part 
of the ocean to another and also between oceans. These sediments 
have a speed of sound through them little faster than in sea water. 
In the Atlantic various thicknesses were measured from 3500 feet 
to practically nothing, whereas a carpet depth of about 1 500 feet 
was more usual in the Pacific. 

The rate of accumulation of this sediment on the sea-bed has 
been measured by inspecting core samples and identifying volcanic 
ash strata blown over the surface of the sea from two separate 
eruptions in historic times, the distance between these two dark 
layers in the core being measured as one would measure the dis- 
tance between two layers in a cream-filled cake. A little under 
half an inch in 1000 years seems to be a popular estimate thus 
obtained, but it seems doubtful if there are many places in the 
oceans where the carpet is laid down from sediment falling only 
from directly above. Sub-surface and bottom currents flowin 
upon as yet undiscovered courses probably carry sediment, like 
snow on the winds, to form drifts upon the ocean floor. 

Beneath the sediments in true oceanic areas the first layer of 
rock would appear to be of great hardness indicated by a speed 
of sound of about 22,000 feet per second, which continues down- 
wards until the earth’s true crust is reached about 36,000 feet 
below the surface of the sea. The meeting of these two is known 
to scientists as a well-defined discontinuity, which under the con- 
tinents is not reached until nearly 100,000 feet has been pene- 
trated. This startling difference in structure between continental 


HOMEWARD 237 


and oceanic areas would seem to suggest that the deep seas have 
always differed from the land masses even though water may not 
always have been contained in the former. 


Visits to Colombo, again to the beautiful Seychelles, to Aden 
and Port Said and Cyprus brought the ship to the Aegean to carry 
out some weeks’ seismic work there. Athens was first visited and 
then a number of the islands, including Lemnos, Skyros, Volos 
and the Mount Athos Peninsula. This last was of fascinating at- 
traction, for spread about the peninsula, in the most precarious 
sites, sometimes over 1000 feet up on the sheer cliffs, are 20 
monasteries. No form of female life is permitted anywhere on 
the whole of Mount Athos, over 6000 feet high. Challengers 
visited six of these monasteries, travelling up the steep, dusty 
mountain tracks on sure-footed male donkeys. On reaching the 
monastery all was kindness, and after a liqueur, turkish delight 
or coffee, the tour of the building would begin. In these remote 
locations beautiful domed chapels, painted with frescoes and hung 
with ikons, had been built. In the altar shrine at Vatopede were 
part of the sash worn by the Virgin Mary, a piece of the True 
Cross and a finger of John the Baptist; manuscripts there were 
too, dating back nearly 2000 years, and examples of the earliest 
painted works. 

Escaping prisoners had sheltered in some of these monasteries 
during the War, and a letter of thanks from General Alexander, for 
kindness shown to these people, was framed at Lavra Monastery. 

These delightful visits over, the parties from the ship would 
come out into the full glare of the sun and mount their donkeys 
for the return journey to the ship which they could see anchored 
far, far below them, a mere white speck on the rumpled blue of 
the sea. 

The end of the World Voyage was now very near, for there 
were visits to be paid only to Malta and Gibraltar and then home 
to Pompey. The ship had travelled 75,000 miles on this voyage 
when she passed the Straits of Gibraltar into the Atlantic once 
again, and headed westward. But the old ship had different ideas, 
she wanted now to go straight home, with no further delay on 
oceanographic observations which the insatiable scientists had 
planned for her on this last leg. It was after she had found and 


238 CHALLENGER 


surveyed a new seamount that she decided to do no more. When 
the engine was put ahead nothing happened, no coaxing would 
turn her single screw. The Engineer Officer tried everything he 
knew as she lay wallowing in the long swell. At long last, by giving 
her an immense amount of steam and opening the throttle with 
a rapid movement, there followed a resounding bang like a clap 
of thunder and she was on her way. There could be no risk of 
a repetition of her single screw refusing to turn while still over 
1000 miles from home, so her head was turned for Pompey and 
the now willing old girl never stopped until she arrived safe and 
sound in her own Home Port, after two and a half years on the 
wide oceans of the world. 


An oceanographic voyage remains today one of the last retreats 
where man may observe and study unmolested. It is well known 
that a captain’s troubles commence when land is sighted and 
reach their peak as the ship is finally berthed to permit agents, 
authorities, customs, press and tradesmen to surge over her like 
an invading army, and all privacy is gone. 

The peace which comes upon the commander of a deep-sea 
expedition as the land slowly sinks below the horizon astern and 
he heads for the limitless ocean is profound. The ship is clear of 
all but those who are there with a purpose, no telephone is con- 
nected, no unwanted midday caller will arrive ; all that matters is 
the one job in hand, that of surveying and studying the ocean. 
Even the wireless office is usually silent upon such a ship, for 
the Admiralty sends few operational signals to a 1o-knot survey 
ship with an extensive oceanographic programme ahead of her. 
There is time to think, time to stop at a moment’s notice to 
study some passing phenomena and to remain there a day if need 
be to investigate the matter. 

One night in the Pacific south of Japan the ship passed through 
a great area of sea, brilliantly illuminated, the water glowing from 
the ripple of the bow-wave across the gently ruffled water to the 
very horizon. The ship was stopped and some of the phosphores- 
cent matter in the water was netted and placed beneath the micro- 
scope. Small spherical objects could be seen, each with a tail 
sticking from it. These were dinoflagellates of the form Noctiluca. 
Scientists have not yet decided among themselves whether this 


HOMEWARD 239 


is a plant or an animal. The light given off by countless millions 
is a cold light producing no heat, a feat still beyond the scope 
of human endeavour. 

One morning in the Indian Ocean John Swallow found a small 
squid about four inches long lying upon the upper deck. It 
appeared that it must have been attracted by a light on deck. 
It had been a flat calm night so that the surface of the sea would 
have been about ro feet below the upper deck. To reach the 
deck, therefore, John worked out that this small squid must have 
been swimming at about 27 miles an hour before it left the water. 

In the Atlantic a hawk sat quietly in the rigging, over 1000 
miles from land. It watched the storm petrels fluttering in the 
ship’s wake and of a sudden left the mast as it would a tree in 
the English woodlands, and swooping upon its prey took and 
devoured a petrel. 

Few ships were ever seen upon the voyages Challenger made in 
the course of her search for knowledge of the sea-floor ; she was 
guided by the shape of the sea-bed rather than the trade routes. 

The moon rising above the horizon like a ship on fire; the 
stars so bright on a calm tropic night that silver threads ran 
beneath them over the dark sea; the green flash from the setting 
sun; the windrows and the calm unaccountable swathes upon the 
surface of the sea when a gentle breeze begins after calm; the great 
fleets of Velellas, pale white and blue, their sails set, and all 
sailing purposefully before the Trades ; the dolphins racing before 
the ship’s stem one above the other, turning upon their backs 
to show their white bellies in pure ecstasy of enjoyment; the 
steady, relentless progress of a giant swell generated by a distant 
storm, passing across the surface of the sea; golden rafts of algae 
being the species Trichodesmium, recognisable under the micro- 
scope as a neat little bundle of sticks: these are the things one 
has time to regard and time to ponder on when passing unhustled 
across the face of the ocean. 

Challenger’s arrival at Portsmouth was not quite the end of the 
story. She paid off and took on a new crew for a last short com- 
mission to carry out a series of seismic and sounding cruises in 
the North Atlantic in an attempt to learn more of the topography 
and construction of that great range of submarine mountains 
known as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. She sailed on her usual 


240 CHALLENGER 


three-week cruises, returning alternatively to Londonderry or 
Portsmouth for fuel. She paid one visit to Punta Delgada, her last 
foreign port of call, where on this occasion the men could get 
onshore to enjoy the delights withheld from their predecessors 
of 1942; and in the terrible gale at the end of January, 1953, 
she was in the Shetlands again after so many years, riding out the 
winds of 100 miles an hour, nearly the whole complement of 
her officers and many of her crew suffering from raging influenza. 
She lost a boat alongside in this terrible weather. Divers who 
were flown up from Rosyth when the wind moderated were able 
to recover this craft within a day or so. 

The spring and summer of 1953 were unpleasant, gale after 
gale swept the North Atlantic and the old ship lay many days hove 
to, her old bones creaking as she rose and fell. One great wave, 
s0 feet or so in height, rolled towards her. Those on the bridge 
held their breath and stared, then it broke over her quarter, 
making her falter as she rose to it and breaking and scattering her 
boats stowed on the quarter-deck. But steadily she battled through 
that last stormy summer in the North Atlantic and in September 
sailed into Portsmouth, and paid off for the last time. 

As she had taken over from the old Iroquois over 20 years before, 
so now another new survey vessel was ready to take her place. 
Vidal was complete at Chatham, a fine modern vessel with every 
piece of up-to-date surveying equipment, including a helicopter 
for landing survey parties upon the mountain tops, and a com- 
plete chart reproduction outfit of the latest type, far removed 
from Challenger’s old flat-bed press that she had carried with 
the Eastern Fleet. How many surveyors had spent happy and 
adventurous days in this well-loved ship! Each remembered the 
ship as he knew her—white and spick and span anchored off a 
tropic island in her early days in the Caribbean, the trade wind 
bringing the scent of the land; grey and drab in war time, fighting 
a gale in northern waters, the wind stinging the eyes of those 
upon the bridge; camouflaged and curious, nosing through the 
reefs of Torres Strait, the breeze warm as the blast from a 
furnace. 

The author remembers her far out on the Pacific, a blue dome 
of sky above, great depths beneath, a white speck in an empty 
world. It is the forenoon onboard and the lifebeat of the vessel’s 


HOMEWARD 241 


pulse comes from below as her engines push her ahead through 
the long low swell; other sounds come racing back, the gentle 
flap flap of the bridge awning in the breeze, the shrill of the 
boatswain’s call and the song of a sun-tanned seaman at work on 
deck. And smells, too, are there—freshly applied paint, tarred 
hemp and the tang of navy rum which pervades the little ship 
at noon. The cook is in his gleaming galley, serving out the 
dinners, his white chef’s hat above a beaded brow; the quarter- 
master, stripped to the waist, stands at the wheel; the navigator 
is taking his midday sights upon the bridge; while on either bow 
flying-fish skim away from the oncoming vessel. 

For a time there was talk of a reprieve for the dear old ship; 
she might become a drill vessel for the Royal Naval Volunteer 
Reserve. She was inspected with this end in view but she was 
done; her hull had worn paper thin below, the upperworks were 
rusting beyond repair, and rust too was thrusting its way through 
the timbers of her deck. Twenty-two years is not a great age for 
a ship, but she had lived hard. 

‘Approval has now been given for H.M.S. Challenger to be 
handed over to the British Iron & Steel Corporation for scrap’, 
ran Admiralty Acquaint Notice 4195, dated 7th December, 1953. 
Blunt and materialistic was the epitaph written by those who had 
never known her, but Challenger’s true epitaph is carried in the 
titles of her many charts. 


1931-32 
1932 

1932-35 
1935739 
ew imsie) 
1939-42 
1942 

1942-44 
1944 

1944-46 
1946-48 
1948-49 
1949-50 
1950-51 
1951-53 


APPENDIX 


CHALLENGER’S CAPTAINS 
(Ranks and decorations when holding the appointment) 


LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER E, H. B. BAKER 
Captain A. L. JACKSON 

COMMANDER A. G. N. Wyatt 
COMMANDER ALUN JONES 
COMMANDER E. H. B. Baker 
COMMANDER W. C, Jenks, O.B.E. 
LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER R. Bitt, D.S.O. 
CapTaIn A. G. N. Wyatt 
LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER R. Bi11, D.S.O. 
COMMANDER C, W. SaBINE, O.B.E. 
CapTaINn R. M. SOUTHERN 

COMMANDER J. M. SHARPEY-SCHAFER 
COMMANDER R, Birt, D.S.O. 
COMMANDER G. S. RitcuiE, D.S.C. 


COMMANDER W. AsHTon, D.S.C. 


242 


Index 


(* Denotes Captains of H.M.S. Challenger) 


Abadan, 162 

Abel, Stoker Mechanic, 195-196, 219 

Aberdeen, ro1 

Aberdeenshire, 7 

Achpitok Island, Labrador, 14, 55 

Adak, Aleutians, 203 

Addison, Dr., Minister of Agriculture and 
Fisheries, 2 

Addison, Miss, 2 

Addu Atoll, 128 

Aden, 163-164, 169 

Aegean Sea, 237 

Africa, East, 127, 129, 134, 169 

Africa, West, tos, 112, 124, 127, 129 

Agriculture and Fisheries, Ministry of, 1-3 

Al Bushirya, Persian Gulf, 159 

Albatross, varieties of, 204-205, 209-210 

Albatross expedition, 186, 188 

Albreda, Gambia River, 120-121 

Alert Bay, B.C., 198 

Aleutian Islands 203 

Allack, Job, 49 

Angoorli, Mr., 163 

Anselm, s.s., 106-110 

Antarctic Ocean, 55, 225-226 

Arakan coast, 140-142 

Arctic Ocean, 225 

Argus, H.M.S., 94 

*Ashton, Lieutenant-Commander W., 
R.N. (later Commander), 163-168, 
171-173, 176 

Athens, 237 

Athos, Mount, 237 

Atlantic Ocean, 7-9, 113, 123, 190-193, 
226, 236, 237, 239-240 

Auckland, New Zealand, 208, 219 

Aulatsevik, Labrador, 16, 52, 59 

Azores, 111 


Baffin Bay, 225 

Baffin Land, 56 

Bahrein, 77, 156-159, 162, 168, 177, 178 

Bahrein, Sheikh of, 77, 157 

Baillie apparatus, 226-227, 229 

*Baker, Lieutenant-Commander E. H. B., 
R.N. (‘Buck’) (later Captain), 2-5, 
26, 36-37, 39-43, 45-49, 51-53, 
55-59, 72; 76, 81, 209 

Balfour, Captain Andrew, R.N., 227, 232 

Baltic Sea, 186 


Banda, 152 

Banks, Mr., 146 

Barbados, 72 

Barbour, Able Seaman Harry, 99-100 

Basra, 162-163 

Bathurst, 106, 113-114, 122-123 

Beagle, H.M.S., 143 

Bean, Miss Lucy, 135 

Belle Isle, 11 

Bengal, Bay of, 128 

Bennett, Sam, 198 

Bermuda, 71, 190-193 

Big Bay, Labrador, 56 

*Bill, | Lieutenant-Commander Robin, 
R.N. (later Commander), 127, 137, 
147, 190 

Bingham, Surgeon Lieutenant-Commander 

E. W., R.N. (‘Doc’) (later Surgeon 

Captain), 26, 32-33, 36-37, 42-43, 
45-46, 49, 53, 55-56 

Black Bear Island, Labrador, 11 

Black Island, Labrador, 52 

Black Point, Labrador, 56 

Blackwall, East India Dock, 1o1 

Blackwood, Captain, 146 

Bombale Kana, Gambia River, 121 

Booby Island, Torres Strait, 146, 151-152 

Borneo, North, 155 

Bridges Run, Labrador, 54-55 

Bristol Channel, 86 

British Columbia, 195-200 

Brooke apparatus, 226 

Brunei Bay, 155 

Buchan Deep, 7 

Buck, Sir Peter, 202 

Burma, 137, 155 


Cairo, 77 

California, University of, Scripps Institute 
of Oceanography at, 194, 232 

California Standard Oil Company, 77 

Cambridge, University of, Department of 
Geodesy and Geophysics at, 186 

Canada, 91, 182 

Cape Harrigan, 13, 23 

Cape Johnson, U.S.S., 228 

Cape Johnson depth, 228 

Cape of Good Hope, 113, 127-128, 134— 
136 

Cape Town, 133, 135-136 


244 


Cape York Peninsula, 146 

Caribbean Sea, 72, 240 

Carriacou, 27—30, 58, 60-61, 65 

Cartwright, Labrador, 32, 58-59 

Cathay, merchant cruiser, 110-111 

Celerol, H.M.S., 71 

Central Island, Labrador, 52 

Ceylon, 24, 128, 136, 144, 155; Survey 
of, 137 

Challenger, H.M.S.: Captains, see Ashton, 
Baker, Bill, Jackson, Jenks, Jones, 
Ritchie, Sabine, Sharpey-Schafer, 
Southern and Wyatt; planning and 
construction of ship, 1-2; launching 
and naming, 2-3; first crew, 3-5; 
equipment, 4-7, 57, 84, 148, 178; 
‘bottling stations’, 8—9; Labrador 
survey, 8, I1—23, 26, 30-59, 60; 
West Indies survey, 26-30, 57-58, 
60-70; Trinidad surveys, 70-72; 
Arabian survey (Muhammad Qol), 
73-82; war channels survey, 83-84; 
Thames tidal stream survey, 84; 
armaments fitted, 84; Scottish survey, 
85-90; Icelandic survey, 90-97; 
voyage in convoy to East India Dock, 
g8—101; in bombardment of London, 
IOI-103;_ refits, 101-103, 124, 
133-136, 145, 163, 167, 177, 208; 
Londonderry surveys, 103-1043 voy- 
age to West Africa and Battle of the 


Atlantic, 105-112; Gambia River 
survey, 113-123; Indian Ocean 
surveys, 125-144; Torres Strait 
survey, 147-155; Trincomalee sur- 


vey, 155; Singapore survey, 155; 
Saigon, Hong-Kong, North Borneo 
and Sarawak surveys, 155; Persian 
Gulf surveys, 156-177; in Cyprus, 
163, 167, 237; Cyprus survey, 
178-184; seismic experiments, see 
under; world cruise begins, 185— 
190; in Bermuda, 190-193; in 
Kingston, Jamaica, 193; in San Diego, 
194; in British Columbia, 195—200; 
in Hawaii, 201-203; in North 
Pacific, 203-206; in Japan, 206-207, 
233-235; en route to Aegean, 237; 
voyage home to Portsmouth, 237—- 
240; ship paid off, 240; handed over 
for scrap, 241; Royal Marines in, 
see Crowford, Laws and Lyons 

Challenger expedition of 1872-1876, 1, 
202, 215, 226-227 

Challenger Cove, 43 

Challenger Rock, 23 

Chatham, 1, 3-4, 139, 158, 188, 190, 240 

Chidley, Cape, 11 


INDEX 


China Sea, 137 

Chinnco, Lt. William, R.N., 25 

Chittagong, 140 

Clarke, Captain, 10-11, 14 

Clarke, Mr., of Hudson Bay Company, 
31, 39, 42 

Clarke, Mrs., 39 

Clausing, Captain, of California Standard 
Oil Company, 77 

Clyde, 86, 106 

Cockade, H.M.S., 163 

Coconut Island, Torres Strait, 154 

Cocos-Keeling Islands, 142-144 

Cole, Lieutenant-Commander, 
133 

Colombo, 128, 136-139, 143-144, 155, 
237 

Connell, Lieutenant T., 
Captain), 92 

Contest, H.M.S., 163 

Cook, Captain, 146, 151, 209 

Cooper, Surgeon Lieutenant W. A. B., 
R.N.V.R., 109 

Coral Reef Committee, Royal Society’s, 
215-217 

Cornwall, H.M.S., 128 

Cornwallis, s.s., 65 

Cox’s Bazaar, Arakan coast, 140-142 

Croome, Lieutenant E. E., R.N. (‘Trap- 
per’) (later Lieutenant-Commander), 
143-144, 161, 163 

Crowford, Sergeant, R.M., 126, 131, 133, 
135, 139 

Culmore, 103-104 

Curacao, H.M.S., 98 

Currents, ocean system of, 7-8, 63-64 

Cypress Sands, Naaf River, 140-141 

Cyprus, 163, 167, 178-184, 237 


R.N.R., 


R.N. (later 


Daimmiyat Islands, Persian Gulf, 158 

Dakar, 113, 120, 232 

Dalrymple Island, Torres Strait, 146 

Dampier, Seaman, 7 

Darwin’s atoll construction theory, 143, 
215-216, 224 

Davis Inlet, Labrador, 14, 30, 56 

Dawa, Head Man of, 76 

Deane, Lieutenant Dennis W., R.N. (later 
Lieutenant-Commander), 26, 36, 40— 
43, 45-47, 49, 51-52, 56, 58, 60 

Dehra Dun, 137 

Delhi, 140 

Denham, Captain H. N., R.N., 25 

Denmark Strait, 96 

Devil Point, Gambia River, 121 

Devonport, 4 

Devonport, New Zealand, 228 

Doctor Forbes Air Survey, 19 


INDEX 


Dog Island, Labrador, 14 

Dogo, Matsuyama, 206 

Doha, Qatar, 157-160, 164-165, 167, 
169, 172, 177 

Dohat as Salwa, Bay of, 157, 177 

Dominica, 70 

Domino Run, 23 

Dorsetshire, H.M.S., 128 

Douglas, Rear-Admiral H. P., 1 

Dover, 83 

Dungeness, 84 

Durraween, H.M.A.S., 147 


Echuca, H.M.A.S., 148 

Edgell, Vice-Admiral Sir John, 103, 123, 
147 

Egeria, H.M.S., 197-198 

Egypt, 74-75 

E] Alito, oil tanker, 86 

Ellice Islands, 214-224 

Elliott, Captain Andrew, Merchant Navy, 
110 and n. 

Emden, German ship, 228 

Endeavour, H.M.S., 124 

‘Engby, s.s., 142 

English Channel, 6 

Ephraim, 47 

Erebus, H.M.S., 225 

Eros, s.s., 98-101 

Essau, Gambia River, 119-120 

Esther, river steamer, 140-141 

Europa Island, 129 

Evans, Dr., 212 

Eyjafjord, Iceland, 96 


Fadiffolu Atoll, 138-139 

Fair Isle Channel, 7 

Famagusta, 179-180 

Fao, 162 

Farmyard Islands, Labrador, 13 

Faroes, 89-90, 96 

Fasht al Arrif, Persian Gulf, 
161, 164 

Fasht al Odaid, 161 

Fiji, 210-211, 213 

FitzRoy, Captain, R.N., 143 

Flinders, H.M.S., 60 

Fly, H.M.S., 146-147, 151-152 

Fongafale, Ellice Islands, 214, 219 

Ford, Joe, 53 

Ford, Willie, 53 

Ford’s Harbour, Labrador, 20, 22, 31 

Formidable, H.M.S., 128 

Fort Garry, Hudson Bay Company schooner, 


I§J-159; 


56 
Franklin, H.M.S., 90-91 
Fraserburgh, 101 
Freestone Islands, Labrador, 14 


24.5 


Freetown, I11 

Friday Island, Torres Strait, 154 

Fry, Amos, 56 
Funafuti, Ellice Islands, 214-220, 223-224 


Galatea, Danish research ship, 228 

Gambia, 114, 120 

Gambia River, 106, 113, 115-122 

Gaskell, Dr. T., 189, 200, 206, 217, 220, 
222-224, 225, 233, 236 

Gibraltar, 73, 163, 167-168, 177, 237 

Gillingham, Mr., 43, 45-46 

Goo, Mr. Ducky, 202 

Good, H., Lieutenant Engineer, R.N., 23 

Goolgwai, H.M.A.S., 147 

Gordon, Lieutenant-Commander D. L., 
R.N. (‘General’) (later Commander), 
93, 102-103, 134, 163-164, 180-184 

Graham Island, B.C., 196 

Grattan, Lieutenant Charles, R.N. (later 
Commander), 140-141, 158, 161, 163 

Greenock, 105 

Greenshields, Petty Officer J. (later Chief 
Petty Officer), 127, 140-142, 189, 
229 

Grenada, 27—28, 58, 65, 67-69 

Grenadines, 26-30, 57-58, 60-70 

Grenfell Mission, 13, 32 

Griffiths, Lieutenant R. H., R.N. (later 
Lieutenant-Commander), 61 

Grubb, Mr., of Moravian Mission, 31, 
39, 42, 52, 56 

Grubb, Mrs., 39 

Guardian, H.M.S., 90 


Halifax, 20, 23, 30, 33, 58-59 

Hall, Lieutenant G. P. D., R.N. (later 
Commander), 93, 95-96 

Hamaya, Japanese interpreter, 233, 235 

Hampson, Leading Seaman, 36 

Hare, Mr., 143 

Harvey, M., Lieutenant-Commander (S), 
165 

Harwich, 83 

Hat Islands, Persian Gulf, 159-160 

Hawaii, 200, 201-203 

Hay, Lady, 162 

Hay, Sir Rupert, 158, 162 

Hebron, 42-43, 47-50, 51 

Heliotrope, H.M.S., 23 

Hen and Chicken Islands, Labrador, 59 

Herald, H.M.S., 25 

Hermes, H.M.S., 128 

Hess, Dr. H. H., 228 

Heysham, 127, 151 

Hillsborough, Carriacou, 30, 58, 60 

Hilo, Hawaii, 202 

Hiroshima, 207 


246 


Hofdi promontory, Iceland, 92 

Holgate, Officers’ Steward, 36 

Hong-Kong, 91, 155, 233, 236 

Honolulu, 201-203; Bernice P. Bishop 
Museum at, 202 

Honshu, 205, 233 

Hood, H.M.S., 96 

Hope, Stoker Mechanic, 194-196, 219 

Hopedale, Labrador, 11, 13, 33, 55-56 

Horizon, U.S.S., 232 

Horta, Azores, 111 

Houot, Lieutenant-Commander Nicolas, 
French Navy, 232 

Hoxa Sound, 90 

Hrutafjord, Iceland, 96 

Hudson Bay Company, 30-31, 36, 39, 
42, 46-48, 56, 197 

Humber, 83 

Hurricane ‘Doris’, 191 

Hurricane ‘Effie’, 192-193 

Hyvalfjord, Iceland, 90-92, 94, 96 

Hydrographer of the Navy, 1-2, 7, 24~-26, 
103, 123; see also Douglas, Edgell, 
Southern (Assistant Hydrographer) 
and Wyatt 


Iceland, 37, 89-97, 98, 102, 104, 127 

Iceland-Faroe Channel, 96 

India, 136, 162; Survey of, 137 

Indian Harbour, Labrador, 11 

Indian Ocean, 125-144, 146, 155, 178, 
236, 239 

Invergordon, 98 

Iraq Petroleum Company, 157-158 

Irish Sea, 86 

Iron Bound Islands, Labrador, 13 

Troquois, H.M.S., 4, 240 

Islay, Sound of, 87 

Itibliasuk, Labrador, 47, 49 


*Jackson, Captain A. L., R.N. (later 
Rear-Admiral), 5, 7 

Jane Victoria, schooner, 65 

Japan, 205-206, 225, 229, 233-235 

Japan Trench, South Pacific, 226, 228, 232 

Japanese Fleet, 128, 136, 140 

Jazirat Safliya, Qatar, 165 

*Jenks, Commander W. C., R.N., 84-87, 
91-93, 95-97, 99, 101, 103-110, 
TI4-115, 117-121, 124, 127 

Jesselton, 155 

Jezirat Halul, Persian Gulf, 167, 178 

*Jones, Lieutenant-Commander Alun, 
R.N. (later Commander), 60, 64-65, 
68-70, 72 


Kamaran, Red Sea, 169 
Kandy, 137 


INDEX 


Kasban Creek, Gambia River, 121 

Kauk Harbour, Labrador, 33 

Kayaksuatlik, Labrador, 13 

Kermadec Trench, South Pacific, 209, 227, 
232 

Khamis bin Hilal, Sheikh of Masira, 75—76 

Khor, 169-172; Sheikh of, 172-173, 176 

Khor Kaliya, 77 

Khor Shaqqiq, 169-170, 177 

Kidlialiut, Labrador, 13 

Kiglerpait Mountains, Labrador, 43, 45, 
49-50 

Kikkertaksoak Islands, Labrador, 13 

Kikkitavak, Labrador, 15 

Kilauea, Hawaii, 202 

Kilindini, 128-129, 131, 133-135 

Kingston, Jamaica, 193-194. 

Kingstown, St. Vincent, 65, 67—69 

Kinkujung, Gambia River, 119 

Kinnaird Head, 98 

Kirsopp, Officers’ Cook, 235 

Kirkwall, 87, 89 

Kofe, Chief Clerk, 215, 220 

Kristiansson, Bragi, 91-92 

Kruger Island, Labrador, 40 

Kuching, 155 

Kunghit Island, B.C., 195-196 

Kunkudella, Gambia River, 119 

Kuntaur, Gambia River, 121-123 

Kutallik Island, Labrador, 14 

Kure, Honshu, 205, 233 

Kuril Islands, 226 

Kurukuluk, Labrador, 45-46, 49 

Kyle, Newfoundland steamer, 32, 55-56, 
58-59 

Kyle Akin, 89 

Kyrenia, 183 


Labrador, 7-8, 10-23, 26, 28, 30-59, 
60, 91, 127, 147, 200 

Labuan, 155 

Latra Sibige, Gambia River, 119 

Lavender, H.M.S., 105 

Laws, Corporal, R.M., 126, 131-133, 
135, 139 

Learmouth, Captain, R.N. (later Rear- 
Admiral), 198 

Leeward Islands, 72 

Limassol, 180-181 

Little Martinique, 28 

Little St. Vincent, 28, 58, 64 

Liverpool Bay, 86 

Lizard, 86 

London, bombardment of, 102-103 

Londonderry, 103-104, 124, 240 

Long, Petty Officer Charles (later Chief 
Petty Officer), 127, 137, 145 

Lough Foyle, 103 


INDEX 


Lough Larne, 104 

Lucas, 45 

Lyons, Corporal, R.M., 126, 131-133, 
135, 139 


Macmillan, 56 

Mahé, Seychelles, 136-137 

Malacca Straits, 137 

Malaya, 136, 155 

Malta, 237 

Manama, Persian Gulf, 77, 159 

Mandinari, Gambia River, 119 

Manus, New Guinea, 207, 
229 

Manza Bay, 133 

Marianas Trench, South Pacific, 224-226, 
228, 230, 232 

Marie Louise Mackay, cable ship, 86 

Marlowe, Able Seaman, 36, 41, 52 

Marshall, Able Seaman (later Chief Petty 
Officer), 36, 39 

Mary Nolander, schooner, 56-57 

Masira Island, 75, 77 

Sheikh of, see Khamis bin Hilal 

Massie, Mr., 47-48 

Matthews, Dr. D. J., of Hydrographic 
Department, 8 

Mauna Loa, Hawaii, 202 

Maungdaw, 142 

Maury, Lieutenant, U.S.N., 226 

Maury, U.S.S., 168 

Mayatib Island, Red Sea, 80 

McKenna, Able Seaman Charles, 99—100 

Mediterranean Sea, 74, 113, 178, 185, 
232521216 

Medway, 103, 125 

Mendora Creek, Gambia River, 121 

Menzies, Lieutenant-Commander Henry, 
R.N. (later Captain), 70, 105 

Mesquite, U.S.S., 155 

Metcalfe, Willie, 46—47 

Milford Haven, 89 

Miller, Surgeon Lieutenant Sloan, R.N., 
76-77 

Minnie B., American schooner, 32 

Monaco, International Hydrographic 
Bureau at, 9 

Mokkovik Island, 13 

Mombasa, 131, 133, 135 

Monro, Squadron Leader, 109 

Montrose, H.M.S., 86 

Moore, Sub-Lieutenant J. E., R.N. (later 
Commander), 131, 232 Nn. 

Moravian Mission, 39 

Moray Firth, 98 

Moresby, H.M.A.S., 147 

Mortimer Shoal, Labrador, 12-13 

Motor Launch No. 1248, 144 


Tole eM 


247 


Mountbatten, Lord Louis, 142 

Mozambique Channel, 129, 134 

Muara, 155 

Mugford Range Mountains, Labrador, 47 

Muhammad Qol, 79-82 

Mulgrave, Lord, Arctic Expedition of 
19735 225 

Mull, Sound of, 87 

Murray’s atoll construction theory, 215- 
216 

Muscat, 75, 79, 156 

Sultan of, 75 


Naaf River, 140-142 

Nain, Il, 13, 16-17, 20, 30-33, 35-36, 
38-44, 48-53, 55-56, 58-59 

Nanpo Shoto Islands, 204 

Nathan, 45 

Natural History, British Museum of, 230 

New Caledonia, 208 

New Guinea, 146, 207 

New Zealand, 208—209, 227-228 

Newfoundland, 7, 10-11, 16, 23, 32, 56, 
58-59 

Newfoundland Bank, Great, 190 

Nguva, H.M. Yacht, 144 

Nianmaru, Gambia River, 121 

Nicosia, 181-182 

Niumi, Lower, 119-120 

Seyfu of, see Nomandu Sonko 
Niumi, Upper, 120 
Seyfu of, 120 

Noazunaluk, Labrador, 52 

Nochalik, Labrador, 14 

Nomandu Sonko, Seyfu of Lower Niumi, 
I19—120 

Nore, The, 3 

North Sea, 7 

Norway, 89 

Nova Scotia, 30 

Nukufetau, Ellice Islands, 220, 223-224 

Nunaksaluk, Labrador, 13 

Nutak, Labrador, 42-43, 46-47, 49 

Nuvutannak, 58 


Oahu, Island of, Honolulu, 202 

Oman, 75-76 

Ominato, Honshu, 233-235 

O’Neill, Lieutenant B. G., R.N. (latet 
Commander), 93, 95, 99-100 

Oom, Lieutenant-Commander 
R.A.N. (later Commander), 147 

Orkneys, 87 

Owen, Captain, R.N., 121 


Karl, 


Pacific Ocean, 7, 146, 194, 201-206, 208, 
QlO; 2A, 227, 2128) 230, .232,) 236, 
238, 240-241 


248 


Paisley, Lieutenant J., R.N. (later 
Lieutenant-Commander), 115-116 

Palk Straits, Indian Ocean, 136, 142 

Palungitak Island, Labrador, 15 

Panagonjak, Ama, 43, 45 

Panama Canal, 72, 194 

Paria, Gulf of, 70, 72 

Parkivik Point, Labrador, 46 

Patricia, Trinity House vessel, 84, 96 

Paul Island, Labrador, 15-16 

Pearl Harbour, 201, 203 

Penguin, H.M.S., 215, 227 

Pentland Firth, 98 

Persian Gulf, 156-167, 168-177, 178- 
179, 185 

Peters, Hudson Bay Company trader, 56 

Pettersen, Professor Hans, 186 

Petunia, H.M.S., 105 

Philippine Trench, South Pacific, 228, 232 

Piccard, Professor Auguste, 232 

Planet, German ship, 228 

Plymouth, 6, 84-86, 89 

Polaris, seine net fishing vessel, 147 

‘Port A’, West Coast of Scotland, 85-87, 
89 

Port Manvers, 16-17, 59; Port Manvers 
Run, 16-17, 19, 35, 43, 59 

Port of Spain, Trinidad, 30, 71-72 

Port Reitz, 129 

Port Said, 74, 237 

Port Simpson, B.C., 197-198 

Port Victoria, Seychelles, 136 

Portavogie, S.s., 86 

Portsmouth (‘Pompey’), 3-5, 7-8, 23, 
34, 57, 59 ©J, J, 72, 82, 89, 155, 
188, 237-240 

Portsmouth, W.I., 70 

Preston, Surgeon Lieutenant F. S., 
R.N.V.R. (later Surgeon Lieutenant- 
Commander), 164-165, 176 

Prien, Lieutenant-Commander, 
Navy, 90 

Puerto Rico, 72 

Punta Delgada, 111, 240 

Pyrgos, 183 


German 


Qatar, 156-161, 164-165, 167, 170, 177, 


179 
Sheikh of, 77, 156-159, 172 
Quebec, 59 
Queen Charlotte Islands, B.C., 195-196 


Ragged Islands, Labrador, 11 
Ramapo, U.S.S., 228 
Ramzam, Hassan, 76 

Ras at Tannura, 77, 79, 157 
Red Sea, 4, 79-80, 169, 179 
Reher, Mr., 217, 219 


INDEX 


Repulse, H.M.S., 96 

Revelle, Dr., 194 

Reydarfjord, Iceland, 96 

Reykjavik, 91, 94-97 

*Ritchie, Commander G. S. (later 
Captain), 182, 190-192, 197-199, 
201-202, 206—213, 21§—222, 230, 240 

Rizo-Karpaso, 182-183 

Rookah Channel, Persian Gulf, 162 

Ross, Captain, 143 

Ross, Sir James Clark, Antarctic Expedi- 
tion of 1839-1843, 225-226 

Ross, Sir John, Baffin Bay voyage of 
1817-1818, 225 

Rosyth, 240 

Rotuma, 210-213 

Royal Oak, H.M.S., 87, 90 

Round Island, Torres Strait, 152 

Rutherford, Surgeon Lieutenant P. T., 
R.N.V.R. (later Surgeon Lieutenant- 
Commander), 160, 164, 181-182 


*Sabine, Commander C. W., R.N., 151 

Sabine, tug, 101 

Saigon, 155 

St. George’s, Grenada, 27-28, 58, 65, 67, 
71 

St. James Island, Gambia River, 121-122 

St. John’s, Newfoundland, 7, 10, 16, 32 

St. Lucia, 69 

St. Martin’s Island, Indian Ocean, 141 

St. Vincent, W.I., 65-69 

Salekine Point, Gambia River, 121 

Samuel Benbow, H.M.A.S., 147 

San Diego, 194 

San Miguel, 111 

Sararat, 80 

Sarawak, 155 

Satosoakkuluk, Labrador, 38 

Saudi Arabia, 77, 157, 168 

Scaale Fjord, Faroes, 90 

Scapa Flow, 87, 89-91 

Scotland, West Coast of, 85-86, 89 

Scott, H.M.S., 84 

Scripps Institute of Oceanography, see 
California 

Seismic experiments, 186-188, 215-216, 
222-224, 225, 236-237, 239 

Senegal, 114, 121 

Seychelles, 136-138, 237 

Seydisfjord, Iceland, 96 

Seymour Narrows, B.C., 198 

*Sharpey-Schafer, Commander J. M., 
R.N., 111-112, 168 

Shatt el Arab, 162 

Sheerness, 84, 103, 124-127 

Shetlands, 89-90, 240 

Shikoku Island, 206 


INDEX 


Shoal Tickle, Labrador, 56 

Simeon, Lieutenant-Commander G., R.N., 
182-184, 195 

Singapore, 155; Keppel Harbour, 155 

Sitrah, Persian Gulf, 158 

Smith, Mr., Hudson Bay Company trader, 
42-43, 45-46 

Sombrero Channel, 72 

Somerville, Admiral Sir James, 5, 6, 129 

Soulsby, Leading Sick Berth Attendant, 
189, 196, 219 

Southampton, 73 

*Southern, Captain R. M. (‘Sam’), R.N., 
158—161,164, 167-168, 179-180, 182 

Spithead, 89 

Spracklings Island, Labrador, 14 

Start Point, 85 

Starwort, H.M.S., 105, 109, I11 

Stevenson, Petty Officer, 26, 36, 42-43, 


45, 49 
Striped Island, Labrador, 13 
Stuart, Rear Admiral C., 134 
Suez, Bay of, 75 
Suez Canal, 74 
Sullom Voe, Shetlands, 89 
Sumatra, 142 
Sunda Straits, 236 
Suva Fiji, 210 
Swallow, John, 189-190, 205, 222, 224, 
225, 236, 239 
Switha Sound, 90 
Sydney, 145, 147 


Table Bay, 128 

Taktok Tickle, Labrador, 15 

Tangier, 168 

Taunton, Hydrographic Supplies Establish- 
ment at, 126 

Te Aute, Hawkes Bay, N.Z., 208 

Tek Naaf, Naaf River, 140, 142 

Telemachus, H.M. Submarine, 232 n. 

Terror, H.M.S., 225 

Thames Estuary, 83-84 

Thompson, Colonel, 169 

Thomson, Lieutenant J., R.N. (later 
Lieutenant-Commander), 151-154 

Thursday Island, Torres Strait, 148, 151, 
154 

Tilbury, 103 

Tikkerasuk Light, Labrador, 13, 43 

Tobago Cays, 60 

Tobermory, 127 

Tokyo Bay, 204 

Tonga Trench, South Pacific, 232 

Torch, H.M. Steam Tender, 25 

Torres Strait, 146-154, 240; North-East 
Channel, 147, 148, 153-154; Prince 
of Wales Channel, 148 


249 


Trincomalee, 128, 136, 139-140, 144, 165 

Trinidad, 30, 58, 65-66, 7o 

Trinity House, 83-84, 96 

Tripp, Lieutenant-Commander R. T., 
R.N. (later Commander), 138, 147 

Trucial Coast, 156, 158 

Tuglavina, Renatus, 42-43, 48-49, 51, 
58-59 

Tuglavina, Willie, 47, 49 

Tuktuinak Islands, Labrador, 14 

Tunnungayualuk, Labrador, 14 

Turkey, 183-184 

Turnaviks, Labrador, 13 

Tuscarora, U.S.S., 226 

Tyrell Bay, Grenadines, 65 


Udlik Point, Labrador, 46 
Ukasiksalik Island, Labrador, 14 
Ulgoklialuit Island, Labrador, 13 
Umm Said, 164, 177 


Vancouver Island, 195, 198—200 
Venezuela, 70 

Victoria, B.C., 189, 199 

Vidal, H.M.S., 240 

Vigilant, H.M.A.S., 147 

Virgin Islands, 72 

Voisey, Amos, 56-57 

Voisey, Henry, 36, 43, 45-46, 51-52 
Voisey, John, 55 


Waldo, 55 

Warspite, H.M.S., 128 

Watts, Major, 75-76 

Webeck Harbour, Labrador, 11 

West Indies, 8, 23, 26, 70, 72 

White Bear, H.M.S., 145, 155 

Wight, Isle of, 73 

Willebord Snellius, Dutch ship, 228 

Willingara, Gambia River, 119 

Willm, Engineer Henri, French Navy, 232 

Windward Isles, 27, 65-66, 69, 723 
Governor of, 27, 65, 69 

Windy Tickle, Labrador, 13, 56 

Winter, seine net fishing vessel, 147 

Wiseman, Dr. J. D. H., 230 

Wrecked Boat Island, Labrador, 13-14 

Wren, H.M.S., 164 

*Wyatt, Admiral A. G. N. (later Sir Guy), 
J, 10, 13-14, 20, 23, 26, 32, 57> 
60, 127, 129-134, I 36-1 39, 142, 
145, 147, 158 

Wyre Lighthouse, Heysham, 151 

Wyville Thomson, Dr. (later Sir), 176 


York Harbour, Newfoundland, 23 


Zubara, Fort, Persian Gulf, 159 


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