Brian Wood – Forgot that I’d volunteered for the Submarine Service

I still enjoyed my time on there, until we got back in early ’65, and this Draft Chit appeared onboard for me to go to HMS Dolphin. The Chief Stoker said, “What’s this?” He was laughing and he said, “It’s the best place for you. That the Submarine School.”

I thought, “Oh dear no” ‘cos we’d been used to seeing these Submariners out in Malta and they were old, angry, all wizened and all horrible dirty uniforms and things and we used to avoid them, you know, ‘cos they had their Submariner’s Pubs and the Surface Fleet subs and I thought, “I don’t want to mix with that lot, they’re awful.” So, I was drafted to HMS Dolphin.

Simon: What was your feeling when you …?

I wasn’t too happy because I was enjoying myself on the Frigate you know, going all around the Mediterranean, sunning and all, and she was off on lots of other trips when we came back from the Mediterranean. But I joined Dolphin 2 and they asked me, “Who volunteered for submarines” because just prior to ’63, it was all volunteer force, the Submarine Force and you couldn’t join submarines until you were at least 17 ½ years old, but they’d just reduced that because they were now building up all the nuclear submarines. They were still building the last of the P&O Class submarines, and they were desperately short of manpower in submarines. And they sort of ask you when you join, who’s a volunteer, who’s a non-volunteer.

I’m a non-volunteer. Because they used to try and identify people. Is he going to try and fail the Course to go back, which I found out again later. They’d keep their eye on you if you were a non-volunteer ‘cos you had to do the Medical, you had to do lots of exams and things like that. You had to do SETT training and people would try and fail a Medical because it was quite a strict Medical at the time, and anything to get out of joining the submarines.

So, I put my hand up, “I’m a non-volunteer.” “No, you’re not. You volunteered for submarines at HMS Ganges.” I thought, “Oh God” ‘cos my Divisional Officer at HMS Ganges was a Submarine Skipper on a rest period, and I remember him talking to us, saying, “Submarines are the future, we’ve got now the Dreadnought, they’re building the Courageous, the Valliant, all these things, these missile submarines” he said. “That’s what you …” and he started spinning dits about submarines. I thought, “I’m having some of that.” I forgot all about that hadn’t I? He said, “You’re a volunteer.” My world dropped out. I wasn’t too happy. I finished the Submarine Part 2 Training in Dolphin 2 and then drafted down into the main Establishment of Dolphin at the time.