Brian Wood – HMS Ganges was an eye opener for a young lad
I had to go to the Recruiting Office in Cardiff. Me and my friend actually went, but he failed the Exam, so off I went on my own.
Oh I just thought I’ll join, they’ll give me a uniform, I go on a ship and then off we’d go round visiting all these foreign Ports. My eyes opened when I joined HMS Ganges, dear me. They soon brought me down a little bit.
Simon: Ganges was where the 15 ½ year olds went for training?
Yeah, older people joined up at Raleigh or St Vincent in Gosport, but us youngsters were all sent to Ganges up in the east coast. It was more like a Borstal more than anything else, but no, it was … they soon sort you a bit of discipline, bit of self-pride, sort of knocked all your old habits that you’d developed up to 15 years old out of you. I quite enjoyed it when I look back but I was the fittest I’ve ever been that’s for sure.
Simon: Is it a sort of short sharp shock idea is it?
Oh yeah. You go into what they call the Annex first which is a little Establishment outside the main Establishment of Ganges. Then you’re there for a couple of weeks, they teach you marching, spit and polish boots so to look after your kit, and then they move across into the main Establishment and that’s when your training begins, and you really have to knuckle down. It’s like back to school and …
Simon: It’s classroom stuff.
Lots of people. Oh yeah, there’s classroom stuff, you did Maths, English, just to try and bring you up if you didn’t have those sort of … as I say I missed a lot of the later part of school so I had to some fairly quick learning. Lots of fitness stuff, lots of marching, lots of people shouting at you doing different routines and looking after your kit, doing kit musters, climbing masts. Lots of sport, which I loved.
So, it was a bit hard at the time but you know, learning to obey people, do as you’re told like now, don’t question it, it’s done for a reason. And then you realise yeah it’s alright isn’t it, let’s knuckle down and get on with it.