Franck was called up to the Royal Navy in 1943 and assigned to serve on a Arromanches Merchant Navy ship. This was an Estonian cargo ship in Hull, armed with two 20mm anti-aircraft guns and an old 12 pounder. They sailed in a 6-knot convoy to Canada which took eleven days. On arrival in Canada they experienced great hospitality before sailing back to Belfast. He was then transferred to an ex-Danish vessel based in Cardiff that was being modified to carry troops and ammunition for the Normandy invasion. It was partly crewed by Puerto Rico stevedores serving in the US armed forces. The US infantry on board impressed Franck with their fatalistic defiance, their attitude being that they were not coming back and they just had to seize their objectives on the beach whatever the cost. On arrival at Omaha beach they began to ferry troops and ammunition ashore, using DUKW amphibians. Only one of these vehicles returned to the ship. From his vantage point on board Franck could see the course of the assault and observed how the US troops persisted in the attack, despite taking heavy casualties as they disembarked. In Mumbai on his next posting they got news of the dropping of the Atom bomb to end the war and celebrated with free beer. At the time, as a young man, the whole thing seemed like a big adventure. Looking back on these events he recalls the waste of life and the single-mindedness of the American troops.

Megan Moir joined the WRNS (Women's Royal Naval Service) aged 18 in December 1944. After brief training she went to Larne in Northern Ireland, but soon had the rare opportunity to join HMS Philante, a former luxury yacht which was used to train warships involved in anti-submarine work, with submarines acting as U-boats. They sailed to the naval base at the Kyle of Lochalsh opposite Skye, where she spent the rest of the war typing training instructions and training results. After the war she typed up reports in German following the surrender of U-boats there. She recalls her excitement when offered the chance to go to sea at 10 minutes notice, because very few WRENS went to sea; she vividly recalls being on the bridge, where she could see what was happening. She only stayed onboard one night; the rest of the time she slept in the “Wrenery”, where she enjoyed socialising in the common room with fellow WRENS and visitors. She narrates many fascinating anecdotes, including the celebrations for VE- and VJ-Day.

Lewis Trinder joined the Royal Navy on his 18th birthday in 1942, as his father had done before him. After training he went to sea on HMS Fleetwood, an escort ship based at Gibraltar. The ship was used in convoys to West Africa. On his second convoy a stricken U-Boat U528 was spotted by an aircraft and Fleetwood located it and released depth charges forcing it to the surface where it was shelled. Fleetwood took on board the surviving 45 crew. After Fleetwood was sent for a refit, Trinder joined HMS Magpie as a plotter. Magpie was a convoy escort ship in both the Atlantic and Arctic, before being used on assault convoys in the English Channel for D Day. In August 1944 the ship was used to clearing a path across the Channel for laying a fuel line from the Isle of Wight to Cherbourg as part of Operation PLUTO. After this Magpie was stood down for a refit in November 1944 and Trinder joined HMS Opossum which was sent to the Far East, joining the British Pacific Fleet and was deployed on patrol duties based out of Hong Kong. Trinder opted to be demobbed in 1946 and retuned to the UK.