A few months after World War II began, Frank Wilson enlisted in the Royal Navy. He completed 10 weeks of training at HMS Collingwood and continued at HMS Wellesley in Liverpool, where he trained as an anti-aircraft gunner. Frank was then stationed on HMS Activity, a 14,000-ton ship, posted to the forward starboard side operating the anti-aircraft guns. He fondly recalls Captain Willoughby as an absolute gentleman. While training, Frank remembers being held in the harbour at Greenock when HMS Dasher exploded and sank in the Clyde in March 1943, with 379 out of 528 crewmen lost. He saw the smoke and heard about the sea being afire with aviation fuel. Frank’s first Russian Convoy was extremely cold, with temperatures below 50 degrees. He was part of the team escorting battleships Royal Sovereign and Missouri. On another trip, he witnessed HMS Bluebell get hit by a torpedo from the German submarine U-711 in the Barents Sea, where only one person survived. In Russia, Frank saw the hunger and gave food to the locals whenever he could. The Activity had to keep moving in dangerous waters to avoid being an easy target for the Germans. Frank was part of 20 different convoys, traveling in the Arctic, Atlantic, and Mediterranean. After serving on The Activity, he was transferred to HMS Berwick and sent to the Far East. In Singapore, he visited HMS Activity again to celebrate the end of the war with his old friends.  

Aged 14 when WWII broke out, Gladys spent the early war years in Gillingham, Kent. Gladys frequently sought refuge at home or in shelters when bombs and landmines were dropped on her street. She explains how the war shattered everybody’s lives and deprived young people of their carefree teenage years. At 17, Gladys decided to join the WRNS to contribute to the war effort, following in the footsteps of her Navy and Marine relatives. She trained in Rochester to wait on tables for breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner, before serving at Chatham Barracks as an Officer Steward. She describes her daily routine, getting to know the naval officers, and her friendships and moments of mischief with fellow Wrens. As the war drew to a close, Gladys felt optimistic about the future and was excited for life to return to normal. After peace was declared, local people flocked to see the barracks lights fully illuminated again – a captivating sight that symbolically marked the end of the war’s disruption. Though Gladys sheds light on the difficulties faced by WWII’s teenage generation, she fondly cherishes her memories of her time as a Wren.

With a long-held ambition to join the Navy, Fred Estall keenly awaited the arrival of his call-up papers, which sent him first to Pwllheli in north Wales for initial sea training and then to HMS Wellesley in Liverpool for gun training. He passed out as a DEMS gunner (Defensively Equipped Merchant Ship) and went to Nova Scotia – via HMS Belfast and RMS Queen Mary – to join the crew of a Merchant Navy oil tanker. Fred talks about life on board, describing the extra work available to anyone willing to get his hands dirty – which he always was, not only because he could earn more money, but also because keeping busy helped him keep his mind off the U-boats. He explains the stark difference between the atmosphere of camaraderie in the Royal Navy and the Merchant Navy, and talks about the distinct lack of entertainment onboard a merchant ship. Recalling heavy seas, storms and the huge expanse of ocean, Fred’s memories bring vividly to life what it was like to move from tanker to tanker while the world was at war, keeping allied ships fuelled from 1940 – 1944.