After serving in the Home Guard and experiencing bombing in the blitz in London, Cornelius Snelling was conscripted into the Royal Navy in 1942 and carried out his basic training on HMS Ganges at Shotley. From his port division, Chatham, he was assigned his first posting, as a Bosun’s mate, to a newly commissioned ship docked at Glasgow, HMS Wild Goose, a Black Swan-class sloop. HMS Wild Goose specialised in anti-submarine patrols in the North Atlantic and the Bay of Biscay and Snelling took part in some of the ship's most notable actions, including the renowned "six in one trip" in 1943, which saw HMS Wild Goose, alongside other Bird-class sloops, sink six German U-boats in a single patrol. Snelling’s final journey aboard HMS Wild Goose was participating in an Arctic convoy to Murmansk and he describes the extreme conditions. In 1944, Snelling transferred to HMS Tyler, an American-built frigate on loan to the Royal Navy. HMS Tyler conducted patrol and escort missions in the North Atlantic and the English Channel, where it also escorted landing craft and supply ships during the D-Day invasion of the Normandy beaches. Snelling's service concluded in October 1945 when he steamed with HMS Tyler back to the United States, where the ship was returned to the US Navy.

Alec Victor Ashcroft Pulfer was conscripted into the Royal Navy in August 1939, just before World War II. Despite his reluctance to join the Royal Navy, he decided to see the war through. After four months of signalman training, he joined HMS Javelin in Southend on Sea. He struggled with Morse code but eventually mastered it, finding Morse code and semaphore crucial for his daily duties. In the Battle for Norway, Alec and his crew faced a disaster when their transport ship was torpedoed by the Germans and sank, leaving them unable to save anyone while they hunted the attacking submarine. They retreated to Alesund, where German paratroopers attacked, but HMS Javelin managed to return to England. Unfortunately, HMS Glorious and other ships were not as fortunate. Alec then joined HMS Woolwich, heading to the Mediterranean fleet. After two years in the Mediterranean, HMS Woolwich survived despite losing most of its fleet. Alec returned home for signals training before heading back to the Middle East, where he fought in the Greek civil war, his worst experience. He remembers seeing people die, describing it as very grim, but it was something he got used to. But he never got used to seeing civilians dying, that was a common occurrence in Greece, as the Germans had mined everywhere before they left. Alec was tasked with safely routing ships in and out of Greece. Eventually, the war ended and Alec returned home and was demobbed (released from service).

Alex talks about the first strict days of his Naval training at the shore station of HMS Ganges in Ipswich, and the even stricter regime that followed at Chatham Barracks, recalling the general attitude amongst his peers of ‘just getting on with’ whatever they had to do. His first draft as an ordinary seaman was to HMS Savage, a brand-new ship which he was one of the first to board. Unfortunately for Alex, as soon as he left the shore for the very first time, he was laid low by seasickness which took a fortnight to get over and left him temporarily unable to care if the ship sank or sailed! Alex shares stories from his time on the Russian convoys and the unimaginable hardships the crews endured. He also details close contact with the SS Penelope Barker, as well as Savage’s heroic role in the sinking of the German battleship Scharnhorst: an amazing account made even more incredible when he remembers the moment the Savage turned her guns in the wrong direction… A charming, generous and funny man, Alex’s story is that of a young sailor at sea determined to do his bit, regardless of the dangers and fears he encountered along the way.