Seachanges

David Jackson

Description

The story of David Jackson's voyage of life; on the sea, over the sea and in its depths. Full of anecdotes that will at times bring tears of laughter to your eyes, but sometimes show the dark side of people's personalities. The book is a potted history of traditions, and what life was like on RN ships and in the air.

An unlikely hero, David tells of accidentally torpedoing a British submarine, surviving two helicopter crashes, re-writing the rescue manual after rescuing in 60 ft waves and when engulfed in smoke from a blazing ship during the Falklands war. 

This book tells how, out of humble beginnings, and with a love of the sea, David became the most decorated sailor of his time. Later, he became an instructor of flying and desert survival to Omani Arabs. Eventually, the restless seas drew him back and he again sailed the oceans, this time in his own boat with even more adventures, and as a sailing instructor.  He has again changed direction in life, but has not lost his connection with the sea, producing a revolutionary rescue device, the SeaStrop.

Sujets

• Nautical
• Omán
• Biography
• Search and rescue
• Sailing
• Falklands War
• Autobiography
• Royal Navy
• Oman
• Aviation

Informations

• Publié par: Studio 24 Digital Ltd
• Date de parution: 20 juillet 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781914366642
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

Extrait

Seachanges – Of sea and seafolk
Author: David Jackson
Copyright © David Jackson (2021)
The right of David Jackson to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First Published in 2021
ISBN 978-1-914366-34-5 (Paperback) 978-1-914366-64-2 (Ebook)
Book cover design and Book layout by:
White Magic Studios www.whitemagicstudios.co.uk
Published by:
Maple Publishers
1 Brunel Way,
Slough,
SL1 1FQ, UK www.maplepublishers.com

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or translated by any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission from the author.


Acknowledgements and thanks
This book could not have been written without the help of my good friend Bernard Perry, who spent hours teaching me how to write acceptable English and then not complaining when I forgot. He worked so hard that I deliberately omitted all the embarrassing bits about him…
I also wish to thank all the people who unwittingly gave me things to write about during the last 60 years. I have not mentioned names of the ‘bad guys’ for obvious reasons (although most of them are dead). If I have mentioned your name then you are one of the good guys, which have been in the majority during my life at sea. If you haven’t got a mention then it is because this book is about the sea and you didn’t do anything crazy enough when I was around to notice. Drunken ‘runs ashore’ do not count. Sorry Bob Venables.
Lastly I wish to thank the guys at White Magic Studios for their advice, and forbearing with me when I kept on adding to the ‘finished’ manuscript.
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Forward 1955-57
I don’t want this story (which is as true as I can remember) to be about me, but about the sea, what has happened above, on, and under it, throughout my life. I have never kept a diary, but I did have to keep a flying logbook throughout my aviation years. This may mean that I have made a few errors in dating some of the events, but the events are true. Things often seem to happen when I am around. Maybe I am ‘incident prone’. I was initially thinking that my tale about the sea started when I joined the Royal Navy, but on reflection, my nautical life started in 1955.
My Grandmother, who raised me, worked on the Palace Pier, 30 feet above the sea, in Brighton, every summer season, so it was natural that I would hang around with her during the school holidays. I became well known to the pier crew and when it was realised that I had discovered the technique of how to win a bar of chocolate for one penny on the slot machine, I was in demand by the crew and had pennies pressed into my hand at snack time. I was allowed into all the attractions free and when I was 12 years old I was asked, by David and Katrina Southard, if I would help in odd jobs. David and Katrina were impresarios. They did a mind reading act and had another act of ‘Blondini’, Brighton’s version of Houdini. His act included eating light bulbs, lying on nails and having concrete slabs smashed on his chest etc. Blondini was supposedly buried alive in a glass tank, and it was going to be in it for a month. During the day and evening people would pay sixpence (two and a half pence in today’s currency) to view him entombed.. For two week, things went well but then he was found drunk in a bar in the early hours of one morning. To cover this, a girl was paid to smash the tank, saying ‘I don’t want him to die’!!
I learnt out how to eat glass and razor blades and how to avoid being strangled by 4 men with a rope. Not surprisingly, no one has ever asked me if I was qualified in these things.
The following year I helped them in a sort of peepshow and received half a crown a day; 13p in today’s currency.
When I was 14 years old, they had a new attraction ‘ Nantina, the girl in the tomb’ . Having paid sixpence, you would go into a dark room and eventually found yourself looking through bars at a graveyard scene. The graves were glowing green,(the effect of invisible UV light on ‘sunshine’ paint’) and above and beyond them were the outlines of a large coffin. When sufficient customers were present, the coffin lid slowly started to open, and then dropped closed with a crash. That was good for a few girly screams. Again, the lid creaked open, and this time remain so. After a long pause, from one end of the coffin, came an elongated, green skeleton hand, with red fingernails. From the far end then came the other hand. They stopped, seemingly hovering above the coffin, then, like a pianist’s hands, they moved towards each other and away again, and once more stopped. The hand closest to the audience extended a long, bony finger and pointed at a girl, which got another scream when it slowly beckoned. As this was happened the girls at the front tried to squirm their way towards the back,. hiding behind their companion. Slowly, a hideous, green skeleton face, with flame red hair floated out of the coffin.
That was me, dressed in black and wearing a mask and specially made rubber gloves and I was paid £5 a week.
Near closing time, the more intoxicated punters would come in and some would spit at me, so I bought a water pistol and squirted them back. Occasionally I got carried away and if there was a girl with a low-cut dress she would also be my target. This always got a scream from her and a laugh from her boyfriend. During one performance, I was a bit too exuberant with the water pistol and an irate punter forced his way back to the cash desk, through the incoming crowd, and shouted, ‘I want my money back, that Bloody Mare in there has just pissed all over me’!
David and Katrina liked my performance and tried to talk me out of my dream of joining the navy, and join a show they were arranging, touring South Africa, but they had no hope of doing so. My mind was made up. I was going to be a sailor but the love of theatricals never left me and helped me many times in my future life.
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Chapter 1 HMS St. Vincent, HMS Vernon 2, Gosport. Boys time under training 1958-59
O n April 6th, 1958 a short, skinny, 15 years and 3 month old youth got off the train from Brighton at Portsmouth Harbour station, clutching a cheap attaché case, and looked nervously around. Noticing a gaggle of similar aged boys, who were gathered around an Royal Navy Petty Officer, he approached them and when asked his name replied ‘David Jackson’ and this name was ticked off on the PO’s clip board. The group, when complete, was herded across a floating pontoon in Portsmouth harbour and then onto a harbour launch, which soon cast off its ropes and headed across the harbour to Gosport.
This was my day; the day that I had been waiting and dreaming of for the last 6 years. I was going to become a sailor. The dozens of books that I had read about the sea and the Royal Navy were just history, I was going to become the navy of the future, the person they would write about – or so I imagined.
The trip across the harbour was the first indication that maybe things were not going to be so straightforward as I anticipated; the fumes from the launch’s diesel engine, the overpowering, eye watering, stench from dozens of warships burning FFO (furnace fuel oil) to power their boilers, the smell of tar, paint and a myriad of other substances such as rotting seaweed and sewage, worked with the slight swell produced by wind against current to send me very quickly vomiting over the guardrails. My half-digested Mars bar and egg sandwich which Gran had so carefully prepared, sank to the bottom of the harbour, amalgamating with the detritus of my historical heroes. I knew that Nelson used to be seasick every time he went to sea and crossing Portsmouth harbour was not exactly an ocean voyage, but I hoped that it would count as a point in my favour.
That day I joined HMS St Vincent, a Junior Seaman training establishment in Gosport, and my home for the next year. St Vincent was an impressive Victorian establishment. After entering under an imposing archway, eyes were immediately drawn to a large figurehead of Admiral Lord St Vincent, and then to a tall mast (reputed to be 125 feet) on the far side of a huge parade ground. Someone joked that we would have to climb to the top – except it was no joke. Soon after completing 6 weeks of ‘Nozzer’ (new recruit) segregation and training, where we learned how to wear, wash and repair our uniform and the basics of marching and naval discipline, we were rated as Junior Seaman Second-Class and made to climb the monster mast and ridiculed if we went through the ‘Lubbers Hole’ at the first platform, about 50ft up, instead of monkey climbing outwards at 45 degrees to gain access over the edge via the ‘Devil’s Elbow’.
After that first ascent I lost all fear of heights and often, in my ‘blues’ periods, would climb to the very top for solace and solitude and play my harmonica. There were no Health and Safety at Work rules in those days. The so-called safety net was tarred cordage hauled so tight it felt like wire and a fall would have meant certain death but as far as I know there had never been an accident. The sense of self-preservation was so strong that our grips were as tight as a padlock. My pay for the first six months was 50p (10 shillings as it was then), per week rising to 75p when I became a Junior Seaman First-Class.
Half of every weekday was spent in academic school classes and the other in learning nautical subjects. We were taught how to wear our uniform correctly (to put on the Burberry raincoat you have to cross your arms and slide them into the sleeves whilst facing the coat an