HOMEWARD BOUND
As Remembered By Douglas Skinner
One of my most pleasant memories from the Canal Zone commenced in February 1954. I had completed my National Service and was about to leave Egypt after serving about 18 months out there. A ship was waiting at Port Said ready to bring many servicemen back to England for their demob. The voyage would take twelve days non-stop. The ship was the “MV Somersetshire” and I felt very privileged to be coming home on her, as it was her very last trip as a troopship. It was a beautiful ship and it was so hard to believe she was going to be broken up some time after this voyage.
“MV Somersetshire”
With several hundred servicemen onboard, no one was allowed to laze about and the sergeants dished out duties for all. Myself and three other men had all been in the Army Catering Corps and were detailed to help in the Galley and told to report to the Chef for duties. It turned out that the Chef only required two men daily to help serve out the food to the troops as they passed along the food counter with their trays at meal times. We decided to pair off and work one day on - one day off. Of course, we never told our sergeant of our plan so he never knew where we were at any one time and the Chef said we could use his cabin any time we wanted to keep out the way. The crews quarters were technically “Out of Bounds” to the troops. We really did make the most of this situation – many other soldiers were doing really menial jobs, so we had come off really well.
We did slip up one day though. There was a fire drill and the alarms were going off, so we scooted off from our own cabin down to the Chefs cabin where we thought we could keep out of the way. How wrong we were! The door burst open and the ships Captain came in and gave us such a roasting and told us that a fire drill meant everyone and ordered us to get up on deck immediately. We were the last to assemble up there and also looked so scruffy – it was very embarrassing!
Apart from that incident it was such a happy time and I seriously considered applying for a post as a cook with the “Bibby Line”. Chef said I would stand a good chance being an Army cook, but I never did apply. I got demobbed and went back to my old civilian job.
I’ll never forget those twelve
days at sea on that wonderful ship. There was a certain smell below decks and
if I try really hard, I can almost imagine it. It was like the aroma of boiling
potatoes and a faintly perfumed disinfectant. I have, on occasions smelt that
very smell or similar and the memories come flooding back. A very happy memory
of being Homeward Bound.