Living in Interesting Times: The Early Seafaring Years of Lt. Cdr. J.C. Marston, RCN, CD, DSC (Retired) 1930-1945
My father first went to sea in the early 1930’s as a 15-year old bridge messenger aboard the Canadian Pacific Steamship Company’s ocean liner Empress of Canada. until the end of WW2 in 1945. He spent almost 2 years and 11 round trips aboard the Empress of Canada on her Far Eastern run from Vancouver, BC to Honolulu, Kobe, Osaka, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Manila and once again to Honolulu before returning home to Vancouver. The Asia Pacific region was an exciting place for a young lad to visit during the early years of the Great Depression, and the voyages of the Empress of Canada were constantly impacted by such events as monstrous Pacific typhoons and the Sino-Japanese War. The book provides a detailed picture of life aboard the Canada, as well as a first hand account of many of the great cities of the Far East during this fascinating period.
In 1933, Joe senior managed to secure a position as an apprentice aboard the cargo ship Moveria, which was engaged on a regular trade route between Glasgow and Vancouver, with regular ports of call in the Caribbean, Central America and along the west coast of North America (including San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle before concluding the west bound portion of the journey in New Westminster, BC. Moveria belonged to the famous old Scottish shipping company, the Donaldson Line, which ran regular cargo liner services between Glasgow and Canada. As an aside, the declaration of war by the Allies against Nazi Germany in September of 1939 came as a direct result of the unauthorized sinking of the Donaldson liner SS Athenia, which was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-30 on 3 September 1939, with a loss of 117 passengers and crew. Britain declared war on Germany that same day.
But I digress. Joe Sr served aboard 5 different Donaldson Line ships during the 1930’s, including Moveria, Parthenia, Sulairia, Gracia and Corrientes. He worked his way up through the ranks, and got his Second and First Mates certificates during this period. Along the way he came in contact with many different characters, including Captain “Bully” Rankine of the SS Sulairia . Bully was the senior captain of the Donaldson Line, and by all accounts was a difficult man to please!! He was also Dad’s first captain when he was promoted to Third Officer aboard Sulairia in 1937.
In early 1940, Dad transferred from the Donaldson Line to another Glasgow-based shippingcompany, the Blair Line, and assumed the position of Second Mate aboard the tramp steamer, SS Blairspey. In October of 1940, Blairspey was assigned to the ill-fated convoy SC-7, sailing from Sydney, Nova Scotia to the UK. On 17 October, about 2 weeks after departing Sydney and while sailing several hundred miles off the west coast of Ireland, the convoy was intercepted by one of the earliest u-boat “wolf packs” of the war. Prior to that point, lone u-boats had tended to execute “hit and run” attacks on individual ships in convoys, and then make a run for it before the convoy escorts could home in on them. The wolf packs, by contrast, would bring together perhaps 6 or 8 u-boats to conduct a concentrated and much more fluid attack on an individual convoy, and would often spread scarce convoy escort resources too thin to mount an effective defense. Such was the case with SC-7. Of the 35 merchant vessels in the convoy, over the course of three days between 17 and 20 October 1940, the u-boats sank 20 ships, and badly damaged two others, including Blairspey. At about 11 p.m. on the night of 18 October, she was torpedoed by U-101. She didn’t sink, but couldn’t keep up with the main body of the convoy and became an unescorted “straggler.” Four hours later, at about 3 a.m. on the 19th, she was hit by 2 more torpedoes, this time fired by U-100. Once again, she didn’t sink, as she was carrying a full load of lumber from Quebec to Glasgow which kept her afloat, although just barely! However, by this point she was on fire and had lost all power, so the captain ordered the crew into the lifeboats, and they set off for the Irish coast. They were picked up by the Royal Navy corvette HMS Bluebell, which had been sent back from the main body of what was left of the convoy to search for survivors. When Bluebell arrived in Scotland a few days later, she had more than 300 survivors from from SC-7 on her cramped deck. About a week after Bluebell landed her survivors from the convoy in Glasgow, Dad was taken aback to learn that Blairspey, which they had presumed had sunk following the second torpedoing by U-100, turned up at the mouth of the River Clyde near Glasgow under the tow of the deepsea salvage tug Salvonia. The ship had been almost broken in two by the three torpedoes she had received midships, and was literally held together by a string! However, the ship repair engineers who assessed the damage decided that she could be put back together, and after completely replacing the damaged forward half of the ship, she went back to sea some months later, where she continued to sail until 1967!
After his adventure aboard SC-7, Joe Sr. came to the realisation that perhaps it was better “to give than to receive,” and in early 1941 he signed up as a junior officer in the Royal Canadian Navy. His first navy appointment was to the corvette HMCS Spikenard in the capacity of ship’s navigator. After a few brief months aboard Spikenard, he was reassigned to Halifax for several months of naval indoctrination training which he had initially missed. A few months later, Spikenard was torpedoed and sunk, with only eight survivors out of a crew of 65.
From 1941 until 1943, he served on North Atlantic convoy escort duty aboard the World War I vintage four-stack destroyers HMCS St. Clair and HMCS Hamilton. They had originally been built for the US Navy for inshore patrol duty during the latter years of World War 1, and were never designed for extended open ocean service. Among other deficiencies, they were extremely narrow-beamed, and Dad never hesitated in referring to them as the most “unseaworthy and terrifying ships” he had ever had the misfortune to sail on. He recollects instances where the Hamilton and St. Clair would roll up to 55 degrees in a heavy cross sea. The ship would continue to roll until it seemed she would be unable to right herself, but after what would seem like an eternity, she would slowly, slowly recover, and they would survive until the next big wave hit! Exciting times indeed!!
He received his first command in 1943 as captain of the minesweeper HMCS Blairmore, which was assigned to the 31st Canadian Minesweeping Flotilla. The ships of the 31st M/S Flotilla served at Omaha Beach on D-Day, and were among the very first units to get close to the beach in order to clear sea lanes of mines for the landing ships which would bring American troops ashore. The Flotilla continued to sweep mines along the British and French coasts until the end of the war in May 1945 and, in fact, Blairmore continued to sweep mines along the French and British coasts for several months after the official end of the war. She was one of the last four Canadian Navy ships to return home to Halifax in late September of 1945.
Book Synopsis of the Early Seafaring Years of Joe Marston, Sr.
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My father first went to sea in the early 1930’s as a 15-year old bridge messenger aboard the Canadian Pacific Steamship Company’s ocean liner Empress of Canada. until the end of WW2 in 1945. He spent almost 2 years and 11 round trips aboard the Empress of Canada on her Far Eastern run from Vancouver, BC to Honolulu, Kobe, Osaka, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Manila and once again to Honolulu before returning home to Vancouver. The Asia Pacific region was an exciting place for a young lad to visit during the early years of the Great Depression, and the voyages of the Empress of Canada were constantly impacted by such events as monstrous Pacific typhoons and the Sino-Japanese War. The book provides a detailed picture of life aboard the Canada, as well as a first hand account of many of the great cities of the Far East during this fascinating period.
In 1933, Joe senior managed to secure a position as an apprentice aboard the cargo ship Moveria, which was engaged on a regular trade route between Glasgow and Vancouver, with regular ports of call in the Caribbean, Central America and along the west coast of North America (including San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle before concluding the west bound portion of the journey in New Westminster, BC. Moveria belonged to the famous old Scottish shipping company, the Donaldson Line, which ran regular cargo liner services between Glasgow and Canada. As an aside, the declaration of war by the Allies against Nazi Germany in September of 1939 came as a direct result of the unauthorized sinking of the Donaldson liner SS Athenia, which was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-30 on 3 September 1939, with a loss of 117 passengers and crew. Britain declared war on Germany that same day.
But I digress. Joe Sr served aboard 5 different Donaldson Line ships during the 1930’s, including Moveria, Parthenia, Sulairia, Gracia and Corrientes. He worked his way up through the ranks, and got his Second and First Mates certificates during this period. Along the way he came in contact with many different characters, including Captain “Bully” Rankine of the SS Sulairia . Bully was the senior captain of the Donaldson Line, and by all accounts was a difficult man to please!! He was also Dad’s first captain when he was promoted to Third Officer aboard Sulairia in 1937.
In early 1940, Dad transferred from the Donaldson Line to another Glasgow-based shippingcompany, the Blair Line, and assumed the position of Second Mate aboard the tramp steamer, SS Blairspey. In October of 1940, Blairspey was assigned to the ill-fated convoy SC-7, sailing from Sydney, Nova Scotia to the UK. On 17 October, about 2 weeks after departing Sydney and while sailing several hundred miles off the west coast of Ireland, the convoy was intercepted by one of the earliest u-boat “wolf packs” of the war. Prior to that point, lone u-boats had tended to execute “hit and run” attacks on individual ships in convoys, and then make a run for it before the convoy escorts could home in on them. The wolf packs, by contrast, would bring together perhaps 6 or 8 u-boats to conduct a concentrated and much more fluid attack on an individual convoy, and would often spread scarce convoy escort resources too thin to mount an effective defense. Such was the case with SC-7. Of the 35 merchant vessels in the convoy, over the course of three days between 17 and 20 October 1940, the u-boats sank 20 ships, and badly damaged two others, including Blairspey. At about 11 p.m. on the night of 18 October, she was torpedoed by U-101. She didn’t sink, but couldn’t keep up with the main body of the convoy and became an unescorted “straggler.” Four hours later, at about 3 a.m. on the 19th, she was hit by 2 more torpedoes, this time fired by U-100. Once again, she didn’t sink, as she was carrying a full load of lumber from Quebec to Glasgow which kept her afloat, although just barely! However, by this point she was on fire and had lost all power, so the captain ordered the crew into the lifeboats, and they set off for the Irish coast. They were picked up by the Royal Navy corvette HMS Bluebell, which had been sent back from the main body of what was left of the convoy to search for survivors. When Bluebell arrived in Scotland a few days later, she had more than 300 survivors from from SC-7 on her cramped deck. About a week after Bluebell landed her survivors from the convoy in Glasgow, Dad was taken aback to learn that Blairspey, which they had presumed had sunk following the second torpedoing by U-100, turned up at the mouth of the River Clyde near Glasgow under the tow of the deepsea salvage tug Salvonia. The ship had been almost broken in two by the three torpedoes she had received midships, and was literally held together by a string! However, the ship repair engineers who assessed the damage decided that she could be put back together, and after completely replacing the damaged forward half of the ship, she went back to sea some months later, where she continued to sail until 1967!
After his adventure aboard SC-7, Joe Sr. came to the realisation that perhaps it was better “to give than to receive,” and in early 1941 he signed up as a junior officer in the Royal Canadian Navy. His first navy appointment was to the corvette HMCS Spikenard in the capacity of ship’s navigator. After a few brief months aboard Spikenard, he was reassigned to Halifax for several months of naval indoctrination training which he had initially missed. A few months later, Spikenard was torpedoed and sunk, with only eight survivors out of a crew of 65.
From 1941 until 1943, he served on North Atlantic convoy escort duty aboard the World War I vintage four-stack destroyers HMCS St. Clair and HMCS Hamilton. They had originally been built for the US Navy for inshore patrol duty during the latter years of World War 1, and were never designed for extended open ocean service. Among other deficiencies, they were extremely narrow-beamed, and Dad never hesitated in referring to them as the most “unseaworthy and terrifying ships” he had ever had the misfortune to sail on. He recollects instances where the Hamilton and St. Clair would roll up to 55 degrees in a heavy cross sea. The ship would continue to roll until it seemed she would be unable to right herself, but after what would seem like an eternity, she would slowly, slowly recover, and they would survive until the next big wave hit! Exciting times indeed!!
He received his first command in 1943 as captain of the minesweeper HMCS Blairmore, which was assigned to the 31st Canadian Minesweeping Flotilla. The ships of the 31st M/S Flotilla served at Omaha Beach on D-Day, and were among the very first units to get close to the beach in order to clear sea lanes of mines for the landing ships which would bring American troops ashore. The Flotilla continued to sweep mines along the British and French coasts until the end of the war in May 1945 and, in fact, Blairmore continued to sweep mines along the French and British coasts for several months after the official end of the war. She was one of the last four Canadian Navy ships to return home to Halifax in late September of 1945.
Synopsis prepared by Joe Marston Jr. on 23 November 2023
Email: jmarston@telus.net
Mobile: 778 242 1811
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