- Author
- Cox, Leonard J.
- Subjects
- Ship histories and stories, WWII operations
- Tags
-
- RAN Ships
- None noted.
- Publication
- September 2006 edition of the Naval Historical Review (all rights reserved)
In October 1942, an Australian ‘N’ Class and an RN Destroyer were searching for survivors from a ship torpedoed some 800 miles south of the Cape of Good Hope. The two ships were part of a convoy escort group operating 200 miles south of the Cape and had been ordered to carry out a search and rescue operation. After travelling all afternoon and through the night to reach the reported position, they commenced a box search looking for telltale flotsam and lifeboats. Operating off the South African Coast, German U-boats were having a field day sinking ships, causing the Eastern Fleet Admiral to send all available destroyers south to deal with the problem.
After searching for many hours in foul and icy conditions, our Captain decided to send a high priority signal asking Simonstown for confirmation of the search area.
In our Wireless Office, the duty operator was experiencing difficulty reading the Wireless Station’s routine traffic, despite the fact that the transmissions were quite loud, and the PO Tel. Alby Bromill was getting nowhere trying to raise the Shore Station on all the Ship/Shore frequencies.
Something was very wrong – not all the operators could have been that lax. To make matters worse, the Captain was really on our backs. While one operator kept calling the Shore Station, Alby decided to tune the low powered gunnery control transmitter to the Naval World-wide emergency frequency 8290 kHz, and told me to transmit GBXZ O-U V AC three times. The signal meant ‘Any Naval Shore Station or warship Most Immediate’. We had been using a 5 kw transmitter, and this one was only 50 watts. Then, suddenly, I heard a faint but readable reply, telling me to send my message.
The Coder looking over my shoulder said that the Station was Scapa Flow, nearly 60 degrees North – our position was around 50 degrees South, a long way away.
‘Send it,’ said Alby. ‘Scapa Flow has a teleprinter service to Admiralty which has a direct wireless service to Simonstown!’
As we listened to Simonstown transmitting its routine message, someone said ‘this is going to be interesting’. Five minutes went by, then six. Finally, at seven minutes, Simonstown stopped and transmitted ‘AS O-U’, which means ‘Wait Most Immediate’. When the Captain was informed that his signal had been sent, he expressed some relief that we had raised Simonstown. ‘No Sir,’ said Alby. ‘It went via Scapa Flow!’ The Skipper made no comment, but he must have wondered.
The incident remained forgotten in my memory bank until years later when I was working in the Transmission Planning Laboratory in the PMG Engineering Department in Adelaide. Strangely, for some reason, it came to mind and I suddenly knew the answer, which had to be in the ship’s aerials.
The ship’s main transmitting aerial was horizontal and semi-directional and would have been most efficient when it was beam on to another wireless station. The ship’s receiving aerials were vertical, hanging from the foremost yardarm, as were the low powered transmitters. A vertical aerial is ‘omni-directional’, and efficient through 360 degrees. The ship had probably been cruising slowly northwards, which meant that the transmitting aerial would have been ‘end-on’, and not very efficient. The ship was also some 800 miles south of the Cape.
The gyro repeater in the W/T Office would have confirmed the ship’s course and all that was needed was to ask the Skipper to alter 90 degrees to Port or Starboard.
This article gives some idea of the efficiency and back-up of Naval Communications at sea during that period. Sadly, I never had the chance to discuss this with Alby, who had passed on years ago. I remember when I was serving in an RN Armed Merchant Cruiser in the Atlantic, we had one transmitter permanently tuned to that world-wide emergency frequency, and this was operating in the second wireless office down aft. I often wondered if Sydney ever had a chance to use its second office. No one will ever know!
To conclude, the Captain had suspected that we had been lured away from the convoy by a German U-boat. He was probably right!