|
 FRANK S. TAYLOR FAMILY
AND ROYAL NAVY HISTORY.NET 
H.M.S. DAUNTLESS
Leslie Gordon Percival Shiers
Surgeon-Lieutenant
Commander
Royal Navy
Adored affectionately by his
daughters Kate and Sarah
as Papa
A Surgeon in the Royal Navy
Source:
http://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20060522120000/http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/69/a2535969.html
Article
courtesy of WWII People’s War
It was about the month of October. I was
exactly twenty-three years of age, I was newly qualified as a doctor and I
was anxious to get out and get a job and earn some money after years of being
a poor student. Accordingly, I sought out the British Medical Journal and
looked for an appointment as a locum somewhere. There was a vacancy in
general practice in Coventry
and so I applied for the post while the doctor was away for a fortnight and I
commenced my first venture into the active practice of medicine. However,
after a week of general practice I got tired of vaccinating babies and
treating nappy rash and decided that general practice was not for me and I
would become a surgeon.
In order to become a surgeon, one needed
a hospital and therefore I applied for a post of a surgeon at the local hospital
and finally was given the job of Casualty Officer. This in those days was the
lowest form of hospital life. Shortly after I had obtained the post, the
clouds of war were looming and the Ministry of Health, fearing there would be
dozens of bodies lying in the streets from bombing sent a memo to all
hospitals offering the doctors there a permanent post for the next three
years during which time they were assured they would not be called up for any
of the armed forces. However the idea of being out of the war did not appeal
to me and so I resigned my post and, as an unemployed doctor, decided to join
one of the services. The choice lay between the Air Force, the Army and the
Navy. I knew nothing about flying so that ruled out the Air Force, and I
loathed walking and marching so that ruled out the Army and the one place
left, obviously, was the Navy. How did one get into the Navy?
Well, I had a friend who had been at prep
school with me who was a Royal Naval Lieutenant and I wrote to him and asked
him what to do. He told me I must write a letter to the Admiralty and he
kindly dictated the format. The letter would read: "To the Lord
Commissioners of the Admiralty. Sirs, I have the honour to submit my
application for a Commission in the Royal Navy. I am twenty-three years of
age, fully qualified as a doctor; I am a good swimmer and a keen rugby
player. I have the honour to be your obedient servant".
In due course, I received a reply which
thanked me for my offer but pointed out that the Royal Navy was no longer
giving short service commissions, that the RNVR was full and that the RNVSR,
the Supplementary Reserve, was also full. However, they saw no prospect of an
immediate conflagration but thanked me for my offer once again. Six weeks
after receiving this reassuring message we were at war; the Germans having
marched into Poland!
I was now an unemployed doctor and
wondered what was the next move. In the town, there
was a shop which had been turned into a recruiting office, and in the window,
was a poster of a fierce looking man saying "Your country needs
you!" I decided that I must go into this shop and see how one got into
one of the armed forces. I duly went into the shop and a scary looking man
with three buttons on his sleeve who, for all I knew, might have been an
Admiral but I learned later was a Chief Petty Officer, barked at me and said
"What do you want?" "Please, Sir" I said "I have
come to join the Navy". He looked me up and down and said "Seaman
or stoker?" The thought of shovelling coal in a hot engine room below
the water line did not appeal to me and so I decided that the proper answer
would be seaman. I therefore replied "Seaman, Sir". He said
"Fall in there" and pointed to a queue of men standing outside an
open door. I fell in, as requested. The column of men shortened, as each one
went into the room. I peered through the open door and to my surprise I saw
the man who was standing next to me and the one who had gone in just before
me, were standing with their trousers round their ankles while an elderly
grey-haired man sitting on a stool was closely inspecting his private parts
with the aid of a torch
I began to wonder if the stories I had heard
about the Royal Navy were true. However, I decided I would not drop my
trousers and have my private parts examined by a stranger, so I stepped out
of line and went back to the scary looking man with the three buttons on his
sleeve. "I", I said "am a doctor". "You are a
doctor" he said, "and I am Emma Hamilton. Now, get back
there". Well, I had always remembered my father telling me that when
addressing a member of what he termed the lower classes you could always put
them in their places by saying "Now look here, my good
fellow". So, I said to this man "Now look here, my good
fellow", his manner changed immediately. His face turned bright pink,
indeed he was so suffused I thought it might be an impending stroke. However,
taking of his cap, he tucked it under his arm and marched in to where the
grey-haired man with the torch was still inspecting private parts. He
whispered something into this man's ear and the man came out and taking me by
the arm said "My dear chap, are you really a doctor?" "Yes,
Sir, I am a doctor, and I am at the local hospital". "My dear
chap" he said "you should not be in here. This is for
ratings". I explained that I had written to the Admiralty and they did
not want my services, so how could I get into the Navy? He said to me
"Write down your qualifications, your age and I will see that due
attention is given to your application".
This he must have done because ten days
later precisely, I received a letter informing me that I must proceed to a
house in Birmingham
for a medical examination by one of their surgeons and agents. At that time,
I was very fit, training with the Coventry
rugby team, and my only sins were an occasional beer after the match on
Saturday and the best of three falls! I gave up these pleasures of the flesh
and went into strict training, running a couple of miles each morning before
breakfast and doing several press-ups.
In due course, I arrived at the house in Birmingham and run the
front door bell. The door was answered by a maid, dressed in the uniform that
they wore in those days, "The surgery is closed, she
said you have to come back tomorrow". I said "I am not a patient, I
am a doctor, and I wish to see the doctor". "Oh" she said, and
she ushered me into a large room where a lady was sitting by an open fire.
She said "Ah, you are the doctor who has come for an appointment".
"Yes" I said. "Well, I am Peter's wife, do come in and have a
drink". "No, no", I said, fearing I might fail the examination
if alcohol had passed my lips. "I won't, thank you very much". I
just sat down and we commenced a little general chit-chat when the door
opened and in came a very large man who said "My God, what a
shower". Then, noticing me, said "Who is this?" His wife
replied that I was the doctor who had come for a medical examination prior to
joining the Navy. He said "Have a drink". And I said "No,
thank you, Sir". And he said "Don't you drink?” And I said
"No". Immediately the atmosphere became a little chilly and,
marching up to me, he said "Well, are you healthy? Have you got piles?
Have you got a hernia?" I said "No". He said "Drop your
trousers".
Now, this was the second time I had been
asked that and I really begun to suspect the Navy. However, I said "Sir,
your wife is here". "She has seen it all before" he said.
"She may have done, but she has never seen mine. Can't we go into your
surgery?" "Oh, well," he said "if you don't have piles or
a hernia that does not matter. So, you are alright, eh?" Then he put a
stethoscope on my chest and said "Take a deep breath", and that was
that. I said "Aren't you going to test my eyesight?" "Oh, yes,
yes, yes, of course" he said. And he marched into the surgery with the
usual white card, propped it up against the wall, took me by the arm, marched
me to the end of the room and said "Now read the bottom line". We
were so far away from this card that I said "Sir, I cannot even read the
top line". "Good God" he said "good God". I said
"Can you read the top line?" Covering one eye with his hand and
said "I can't even see the bloody card! How far away should you
be?" I said "Six feet, Sir". "Six feet?" So, we
approached the card and I duly passed the test by reading the bottom line. He
then said "Is there anything that you would like to ask me?" Having
passed the test, I said "Yes, Sir, I would like to have that
drink". Immediately the atmosphere thawed and we started to talk about
rugby. Having learnt that I had played once on the sacred turf of Cardiff Arms Park,
he informed me that he was an Irish international and late into the night we
talked rugby and, between us, sank an entire bottle of Scotch whisky.
Two weeks later I received a telegram
from the Admiralty which read "You have been appointed as Acting
Temporary Surgeon Lieutenant to HMS Drake and will repair aboard that vessel
at 0900 hours" and it gave at date just three short days away. Now, all
over the country there were posters saying "Don't say where your ship is
because Hitler is listening and there are spies everywhere". And how was
I, in the middle of Coventry,
to find out where HMS Drake was laying or indeed was sailing. Fortunately,
the Chief Medical Officer had a brother in law who was in the Navy and who,
in the next two days, was about to visit him. I told him my dilemma and he
invited me over to meet this officer, who informed me that Drake was the name
for a barracks - a stone frigate, it was the name given to Plymouth,
and Raleigh the name given to Portsmouth." I thanked them both and
two days later packed my few belongings including a set of golf clubs and a
fishing rod and departed for Plymouth.
I arrived to see the streets literally
packed with sailors and, approaching one of them, I said "Can you tell
me where the barracks are?" He gave me the directions and I entered this
very large building, crossing the square, which again was practically was
sailors moving in every direction. I had been told that I should go to the Ward Room
and stopping the nearest sailor to me I said "Can you tell me where the Ward Room
is?" He said "What is your rank, Sir?" And I said "Surgeon
Lieutenant". He straightened his cap, and stubbed out his cigarette
before advising me accordingly.
I thanked him and walked over, in a cubby
hole in the hall was another man in uniform with three buttons on his sleeve.
By now I knew the correct method of address was to call him Chief because he
was the Chief Petty Officer and I said "Chief, I have come to join the
Navy and I am commissioned as Surgeon Lieutenant". I produced my
telegram, which was the only form of identity I had and he said "You
ought to go up to the Billiard Room; there are still places under the
billiard table where officers are sleeping, because all the cabins are
full".
I duly went to a very large room in which
there were four billiard tables and underneath all of them were sleeping
bags. Just as I entered this room, I bumped into a very tall fellow who had
two stripes on his sleeve, but one of them had obviously recently been taken
off because you could see the gold thread hanging down. He said
"Hello", and I said "Hello. What happened to your other
stripe?" He told me his name was Miller and that he had been serving on
a gunboat on the Yangtze, while his Captain was ashore he was entertaining a
Chinese lady in his cabin when a Labour MP had come up quite unexpectedly to
see what the Navy was doing. Subsequently there was a board of inquiry, which
resulted in Miller losing six months seniority and the Captain being court
marshalled. This was my introduction to naval discipline and also to the fact
that the Navy drank gin and lime. I had always considered gin and lime to be
a drink for tarts but Miller told me that it was to prevent them having the
scurvy, which was why the lime was there. It was rather interesting that when
I got to sea we always drunk pink gins rather than gin and lime in spite of
the threat of scurvy.
I waited in the barracks for a fortnight,
and each day all of us temporary lieutenants would go down to a box in the
hall and look under our initials to see if there was any message for us. On
the tenth day, there was a letter addressed to me informing me I had been
appointed as Surgeon Lieutenant to His Majesty’s Ship Weston, which was a
ship in the destroyer flotilla based at Rosyth and
I should join the vessel forthwith. I drew my railway chit, in those days
officers were given railways chits, indeed so were the men, so you would
travel free, and I went down to Rosyth.
H.M.S.
Weston
When we got to Crewe
there was a great kafuffle and the train stopped while everybody got out. We
were then told there was a bomb on the line further up and we would be
delayed for some time. Whilst I was at the railway station, I bumped into a
man I knew who had joined the Army. We had a drink or two together and then,
when the scare was over, I went back to the train. I was carrying my suitcase
and the train was packed absolutely solidly, people were jammed in the
corridors. I managed to squeeze myself in between a crowd of sailors and I
noticed, as I looked around, that just behind me the curtains of this
particular compartment were drawn tightly and there was some scattered
confetti on the floor. Being of a curious nature, I pushed over the door to
see the happy couple and there, stretched out alone in the compartment, was
an Army officer. “Hello” he said, “you have rumbled me, would you like a
bed”? I accepted his offer and closed the door and we, he
on one bunk and me on the other, had a very pleasant journey all the way up
to Rosyth.
H.M.S.
Weston 1943
On arrival, I registered in an Edinburgh hotel and
each day went down to the dockyard at Rosyth to
enquire to the whereabouts of my ship. This lasted for a period of about
twelve days, during which time I had made the acquaintance of a new rather
agreeable WREN who was also staying in the hotel. On the eleventh day, I
failed to go to the dockyard because I was a little delayed in my room and,
Sod's law being what it was, when I went down the following day, I found that
my ship had come in to refuel and re-ammunition and was already back at sea.
Well, there it was, and one must never question fate too closely, so another
twelve days passed happily in this hotel in the company of this charming
lady. At the end of that time, when I went down to the dockyard, to my dismay
the ship had returned and I fell in to make my number.
Having boarded the ship, saluted the
quarter-deck and being greeted by the sentry, I asked him where the Wardroom
was and he directed me towards it. The ship was old, she was a sloop and this
meant that, although she lacked the speed and the armament of a destroyer,
she could stay at sea much longer, indeed while a destroyer would have to
return for re-ammunitioning, and refuelling within
the space of about a week, the Weston could stay comfortably at sea for three
weeks at a time. Having entered the Wardroom, I was greeted by the First
Lieutenant who told me how delighted he was to see a real doctor. I asked him
what he meant by a real doctor and, pointing to my wavy stripes as opposed to
his straight ones, he told me that most of the doctors in the Navy who were
regulars were really young disreputable characters who could not get a decent
job ashore. Having received this welcome, I was shown to my cabin which was
down a hatch aft between two sets of watertight doors and whilst we were at
sea these doors were closed and I slept on the wardroom floor in a sleeping
bag. When asleep, like all the other officers, I merely removed my shoes and
kept my life jacket close by.
The sick bay contained two swinging cots
and had an elderly sick berth attendant He did not like the First Lieutenant
who had been acting as a doctor prior to my appointment and there was no
doubt he was delighted to see me. It is a strange thing but in the Navy the
sick berth attendant was known as the doctor and the doctor was known as the
quack. That is the sailors' particular sense of humour. However, we went to
sea and we were given a convoy to take out into the North
Atlantic.
One terrible night, out of thirty-five
ships filled with food and fuel we were escorting we lost thirteen to U-boat
attacks. At this time, the Yanks were not yet in the War but Mr Churchill
made a trip to America
where, by establishing friendly relations with the American President
Roosevelt, he received the loan of fifty First World War American destroyers.
These were fitted up with our RADAR which the Americans did not have (this,
by the way, is an anti-submarine detection device which later on we passed to
the French and then, unhappily, when France surrendered, it came to the
knowledge of the Germans who very soon produced a locking device of great
efficiency). However, instead of having two destroyers, or perhaps one
destroyer and a corvette to shepherd a fleet of perhaps thirty merchant
ships, we now had fifty American destroyers and we began to sink the U-boats
to such effect that The German Admiral Doenitz called off his “Wolfpacks” unable to sustain the losses.
Thus, the whole battle of the Atlantic changed in our favour. Food and fuel had to come
across the Atlantic arriving at Rosyth in Northern
Scotland after traversing the Pentland
Firth. It then came down through the North Sea to the port of London. Our task in the Western was to
shepherd the convoy of ships to their destination in London. The Germans standing on the beach
at Calais could clearly see the movement of
some odd vessels sailing in convoy towards Dover. And in a hope of avoiding the Stukas (dive bombers) these vessels had a Barrage balloon
attached by a cable so that they flew some 100 feet above each vessel in the
hope of trapping any Stukas making a dive bomb
attack. The most dangerous part of the passage to London
was off the mouth of the Thames estuary.
Early in the war we had laid a line of mines about a mile off the English
coast and through this narrow passage our vessels could move safely.
At night, the Germans flew over the Thames estuary dropping magnetic mines which would lie
on the bottom until attracted by the metal of the ship passing over them when
they would immediately rise towards the hull. Having lost a number of ships
to this device the backroom boys came up with a solution in which a long
(degaussing gear?) electrical cable was laid right around the deck of the
ship so as to neutralize her magnetism. However very rapidly the Germans
devised another type of mine, the acoustic mine which was activated by the
sound of passing ships propellers. To counter this, large vessels were towed
out of harbour in the open sea before they started their engines. However,
the noise from the towing tug’s propellers resulted in the loss of a number
of these tugs. At this stage, the Luftwaffe came over night after night
dropping mines into the Thames estuary. The
only method of counteracting this move was by using the flotilla of mine
sweepers. These vessels towed rafts some laden with iron bars to simulate the
hull of an iron ship and thus attract any magnetic mine over which they
passed. However, the sound of their own propellers often activated an
acoustic mine and many of these tugs were lost.
Nevertheless sufficient fuel and food was
getting through. These supplies of course coming from America had to cross the Atlantic
avoiding if possible the German warships which patrolled these waters. A
helpful America although
not in the war, escorted these ships as afar as 23 degrees west (half way
across the Atlantic) We in the Weston would sail out there to meet them and
escort them safely to England.
This journey travelling no more than 8 knots took some three weeks. Thanks to
the reinforcement provided by the American destroyers we were able after each
trip to have a week rest in harbour.
It was customary for The Medical
Department of the Admiralty to give doctors after twelve months at sea in a
small ship a shore job. Sure enough, a signal came through that I was
appointed as a Surgeon Lieutenant to a motor torpedo boat based in Lowestoft. In due course, I arrived in Lowestoft where I found to my delight that we were
billeted in a cottage in the gardens of a big house. Actually, it was the
private dwelling of the owners of Bourne and Hollingsworth, the well-known London department
store. The senior officers slept in the house while we more junior officers
were put up in the gardener's cottage at the back of the main lawn, behind
the tennis courts. This we soon found had great advantages, because the ‘Wrennery’ was next door although protected from the
attentions of such junior officers as ourselves by some coils of barbed wire.
It took very little effort for us to make a gap in the wire and there were
some very pleasant evenings spent in the company of these Wrens.
Now it must be remembered that the whole
of Europe was occupied by the Germans and the fledgling pilots taking bombing
raids for the first time were sent over usually to Lowestoft on the East
Coast where, night after night, they bombed indiscriminately, sometimes
causing dreadful carnage, especially one night when a bomb fell on the main
hotel where officers’ wives, sweethearts and daughters were staying over a
long weekend. There was very little we could do in the way of antiaircraft
fire, all we could use were the first world war Lee- Enfield rifles, until one
glorious day a Swedish anti-aircraft gun mounted on a moveable chassis came
to us through the offices of Mr Winston Churchill and we managed to shoot
down a German bomber in a raid over the North Sea.
H.M.S.
Dauntless
However, after six months in this very
pleasant appointment, I began to feel that I was really missing the war and
as I had never been out East, I decided to go up to the Admiralty Medical
Department and ask for a ship going East. In those days, there was a rule
that any doctor passing through London would call at the Medical Department
of the Admiralty in Whitehall, would fill in the chit saying "On
duty", "On leave" or "Request" when he would be
ushered into the presence of an elderly Irish Rear Admiral Medical who would
ask him what he wanted. I was duly ushered in and met the Rear Admiral who
said to me "I suppose you want a shore job". I said "Certainly
not, Sir, I have had a shore job for the last six months and want to get back
into the war". He said "Very well, what would you like?" and I
said "Well, I spent the winter in the North Atlantic and the North Sea,
Sir, I would like to go somewhere warm, I have never been out East and I
would like to do that". He then consulted the sheet in front of him and
said "We have a cruiser which will be leaving shortly for Singapore.
Would that suit you as Second Doctor? She carries a Surgeon Lieutenant
Commander and you would be under his orders as Surgeon Lieutenant." I
said "That would do admirably, and a few days later I got a letter
telling me I had been appointed to His Majesty's light cruiser Dauntless
which was refitting in Portsmouth.
After a few days' leave with my parents I
went down to Portsmouth
and in the dockyard, after some enquiries, found the cruiser Dauntless. I
went on board and was met by a sub-Lieutenant who showed me my cabin. She
seemed vast compared to my previous ship, good old Weston, and I had a birth
in a larger cabin and what was really more of a hospital than a sick bay. The
following day the Surgeon Lieutenant Commander joined the ship and there was
no doubt that from the beginning we were not going to get on. He was an
anaesthetist and had spent the whole of the war in a hospital when I had been
flogging up and down in the North Sea and the North
Atlantic. He was also rather fat, spending most of his time
sitting in the Wardroom drinking gin and left me entirely to do the sick bay,
which I did not mind in the least, as by so doing I got to know the ship's
company much better than he did.
Ten days after I joined the vessel, we
slipped and proceeded down the Channel, calling at Gibraltar, which we
reached having traversed a very smooth and placid Bay of Biscay and because
it is the duty of doctors in the Royal Navy to be in charge of the wine
cellar, I had a pleasant, really very pleasant three days as a guest of Saccone and Speed the wine suppliers, drinking
sherry whilst putting in the order for the whisky and gin as requisite.
Three days later, because the
Mediterranean was too dangerous, we sailed for the Cape.
In due course, we arrived at Simon’s Town, which was the naval base close
to Cape Town
and there we were to spend the next three happy weeks whilst waiting for
further orders and putting on extra anti-aircraft guns. Cape Town was a revelation to us all and
indeed one would not believe that there was a world war taking place. There
was no blackout, the night clubs were full, the local people were very
hospitable, cars would come down to the dock and ask us if we would like to
ride or play golf or swim and it was indeed a total, total contrast to those
bitter cold winters in the North Atlantic. However, all good things come to
an end and at the end of this brief but very pleasant respite we slipped and
proceeded to go and join the fleet at Mombassa. This journey was round the
Cape and up the whole of the east coast but first of all, prior to Mombassa, we were directed to Durban.
Durban was really every sailors' dream of home.
It had absolutely everything: warm sunshine, splendid hospitality, excellent
wine, and I was fortunate enough to meet an old shipmate of mine who was
enjoying life very much in a shore job in Durban. He had a flat and a girlfriend and
he soon introduced me to the delights of Durban in so far as his girlfriend produced
a girlfriend for me and good time was had by all. At the end of three weeks
we were ordered up to Mombassa where we were told
that there was going to be an invasion of Madagascar and we were to join
the fleet.
We set off to the great island of Madagascar,
and it must be remembered that this is the second largest island in the
world, Australia
the first, and it also has at its northern extremities one of the greatest
natural harbours in the world.
Warships
and British merchant ships in the Antsiranana Harbour
(Diego Suarez)
after the French had surrendered on
13 May 1942.
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antsiranana
The harbour at Diego Suarez could
accommodate the entire British fleet as well as the German grand fleet. We
arrived there in the company of the aircraft carrier Illustrious, the great battleship Warspite, a cruiser squadron, a
Birmingham assault ship whose name I can’t remember and the Polish assault
ship Sobeiski as well as four Australian
destroyers.
It was decided that we would invade at
dawn and, as it broke we were close up at action stations wearing anti-flash
gear, with buckets of sand spread about the deck to cover any blood that
might be spilled and we anchored off the entrance to the harbour. Madagascar
was a French Protectorate and we signalled to the governor "We arrive as
friends, we ask you to surrender so that any bloodshed might be
avoided". We knew that there were some Vichy French in the island and so
it was necessary to make this preparatory signal. The reply came back from
the governor "My honour will not allow me to surrender". The
Admiral in charge of the fleet was an Admiral Syfret and
he made another signal shortly after dawn again requesting the surrender and
again he got the same reply. He decided to make one more effort and
accordingly it was agreed that we would send in a high-ranking officer and a
white flag.
The Captain of my ship was chosen and as
British ships do not carry white flags, the Wardroom table cloth was taken
attached to a pair of crossed oars and this was mounted on the motor boat
which proceeded towards the shore. It had hardly got two cables from the ship
when the French opened fire with a machine gun. Immediately the entire fleet
let go but hardly had got off more than two rounds before a Frenchman
appeared with a white flag and hastily mounting the steps which circled the
lighthouse at the end of the pier began to wave his flag. At this point an
Australian destroyer went zooming past the lighthouse, let go of the aft
turret and blew away the man, the flag, the steps and the top of the
lighthouse. This brought the action to a close.
It was then agreed to enter the harbour,
and my ship, the Dauntless, was chosen to lead the fleet in. I remarked to
the navigator that this must be a high honour and he told me not to be so
naive - it was merely that we were the oldest ship in the fleet and therefore
the most dispensable. If the harbour had been mined we would be the first to
get it and serve as a warning to any ship following us. In the event, we
safely entered the great harbour at Diego Suarez where we were to remain
swinging around a buoy for the next three months.
Author’s Note:
While preparing this article we came across the
following interview with L.G. P. Shiers. It was
conducted by (now Sir) Malcolm McBain and published
by Churchill
College, Cambridge. Sir Malcolm McBain was a distinguished Diplomat in the UK.
Many interviews can be sourced simply by googling Sir Malcom McBain.
For a surprising and interesting review of Sir
Malcolm’s career we suggest:
https://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/media/uploads/files/McBain.pdf
The interview continues the story.
Mr
Leslie Gordon Percival Shiers FRCS
Interviewed
by Malcolm McBain, on Tuesday, 4 February, 1997.
Mr
McBain interviewed Mr Shiers
because he was present at the invasion of Madagascar in the Spring of l942
Source: https://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/media/uploads/files/Shiers.pdf
McB
Mr Shiers,
could you tell us something about your experiences at that time, perhaps
starting off with the part you played in the assault on Tamatave.
Shiers
Yes, at that time I was an RNVR Surgeon
Lieutenant in the light cruiser ‘Dauntless’ and she was a cruiser built prior
to the First World War and her main armament was 4 six-inch guns. Now the
initial assault on Madagascar
was taken some months previously to capture the great harbour
of Diego Suarez, a beautiful natural
harbour, the biggest in the world, bigger than the
great harbour at Sydney.
And after the assault and the surrender of the French, the remainder of the
island remained in Vichy
hands and it was decided that the rest of the island should be taken.
Now we in ‘Dauntless’ had been swinging
around a buoy in Diego Suarez harbour as guard ship for something like two
months. Everybody was bored stiff so we were delighted when we were told
there was going to be a second assault. Now in due course the fleet assembled
off Tamatave, which is a port on the eastern side
of Madagascar,
nearer the north than the south. And amongst the ships were the great capital
ships, ‘Illustrious’, the aircraft carrier, ‘Warspite’,
the mighty warship, a number of Australian destroyers, the heavy cruiser
‘Birmingham’, ‘Albatross’ and ourselves in ‘Dauntless’ and a number of
landing craft. Well at dawn, which came at about half past five,
‘Illustrious’ flew off aircraft and dropped leaflets on to the French saying
that we had come as friends and would they please surrender to avoid any
bloodshed. And a reply came from the Commanding Officer, whose name we’ve
got, but I’ve forgotten it, saying his honour would not allow him to
surrender.
So, we waited for half an hour, everybody
closed up at action stations and made another signal ‘would he please
surrender’ and back came the same reply in the
negative. So, the Admiral in Charge, Admiral Syfret,
decided to send in an emissary under a white flag and the Captain of
‘Dauntless’, my Captain, Captain Hewitt, was chosen. And he came down to the
Wardroom where I’d set out all my surgical instruments in case one had to
treat the wounded there, and said ‘What can we use for a white flag?’ because
the Royal Navy doesn’t carry white flags. And I suggested the Ward Room
tablecloth which was being used as an operating sheet. And so, this was taken
and strapped to a cross made of two oars which was put in the barge and the
Captain went off to the shore, which was about two
cables from where we were at anchor. And he’d got about half-way there, so
about one cable off, when the French opened fire with a machine gun, which
they had absolutely no right to do, they were firing on a white flag.
The barge turned around immediately and
headed back to the Fleet and without further orders the entire Fleet opened
fire. We’d got off three or maybe four rounds when a Frenchman came rushing
down the beach and clambered up a sort of tower, it was a sort of lighthouse
with a circular stair around the outside, and I remember looking at this chap
and he was about halfway up with this flag on a pole on his shoulder, when an
Australian destroyer, the name of which escapes me, went creaming along the
shore and let go with her after turret and blew the entire tower to
smithereens. And that was the end of the action, cease fire straight away,
and then the landing craft went in with the various troops.
There was a slight hiccup because they
went in on a falling tide and the landing craft were stranded on the beach
and couldn’t get back for more troops, but happily the French had surrendered
so that was the end of the action. Later on, we interviewed the French
Supreme Commander and he’d been shot in the arm, a fragment had got him in
his left arm, so he was able to surrender with honour and with dignity.
McB
Now you mentioned to begin with that you
had been present in Diego Suarez, the main harbour in the north, can you tell
us why the capture of that harbour was so important to the British?
Shiers
Oh yes indeed. The Japanese were
advancing rapidly, travelling westwards at frightening speed, and the Fleet
had fallen back, we’d fallen back all the way to India and then back to
Mombasa, on the East African coast, when it was decided at high level... Sir
Winston Churchill realised that here was this great harbour in this offshore
island, and if the Japanese could get there they could move their entire
fleet there, and then they could get up to the north of Africa, join up with
Rommel and really that would have been the end of the campaign and the end of
the war. So it was decided to take Diego Suarez, which was brilliantly done
by, really, fifty Royal Marines, because in the planning for the capture of
this great harbour, which is two horns, rather like the Sydney heads, and the
distance between the horns is one sea mile, and half the army were landed on
the western arm, and the rest of the army at the capital, Antsirane,
but when the army landed there to neutralise the guns on that cliff, they
found most of them were rusty anyway, but nobody thought of putting boats at
the base of the cliff to get the army back into the main action. So, half the army sat on their bottoms at
the top of this cliff and most of them got malaria, nasty malaria, malignant malaria, many of them died. Many of the
casualties in Madagascar
were due to the mosquito and not to the French. And the situation looked
pretty tricky for something like twenty-four hours. And then it was suggested
to Admiral Syfret that a diversion might be created
by sending in a party of Royal Marines and fifty were taken from the
battleship ‘Ramillies’ under the command of Martin
Price, and the Second in Command was James Powell, Lieutenant Royal Marines,
and they embarked in the destroyer, ‘Anthony’, which at great risk and
incredible skill went into the harbour at twenty knots, full ahead, stop,
both engines full astern, to the amazement of the French. And the party was
given orders to create a diversion, but not to attack the artillery base and
the naval barracks. Immediately they landed they split into two parties, and
James Powell, Lieutenant, attacked the naval base, while Martin Price and his
men attacked the other stronghold. And it’s a very interesting story about
how Powell took his action. I’m not
sure you’d want me to repeat this, would you?
McB
No, I think that sort of detail is fairly
well covered in some of the other histories. But what is not covered to my
knowledge and satisfaction is the part played in all this by the Japanese
submarine crews.
Shiers
Yes, I can tell you that, because one
night in May, when during a dinner aboard ‘Ramillies’
and this was told me by James Powell, who later came to us as captain of
Marines. They were dining when they felt a thud, no more, and they didn’t
know what it was and they went on deck and then there was another explosion
and our oil tanker slowly sank to the bottom. We found out later on that a
two-man submarine, a Japanese submarine, had been launched from one of their
great I-class submarines which were operating in the Mozambique Channel, and
they’d come in. We had no boom then at the entrance, but we put one up
rapidly afterwards. And they’d come in, quite brave fellows, and they’d fired
two torpedoes, one of which hit ‘Ramillies’ and one
of which sank the tanker. But of
course, in a two-man submarine you don’t carry the full-size torpedo and no
damage was done to ‘Ramillies’. They almost made
their escape but they ran aground on some rocks towards the entrance to the
harbour and they were, later on, captured on the island by Royal Marines and
suitably dealt with.
McB
So there were large Japanese submarines
actually operating in the Mozambique
Channel?
Shiers
Oh yes, they sank a lot of shipping. It
was estimated that some 94,000 tonnes of allied shipping were sunk to these.
So, there they were, right on our doorstep.
McB
Was there any indication that they were
being based in Diego Suarez?
Shiers
Not that I know of. They were never in Diego Suarez but there
was a rumour that they were in the Vichy-held ports right in the south of the
island. And remember the island is a
thousand miles long, it’s some island you see. But
later on, after the War, when the history of the thing came out, it appeared
they were being fuelled and victualled by Japanese
cruisers, rather like the Germans used to have their vessels out in the Atlantic for their raiders. But they were not based in
ports down in the south of Madagascar.
McB
There were no Japanese military soldiers
anywhere in Madagascar?
Shiers
Not to my knowledge, no.
McB
Do you have any recollection of what the
French forces consisted of?
Shiers
No, I haven’t, but it is itemised. I know
they had a lot of Senegalese there. I know they’d recruited some Malagasies,
who were not terribly keen on fighting. Indeed, the French weren’t keen on
fighting. All they were worried about
was their pensions. And once they’d surrendered having put up a fight, that
was secure, you see. They weren’t at all militant. They weren’t really
militant. But there was fighting, and
I can’t remember the names of the regiments who came from the south and were
force-marched through the jungle and there was fighting and they were
wounded. But that is chronicled
elsewhere. We in the Navy didn’t know much about what the Army were doing
down in the south.
McB
I think there are about 130 graves in the
Commonwealth War Graves cemetery at Antsiranana,
the new name for Diego Suarez.
Shiers
What’s the new name?
McB
Antsiranana.
Shiers
Antsirane, but that was the name of the capital, Antsirane.
McB That’s Antananarivo.
Shiers
Oh, is it? Antananarivo.
Nosi Bé was the place on the port side.
McB
Yes, l30 graves there in Antsiranana.
Shiers
Are they allied graves or are they...?
McB Yes, all allied graves. There are no French graves.
Shiers
Well, they must be all Army.
McB
Yes, all Army. And I have seen a quite
impressive cairn put up by, I think, the Scots Guards, somewhere on that
peninsula of land between that harbour and the west coast, Courrier Bay,
which commemorates a battle in which there were quite heavy casualties.
Shiers
Yes, I knew there was some action in Courrier
Bay, but we weren’t
part of that.
McB
But the story about the Japanese mini-sub
is quite fresh in your memory.
Shiers
Oh yes. Absolutely no doubt about it.
Author’s Note:
In 2017, we received a communication from Kate Shiers, the daughter of Leslie Shiers
the text of which follows:
I just
wanted to let you know how delighted I was to see my father’s story on your
website. I painstakingly typed it up and subbed it down for my wonderful
meticulous father. It still sits on the BBC People’s War website which is
sadly now inactive. It is great you are keeping these stories alive.
Kind regards
Kate Shiers
Kate was able to supply a
wartime photo of her Father – he is on the right of the photo with an X above
his head.
Kate's sister Sarah provided the portrait photo of her Father which appears at the top of the article.
Leslie G. P. Shiers
(right) probably aboard H.M.S. Weston 1943
An interesting fact
regarding Surgeon-Lieutenant Shiers (FRCS) is that
he pioneered the
first Total Knee Replacement (TKR) in 1954.
He refused to patent his invention, but chose
rather to allow other surgeons to modify and improve on his ideas.
His funeral notice in The Telegraph reads:
SHIERS
Leslie
Gordon Percival F.R.C.S. Aged 91, on January, 18th, peacefully at home with
his beloved family. An extraordinary man.
A
pioneer in orthopaedic surgery, Total Replacement of the Knee and inventor of
the Knee Hinge. Salisbury
Crematorium, 25th January at 4.30p.m. Family flowers only, donations, if
desired to the Royal Marines Benevolent Fund.
And
say to all the world, “This was a man."
Back
to:
HMS Dauntless - WW2
Contact Us - Home
|
