A Tribute to My Expensive Dad (In Memory):
RAYMOND CARRUTHERS LOCK (07/01/1923- 23/02/2009) – In a position SEAMAN RNVR. SA. -67699
by John Bailey
Crucial terms (tags): Ray Lock, John Bailey,
Flotsam and Jetsam, textbooks, the Book ‘Bismarck, Dorsetshire and Reminiscences’, autobiography, war stories, memoirs, Royal Navy, armed service record, naval battles, naval record, South Africans
Sourced from
FLOTSAM AND JETSAMVol. fifty August 2002 No 209
GOLDEN JUBILEE Version
(and despatched to me some several years in the past by my expensive dad, which I‘m sharing within the www to aid protect his memory, and most significantly, to share his special eye-witness account of epic battles from WW II with the incredible energy of the net.
*
On a crisp, but sunny autumnal early morning before this calendar year, I designed my way from the slim but picturesque Harfield Village — one among Cape Town’s well-liked “Chelsea” locations. Streets bearing the names of English counties abound and immediately become a constant – Otherwise a little nostalgic - reminder as I ambled through Hereford and Leicester, right before achieving my best spot in Sussex …
I welcomed the comfortable and cozy sofa that greeted me on my arrival at No seventeen, but no faster experienced I seated myself than a dapper gentleman appeared and whose correct hand was fast to come ahead in a very sincere gesture of greeting …
Raymond Lock – “Ray” to his family and friends — was instantly recognizable from his Television set graphic as currently being a member on the congregation who had recently attended the sixtieth anniversary service at Simons City, which recalled the sinking of HMS CORNWALL and HMS DORSETSHIRE on Easter Sunday 1942. It wasn't extended prior to Ray was recounting his own ordeals for me …
Born while in the then Southern Rhodesian town of Bulawayo on 7 January 1923, Ray done his education and learning with the South African School High School in Cape Town. Whilst not still seventeen several years of age, he “bluffed” his actual date of delivery, and signed on to the Air Power in November of 1939. A change of coronary heart quickly discovered this intrepid youthful lad heading for Simon‘s City, in which he duly enlisted for service during the Navy. It had been nor lengthy before Ray was posted for responsibility to Klawer Camp on Crimson Hill - a naval installation that commanded an outstanding look at from the naval foundation while in the bay beneath. However, because of the Autumn of 1940, be was at sea, possessing been seconded to the eight-inch cruiser — HMS DORSETSHIRE — as an able seaman.
From the Could of 1941 — and in corporation with HMS RODNEY, HMS KING GEORGE V and HMS
ARK ROYAL — HMS DORSETSHIRE succeeded in routing the German battleship BISMARCK in
the North Atlantic Ocean. It really is interesting to notice that Ray Seem was aboard HMS DORSETSHIRE, as the cruiser fired the ultimate torpedoes to the already crippled battleship …
Japan’s entry in the war inside the December of 1941, opened up a new frontier of conflict for that allies and by the end of March of`1942, an assault within the island of Ceylon appeared imminent.
Soon before midnight on Easter: Saturday — four April — HMS DORSETSHIRE, under the command of Captain Augustus Agar VC and HMS CORNWALL, underneath the command of Captain P C WnMainwaring (or was it Manwaring??) sailed from your Ceylonese port of Colombo. Their objective was to rendezvous with AdmiralSomervi1le some hundred of miles on the South at 16.00 on the subsequent afternoon, and so have the ability to present a united entrance to the enemy.
In his definitive review around the Japanese assault on Ceylon entitled “Quite possibly the most Unsafe Moment”, Michael Tomlinson remembers that “shortly soon after one o’çlock (Sunday fifth April) with all men at motion stations, many radio contacts ended up picked up (by HMS CORNWALL and HMS DORSETSHIRE…wireless silence was now damaged to notify Admiral Somerville in their position (and) to report the enemy shadowing and likelihood of an air assault. (The Japanese) wasted not a minute on sighting the two cruisers…(and) scored strike after strike from the phrase go….The road of attack looked as if it would happen to be thoroughly worked out beforehand…
Young Ray Lock, one of several Dorsetshire’s crew serving a 4 inch ack-ack gun amidships and fuming at their hopelessly restricted industry of hearth, observed himself flung towards the deck 10 feet under by a blast from the bomb. Shaken, he received to his toes, intent on obtaining back again to the gun; but was startled to view only two blackened stumps, where by the twin gun barrels were and the rest of the crew lifeless or poorly wounded. Only some time later on, noticing a squelching seem in his shoes, did he come across them filling with blood and realized that he was significantly wounded during the upper body and legs …
0nly 8 minutes following the 1st bomb hit, her bows rose previously mentioned The ocean, where by now almost all of her enterprise had been floundering in the new oily h2o, and she was absent….
A great deal the identical may very well be said for HMS CORNWALL….Lieutenant Geoffrey Grove relates:
“When at 1.40pm the Jap planes struck, the 1st bomb hit the CORNWALL’s port-side, astern…We experienced a little something like fifteen hits in about seven minutes along with the weak old Woman took up An even bigger record than ever before and commenced to settle….at the time clear of the ship (I) circled and waited for her to go, which she did very quietly, bows to start with. Her stern came up to the air and she or he slid down, a person propeller revolving gradually.”
　
Ray was swift to remember that having abandoned ship, he located himself swimming inside of a sea that was each heat and useless quiet, excepting to get a layer of oil that experienced currently begun to ooze up and out from the sunken cruiser. He was to spend some seven hours within the drinking water, in advance of staying dragged right into a lifestyle-boat to prevodilac srpski na nemacki endure a complete working day and night time, prior to currently being rescued by HMAS PALADIN and transported to Addu Atoll during the Maldive Islands. Here Ray was transferred to some merchant ship to await the arrival in the medical center ship HMNS VITA, aboard which he returned to South Africa toward the top of April.
In his certification for “Wounds and Hurts”, Surgeon Captain OD Brownfeld notes that Ray sustained a “gun shot via (the) remaining ankle with (a) fracture in the neck on the astragalus, in addition to a “shrapnel wound to your still left of (the) Center of (the) sternum.” Nevertheless, the medical doctor can make `no point out of your parts of shrapnel that have surfaced all through Ray’s entire body over the past sixty several years!
　
Glancing quickly at my check out, I noticed how quickly the time had passed… a quick “Photograph-get in touch with” was necessary to remember the celebration and prevod sa srpskog na nemacki jezik Ray, with luggage packed, was shortly to return to Durban…. Like lots of Adult males and girls of his period, his quiet unassuming manner certainly gives 1 no indication as for the emotional suffering that he surely endured at so young an age; nevertheless, his inner bravery and power was to shine forth in the course of an interview recorded through the Everyday News – a Durban tabloid in September of 1987: Needless to say, in hazardous conditions we have been terrified, but You will need to respond. The bravest issue we did was signing the recruiting kind.”
Go effectively, Ray
John Bailey
　
Sourced from
FLOTSAM AND JETSAM
Vol. 50 August 2002 No 209
GOLDEN JUBILEE EDITION
*
　
“Guy is thoughts
and evermore he requires the Instrument of believed
and, shaping what he wills,
brings forth a thousand joys,
a thousand ills.
He thinks in secret
and it comes to go -
Ecosystem is but his on the lookout glass.”
Many thanks a great deal of for sharing with me, father. Your spirit (“pushed”) lives on, as I “perform” * on sharing your distinctive story.
* It’s not really “do the job”, but a “labour of affection”.
“The empires of the longer term tend to be the empires on the brain”
- Winston Churchill (in an adress to Harvard University in 1943)
　
- anon
This great poem was written my my proficient and artistic sister, Glenda Wallace to commemorate our expensive dads 80th birthday in 2003. So am sharing. Take pleasure in...
"Right here we are gathered today
To rejoice the delivery of our Exclusive Ray
January 7th 1923
Marked the beginning of small R.C
An only child was this very small tot
regarded to all
As Raymond Carruthers Lock
The S A C was the school for being
The very best within the state spherical
Not nevertheless in Newlands, was this fantastic school
But in Orange Street, can be observed
Daily life at school for this young chap
Was crammed with Activity and lots of a jack *
Lots of pranks, he likes to remember
of blackboard dusters climbing the wall
Younger Ray Lock enjoyed his Activity
Unsure 'bout' schoolwork
and what he was taught
But rugby, tennis, cross-nation and cricket
In fact this chap saved a high-quality wicket
At 16 off to war he did go
Lied 'bout' his age
So nobody would know
Into the 'Dorsetshire' was he despatched
But after a Jap bombing
Down she went
17 very long hrs within the h2o he swam
fifth April 1942
This younger boy, now a man
The Outdated Mutual his perform after the war
For lots of very long a long time, almost 24
Lots of a sale, experienced this good fellow
Thanks to his socks, which ended up only yellow!
Racing vehicles, hillclimbs and a passion for pace
Kyalami, KIllarney or any monitor in truth.
Even no brakes could discourage this keen person
Dashing down Kloofnek
Into a garage he rammed
Motor vehicle excursions to East London were pretty swift
Speeding at a hundred thirty mph, created me sick
Tapping his shoulder I would yell finally
Decelerate now, You happen to be going far too quickly!
When the yrs of quick cars and trucks had finally handed
The golf bug strike negative and for quite some time did previous
Only the similar 4 ball would do
Lock and Maddock and Hodson by two
Each individual shot analysed, Every single mistake
eighteen lengthy holes, though the 19th took the cake!
A Province lover on the core
Could not stand Naas, that's needless to say
Gainsford, Dawie and Morne were his Adult men
Newlands his ground...which was then!
A move to Durban, some thirty many years back
Took him towards the land of your Sharks you understand
And so the tales of Province have acquired less and less
And he now proclaims Natal is the greatest!
Blue and White acquired packed absent
Black and White grew to become the get in the working day
Funny nevertheless, arrive holiday break
In which do you discover him? At Bantry Bay!
Sipping within the Balcony, is exactly what he loves to do
Scanning for Sharks in the large White and Blue!
This is a male who loves to wager
Matches or notes or simply the Satisfied
A tale is explained to in the noonday gun
Augie was there, and so was Dick's bum!
Oh the game titles, he loves to Enjoy
Oh the hours wasted absent
Augie and Steve could let you know so a great deal more
Alan as well, that is for sure
I need not show you what Ray loves to consume
You all know perfectly, without needing to Assume
J and B and ice, an excessive amount of drinking water a squander
A lot of h2o spoils the taste
He also loves rum, but an exceedingly Unique variety
Pussers the name, but so hard to find
This father of mine
Is a stickler for time
Altho' he did not was
Watches are set,
Then checked and rechecked
Punctuality is actually a precedence
Retired now, passing the day
Lunching at Splashes, a stones' throw absent
A baked potato, fish or toasted cheese
Anything... but no garlic make sure you!!
A several years ago, you gave us a scare
We thank God, that this is currently apparent
No dreadful mooty, to power with your tum
No extra pipes, up your bum!
You are eighty now and nonetheless in wonderful fettle
I have heard it mentioned "a person of mettle"
Yet, using a softening with your coronary heart
Of which God has truly played the aspect
Father, you really are wonderful and glance so properly
80 a long time outdated...that guaranteed does not explain to
So due to the whisky, the rum as well as wine
You're preserved prevod sa srpskog na nemacki cena in Liquor and that's just great!
In this letter and in all this pleasurable
A Take note of seriousness, for this fine chum
Be you a pal or my Father or merely Ray
Acquire our adore for you personally nowadays
That you are special and treasured and usually will likely be
Nowadays the seventh January 2003
Joyful 80th Birthday Dad!
Glenda Wallace (nee Lock)