Dad In The Navy - The Memoirs Of John Francis Connor

Harry Hatton told me a story about Balmoral at Sydney Heads where I had done my training, I asked him what was the reason for the amphitheatre which was built into the hillside overlooking the Pacific Ocean. He told me that in the 1930's an Archbishop (self styled) Leadbeater had come into prominence in Sydney and had forecast that Jesus Christ would walk through Sydney Heads on a specific date (on the water of course), incredibly thousands of people believed him and funds were raised to build the amphitheatre and seats booked for the big day. Of course the "Archbishop" disappeared jut before the date forecast and was later caught and tried for fraud. Whilst at Golden Hind I was roped in for a funeral firing party and by a strange co-incidence I had to fire a salute over the funeral of a man who had lived just around the corner from me at Middlesbrough. Bandy Wilson had been brought up with me on the Whinney Banks estate in Middlesbrough. He joined the navy about th...

HMS Golden Hind was the main Australian base for the British Pacific Fleet, it was about 12 miles from the centre of Sydney at a place called Liverpool. The best part for me was that Hammondville was a short bus journey from Liverpool so I was able to spend more time at the Hattons house which was becoming my second home. Let me tell you something of Hammondville, it was a small community of buildings, almost all self-built which got its name from a Canon Hammond who had campaigned in the 1920s to get electricity and water laid on and established a small suburb of Liverpool. My Uncle Harry Hatton had settled there in the 30's after working on the railways and had a steady job as an ambulance driver. Most of the inhabitants worked in Liverpool or Sydney and the bus driver used to stop at each house every morning to pick us up (one morning I had to wake up on the verandah and I had to hurry and dress while the whole of the bus cheered). It was approaching Christmas 1945 and the ...

I was taken by jeep to HMAS Balmoral which was on the north side of Sydney harbour mouth, the entrance to Sydney harbour was known as Sydney Heads and I would be based on HMAS Balmoral and travel daily across the bay to HMAS Watsons Bay which was on the south side of Sydney Heads. Watsons Bay was a camp on a clifftop with radar ariels sticking up all over the place and huts converted into schoolrooms for lectures, I spent three months training there before passing out as a Radar Plotter second class or R.P.2. The next weekend I went up to Hammondville and told them the news, it was a surprise to them as they thought I would be sailing with the Lothian. I asked Aunt Flo if I could stay every weekend then I could get a living out allowance and native leave in Australia just as if I was in the Aussie navy, she said "Certainly", so on the Monday following I arranged it at the camp to leave Watsons Bay at 3.p.m each Friday and report back for 9.00 a.m each Monday- this I ...