The author was a midshipman in the cruiser HMS Newfoundland during the Suez crisis. Reams have been written about that adventure (but little about the fun and games in the Red Sea) but what follows, paraphrased from the author's Journal written at the time, has not I think been covered in public print before.
THE LITTLE BEIHAN
Following her rather lively participation in "Suez", HMS Newfoundland returned to Aden on 27th November 1956, after some thirty days' seatime and nearly a hundred jackstay transfers with other ships - no helicopters to do all the work in those days. A month at sea was then rather a lot for an RN ship, but the merchant seamen in our RFA tanker Wave Sovereign were out for 57 days.
While we had been out, Nasser had been taking thought. He announced on 6th November his intention of mining the Gulf of Suez; the canal being blocked, and his own frigate in the Red Sea having been now sunk by us (possibly the last warship-to-warship gun-action sinking in history), he was tactically free to mine where he liked; therefore this threat had to be taken seriously. He neatly caught the Admiralty on the hop as the RN then had no minesweepers of any sort East of Suez.
The mines he would use were assumed to be of the conventional type, known even to Beano readers, where a sinker on the seabed is used to tether a steel sphere of explosive floating at a predetermined depth. A touch on one of the mine's actuator horns, a phial of acid is broken, an electrical connection is made and WHOOMFAH! you have a huge and probably fatal hole in your ship. The chaos such weapons can cause was well demonstrated by Iranians' use of eighty-yearold Tsarist mines in the Persian Gulf in the 1990s.
The cure for this simple but deadly device is for some brave fellow to steam along towing a serrated wire, probably armed with explosive cutting devices, and kept splayed out by the sort of otter boards used by trawlers to hold their nets open, so that it cuts all mine moorings across a wide swathe of sea as it is towed along. The lay of the wire helps it "fly" hydrodynamically through the water so that it lies in a roughly horizontal bight, cutting all the moorings at approximately the same depth. By the Geneva Convention - demonstrably ignored by, for instance, Germany - the cut should release a plug so that the floating mine sinks. This is also ordinary tactical sense, since one wishes to mine that piece of water used by the enemy, not this piece used by oneself. Nevertheless the prudent minesweeper stands by with .303 and armourpiercing rounds to sink any floaters that pop up.
The brave fellow needs a suitable ship, preferably of shallow draft, with sturdy winches to work the hundreds of fathoms of heavy wire involved, and with a sufficient turn of speed to fly the sweep. For the most simple of these "Oropesa" sweeps nine knots is about the minimum. Remember this figure.
Our sweeps were the Mk 7 Oropesa. The principal difference between that and the more familiar Mk 9 used in Ton-class Coastal Minesweepers is that the kite is buoyant, so as to support the inboard end of the sweep at relatively lower speeds, whereas in the Mk 9 sweep it forces the inboard end down hydrodynamically. Here's a glimpse at the main hardware:
Brave fellows we had a-plenty but no ships. An early pass at this was the capture by HMS Newfoundland of two odoriferous Egyptian fishing boats, to be sailed to Aden by prize crews and there converted; but Peace then broke out. Urgent research in his law books by the Captain's Secretary resulted in Oscar and Papa being turned loose again. The Admiralty therefore leased three small coasters and a trawler in Aden and set about their rapid conversion. Minimal crews were to be flown out from England, the quick way via Nigeria.
I knew little of this until 29th November when I and three other midshipmen were called up from our boat-running and ordered to sea - "no kit, it's only for the day" - the next day with HM's brand-new 150th Minesweeping Squadron.
Nick, Dick, Graham and myself duly reported aboard our assigned vessels early next morning and, supported by a scratch crew of odds and sods from the frigate St Bride's Bay - our proper crews were still touring Africa - incredibly we spent the day minesweeping.
The Beihan had started life as a Scheldt-class Landing Craft (Tank). These ships, 148' long by 27' and drawing 7'6" had been conceived as a result of urgent requests from SEAC for landing craft to prosecute the Burma War. However, this and its successor the invasion of Malaya, were brought to a welcome and early end by the delivery of a free cooked breakfast to the citizens of Hiroshima followed by a similar, and very well-deserved packet of instant sunshine for the residents of Nagasaki. Beihan's flat bottom and welded-up tank doors betrayed her military origin - and did nothing to help her steer in a seaway. As the 518 ton, seven and a half knot coaster Empire Seaforth she had worked her way to Aden, where, as the by now six-knot Beihan, already "with leaden age oercargoed", she plied north to black Cyprus and south as far as Djibouti with an Arab crew under Italian officers. Her cargoes included live sheep for Mecca whose casual and frequent demise en route ("four sheep thrown overboard") was chronicled in her log. But she had winches, serving the derricks before and abaft her holds, that could be used to work the sweep wires; and with her deck somewhat cleared away - one of her boats had been dumped in the hold, on top of disgusting old mattresses and a large pile of coal ballast - kites, floats, and otters could be stowed handy for minesweeping use. The sweep wires had to be led forward to the winches and back to the molgogger via snatchblocks, creating a formidable (and dangerous) trip hazard on the upper deck sweeps were being worked. But it was amazing how quickly the kit had been got together and installed considering the circumstances.
The coal, 175 tons of it, was for the Bar-class lifting vessels that were berthed nearby, and which were waiting optimistically for a shot at Canal clearance. These, the last coal-burning ships in the Navy, had barely made it from Singapore. One had cadged a tow from an opportunely-appearing tanker; another had arrived with its forecastle awning triced up to a boom slung on its forward derrick, which jury-rig sail had given it an extra knot and a half.
Our squadron was made up with two sister vessels, Seiyun (leader), and Shibam, also taken up (in modern parlance, STUFT) from Aden Coasters; and a 1919-vintage trawler the Romilly, which had shot her last trawl decades before, and had since been leading a quiet life as a harbour tender for Cory Brothers in Aden.
Here comes a look at the rest of the squadron:
Beihan was FILTHY. Her taps did not work, which made cleaning up more difficult than it need have been. Lurking in his cabin, "taken up" with the ship, was her Italian engineer Meester Salvatore who besides making her engine go was charged with her domestic services. When he finally made the water system work he celebrated by locking himself in the only bathroom for an hour but maybe he had a backlog of work on his own account.
Our day out was fruitful and instructional. It was spent conducting manoeuvres special to minesweeping, so that the new COs could become accustomed to their vessels. The secret when sweeping is to minimise the exposure to getting sunk oneself. This means that the squadron lays off in echelon from its leader, each ship's bows tucked in behind and inside the float at the end of the sweep wire of the next ahead. After the first "lap" the leader turns so as, as far as possible, to remain in and return in water that has just been swept. The others turn behind her in a broad sweep, always remaining in swept water, and judging the turn so that the sweep continues to fly and does not bottom, which will happen if the turn is made too tight. Normally the kite is hauled so that the sweep is less depressed, but hauling the whole of the gear and re-streaming it just takes too long, and needs much more sea-room. In our own case we had to manage the rudder particularly cautiously as, having no keel, left to herself Beihan turned on a halfpenny. Another danger to be avoided is overrunning and cutting the sweep or float wire of the next ahead.
The lap is marked with danbuoys, either by the leader or by a special danlayer following astern. We usually used Romilly as the danlayer, partly because, commanded by a Gunner rather than a Lieutenant, she was Junior ship ("canteen boat") and partly because she handled better for that task. The LCTs , which were all freeboard and no draft, paid off the wind rapidly as they lost way, and therefore broached to, and fell away from the dan when one was recovering; or, if the dan was approached from its weather side, one over-rode its mooring and could then in manoeuvring very easily fetch the mooring around the LCT's screw. The trick was to grapple the dan's pellet line very smartly as one came on it with way on - this took practice which our scratch crew hadn't had. Dan recovery also needed smart ship-handling from the bridge.
A dan buoy is basically a steel can with a long pole through its middle which floats on the end of a wire attached to a mooring sinker on the sea bottom. Clearly, the canister floats down-current from its mooring and this "scope" has to be allowed for in assessing what water is truly swept. Dan buoys were a general provision used by all ships for marking any interesting position in the water, until someone better equipped could come along and do it better. It is thought a poor show when minesweeping to cut dan moorings by mistake.
I went back to my comfortable Big Ship, tired and filthy, on that Friday evening to find that the day-trip had not been entirely that, nor just a useful piece of instruction for snotties. Authority had only provided one officer per ship for the 150th - we four had been judged fit (quite a compliment) to make up this deficiency.
Returning on board Beihan to correct charts, assist storing, sort out paperwork and be generally useful, I therefore took her (and now my) CO more seriously. Fortunately I had drawn a thoroughly decent bloke, a junior lieutenant called Peter Wells. I was as happy as Larry under his command which shows how well he put up with me, and he always gave me more rope every time the line drew taut. In the end as an nineteen-year-old midshipman I would often be handling not only Beihan but the whole of our mighty squadron, putting us through our lap turns and taking charge of an entire sweeping operation while Peter caught up on his paperwork below, in his cabin below the port wing of the bridge.
But there was no cabin for me below the starboard wing, where instead - open, usefully enough in the tropics, to any breeze from ahead - lurked the ship's galley, manned not by a proper chef but by a National-Service Ordinary Seaman. Nor might I move into the three pukka, panelled cabins abaft the galley. Meester Salvatore was clearly a permanent fixture and Peter sensibly and rightly hinted that I should leave our Coxswain and Chief Boatswain's Mate - seaman Petty Officers - in residence also.
Newfoundland sailed for another Red Sea patrol on 4th December, so the night before we four Mids made for air-conditioned comfort and luxury on board the storeship RFA Fort Charlotte. Her Chinese crew not only kept the ship spotless - in spite of the Captain's rabbit - but served enormous meals. This heaven lasted four nights. Fort Charlotte then also due to sail, I moved on board Beihan where by now I had built myself a creditable little shack on her poop deck.
I had found a flat piece of deck abaft the funnel, topped by a fixed roof supported by stanchions. First I cut to size, and secured as dwarf bulkheads either side, two large boards with "FIRE DANGER" written on them which I had found in the hold. Meester Salvatore, arms rotating, complained loudly when he found out but it was too late then to restore them to their previous state. Leaving a gap for access and for air (very necessary in Aden) I then set and sewed vertical strips of canvas, also won from the hold, from the deckhead down to the boards and painted the whole with grey paint similarly acquired. Within this six-foot-square space I installed my camp bed, my canvas hanging wardrobe, a chair that had come my way, and a vegetable locker which seemed just the thing for my kit. I rode over the Coxswain's worries about storing his vegetables and of course like a true seaman he solved that problem some other way.
Under pressure from Peter I then repainted the whole thing; I rather had to concede that my grey, a sort of duck-egg greeny colour, was not RN and didn't go with the rest of the ship. A short while later the harbourmaster's daughter told me what fun she had watching the Fleet through binoculars in the early morning. We weren't exactly in winceyette pyjama weather at night so I shifted my screens. They were easy enough to strip and resew; my overhand homeward-bound efforts with palm and needle were nothing like the Flat Seam so beautifully shown in the Seamanship Manual. In the end this maritime bothy lasted my time, and the angel at the top of the mast fixed the weather so that my flimsy erection didn't blow away.
I also made a lasting contribution to naval history by finding some stiff, oiled paper and cutting a stencil so that we could all wear "150" on our funnels. Our regular crew, by now on board and even paid - no one had managed that during their Stanley-like peregrination across the Dark Continent - cleaned up the ship and tried to scrub ten years of grime and grease and sheep-shit out of the wooden decks. We had it easy when it came to leadership as sailors love any new thing, out of the ordinary. Sailors HATE dirt and always keep themselves and their quarters spotless as a matter of personal pride, so they buckled-to between decks. Beihan's merchant-navy standard accommodation, once cleaned, was better than would ever have come their way in a warship. As to painting, if you dumped British sailors on the moon they would set about painting it ship's-side grey and making it tiddley. So there was no problem getting our new hands to lick Beihan into shape as a ship that they could personally be proud of. Sailors will work all the hours God sends if they think the work makes sense. Not that, at Aden, there was much fun waiting for them ashore anyway.
We were becoming a warship, even though we had no armament except for some Lee-Enfield rifles lent by Newfoundland. It was clearly assumed that when we were minesweeping nobody would dream of attacking us.
Indeed a new twist to the plot now became apparent. We were to sweep under the UN flag, in civilian clothes as "volunteers". Our sailors only had uniform with them in those days, so the Coxswain had each man fill out a demob self-measurement form and each, by some arcane feat of logistics, was then issued with a three-piece tweed demob suit, shirt, two collars and choice of spotted tie. It would indeed be a story if anyone ever went minesweeping dressed like that. Our sailors only wore shorts and sandals at sea for rather obvious Red Sea reasons. Officers were deemed to have their own plain clothes available but were to be issued with blue berets with Merchant Navy cap-badges. We would be entirely and convincingly disguised.
Monday 10th December was now set as our sailing date. I reckon it would have taken us a fair two weeks to get to our minefield, twelve hundred miles away, allowing even a minimum of time for very necessary exercising and storing en route, so we looked forward to a Christmas within an easy pull of Joseph and Mary's donkey tracks.
One matter, to which I now recall I failed to give any thought at the time, was dhobeying. On board Newfoundland my Chinese steward removed all discarded clothes which then reappeared freshly starched and ironed within the day (cotton drill and twill, no easy-care poly-cotton in 1956) [he was pretty zealous at this which probably means he was on squeeze from No.1 Laundry Boy for the number of items he could round up to be put on my bill]. In Aden similar service was readily available from shore, leaving one merely with unending button replacement as the buttons disintegrated rapidly from being pounded onto rocks. I very nearly had to figure out washing and ironing for myself - aspects of growing up I had so far managed to ignore.
Meanwhile the week left to us was devoted to intensive day-running sweeping and danning practice to work up our hands, and two days' storing from the base and Fort Charlotte. In between there was some prep, trying to work up a Deviation Card for the magnetic compasses from the accumulated ship's logs that had been left on board (which is how I found out about the sheep). Standard and Steering compasses never told the same tale; even the card we worked up would have been dubious following the major shifting of ironmongery involved in our conversion. When one did give a wheel order one did not know the result as the rudder indicator only gave a varying and broad idea of where the rudder was. We had none of that modern stuff like gyros, radar or Decca (let alone satellite navigation) and our only toy was a commercial voice radio set on the bridge. Less to worry about really. Basically we started just about where Captain Cook left off, except that our vessel was slower than his. We had discovered that into a stiff breeze with sweeps streamed we made barely four and a half knots. When we recovered the sweep the acorn grips, set on the sweep wire to carry the cutters, came up burnished, which showed that we had been dragging the sweep along the bottom.
Peter had also to train up the Coxswain to take a watch. As it was I was on the bridge most of every day at sea. Here I received a good drubbing in traditional coastal fixing. This has to be extremely accurate if the result is to be used to tell some other chap which bit of sea is safe and which dangerous. I saw little of the working of the sweep gear as the Chief Boatswain's Mate saw to all that, and I could not be spared from the Officer stuff on the bridge. We also had to transform the sparker (Telegraphist) sent out from England to a ship with no requirement for wireless morse, into a bunting-tosser (signalman) - all manoeuvring was controlled by flag hoists, hard work too for the halliards which turned out to be quite rotten, so up the mast went Sparker to reeve new ones.
Quite a lot of time had to go into general seamanship like getting used to the merchant-navy style devil's claw cable gear, and gingerly and experimentally lowering the remaining boat. Meester Salvatore, a whirling dervish of Mediterranean gesticulation, came out of his cabin mouthing Latin imprecations. We pressed on and as the boat settled in the water the level inside it matched that outside it just exactly. Carefully draining and re-hoisting the boat, we abandoned the exercise. Meester Salvatore said he told us so. Clearly the last water that boat had been in was the Tyne eleven years before.
At this point the angel at the top of the mast intervened and on the fateful Monday we received a terse and unamplified signal - "You're not sailing". Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean had apparently decided to clear the canal from the North and do all the minesweeping with professional, new Coastal Minesweepers from Malta. These could also sweep magnetic and acoustic mines if necessary. However this new strategy was not immediately confirmed and we spent another two weeks feverishly training and enjoying a second visit from the naval C-in-C East Indies which made us feel really important. The Navy had Commanders-in-Chief all over the place in those palmy days. At one point we set fire (mildly) to the departing destroyer Diana as we steamed past her saluting with Very pistols (our heaviest armament). The fire was put out but so also I guess was Diana's captain.
Suddenly it was Christmas. Traditionally some licence is allowed to sailors on that day. Our OD chef, who had been up late drawing chickens - none of your pre-packaged Sainsbury stuff! had heard of this and called me with the cry "Officers cook breakfast on Christmas Day - Captain's ashore". Entering joyfully into the spirit of the day I did what I could with forty frozen eggs standing up in the frying pan. Sailors can be very polite but I wasn't asked to cook dinner. Anyway it was better than Christmas in a minefield. A volunteer took over, as the chef, enervated by all that drawing and stuffing, had found some never-explained refreshment and was too busy, dressed in the Captain's reefer and holding spoof defaulters, to do any more cooking.
Normally I ate in the saloon with Meester Salvatore and the Petty Officers - which I fear always rather cramped the latter - as Peter's cabin was too small for a mess. For Christmas - plenty of time to prepare as the chickens did not emerge from the oven until half-way through the afternoon - we dined a deux in splendour on the bridge wing, our table a crate covered with the UN flag and an Egyptian ensign, which tablecloths complete with gravy stains I treasured for many years until they disintegrated through age. Tucked into the flag locker but nicely chilled was a good Niersteiner Hock. Our masts garlanded in accordance with the ancient usage of the sea, the 150th Minesweeping Squadron then settled into a general caulk (sleep). Beihan's cake turned up in a trifle three days later. We knew the party was over.
We went to sea for a blow through the day after Boxing Day - somewhat necessary after festivities in the Club and at Tarshine - and took a detachment of Durham Light Infantry out with us. These poor things were Aden Garrison, with pretty well nothing to do; the Communist terrorism, to which Denis Healey capitulated even after Colonel Mitchell's Argylls had infuriated the Labour Government and the Foreign Office by retaking Crater City in a walkover, was a decade into the future. With no armament on board Beihan, there was little for the soldiery to see or do and they spent most of the day asleep, dotted about on the very hot upper deck.
Tantalisingly, Newfoundland put in a brief appearance that day on her way to New Year whoopee in Djibouti but we mids were not yet to be released. Instead the 150th took more DLIs to sea on New Year's Eve. This time Beihan's allocation included a subaltern, so Peter gave him the ship and let him and his troops lay and recover a danbuoy which they did rather well, a pity when I've been telling you how difficult this was.
1957 came in with traditional sixteen bells, hooters and sirens. New Year's Day, like all the others in harbour, we had our customary shower of soot and smuts from the remaining Bar boats - two had already been sailed on Christmas Eve, no doubt on a fraught return trip to Trinco. But the fat lady really had sung. We spent the week landing everything naval and dismantling the sweep gear. Our sailors were better off than those from the St Bride's Bay who could be espied in the far distance being urged up Shamshan rock. A happy cloud of Somalis came aboard to shift the coal out of the hold. That really showed that the whole crazy, happy circus was folding up its tent, and that Meester Salvatore would shortly have his ship back.
Newfoundland returned from her jolly and I humped my kitbag down to her boat. There was a last chance, a week after New Year, to call and say goodbye while someone else was making a hash of hoisting Newfy's Land Rover, with a crane that had not been used for two and a half years, into my pinnace - I was back to boat-running with my trusty crew of Royal Marines. Then I was off aboard my Big Ship, band playing and bugles sounding off, to new adventures on the other side of the world.
I was also back to being a very small cog in a very big machine. I carried a torch for my little Beihan for many years. She, after various changes of name and owner, sank at her moorings in Singapore harbour in 1976, and was sent for scrap truly worn out by her thirty years at sea1. I wonder if her later crews knew of her brief career as a warship, albeit in Harry Tate's Navy. It remained to thank her five years later when I was sent to a real minesweeper as First Lieutenant - unusually on a new appointment, I knew what the job was about. And I never missed a chance thereafter to "hop in and make one" if there was an off-spec odd-job going.
Oh - Nasser's mines - there weren't any.
1 Mitchell, WH, "The Empire Ships", Lloyds of London, 2nd edn 1990
RJH Griffiths, Midshipman HMS Newfoundland
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