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Articles
ROYAL MARINE MEMORIES
from Joy Newman
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In 1920 I was born into a Royal Marine family, and my birth certificate states:
‘The particulars of your child’s birth, having been entered in the records of this Division, the certificate is returned herewith.’
Both my grandfathers and three of my uncles were regulars, as was my father, Albert Stares. As children, both my parents attended the Royal Marines School at Deal, and it was at Deal that my Dad joined the Service in 1909 as a boy bugler, aged 14½. He was sent to Melville Barracks at Chatham, and on arrival was delighted to meet four of his school chums crossing the parade ground in readiness for sounding ‘Sunset’.
During his boy’s service, he had an exceptional experience, which could have blighted his future career. King George V was visiting the fleet at Chatham and Dad was the duty bugler who had to precede the King sounding the ‘Alert’ as he toured the ships. Dad had been issued with a new tunic for the occasion, and during the morning rehearsal found the neckband too tight. It affected his breathing. He asked the Bugle Major if he could loosen one of the hooks, but was told ‘no’ as this would amount to being improperly dressed. As a consequence, Dad’s sounding-off at the rehearsal was less than perfect. He was called before the CO and given a ticking off, together with 7 days’ extra bugle practise. Meanwhile, the King’s visit was imminent.
Put on the spot, Dad decided to take matters into his own hands, and as he raised his bugle for the first call, he quickly undid the top hook of the collar with his thumb. Everything went off beautifully and the unfastened hook remained hidden from view by the bugle. The King was so impressed with Dad’s playing that he remarked on it to the ship’s captain and said that at the end of the year the bugler was to receive a ‘Superior’ for efficiency on his service record. The 7 days’ extra bugle practise was cancelled as a result but nobody knew the reason for the improved performance. If they had, Dad would probably have been put on a charge for disobeying an order.
When telling this story, he used to say that the Bugle Major probably had his suspicions about the episode, but nothing was ever said and the ‘Superior’ remains on my Dad’s service certificate to this day.
At the age of 18, he ‘turned over to the ranks’ of the RMLI as a sea-going Marine and signed on for 21 years. He immediately decided to train as a PTI. He qualified at deal, was promoted to Corporal, and was very soon serving aboard ship on convoys during the First World War.
He and my mum had been sweethearts since the age of 10 and were eventually married in 1918, setting up their home in Gillingham. Then I arrived! By this time, Dad had spent another period at Deal to re-qualify, and my earliest memories are all related to the gym at Melville Barracks (Dad used to say that I cut my first teeth on the wall-bars there!). I recall vividly the goodbyes when his ships sailed; the football field at Chatham where we watched Dad play for the ‘Royals’ in the Kent league; the athletic track at the United Services Ground where he ran many of his races as a 100 and 220 yds sprinter; and the Christmas parties held in the barracks and organised by the PT staff.
After being promoted Sergeant, Dad once again returned to Deal to re-qualify and become a PT Instructor 1st Class. Soon after this, in 1931, he was drafted to HMS York, which was part of the Mediterranean Fleet. After a short embarkation leave he returned to barracks to collect his kit which he stacked in the front passage of our house. That night he had to return to barracks to read the duty list prior to sailing the next day, but when he returned for his last night he amazed us by saying his draft had been cancelled. Instead he was to report forthwith to the RM Depot at Deal, where he was to be a PT Staff Instructor. HMS York sailed without him, and my mother, together with my two-year old brother and myself, moved to Deal and lived in the coastguard station on the Sandown Road. Dad was subsequently promoted Colour Sergeant and I went to St George’s School for a year.
My mother’s father had been a Sergeant Cook in the Royal Marines, and it was while we were living at Deal that she told me about the days, long before, when the men and their families were able to take a jog along to the galley in the barracks at night and get it filled with soup for tuppence. Service pay was very poor at that time.
Dad’s mother took in washing in those days for some of the Marines, and he used to tell me how he, as a schoolboy, would collect it from the barracks and return it when it had been washed and ironed. A typical bundle would be a pair of ‘long-johns’ (four pence), a long-sleeved vest (four pence), a towel (tuppence), and pair of socks (a penny). All that came to eleven pence, and sometimes the men would give Dad a shilling and tell him to keep the penny change for himself. He kept a little book with all the necessary details of each customer.
Dad’s father was a groom during his service life and carried on working for the Colonel after he came to pension. Dad watched the building of the garrison church at Deal Barracks and sang in the church choir there until he left Deal to join the Royal Marines.
In 1932 Dad was promoted to QMSI and sent to Eastney to serve the last of his 21 years, and those years have very happy memories for me as I was able to join the Royal Marines Girl Cadet Corps at Eastney Barracks. We were all aged from 7 to 17 and really imagined ourselves to be ‘miniature marines’ (long, long before females were allowed into the real Corps!). The first time I saluted a Royal Marines officer and received a salute in return was one of my proudest moments. I lived on that memory for months! Dad took us for PT on Monday nights, and every year we competed against the Royal Navy Girl cadets for the Ladies Cup. The competition consisted of PT, maze-marching, drill and semaphore. One year, we were taught club-swinging, and I never hear the tunes ‘Three O’clock in the Morning’ or ‘Gold and Silver Waltz’, without going over the routines in my head. The Royal Marines Band played those two tunes every time we gave a display, and Dad was quite proud of us.
Eastney Barracks parades; Dad being carried shoulder-high through the barrack gates after his fencing team had appeared at Olympia; watching him play football in the Navy Cup and eventually winning three winner’s medals: all are memories with a common denominator – the ‘Royals’.
Eventually, Dad came to pension in 1934 but was recalled to serve in the Second World War in 1939, finally ending his service career in 1945. But memories were still to be made. In 1990 he attended the PT Reunion at Lympstone, and from that meeting a nostalgic visit to Deal was arranged by Captain Frank Allen, Inspector of PT. It was like turning back the clock for both Dad and myself, and the final two hours of that day brought the biggest surprise of all. After going to the garrison church where he had sung in the choir as a boy of 8; seeing a class of bandsmen going through PT training in the gym, where he himself had qualified as a PT instructor so many years before; visiting the swimming pool where he had qualified as an instructor and life-saver; meeting a group of present-day drummers at the School of Music; and paying a visit to the old Royal Marines school where he and my mother had met at the age of 10: after all this, Dad and I had lunch in the Officers’ Mess and thought our day had ended. How wrong we were. The final of the Tunney Cup was being played that afternoon on the very football pitch where Dad himself had so often played, and we were invited as guests. After the match, we saw the cup being presented to the winning team – the same cup that Dad had seen presented by Gene Tunney so many years before, and for which he himself had played as a young PTI. He was given a miniature cup to keep as a memento, and it still has pride of place in my living room.
By the time of that visit to Deal, Dad was 96 years of age, and two years later he passed away. When the funeral was over, a much more recent Royal Marine who had attended, told me on leaving: ‘Don’t forget, you are still a member of the Royal Marines family’; and it is with that thought in mind that I have tried to write down these memories. But these are really Dad’s memories and I am just his ‘scribe’.
Joy Newman
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