"Rare Fish"
Operation Grapple
Foreword.
I was brought up as a “child of Empire”,
living with my father and mother in the West Indies during the war.
My father was Colonial Secretary to the Duke of Windsor in the Bahamas.
We came home to the UK in 1945 and I was sent to school. I did not see
much of my father again until he came home for good in 1949.
A career in the Colonial Police was one of the suggestions given to
me by the careers advisory service when I left school in 1955. I had
volunteered for the Royal Marines and served with them for my National
Service from 1957-1959. I was coxswain of a landing craft on Christmas
Island during the final H-Bomb tests in 1958.
Colin Heape 2015
“ Rare Fish”
Noticing my Royal Marines tie at the Inverness Concert
last year, the Colour Sergeant who was selling CDs for the Band asked
me where I had served. “I was only a National Serviceman,”
I replied. “Well” he said, “You were a Rare Fish,
Sir. We did not have many National Servicemen in the Corps.”
As soon as I had left school, I applied to join the
RMFVR so that I would have a chance of serving my National Service with
the Royal Marines. I was delighted when I received instructions to report
to Lympstone Barracks in the summer of 1957. I had set my heart on being
sent to Norway for training in Artic Warfare. I might have known that
you seldom get what you ask for in Her Majesty’s Forces. I had
just completed my basic training with 42 Commando at Bickleigh and was
waiting to go to Norway after Christmas, when one of my friends told
me that my name had come up on the Company Notice Board. “Report
to Stonehouse Barracks for your Tropical Kit” the notice read,
“You have been posted to an unspecified destination East of Suez“.
After a short leave at Christmas, I was on my way to Christmas Island
in the Pacific. There was not much chance of snow warfare there, but
what I had to take part in was just as exciting.
The Commando barracks at Bickleigh
© Richard J. Brine
I found myself playing a minor role in Operation “Grapple“,
at that time the largest Joint Services Operation ever mounted in peace
time. All three services were required to work together in an operational
role for the purpose of testing Britain’s first thermonuclear
weapons. The Hydrogen bombs, which were in the megaton range, were to
be dropped by R A F Bomber Command V Force. Christmas Island was chosen
because of its remoteness in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean. Operation
“Grapple” involved building a base and an airstrip for large
jet aircraft to land on. At one time there were over 3,000 personnel
living on the base. As far as I can remember there were only 2 women
permanently stationed there as WVS to look after the welfare of all
those young men.
Colin Heape in 1958
de Havilland Comet C.Mk.4C of RAF Transport Command
Six of us young Royal Marines flew from R A F Northolt
on 21st January 1958 in a Comet Jet airliner to Travis US Air Base near
San Francisco in California. The Comet had a very short range and we
had to fly via Iceland and Goose Bay in Canada where we spent the first
night. I remember Captain Carmen RM, who was in charge of the party,
telling us that if we got drunk at Goose Bay we would freeze to death
in the snow outside the huts. The outside temperature was about minus
30 c. It was the first time I had tasted maple syrup on my toast for
breakfast. The next morning we flew on to San Francisco stopping off
at Chicago to refuel. We spent a week at Travis and I enjoyed several
trips into San Francisco on a National Serviceman’s pay. How well
I remember the difficulty in hitching a lift back over the Golden Bay
Bridge when returning to camp. From Travis we eventually flew on to
Honolulu in a civilian aircraft. I bought my first brightly coloured
tea shirt in Honolulu and nearly got into a fight with an American Marine
who called me a limey “Jar Head“. The last leg of the journey
from Honolulu to Christmas Island in an old R A F Transport Dakota was
very uncomfortable. When we landed on the Island, the heat and glare
of the sun reflected from the white coral sand of the Pacific Atoll
hit you like a ton of bricks. New arrivals on the Island were called
Moon Men, until they had been burnt brown. There was no thought of wearing
sun cream in those days and my nose and the back of my neck was permanently
red and sore. As part of the Naval Party, we were packed off to HMS
Resolution, a shore base named after Capt. Cook’s ship in the
Port of London on the west side of the Island. Any sophistication we
might have observed at the main RAF Camp was spectacularly absent from
the rows of old tents that made up the accommodation at the Port Camp.
Christmas Island is the largest coral atoll in the
Pacific and is about 35 miles long by 24 miles at its widest. The land
rises to about 20 ft above sea level and parts of the island are covered
with Palm trees. The only wild animals on the island were rats, but
I remember someone had a pet dog. At night, the shoreline was covered
in land crabs, which scuttled out of the bushes in search of food. One
sailor had a large crab attached to a string, which he took on parade
with him.
Christmas Island - Bombing Run
Landing Craft LCM 18
The Royal Marines were there to man the Landing Craft
and Royal Engineers and Fijian sailors assisted us to unload the ships.
Each LCM was crewed by four Royal Marines and was used to unload all
the heavy stores and equipment from the ships moored in the Bay. Ships
could not enter the lagoon and had to lie off the island, weather permitting.
When the ships were in, we were required to work 10 to 12 hours per
day Saturdays and Sundays included to unload them. This involved a round
trip of about 8 nautical miles from Port London to the ship and back
three or four times a day. When the sea was rough, this meant navigating
the passage through the surf breaking over the barrier reef, which surrounded
the island. In bad weather the channel was closed and the ships had
to put to sea again. The surf breaking on either side of the entrance
was quite dramatic and the flat bottomed landing craft slammed into
the waves as you put to sea. The roar of the surf along the barrier
reef round the island still comes back to me after almost fifty years.
I was promoted to coxswain of boat No 18 after about three months on
the island. My boat was used to take stores and personnel ashore on
both Malden and Fanning, two other coral islands within about 400 nautical
miles from Christmas Island. The LCM was hoisted aboard HMS Narvick
for these trips. To reach Malden Island involved crossing the equator,
and I remember having to pay my forfeit to Neptune by being shaved and
ducked in a canvas bath. I left Christmas Island on 15 December 1958
and reached UK on 22 December just in time for Christmas so I never
spent Christmas on Christmas Island.
Vickers-Armstrong Valiant V-Bomber W2365
The first H-bomb test that I witnessed was exploded
in May 1958. I think I was present for all the tests, which were carried
out that year. The bombs were dropped from a Vickers Valiant bomber
by Group Captain Ken Hubbard RAF who commanded 49 Squadron Bomber Command.
I learnt more details about how the bombs were dropped by reading his
obituary in “The Times” dated 27 January 2004. The bomb
was released from the aircraft flying at 45,000 ft at a point 1.5 miles
from the target and was timed to explode at 8,000 ft over ground zero
at a position over the sea just off the south point of the island. This
was approximately 20 miles from where we were sitting on the beach at
Port London. The bombs were released manually as the aircraft passed
over a target indicator positioned on the ground on the southern tip
of the island. One minute before the explosion, we were ordered to sit
down facing away from ground zero. We were told to cover our eyes with
our hands and on no account to look at the test until given the all
clear. I do not remember hearing the explosion, but I did feel a blast
of hot air. When we did look round the whole sky was filled with a vast
mushroom cloud, the top of which rose to an altitude of 60,000 ft with
ice caps forming on it. The cloud grew bigger and bigger until it filled
the whole horizon. It was certainly an awe inspiring sight. I think
we were given the rest of the day off! The last test on 11 September
1958 produced an explosion with a yield in the three megatons range.
Great Britain certainly had its own independent nuclear deterrent and
the means for delivering it, which is one of the last decisions that
Winston Churchill made before he retired. The words of Churchill’s
final speech- “never flinch, never weary, never despair”
have always stayed with me. National Service taught me to get on with
life and mix easily with my fellows. I had an interesting time and have
lived to tell the tale.
R C Heape, RMV 203101
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