by Harry Hargreaves

It was the 8th of July 1943 and the largest Armada of ships ever put together was all around us. They plodded on and we ran around them listening, looking and let's face it, praying. We knew now what a precious cargo those ships contained, over 150 thousand men and landing craft. It was the Navy's responsibility to get them to the beaches of Sicily and make sure by our vigilance that the enemy could not stop them. Overhead the fighters patrolled in what seemed to be an endless stream; a heartening sight.

That day passed uneventfully and we found it difficult to believe that the enemy seemed unaware of our presence. On the last day before the actual invasion we could detect all sorts of activity going on onboard the ships as we passed them. Landing craft were being readied to lower, soldiers seemed to be massing on the upper decks, probably for last minute briefings and a couple of high speed motor launches were making their way in and out of the columns. Probably passing on last minute information and orders. One had come alongside us and passed over an envelope, which was taken below by our Cipher officer.

Just before sunset our senior officer had ordered us to hoist battle ensigns. These were the largest ensigns carried in the ship and were flown from the masthead. The theory was that we could be readily identified by our own forces. By the same token, of course, we could readily be identified by the enemy. The battle ensign, which I had flown a few times, was a nuisance. As the ship moved around and reversed course etc, it became wrapped around the mast and we had to have a signalman constantly trying to clear it instead of doing his proper job. There was tremendous tension in the ship. We all knew that at dawn we would be into a battle situation that we simply had no experience with and we had no idea what to expect.

At times like these the senior officers try to manufacture a legend about themselves and the battle to come. This senior officer of the Destroyers was no exception and I spent a difficult and useless half hour reading a signal his ship was sending by light to each of us. We were moving at speed, the sea was running a bit and the light was very small. At first I thought that some vital message to do with the operation was going to be passed and strained to read every word. I remember the opening sentence to this day, it was, "On this the eve of the largest sea borne invasion the world has ever known", it then went on to a long diatribe about courage, efficiency, the world is watching etc., etc. It was this officer's version of Nelson's famous signal but it was wrapped in useless verbiage and platitudes. The message never survived to surface again at some later date thank goodness.

The dawn arrived and already we could see the Landing craft leaving their mother ships. Ahead of them and nearer the beaches were a series of Landing Craft of a type I had never seen before. I soon found out their function as they opened fire. They were rocket ships with rows and rows of rockets that blazed skywards towards the beaches in a remorseless barricade. For a moment I felt a sense of horror as all along the beach turned into a sea of flame. Every destroyer opened fire with a barrage laid down on the beaches and as the Landing craft approached the beach with the invading soldiers the barricade intensified until I could have sworn that there could not be one survivor. Of course this was wishful thinking.

At that moment the enemies shore batteries opened up on the ships over the heads of the Landing Craft. We turned and still firing started to Zig Zag. I saw two flags hoisted on the senior officers ship, I could see clearly what they were but I had no idea what they meant and I reported my failure to the Captain who was very annoyed. Suddenly he said, "Check with Smith, an envelope came onboard this morning." Smith was at the back of the bridge when I rushed up to him and demanded if he had received any new signal orders.

He reached in his back pocket and pulled out a sheet of paper. He told me that this had arrived but it was only amendments to the signal books that could wait. I opened it and there in large print was the name "Operation Husky" and underneath it a series of two letter emergency signals that could be used as not everyone had the naval signal books. I could have hit him. The signal flying meant make smoke and I rushed the answering pendant to the top and informed the Captain of the meaning. The signal was executed and we put up an intense smoke barrier between the ships and the shore. What transpired between the Captain and Smith over this incident I never knew but it certainly did nothing to improve our relationship.

Since, naturally, the invasion of Normandy overshadows any other sea borne invasion, it is not generally known that the invasion of Sicily committed more men, more ships and more aircraft than the Normandy invasion. At one time there were over a thousand allied aircraft, a thousand ships carrying troops, they landed in the first waves 150 thousand men and eventually committed three million men to this invasion of Sicily and Italy.

Naturally the day was spent in acute anticipation. From what we could see things were going well for the British and Canadian troops but the radio communication was telling us a different story about the American troops. The full story of this is now well documented in official archives so I must limit myself to what I could see and hear. We heard the army artillery spotters calling for firepower in different locations and the Navy would respond with heavy gunfire. It was a tremendous boost to hear the Army spotters call in that the target they wanted eliminated had been dealt with.

We had the monitor HMS Lord Roberts in the harbour now. She had a twin turret of fifteen-inch guns that could place a shell weighing a ton accurately on a target 20 miles away. Late in the afternoon we heard an Army Spotter calling for fire power several miles away. The troops were being held down by intense enemy action at some difficult terrain. The Lord Roberts guns slowly swung around and each barrel moving up and down independently until it seemed that they had both decided on the correct angle.

The whole ship seemed to explode and move backwards in the water as the shells were fired. Not many seconds later over the radio we heard the Army Spotter and he could not keep the incredulous amazement out of his voice. Instead of reporting the fall of shot in true military manner he practically screamed, "They have gone, they have gone, what the hell was that?" No one enlightened him but to be in the vicinity of two one ton shells falling with absolute accuracy on a target must have given him a lifetime memory.

The rocket ships had ceased their barrage shortly before the first Landing Craft hit the beaches. They returned to their mother ships ready for the next phase if there was one. The firing from the Naval ships continued as they could put their shells well in front of the advancing army under the direction of the army artillery spotters. There was an occasional air attack alarm as the enemy attempted to penetrate the fighter cover but except for jettisoned bombs we were in no real danger.

In the middle of the afternoon a Motor Gun Boat came almost alongside. Lord Louis Mountbatten was onboard, immaculately dressed in his white uniform as if he was at a garden party. I am afraid after such a considerable time at sea we looked considerably worse for wear. Philip left the bridge and went down to the upper deck where they exchanged pleasantries across the dividing water. I remember thinking that the sartorial splendour of Mountbatten was certainly not reflected in his nephew at the moment. The gold badge on Philip's hat had a distinct green tinge and the gold braid on one of his sleeves was hanging loosely from a few threads. Mountbatten was in charge of the seaborne aspect of the invasion and as usual his knowledge and meticulous planning had paid off handsomely.

Throughout the day the Landing Craft Infantry and The Landing Craft Tanks made a steady and, thankfully, uninterrupted journey to reinforce the spearhead that had worked it's way inwards. The night previous to the landing the sea had been quite turbulent and some doubts were expressed about the capability of the Landing Craft to be able to operate in the then high running sea. Fortunately the wind had dropped just before dawn and the sea had smoothed out considerably. Many of the soldiers had been quite sea sick and that plus the enormous tension of preparing for battle must have placed an almost unbearable strain on every one of them. We need not have worried, they performed magnificently and as each Landing Craft passed us we wished the men God Speed.

Our day was full of activity with the bombardment, the smoke screen and the occasional aircraft warning. The news from our sector was extraordinarily good with reports of a rapid advance towards Etna without the massive opposition that had been expected. As night fell we were ordered round the coast to carry out night patrol outside the port of Syracuse. We were supposed to carry out a cross over patrol with another destroyer so that as he came down one leg of the patrol area we passed him on the other leg. Naturally the night was pitch black, the conditions that had been picked for the invasion. Radio silence was imposed on us so we could not contact him and we never saw him at all until we had a report that he had been sunk in a bombing attack. I was never able to confirm this or even find out the name of the Destroyer. Subsequent events however made this report believable.

We arrived at our patrol position just after ten at night and set a steady course and speed to cover the area. The stars were quite brilliant and on the bridge it seemed we could see for a considerable distance. We had this so-called RDF (subsequently know as Radar) operating. To all intents and purposes it was useless, all it indicated when an aircraft was in the area was just that. Where it was, how high it was and what was it's bearing from the ship remained a complete mystery. Our only means of detection was our ears and with the speed of the aircraft it was impossible to tell with any accuracy at all where the aircraft was in relation to the ship.

The sea was black except where our passing cut a huge wake that glowed with phosphorescence for as far as the eye could see behind us. It was almost midnight when we detected the sound of aircraft coming towards us. It had the sound of a single aircraft and we waited in anticipation for it to pass over. It didn't, suddenly there was the roar of its engine diving followed by the scream of bombs. The bombs made a line of water spouts about two hundred yards down our starboard side and the noise of their explosion was deafening. To all intents and purposes we were a sitting duck of a target. We could not see him but clearly he could see us due to the turbulence of the wake. We waited for his next run but strangely enough his noise receded in the distance.

There was a hurried conference on the bridge and it was decided that the guns would be loaded for barrage firing. The First Lieutenant (Philip) would fire a Very pistol flare in the direction he thought, by listening, the aircraft was approaching. The barrage would be put up in the direction of the flare. Within less than half an hour came the sound of aircraft, whether it was the same aircraft that had landed and reloaded we will never know. The flare went up on our port side and the barrage firing commenced with every short-range weapon as well pouring shot into the direction of the flare. The tracers from the short-range weapons seemed to put up a deadly curtain. It was no use; within seconds we could hear the screaming sound of the bombs dropping and that cringing feeling that made you want to shrink to nothing. The explosions this time were much nearer and the deadly whistle of shrapnel accompanied by the dull thud as some of it found it's mark in the ship's side seemed all around.

Again the aircraft could be heard going away and it was obvious that we were the target for tonight and they would not stop until we had suffered a fatal hit. It was for all the world like being blindfolded and trying to evade an enemy whose only problem was getting his aim right. There was no doubt in anyone's mind that we could dodge for much longer and a direct hit was inevitable. The engineer arrived on the bridge to report that we had suffered minor shrapnel damage above the water line. One of the oil tanks had been slightly holed and we were leaking a small amount of oil as the ship rolled. For a few moments there was no question but to accept the fact that on the next run or the one after that we had little chance of survival. I had been through so much that the feeling of anger and frustration was as great as the fear I and everyone else felt.

It was less than five minutes after the aircraft had departed and, if the previous space in time was approximately the same; we had about twenty minutes to come up with something. We obviously couldn't steam far in that time, not even far enough to make the aircraft think we had moved. The First Lieutenant went into hurried conversation with the Captain and the next thing I knew a wooden raft was being put together on the upper deck. The speed that the men were moving was incredible for within less than five minutes they launched a raft over the side at each end was fastened a smoke float. When it hit the water the smoke floats were activated and billowing clouds of smoke interspersed with small burst of flame gave a convincing imitation of flaming debris in the water.

The Captain ordered full ahead and we steamed away from the raft for a good five minutes and then he ordered the engines stopped. The tell tale wake subsided and we lay there quietly in the soft darkness and cursed the stars, or at least I did. Quite some time went by until we heard the sound of aircraft engines approaching. In the distance we could see the intermittent flames and the masses of smoke from the raft. The next few minutes were the most tension-racked minutes I think I ever went through.

The sound of the aircraft grew louder until I thought it was directly overhead and screwed up my shoulders in anticipation of the scream of bombs. The next thing was the scream of the bombs but at some distance. The ruse had worked and the aircraft was bombing the raft. I suppose he was under the impression that he had hit us in his last attack and was now finishing the job. We lay there quietly waiting for him to leave, which he did, and in view of the solitary attacks so well spaced apart we were convinced he would not return. This proved to be true. It had been marvellously quick thinking, conveyed to a willing team and put into action as if it had been rehearsed. Some times I look back on this particular incident and in view of everything that came after I wonder what would have happened to the Royal House of Windsor if Philip had not thought of this ruse and carried it out so successfully.

The night went by without further incident except that we never met with the destroyer that should have been on the other leg of the patrol. As dawn was breaking we sighted, on the horizon, a group of ships. We immediately trained our guns on these newcomers and, as to our knowledge, no friendly ships could be in the area, the Captain gave the order to challenge them. This procedure consists of transmitting in the direction of the unknown ship or ships a three-letter code by light.

These codes changed daily and one of my jobs was to keep the code of the day and its answer in a readily available position. I made the signal on the ten-inch signal lamp, which, at a million candlepower, could hardly be missed. Once the transmission is made a report is shouted to the Captain who, after an appropriate interval for the receipt of a reply (usually 15 seconds) orders the guns to open fire. The point is that by making the signal you may have told an enemy that you are an enemy and he won't delay in replying to your transmission with gunfire.

The time passed and I had my binoculars glued on the oncoming ships. I reported no reply and the guns opened up. I saw the shells burst almost alongside the oncoming ships and the next salvo would certainly have been direct hits. One of the ships either to dodge the fall of shot or to Zig Zag turned beam on and I screamed cease firing. The Captain ordered the cease-fire and of course asked me what was going on. I explained I had a beam silhouette of the vessel and it was a Landing Craft. Sure enough as we steamed towards them we could see a small group of Landing Craft making for shore and behind them their mother ships who had been beyond our vision over the horizon.

As we closed the Captain asked the lead vessel over the loud hailer if we had caused any casualties and thank heaven the answer was no. He then asked why they had not replied to the challenge and was told they had not been issued with one. It seems that we were not the only one cursed with a Sub Lieut. Smith. In answer to the question "Are we on course," the Captain replied, "Follow the golden trail," we were leaking a small quantity of oil as we moved along and it had spread in our wake leaving a clearly discernible path into the harbour.

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