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FAR AWAY BUT CLOSE TO HOME - VETERANS STORIES 2 |
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Boot Camp : Where beginner soldiers get their first training.
Hammock : A net slung between two supports to make a bed. Popular in the navy because they sway as the ship rocks on the sea, so keeping the sailors asleep.
Billet : A home where people visiting from away can sleep. |
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Clean sheets and
dried eggs I joined the Navy as an ordinary seaman. The first training was in a vast boot camp on the south coast of England. We slept in hammocks with just blankets. After that I find myself drafted to a coal burning mine-sweeper on the north sea. We went north in the charge of some leading seaman in a train to Hull. At the station an officer said "You’ll be billeted for tonight. It’s a sailor’s hostel in Hull." Hull had been bombed, and there was a lot of damage. We went there and had clean sheets. I hadn’t had sheets since I joined the Navy! So we spent the night there, and we had scrambled eggs made from dried egg for breakfast, and cockroaches dropping off the ceiling. 126 Words
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