Chapter One — Leaving Home

January

2024

I want to write my memoirs but I don’t know where to put them. I’m gonna just start writing here until I figure that out.

— 1982 —

It was my last day in the Sea Cadets before I left home to join the Royal Navy. I had just turned 16 and Great Britain had just won the Falklands War.

The Sea Cadet officers invited my parents to my farewell party at TS Caprice and we gathered in the officer’s mess for a beer. Everyone was very proud of me.

At my farewell party, Mr Hargreaves cried into his beer as he said goodbye. Mr Hargreaves had been a radio operator in the Royal Navy during World War Two and he taught me Morse code at his house on Saturday mornings. Mr Hargreaves begged me not to join the Navy. I should stay and do my A-levels and go to Cambridge, he said. I could always join the Navy later if I was still interested. But I had made up my mind. I was going to join the Navy.

Before I left home, I led a double life. At home, I barely spoke and I was always in trouble at school. I didn’t even read a book for the last two years. But in the Sea Cadets, I was the star of the show. I won Best Cadet two years in a row and I was the only Cadet Petty Officer in my district. We had competitions against other Sea Cadet units practically every other weekend. Sailing, rowing, shooting, orienteering, pentathlon, adventure training, guard drill, PT and more with me as team captain and we won pretty much everything. TS Caprice won the coveted Burgee Award for Excellence.

At school, I was a clown and a troublemaker. I went to a fancy grammar school but everything was so easy and boring that I switched off and did no work at all for the last two years. I was always in trouble and did zero homework but I always came top of my class anyway.

I came first in my year and won prizes in maths and advanced maths but I couldn’t face another two years of this. I needed a challenge. I needed to get away.

At my farewell party, they gave me a gift and everyone shook my hand. My mum gave me a St Christopher for safe travels and my dad gave me twenty quid for beer.

The Commanding Officer gave me a Bosun’s Call.

The train for Plymouth left from Paddington Station at 9:25 am on the Third of September 1982 and I was off. I had twenty quid, a St Christopher and a change of clothes. I didn’t look back.