- Area:
- Wales
- Programme:
- Heroes Return
- Release date:
- 28 5 2012
His ship transported top Generals and the future President of the United States of America safely ashore following the Allied invasion of Sicily and he used the latest Radar technology which gradually handed the Allies superiority in the sea and the air during the Second World War.
Now, thanks to an award from the Big Lottery Fund’s Heroes Return 2 programme, 89 year old Daniel James from Cardiff will return to the shores of Italy to recall the role he played in one of the longest, largest and most complex naval battles in history – The Battle for the Atlantic.
In July this year Danny, or ‘Taffy’ as he was nicknamed by his comrades during the War, will visit Sicily and other parts of the Italian coast where he served as an Able Seaman and Radar Operator onboard the Hunt Class Destroyer, HMS Brocklesby, during WW2.
He is one of numerous veterans from Wales who have made a poignant return to the places where they served during the war. The Big Lottery Fund’s Heroes Return programme has to date awarded over £1 million to more than 830 Second World War veterans, widows, spouses and carers from Wales for journeys in the UK, France, Germany, the Middle East, Far East and beyond.
Daniel James was born in Cardiff’s Tiger Bay in 1923 and grew up in abject poverty in the depths of the Great Depression which followed the 1926 General Strike. Once the largest and busiest port in the world, the docks at Cardiff were built on exporting coal from South Wales but exports had fallen to below five million tons and dozens of locally owned ships were laid-up. It was an era of depression from which Cardiff Docks never recovered from.
“It was a hard life but I just thought that was the natural way of life because I didn’t know any different,” says Danny.
“We didn’t have anything. We never had any luxuries but we always used to have a Sunday Roast dinner. I don’t know how my mother managed to afford that but I survived it and it didn’t do me any harm. In my teens I did all sorts of jobs as a builder and worked in factories until I was called up to the Royal Navy at nineteen years of age. I always remember the day I was called up. It was the 10th of December 1942. I was excited at the time and thought it would be an adventure.”
Daniel was then posted up to HMS Glendower camp in Pwllheli, North West Wales, which was used as a training base for the Royal Navy during the War.
“It took us twelve hours to get up there,” says Danny.
“We got up at ten in the morning and we didn’t get there until ten in the evening.”
Danny on the Radar
“Whilst I was there, they came out with a new thing called RDF, which is Radio Direction Finding or ‘Radar’ as they call it,” says Danny.
“They were looking for new recruits to operate the new Radar systems on the ships. I’d heard lots of funny stories about it but I thought I’d take a chance and have a go at it. I passed the exam and we then did six weeks training at the Isle of Man. I’d never heard of Radar until I joined up and I didn’t know much about electrical things of any sort to be honest. Looking back, I don’t know how I got into it really.”
Little did Danny know that key battles would eventually be won by the side that was first to spot enemy airplanes, ships, or submarines. To give the Allies an edge, British and American scientists developed radar technology to "see" for hundreds of miles, even at night. They allowed hunter-killer ships and aircraft to be dispatched at high speed in the direction of the incoming enemy. It was the operation of radar technology which eventually turned the tide against the German U-boats and E-boats in the Atlantic.
Joining HMS Brocklesby
Following his training, Daniel passed as an Able Seaman and Radar Operator and was stationed in Plymouth before being drafted to the island of Gibraltar in 1943 where he joined the Mediterranean fleet and his ship, the HMS Brocklesby.
It was here that Danny also joined the Battle of the Atlantic, the longest continuous military campaign in World War II, running from 1939 to the defeat of Germany in 1945. If the Allies had not been able to move ships about the North Atlantic, it would have been impossible to protect and supply British and American land forces ashore in the Mediterranean. The outcome of the battle was a strategic victory for the Allies—the German blockade failed—but at great cost: 3,500merchant ships and 175warships were sunk for the loss of 783U-boats.
For the next two years, Danny and HMS Brocklesby took part in the escort of what is believed to be the largest convoy of the war, which consisted of 129 merchantmen and 19 escort vessels which covered an area of 68 square miles.
“I didn’t know anybody and I didn’t have an action station when I joined the ship in Gibraltar,” explained Danny.
“We used to go out far into the Atlantic to meet the merchant convoys and escort them safely to where they needed to go and provide protection for them if needed. They Allies had just landed in Algiers in North Africa by then and it was our job to help keep the supplies going to the Forces in North Africa. We would also go down to Malta to help escort supplies in the preparation for the invasion of Italy. This was the largest convoy put together until the D-Day landings that is. There were hundreds of ships involved.”
Packed like Sardines
Life onboard the Brocklesby was cramped with 280 crew members packed on a ship which should only have comfortably held 150.
“It was a tight squeeze but you just got on with it and got used to it,” explained Daniel.
“We had hammocks but I don’t think I slept in mine. You put your head down wherever and whenever you could. We were always keeping watch as well and it was four hours on and four off during the height of the conflict. We all had different jobs to do on the ship and I remember being down in the hold of the ship once, putting shells onto a tray with the Cook in the kitchen to take them up to the guns on deck. We were never bored and you always had a laugh with your mates. We were living together and we had to get on with each other.”
Finding his way with the Radar
Looking back, Daniel realises how important Radar technology was in securing Allied supremacy in the Atlantic during the War.
“I remember the first day I saw the Radar on the ship,” he says.
“It was a massive room full of machinery. I don’t know how I got it working to be honest, but I did. It was three months after my training that I saw the radar for the first time on the ship. The radar was really important. We could tell when the incoming enemy aircraft and ships were coming in.”
“Once we spotted the enemy, I would relay the information to the Radar Director who would then get the exact coordinates and direct the guns to fire at the enemy. We would provide them with information all the time. Without radar, we would have been lost. It definitely helped turn the tide of the War. The enemy didn’t have any idea that we had radar and they also didn’t realise that we had cracked the ENIGMA code and that we understood all the messages they were relaying to each other. It was terrible the amount of ships we were losing prior to this.”
Precious Cargo during the Invasion of Sicily
During the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, HMS Brocklesby had the honour of transporting Admiral Ramsey, General Montgomery and the man who would eventually become the American President, General Eisenhower, to where the assault had been made by Allied Forces to push back the Germans.
“I remember while we were in Sicily, we were sent on a mission to see if some of the other ports on the island were clear and safe to use. We were coming up to this little port which was as big as Penarth when, all of a sudden, a shell came flying over and just missed us. It was a German Tiger tank firing at us from land. Those tanks had big 88mm guns. They were bigger guns than what we had on the ship.”
For the remainder of 1943 and 1944, the Brocklesby took part in several bombardments of enemy positions, including the landing at Salerno when the mainland of Italy was invaded.
Etched in Memory
Some of the horrific incidents which Danny witnessed during the War are forever etched in his memory.
“I remember one incident when a Canadian fighter plane with the convoy was shot down and landed in the sea,” he says.
“The crew were in the water. It was the afternoon but it was getting dark by the time we found them. We could see that one of them was dead and the other one was alive and hanging on to the life raft. We brought the body and the survivor onboard. We gave the dead Airman a burial at Sea.”
“It wasn’t the first time I’d seen a dead body. You would see them all the time in the water when you were coming into ports. Often, when we pulled in to Naples, we would see all the injured and dead soldiers being piled onto Hospital Ships. You couldn’t do anything about it. I remember that some of the soldiers fighting in the battle of Monte Cassino had terrible injuries and they were bringing them down to the port in Naples by the load.”
“I used to thank God I wasn’t in the Army.”
Devastation in Malta
Danny also vividly remembers the devastation left in Malta in the wake of German and Italian bombing raids and the scenes of people starving for food.
“The damage inflicted in Malta was horrendous and the people were starving. We were virtually starving ourselves and all we had were tins of herring in tomato sauce,” recalls Danny.
“But the Maltese would come to our ship, put all our scraps in a tin, take it ashore, heat it up and eat it. That shocked me to be honest. To see the devastation when we went back to Valetta (the capital of Malta) after the War was horrendous. There were lots of ships sunk in the harbour and we had to be very careful when we were going round them.”
Increased enemy activities with U-boats and E-boats in home waters in the early part of 1945 resulted in the recall of Hunt Class Destroyers from the Mediterranean for service nearer to home. The Brocklesby was one of those detailed and she returned to Plymouth on March 16. Daniel was discharged from service in 1946, the same year in which he sang as part of an Armed Forces Choir at the Royal Albert Hall in the official Festival of Remembrance and the first anniversary of the end of WW2.
Looking forward to returning to the shores of Italy, Daniel says: “I can’t wait to go back and see how these places have changed since the Second World War.”
The Big Lottery Fund has extended its Heroes Return 2 programme. The programme has no fixed deadline for applications at this time. This extension is for those veterans who have so far been unable to undertake a commemorative visit.
More information and details of how to apply for a Heroes Return 2 grant are available by calling 0845 00 00 121 or visiting www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/heroesreturn
BIG is continuing its support for UK veterans through its new £35 million Forces in Mind initiative to establish an independent trust to provide long term support and advocacy for former service personnel. The funding will help veterans who served in conflicts including Iraq, Afghanistan and the Gulf War struggling with the transition to civilian life, especially those whose psychological well-being subsequently impacts on the quality of their life and others around them.
Heroes Return was the centre-piece of the Veterans Reunited programme including Home Front Recall which awarded £19.2 million to support UK-based group events and activities to commemorate those who contributed to the war-effort on the home front, and Their Past Your Future with an ongoing £9.6 million scheme funding a UK-wide schools and education programme to give young people the opportunity to learn first-hand from veterans about their experience of war.
Further Information
Big Lottery Fund Press Office – Oswyn Hughes: 02920 678 207
Out of hours contact: 07760 171 431
Public Enquiries Line: 0300 123 0735
Textphone: 0845 6021 659
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Notes to Editors
- The Big Lottery Fund (BIG), the largest distributor of National Lottery good cause funding, is responsible for giving out half the money raised for good causes by the National Lottery.
- BIG is committed to bringing real improvements to communities and the lives of people most in need and has been rolling out grants to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK since June 2004. The Fund was formally established by Parliament on 1 December 2006.
- Since the National Lottery began in 1994, 28p from every pound spent by the public has gone to good causes. As a result, over £28 billion has now been raised and more than 383,000 grants awarded across arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.
- Heroes Return £17 million scheme provided funding to Second World War veterans, their wives or husbands, widows and widowers and, where required, their present-day carers to visit the overseas areas where the veterans saw active service. By linking with activities funded through the Their Past Your Future scheme, Heroes Return is also helping to give young people a better understanding of the efforts and sacrifices made by veterans.
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