it was nice to have the extra space ondeck. Finally, the entire Fleet retiredto Singapore for the inevitable 'wash-up' and in our case an S.M.P. Wewere hosts to 900 Commonwealthguests at a monster cocktail party on-board. It was during this exercise, on11th, that we `Spliced the Mainbrace'in honour of the birth of HerMajesty's third son, Prince Edward.

We then spent a pleasant Easter atSingapore in our several ways. Forexample;

OPERATION BANYANVictorious and Vikrant in company during JET 64.

at a difficult time in the young livesof their nations.

We pressed on across the IndianOcean, and did not have time for anyflying except by the helicopters to gettheir A/S gear working again and fora Vixen sortie at long range over theanchorage at Langkawi, where theremainder o f the JET Fleet werelying. Even at twenty-one kts, thepassage takes eight days, and `HappyHour' on the flight deck and enter-tainment onboard came into theirown again. As the shape of the shipmakes it difficult to show films to alarge audience, many showings are

A welcome guest: Flag Officer,Commanding Indian Fleet.

needed; in fact, in twelve monthsover 1,000 showings were made. Wewere fortunate to get many goodfilms, and VICTORIOUS was thefirst ship to screen `Tom Jones' in theFar East. The S.R.E. operators (aliasthe Disc Jockeys of V.B.S.) kept thetapes turning and the Pops poppingand provided something for all tastes;they had learnt early in the commis-sion that a barrage of rotten eggs isone of the hazards of the game, andso locked themselves in their studioand pressed on with the good work.

We arrived at Langkawi on Sun-day, 1st March at speed and droppedanchor with a flourish in our allottedberth among the CommonwealthFleet.

F.O.2, Admiral Scatchard cameaboard once more and I.N.S. VIK-RANT was flying the flag of F.O.-C.I.F., Rear Admiral B.A. Samson.Indian, R.A.N., R.N.Z.N., R.C.N.and of course R.N. ships were allinvolved in the exercise which keptus busy for the next fortnight. Therewas also a chance to get ashore for aswim at Langkawi at the weekend,and VIC' ran a Fleet sailing race -our recent practice in Mombasa paidgood dividends. VICNEWS kepteveryone informed about the state ofplay, and the novel experience (atleast for this commission) of operat-ing in company with so many ships,particularly when all the ships of theFleet assembled briefly at anchor offthe Nicobar Islands, was appreciatedby the Goofers. The Buccaneers leftus early in the exercise for Tengah,and, sorry as we were to see them go,

Extracts from the log ofan infiltrator, capturedin Singapore:

" imperialist . . . . and thinking to catchthe Imperialist Colonialists off theirguard over the Easter holiday, I

beached my boat on a small island inthe Straits, and set up watch uponthe Naval Base.

"Shortly, I observed a smallwooden motor vessel leave the jettyalongside the carrier H.M.S. VIC-TORIOUS. Th e crew were mainlyattired in garishly coloured shirts andhats, but this did not fool me, as Ihad already noticed , the militarycolouring of the craft itself.

"I launched my boat and followedthem at a distance. This was notdifficult, as they were dropping be-hind them a steady supply of routemarkers disguised as tin cans.

` At 1500 hrs. they anchored off anisland and sent a man ashore (nodoubt to establish contact with the

19

natives). There seemed at this stageto be some dissension amongst thecrew, as the young one who talked alot was thrown overboard. But theymust have thought better of it, forthey then cast their dinghy adrift toenable him to regain the vessel.Shortly after this, their mission com-pleted, they headed back for theStraits, and anchored for the night.All this time, they maintained theirpretence of being pleasure seekingcivilians. Some even went to thelengths of acting as if they were sea-sick. Despite the relatively smallswell, their acting was most impres-sive.

"The following day they landed ona small island where they immediatelyestablished contact with anotherpatrol. The newcomers includedseveral females, and I heard themreferred to as `Crabs'. (Although Ithink this term may have been usedto refer to the position adopted bytheir vessel, during the later part ofthe day).

"After conferring noisily and atlength aboard the Naval vessel, the`Crabs' departed and the rest of themmoved ashore, taking with them anamount of equipment. This includeda number of metal cylinders, which Ifirst thought to be beer cans, but thelarge number of the objects landedmade this idea seem unreasonable,and I came to the conclusion thatthey must be establishing an ammuni-tion dump, although later investiga-tion revealed only empty cans.

"When dusk had fallen, they litseveral signal fires and started to

operate a radio set. I have beenunable to decipher the very strangesignals transmitted by them, althoughI did get their call sign. It was -' Beatles'.

"The next day, after replenishingwith fresh water from a derelict bat-tleship, they headed up the JohoreRiver, delaying their final approachto the town of Kota Tinggi until aftersundown, where, under cover of dark-ness, but with a surprising lack ofstealth, they sent a large landingparty ashore.

"Here, I played my master handand managed to infiltrate one of thebars in the town with some of myfemale operatives. While plying themwith much beer these women gaineda considerable amount of valuableinformation. Particularly informativewere the small one, who seemed to betheir leader, and the large one whoappeared to show much interest inthe gold teeth of Sub Agent No. 984.

Other helpful members of the partyincluded the very young one, whoseemed to be particularly susceptibleto the charms of Sub Agent No. 264,and the dark haired one who wasapparently responsible for the field-training of the former.

(See separate confidential reportfor information gained during thisencounter).

"Shortly after midnight they re-turned to their boat, carrying the redhaired one, who must have beenwounded somehow. Unfortunately Imissed their departure in the morn-ing, as I had some pressing businesswith another of my Sub Agents.Another agent, later in the day,signalled me that the vessel appearedto be streaming some sort of mannedparavane. (Photograph enclosed).

"They returned to their base atabout 1700 hrs. It is my belief thatthe purpose of their mission was

Shooting had become increasinglypopular during the commission.Starting with a friendly competitionagainst the Royal Scots Greys at

The Boys Brigade visits the ship at Singapore.How's that for size?

Lieutenant (SD) (AV) G.M. Ramsay -Fleet Rifle Champion - and his

Trophies.

20

The H.M.S. VICTORIOUS teams at the conclusion of the Far East Rifle Meeting.Standing - P.O.A. F. Ashton, R.E.A. Turley, R.E.A. Cranie, E.R.A. Armstrong,C.A.A. Nichols, Surg.Lt.(D) Grant, R.E.A. Hodder, C.P.O. G.I. Ward, L.A.Cumpson, P.O.M.(E) Caldecott, Lt.Cdr. Perry, N.A.M. Rowsell, Lt. Ramsay,Stwd. Evans, A.B. Fiest, M(E) Platt, J.M.(E) Miller, Sub.Lt. McKeay, R.E.A.

Mason, A.M. Jones, Lt. Whatley.Sitting - L.S. Nundy, J.S. Harvey, J.S. Kirk, J.S. Colbourne, M.(E) Smith,

J.S. Miller, E.M. Brides.The following, not in the photograph, also competed; P.O. Haynes, J.M.(E) Allen,

Ck.(S) Walsh .

Aden, and two days for practiceduring our first visit to Singapore,the programme continued with aninter-departmental competition atHong Kong; 18 teams from the shipand 3 from H.M.A.S. QUIBERONtook part on the Stonecutters' range.893 Squadron won the team aggreg-ate, and the highest individual scorerwas C.A.A. Nichols. Then, onpassage to E. Africa the .22 rifleswere used for practice on the Flight-deck, and at Mombasa we combinedwith DIANA for a competitionagainst the Police; their .303 range,15 miles inland in the bush, was alsoused for a further two day's veryhot practice.

The Far East Fleet Rifle Meetingwas held at Easter, and the ship'steams had a great success. Forty ofthe ship's company were selected forthe preliminary three day's practice,and we then entered 8 teams of 4for the three day meeting; fifteenother units took part. Our teamscollected deep tans and deeperthirsts as well as an impressive arrayof trophies. Lt. G.M. Ramsay be-came the Far East Fleet RifleChampion, and R.E.A. Cranie wasthe runner-up. We also provided alarge party for the range and buttsand ran the recording. Subsequently,C.P.O. G.I. Ward came away fromthe Singapore Rifle Association

Meeting with several more pots forhis mantle-piece.

Our departure from Singaporeafter Easter was overshadowed bythe death of Sub. Lt. Ellis as a re-sult of a motor accident near theship. We spent a busy week at sea,in the local exercise areas, and mettwo German frigates with famousnames - the GRAF SPEE andHIPPER.

On the 13th April, we sailed againwith our Australian friends PARRA-MATTA and YARRA together withLINCOLN all in close attendance.HAMPSHIRE, the first of the newCounty Class G.M. destroyers toreach the Far East, met us and fireda Salute to F.O.2's flag. After a littleprivate flying, we joined CENTAURfor an air defence exercise designedto test the defences of Singapore aswell as our own. We jointly pound-ed Singapore on the first day andfor the second the roles were re-versed: CENTAUR chose that mo-ment to report sick, so we operatedsome of her aircraft from our deck- a good exercise in flexibility, butother expressions were used at thetime. Rear Admiral H.R.B. Janvrin,D.S.C., the new F.O.A.C. was wel-comed onboard from CENTAUR foran informal day's visit. He had beenCaptain of VICTORIOUS duringher last commission, and was keen

F.O.2 greets F.O.A.C. when he arrivesaboard Victorious for an informal visit.

to have a thorough look at all thechanges made during the refit. Afurther day was spent exercisingwith CENTAUR and recovering ourvarious parties ashore before wesailed for Hong Kong once more.

On arrival, we laid on a "Shop-window" display at sea off HongKong for local V.I.P.s, service andcivilian, and the press. PARRA-MATTA, AMBUSH, ANCHORITEand TIDESPRING helped us givean ambitious display which went likeclockwork: when it was completed,the aircraft disembarked direct to

A quiet moment before the flyingdisplay. The Director of the RoyalHong Kong Observatory, Dr. Watts is

"window-shopping.`

21

At Hong Kong again.

Kai Tak and we took our visitorsup harbour with us. They seemedwell pleased with their full day atsea.

For most of us, this was the se-cond visit of the commission to HongKong, but there were a lot of newfaces among the squadrons. Allalike were soon ashore, and parcelpacking once more became a majorindustry onboard; four tons of par-cels were posted from the ship dur-ing our stay! This visit coincidedwith Anzac Day and, with Australianand New Zealand ships in harbour,

The island flood-lit at Hong Kong. Victoria Peak behind.

a large parade was held at the Hong-Kong war memorial. The ceremonyconcluded with a fly-past; Hunters,Vixens and Buccaneers swept by andfinally a Wessex, appropriately pilot-ed by an Australian and a NewZealander both on loan service with814 Squadron, passed between theskyscrapers and flew low over theparade streaming the two Anzacflags.

Jenny gave us a deafening fire-cracker send-off when we sailed on6th May for Japan. On the way,

we passed through the Straits ofFormosa ... "On my left, Red China:on my right, Nationalist China".The temperature began to fall, sowe shook the moth balls out of ourblue suits and ruefully comparedtheir waist measurements with ourown. ". . . and ne'er the twain shallmeet!" Okinawa slipped by, and wewere all set for a two day exercisewith the U.S.S. KITTY HAWK ...an American carrier of a cool 80,000tons. Unfortunately, the second day,which should have been the moreinteresting, was marred by a smallsample of genuine August Bankholiday type weather and the flyingwas cut short.

Next morning, we steamed intoYokosuka Naval Base to find if allthe stories told about past visits toJapan were true: they were. U.S.naval hospitality was marvellous,and everyone found something tokeep them happy. Many madetourist excursions to Yokohama,Tokyo or the area around Fuji-Yama(and found amazing numbers ofJapanese also busily looking atJapan), and an Exped. mountaineer-

A coy Kimomo.

. . . U.S.S. Topeka, our host ship, was lavish in her hospitality.

22

Jenny gets her cake.

cinating cocktail party at which ourJapanese guests kept vanishing fromsight as they ' bowed, rebowed andbowed again to one another in acomplex of greetings. A sailing teamalso found time for a match againstthe Base Yacht Club for the Yoko-suka Cup, a trophy which is retain-ed at the club for competition withany H.M. Ships that visit. NEW-CASTLE won it last in 1955 andwe added another H.M. Ship's nameto the inscription at the base of thecup.

A crop of jaunty caps appeared ondeck after we sailed a week later forOkinawa and there were even a fewcrew-cuts. Off Okinawa, F.O.2gathered together all his ships, whichhad been dispersed to a number ofJapanese ports, and after a shortexercise period we all sailed south forSubic. On the way, we had a ring-side seat for the formation ofTyphoon Viola - just an innocentyoung thing at that stage; we weresafely into Subic Bay before theweather worsened seriously.

For the next fortnight, we werepart of the mighty SEATO Fleet(U.S., U.K., Australian, New Zealandand Philippine) of over 90 shipsassembled for LIGTAS, a large scaleamphibious exercise. 801 Squadrondisembarked with their Buccaneersto N.A.S. Cubi Point, having becometurncoats and joined the enemy who,it was rumoured, paid better: for therest of us, predawn starts and mid-night finishes (when we were lucky)with a steady flying programme inbetween became the order of ourdays. `Happy Hours' became `HappyHalf-hours' - two of them a day,and RASes were, perforce, carriedout at night; the loads came acrossand were stowed in almost completedarkness, and Flying Stations wassounded for a new day before the lastfuelling hose was uncoupled. As theexercise moved to its end, the com-mission was coming to an end too -at least for all those to leave in Julyand August - and the time came torecord this past year and perhapscompare it with earlier commissions.

Statistics in bulk both confuse andbore, but the figures sent to the

` Where did you get that hat?'Photo by N.A. Gilbert.

ing party even climbed to the snowytop of the sacred mountain, but per-haps most were content with thelocal attractions of the Naval Baseand the town of Yokosuka. No oneclaimed to have made the full tourof the 275 bars, although a few whodidn't like to leave a good job halfdone found the curfew a nuisance.U.S.S. TOPEK A was our host shipand lavish in her hospitality andoffers of sporting fixtures. We gavea children's party as well as a fas-

Part of the Ligtas fleet off the Philippines - U.S.N. photograph.

23

The children's party at Yokosuka.

A perfect approach into the nylon barrier by Lt. Wilkinson. The arrested Buccaneer subsides gently onto its nose. Thefire and rescue crews are not needed.

Cutting the anniversary cake after a year in Commission. The last launch.

Editor by the Met. Officer of theship's first, war-time commissionprovide a revealing commentary onthe changes that have taken placeduring the ship's life. These statis-tics were first published in the 4thedition of the Fleet Air Arm Bulletin,in June 1943.

Then, VICTORIOUS flew Sword-fish, Albacores, Gladiators, Hurric-anes - 17 types in all up to 31stMay, 1943. In that time, she spent389 days at sea, steamed 118,000miles and flew her aircraft for 7,716hours; they made 5,505 landings onthe deck, but there were only 352`accelerator' shots - the others wereall free take-offs. For comparison,

during the past year we havesteamed 62,000 miles in 159 days atsea; there have been 4,879 landingsand 2,364 catapult launches (814don't believe in that sort of thing);the squadrons have over 5,243 hoursfrom the ship (and many more fromashore). Almost as many sorties,note, in under half the days at sea -and with fewer aircraft onboard too.The pace is much hotter nowadays.

The biggest difference is in thelanding technique; the old proudrecords for the times between`wheels' are now the averages, andan idea of the hazards of making alanding in the `good old days' is givenby the fact that whereas the first

commission lost 31 aircraft onoperations and 18 on non-operationalflying, no fewer than 88 weredamaged in landing or ranging -and `damaged' was often an under-statement! What of today, withangled deck, steam catapult, landingsight, nylon barriers, etc.? Well,take the final landing of the commis-sion as an example.

LIGTAS was at an end, and theF.D.O. and his minions were lookingat their watches and counting theminutes to the time when they couldgo below for a shower and someinternal liquid refreshment - justone more to come - shouldn't belong now; but the final Buccaneer

24

was in trouble. The nose-wheelwouldn't come down, and a normallanding was out of the question; butthe aircraft was not lost. The flight-deck parties' many drills wererewarded, and the barrier was riggedin double-quick time. ThenLieutenant Wilkinson flew a perfectapproach into the nylon to preservea year's unbroken fixed-wing record- `all our aircraft returned safely'.This was the first time that theBuccaneer barrier had been used inearnest, and made a dramatic climaxto the flying onboard.

On passage back to Singaporeagain, with the docking to come andthen the recommissioning by air, we

celebrated our year in commission.First the Captain and then F.O.2.addressed the ship's company on theflight deck, and the birthday cake wasthen wheeled on - and a splendidcake it was, 274lb. of it.

Our Squadrons flew ashore onFriday 12th June, and a final cere-mony then took place. The gentledrizzle must have made the dock-yard mateys, who emerged from thehole on the top of the howdah, feelquite at home; the gallant officer ofthe guard ensured that no timewould be wasted tracking the Met.balloon; all the F.D.O.s waved theirflags in great confusion, and withgreat pomp and display the launch

of

our

brick-built.....

. . . . . wascompleted.

For Admiral Scatchard, this wasmore than the end of a commission.He left us on Saturday morning onhis retirement from the active list,and took with him our very bestwishes; the squadrons flew past asa mark of their respect as he left theship - to his surprise and delight.

So we come to the end of the yearcovered by this Book. We are allsorry not to be taking VICTORIOUShome, but it will be nice to get backjust the same! To those who fly outto take over, we wish a commissionas varied, enjoyable and worthwhileas ours has been.

25

Victorious toF.O.2 F.E.F.. . . It has been an honourand a great pleasure forVictorious to fly yourflag. ...On behalf of mywhole ship's company,may I wish you andyour family health, hap-piness and all good for-tune in the future.

F.O.2 F.E.F. toVictorious.Never in my life did Iexpect to have a fly pastin my honour. It wassplendid. Thank you.

Some

The Captain greets Vice Admiral Sir John and Lady Hamilton.

of

26

F.O.F.T., Rear Admiral P.D. Gick, O.B.E., D.S.C.,strides aboard

A Subic visitor: Rear Admiral Groverman, U.S.N.

Superintendent M.M. Kettlewell, C.B.E.

our

Beaver - mind it doesn't blow away!

Visitors

Sea Balliol from Boscombe Down. A Skyraider makes a free take-off.

Single Pioneer of 229 Squadron.

27

Sports Reports

C.P.O. Cooper, L.S. Barr, C.P.O. Reeves, Lt. Cdr. Tordoff.

Deck-hockey.

Tug o' War Inter-Part Final on passage to Mombasa.

Happy HourOnce the commission got under

way Happy Hour became a veryimportant part of the ship's day formany people. Deck Hockey andVolley ball increased in popularity asthe commission progressed and inthe later stages, if you were not pre-pared to get up early, you would beunable to get a game - most book-ings being taken within five minutesof the pipe being made.

In the first competition we heldthere were 27 entries in the DeckHockey and 26 in the Volley Ball.They were won respectively by theSupply & Sec. Dept., and the AirDept. Officers. A measure of theincreased popularity of these sportswas in the second competition wherewe had 53 entries for the DeckHockey and 43 for the Volly Ball;they were won by the Air Ordnanceand Flight Deck Engineers respec-tively.

A Tug of War competition drew27 entries and the A.E.D. team ofgiants won the event with ease.

RugbyRugby "East of Suez" is for the

dedicated; only a brave man willplay the game! The differentclimates; the hard pitches; the lack ofopportunities to train; the long inter-vals between matches; all combine todaunt the faint-hearted. We inVICTORIOUS were lucky. Aftertrials at Aden (on a pitch of sand andglass) and at Singapore we had aboutfifty players from whom it waspossible to choose three sides ofvarying strength. John Highton waselected captain of the 1st XV, thecaptain of the other teams variedwith their composition, Joe Isaacsundertook to be secretary.

Highlights of the season were thegames against the Hong Kong club,H.M.N.Z.S. OTAGO and TARA-NAKI. We drew against Hong Kongafter a very hard and exciting game,after which one opposing 2nd rowforward who weighed 15 stone washeard to remark that it was the firsttime he had been pushed so hard thathis feet were off the ground. OTAGO

Volley Ball