What the hell have I done?
Along For the Ride Chapter 6.
Early afternoon, Sunday, March the third, 1966. Less than two weeks after turning eighteen. A late summer day at Spencer Street Station about to get on the Navy bus to the new life ninety minutes south-east of Melbourne. The bus is almost full of young blokes like me looking lost carefully avoiding eye contact. Two dudes looking very impressive in their white uniforms try to wrangle us on board. It turns out that they were on an Observer course that started a couple of weeks prior to us and is our first example of how even one day’s seniority can be a big difference.
All of us dressed alike with a shirt and tie, some with jackets, even suits. Only one thing made me stand out: I was the only one with parents to wave me off. Keith’s wearing a suit and tie and Mum has her best summer dress. Jesus, how embarrassing. Thankfully they didn’t do much waving. Maybe they were just there to ensure I got on board.
As the bus passes through the main gate of Cerberus it all starts to get serious. Immaculately kept campus. Grass and gardens well tended. Gutters are painted white. (WTH? It’s a navy thing – if it’s still, paint it, if it moves, screw it.) Sunday afternoon is our arrival so church parade is over and all looks relaxed. A football game is in progress on the oval and people wandering around, mostly in civvies.
The main gate, obviously before 1966
The Gunroom. From Henry VIII’s days the traditional domain of Midshipmen.
Straight to our future abode, the Gunroom. Turns out it’s a dormitory with a main formal dining room, a bar area and two long corridors with two-person rooms on either side, and a larger suite at the end for our Division Officer. We are to learn pretty quickly that no matter how loud the noise in the bar area is, it needs to steadily diminish as one progresses down the corridor. Bunk beds, individual fold down desks integrated into the drawers (just like the cabins at sea as it turns out) and enough room to swing a cat if you open the window.
The base transforms on Monday morning. It’s the Navy’s main training depot and there are squads marching or double-marching to their next assignments. A large parade ground is central to the layout and much marching practice is to be carried out there, as well as formal parades, rifle and sabre drills.
I'm in with a bloke from Cooma, in the mountains near Canberra. He has his own car so he gets the bottom bunk. First order of business is to follow the rest to the bar and to settle the important things in life: how to drink and our nicknames. After almost eighteen years of watching a drunk in action and being offered countless beers I’m about to have my first drink.
The guys who transferred from the lower deck (ie are ex-sailors) enthusiastically take the younger ones under their wing to get them as drunk as possible at every occasion. They are ably abetted by the mess stewards who delight in pouring a double when a single would have been way too much.
Nicknames seem to be a serious thing. In the Navy everyone seems to have a nickname, and they range from standard to elaborate to too hard. A standard nickname is based on your surname (all Paynes are Wacka, all Browns are Bomber, etc) or a physical attribute (all redheads are Blue.)
An elaborate nickname was derived over time and could evolve, for instance someone with a surname of Donald became Daffy because Donald was a duck as was Daffy. Some were not to be cherished. Crayfish could mean you have a big arse, or you are dumb, or both (meat in the arse and shit in the head. Gettit?) I’m still not sure if Rockpile told his wife that he was bestowed with that moniker because it was thought he’d fuck a pile of rocks if there was a ten percent chance of a snake being in there. On the other hand, I’m sure Slug was proud of the recognition of the size of his member.
And then there were those that are too hard, either through a lack of physical attributes or personality. I became Smithy. It was a reasonable, non-embarrassing outcome but bloody boring.
The second day at Cerberus the Division Officer announces that one of our party is in the sickbay and we should visit him. No one can place him so two of us decide to drop up and see him. I’m standing by the bed; my companion is on the bed.
“How are you?”
“OK. Should be out in a couple of days”.
“Whats the problem?”
“I’ve got the VD mate.”
I’ve never seen anyone move so fast as my companion getting off the bed.
“I met this sheila on the train down from Brisbane…”
Instant folk hero. No one else visited. And no explanation as to why he was in the sickbay for an STD.
So, nicknames allocated, we must get ready for our first formal mess dinner. This needs the completion of formal ‘knife and fork’ training, a process where a Lieutenant Commander sits with us during dinner and lectures us, while eating, on the correct etiquette for an officer and a gentleman. To this day I feel sorry for the poor bugger. Even at my tender age I was wondering what could have happened to a potentially brilliant Naval career that caused him to be sitting among pimply 18- to 22-year-olds showing them how to eat fruit with a knife and fork. A skill I’ve never used since but have not forgotten.
The night of the dinner. Fully kitted out in our formal mess rigs with bow ties feeling very flash. Not sure how the decision was made but Bacardi and Coke chosen for the pre-dinner drinks. A great night was had by all. I wish I could remember it.
The next day’s six oclock wake up call from the duty midshipman. Lights come on with an almost audible bang.
“Oh shit!”
Strange cry, usually it’s wakey wakey. Not a great taste in the mouth. The pool of vomit on the pillow is embarrassing, although not nearly as embarrassing as the pool of vomit on my downstairs roommate. Oh dear. Wacka doesn’t seem to mind too much so the only thing to do is get into our PT gear and go for our morning round of physical abuse from the PT instructors. A few more vomits and we’re ready for breakfast.
Shower, get into clean kit, breakfast and off to classes. What to do about the vomit everywhere? Obviously leave it to the Stewards to clean up. Come back, all bedding is gone, just a mattress left. Nothing for it but to borrow Wacka’s sleeping bag. After a week I become known as the bloke in the bag. Finally approached by the Division Officer.
“Sick of the bag yet, Smith?”
Actually it was quite comfortable. Not sure of the right answer.
“Yes?”
“Well go and bloody well apologise to the Chief Steward for your behaviour and maybe they’ll restore your bedding.”
I did. He did, after a bollocking. It was better than the bag after all.
After all the books and movies about defence recruit bastardisation there’s nothing. Just lots of PT, parade drill and classroom lessons. Good food and plenty of it. Too much booze and the peer pressure to drink is off the clock. Parade drill is called Power of Command and the essence is to yell loudly and march the students around without hitting anything. Oh and salute all the dignitaries. Today Legs is in charge, so named because his lower limbs seem to have a mind of their own.
Stage whisper: “Legs - Commodore’s car coming!”
“Aircrew halt!” Good. Very loud.
“Aircrew left turn!” Still loud but the wrong bloody direction. Half of us do the wrong thing and turn the right way, the other half the right thing and turn the wrong way.
“About turn!” We all do the right thing and turn 180 degrees, still looking at each other. It's getting funny now.
“Front turn!!!” Not in any manual but we knew what he meant. All now facing the Commodore’s car receding, with the Commodore visibly shaking his head. The drill Chief took the salute with a straight face. Legs got us back for lunch without running us into any buses.
The Academic block is close to the main gate and is indistinguishable from the 50’s red brick architecture of most senior schools in Melbourne. All the way at the other end of the base are the seamanship training facilities, appropriately close to the water. Some devious prick of a scheduler thought it’d be a great idea to have us alternate our classes between the two facilities which forced us to double-march (run in formation) between the opposite ends of the base, ensuring we were constantly sweating and whinging through classes, at least for the first couple of weeks until we toughened up.
There was an old minesweeper tied up next to the seamanship school. It’d been rigged up so that when a valve is opened, water spewed into the spaces below decks. After a lecture we were introduced to the spaces below that are also equipped with lumps of wood, hammers, old mattresses and other rubbish laying around. The tap is opened and we are drenched in freezing water. We are meant to split into groups attacking individual leaks and stop them before we drown. We must have been successful as after the chaos we were wet and frozen but still breathing.
Our jogs to and from classes take us through streets of what is in effect a little, self-contained town. Red brick barracks for sailors, sporting facilities, shops and a post office. All the necessities. Including a cinema.
Saturday night we go to the movies. Just like civvy picture houses. Sailors and officers intermixed, most in uniform. Tense moment in Von Ryans Express when the traitor turns out to be the gorgeous Italian woman with the huge breasts. As she lays dying sprawled across the steps to a piazza a hush descends on the audience until a sailor calls out “Quick! Give her a poke before she goes cold!”. I’ve found my home.
During initial entry at Cerberus the only interaction I had with sailors was with the Chief Petty Officer who led our training and the stewards in the Gunroom mess. Until our first weekend leave that is.
Blue was from Adelaide and had no family in Melbourne so came to my place for the weekend and crashed on the couch. Of course, Keith takes us up to the Pig and Whistle on Saturday morning to meet his mates and have a beer or two, after which Blue as an ex-sailor decides to show me some of his old haunts in Melbourne. We lob into the Australia Hotel in Collins Street, a renowned hang out for sailors and women who chase sailors. Rather than catching Miss Right we meet Steward Pug.
Not sure of his real name. About 5 foot 5, angry looking, head battered by many fights hence the nickname.
“I know you two from the Gunroom.”
“Piss off Pug” says Blue and walks off to chat up someone at the bar.
“You’re Roscoe. You’re Ok. Not like that prick Plateface”.
“Who?” Never heard of Plateface.
“That prick Arfa. Always Steward do this, Steward get me that. And never a please or thank you. But we show him”. On reflection Arfa does have quite a flat face in profile.
“How?” I knew I shouldn’t have asked. I’m amazed at the amount and variety of bodily fluids that can appear in one person’s meal without their knowing.
“Yeah you always look at us and say please and thank you. You’re OK”. Another life lesson learned, this time in regard to people involved in what you are about to eat.
At some stage Steward Pug starts getting aggro and inexplicably takes it out on my left nipple, which is squeezed, twisted and pulled till it’s raw. One thing the band has taught me is how to get away from aggro situations and I try my best but it takes Blue to step in with another “Piss off Pug” to get rid of him.
For the rest of my time at Cerberus and for all my pleases, thank yous and eye contact, every time Pug serves me a meal he smiles knowingly. Not good for the appetite.
Along for the Ride is my personal, non-peer reviewed memoir. For an entertaining and authoritative description of the training our four groups of young Aussies went through in the sixties, Wings Of Gold by Trevor Rieck, Jack McCaffrie and Jed Hart is the go-to publication.
Trevor, Jack and Jed co-ordinated input from all participants in producing this highly detailed and very readable book. I’ve used it as a vital aide-memoire and have tried not to plagiarise it (too much).
Sourcing details are at this link: Buy Wings of Gold