Change of topic (if that's allowed).
I'm writing about a fellow by the name of Bob Wright. A client of mine, became a friend despite being 50 years my senior. He was a WW2 veteran, a coder on Royal Australian Navy River-class frigate Gascoyne which was seconded to the US Fleet in the Pacific. I would always try to get him talking about his experiences and he was happy to oblige. I remember saying to him a couple of years ago that in 100 years time no-one would care what we did today. "Why's that", he asks. And I reply that last week was the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Jutland, the largest naval battle of WW1 and the last decent stand-up fight between battleships, and it passed without even getting a mention. And he says, "Yeah, well no-one talks about the Battle of Leyte Gulf either and it was the biggest naval battle in history. It went for three days. And I was there".
One incident he related was in that battle when a Jap kamikaze had singled out the heavy cruiser HMAS Shropshire (which had been gifted to the RAN by England after the loss of HMAS Canberra at Savo Island) for destruction. The Gascoyne was nearby and also firing at the plane. The plane had almost reached the Shropshire when, in the rolling seas, a 4 inch shell (from the single 'big' rear gun on the little frigate) strikes the Japanese, Bob said it was a bit like a hole-in-one playing golf. The plane is obliterated and bits of plane and pilot are spread all over the other ship. A message comes over from the captain of the Shropshire to the Gascoyne by light "Please refrain from leaving your rubbish all over our quarterdeck"!
Later in the same battle, a Jap dive bomber targeted the Gascoyne. Mostly, the Japs went for the big stuff but this one had a go at the frigate. He got through all the flak untouched and was so close that Bob's shipmates said they could see the pilot smiling, thinking "I've got them". He drops the bomb, which narrowly misses, striking the water about 10m from the Gascoyne which would bend the ship like a banana and send it straight to the bottom. Or it would have but the bomb either didn't have time to arm or was a dud and didn't explode! Such little things could be the difference between surviving and spending eternity at the bottom of the sea.
Along with two American minesweepers, the Gascoyne did the recon and mapping of the bay where MacArthur famously strode ashore having returned to the Philippines. At the end of the war in the Pacific, the Gascoyne was to be present for the signing of the Japanese surrender but the senior officer aboard the HMAS Hawksbury pulled rank and that ship took their place but Bob said they didn't care. They were young, free and the war was over so they could go and have some fun.
Bob returned to Australia, married and had three daughters and spent 35 odd years as an engineer managing one of the largest engineering concerns in the country, eventually retiring to our little town. He was highly intelligent, well read, articulate and polite, and a genuinely good bloke. He died yesterday morning aged 93.
