Destroyer Depot Ship HMS Hecla

My Father told this story a few times during my younger years but never with so much emotion as the last time he recounted it a couple of weeks before he passed away in 1991. On previous occasions it was always just a vague account of how, in the course of his service with the Royal Navy during the 2nd WW, his ship had been torpedoed whilst on convoy duties and he was brought up with the dead only to be revived. He went on to complete a successful teaching career, live a full life and raise a family of three sons – I was the second.

He was a good father but with a very strict sense of duty and a somewhat mischievous sense of humour that would break through from time to time. He gave us a good upbringing but, in hindsight, often…