The Volunteer - National Maritime Museum

Proceeding through the Celebes Sea we
planned to call at Makassar but were warned
off by the Port Authority as the area still had
magnetic mines about and Ping Wo naturally
had no degaussing gear to deal with these. We
had therefore to proceed to Tarakan for
urgently needed supplies as we were virtually
out of water, and other stores were running
very low, but there were some hours of
tension till we were well out to sea again.
Tarakan, then in Dutch Borneo, had many
signs of defences erected during the Japanese
occupation. After some difficulty we secured
just enough water to last till our next port,
Manila.
Our passage there through the Sulu Sea was
happily made in calm conditions and a 4 day
stay in Manila was full of interest, including
the old walled Spanish city, a sharp contrast
to aspects of the American occupation. I
counted over 90 wrecks in the harbour still
waiting to be cleared. We sailed on the last leg
of the voyage to Hong Kong still very low on
water and stores, having had replenishment
problems again. We then encountered the
roughest seas of the whole voyage, and
we rolled so heavily at times that I thought
we might turn right over and fulfil the
gloomy forecast we heard when we joined
the vessel.
My relief when we finally entered Hong
Kong harbour on 8 June can be imagined. I
arrived weeks later than scheduled on 29
June at my final destination, the Japanese
naval base at Kure, to join HMS
Commonwealth, part of the Commonwealth
occupation force there, taking passage from
Hong Kong this time on the aircraft carrier
HMS Vindex, a vessel much more to my
liking! My time in Japan, which included
visits to Hiroshima before it was rebuilt, is
still a haunting memory, but a story for
another time.
Written by Derek Prince, Volunteer.
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