Sea mist shrouded the boats on the river Dart as the train from London pulled into the riverside station at the Royal Dart Hotel. Train passengers carrying strange parcels then made their way silently onto the ferry and across the river to the old paddle steamer called Westward Ho!
It was 1942 and David Birkin was just a messenger for the Naval Intelligence Division, but he knew that in just a few hours these secret agents would be arriving in darkness on a French beach, scrambling ashore to meet the Resistance. He begged his boss to be part of these clandestine operations.
However the Medical Board had pronounced David Birkin unfit for any form of military service. He suffered from sea-sickness, sinus infections, bleeding lungs and double-vision. After two years working as a telegraphist, spending most of that time in hospital, Birkin had dwindling hopes of ever seeing the ‘real’ war. Working for transport operations was the best he could hope for. Or so he thought.
The 15th Motor Gunboat Flotilla at Dartmouth urgently needed navigators to get them to the French coast and they were willing to let David Birkin have a go, sending him on a crash course in navigation and assigning him on probation to Motor Gunboat 318.
Their charts for the rock-infested north Brittany coast were out-of-date and using radar would attract unwanted attention from the enemy. So Birkin had only a compass, log and an echo-sounder to find their way in the pitch dark. After steaming across the Channel for seven hours, the echo-sounder often didn’t work.
In MGB 318’s chart room, every mission was a challenge. The bridge was armoured, but the chart room was just plywood as Birkin discovered when the boat lurched and he fell through the wall. The chart-table was collapsible as it frequently demonstrated. In the diffused lighting, red for black-out purposes, he could barely see the charts and the room stank of cabbage and engine oil. From the voice-pipe connecting him with the bridge came sea-water and rust, often pouring through in foul weather. When the ship first nosed into the swell, David Birkin was up to his ankles in salt-water, trying to read sodden charts; the lamp exploded on the floor and in the sudden darkness, he was violently sick. Only another twenty-three hours of this to go...
David Birkin’s story is just one of many true stories of clandestine operations in the West Country during the Second World War, as told in South West Secret Agents.
.
Laura Quigley is the author of South West Secret Agents, a collection of true stories of spies, espionage and the West Coutry during the Second World War. She will be signing copies of her book on the 28th of September at Hidden Heritage, Cornwall from 11.00 am-4.00 pm. She is also apprearing at the Plymouth International Book Festival on October 22nd at 7.30pm.