An endless argument goes on about which were best to serve on, only went on one big ship, one of the older carriers, I didn't like it, only went on there to pick up the mail and this nasty man shouted at me a lot, apparantly He didn't appreciate my Beatles haircut and striped T shirt, I tried to explain that we all had different ideas on what looked good, but it didn't seem to help.
My biggest ship was the Ulster, a WWII Destroyer converted to a Frigate, even that was a different life style to everything else afloat that I was on, very little mixing among the crew, to a large extent different branches seemed to stick together.
My other Skimmer, the old Hunt class Brocklesby, then doing service as a trials ship at Portland, only had a crew of about 70 and as the result there was, in my opinion, a much better mix among crew members, not unlike the Boat crews that I served with later.
D/E Boats, I have no experience of Nucs., everyone just mixed in ashore, even at time members of the Wardroom, something unheard of in those days. Happy memories of the forendies fighting over the Womens clothes found in the rag bags, so they would have a new steaming rig for the next trip. Pirate rig at sea, at times down to Cacks and steaming boots in the warmer climes.
I'm sure there were advantages of being in Big Ships, all that disipline, RPO's, inspections and bullshine :wink: :wink:
My biggest ship was the Ulster, a WWII Destroyer converted to a Frigate, even that was a different life style to everything else afloat that I was on, very little mixing among the crew, to a large extent different branches seemed to stick together.
My other Skimmer, the old Hunt class Brocklesby, then doing service as a trials ship at Portland, only had a crew of about 70 and as the result there was, in my opinion, a much better mix among crew members, not unlike the Boat crews that I served with later.
D/E Boats, I have no experience of Nucs., everyone just mixed in ashore, even at time members of the Wardroom, something unheard of in those days. Happy memories of the forendies fighting over the Womens clothes found in the rag bags, so they would have a new steaming rig for the next trip. Pirate rig at sea, at times down to Cacks and steaming boots in the warmer climes.
I'm sure there were advantages of being in Big Ships, all that disipline, RPO's, inspections and bullshine :wink: :wink: