SEA STORY

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26521, 8 September 1951, Page 3

SEA STORY

' »and book of the WAR

tu London Correspondent of "The Press") Sea. By Nicholas Monsarrat. tide Of books already pub--01, “lout the war many have been jj*V_ a few have been outstandas yet Probably none can be great. However, one is bethis month which must MB’ into this latter class. It jrL Cruel Sea' by Nicholas Monj 7 Already it has been chosen in the Book of the Month and ***7 Britain as the "Evening Stan0L® 9n d Book of the Montn Club iS® <or September. Cassell’s first 120,000 copies is one of the , ever made in this country for iiS uthor who is not already estabCruel Sea" is. as the author m his opening sentence “ . . . , SfiSy the long and true story, of two ships, and about 150 sue « ; That s tory is told in ’ftn taut words so packed with high ■*'i description, humour, and vivid that the reader canSf’*. it down until he has either J’S it or his eyes have given out. ’’’having finished it, he will rereread. It is that kind of a story starts in the unrealistic 2; of 1939 when the war was still a WJ distant disaster fof most young 2 At a dockside on the Clyde, a dockside still working an 1 kt hour day, we meet the characters T\-upy the first part of the book tough, doughty little corvette >mnass Bose and a dozen members Swcrew. There is the skipper, ■Jjtenant-Commander Ericson, cool, determined, and his raw oftiiTconsistmg of an unpleasant bullyin Australian named Bennett, a jourJid called Lockhart (a thinly disS Monsarrat himself), and i“Ljhy a young bank clerk only too ‘Saous of his short-comings. Then are the lesser, but more colourWacters like Petty Officer TaiLi the senior engine-room rating, SE. R. A. Watts, Leading Signaler Wells, and Able Seaman Gregg, follow them through their comZisoning. their early training. grU their fears and triumphs. On we make the acquaintance of i families, their wives and their -asaal women friends. out into the turbulent Atlantic, . howling stinging Atlantic for the Ld part, that fough, them and their Sfotoexhaustion. For two desperate LL we follow the fortunes of Com- ■ „ Rose and the merchant ships she Lu to protect against the ravenous r boats. The description of the 1941 G’braltar convoy. 21 ships strong, wikh was reduced after eight days to mk 10 ships, is electric in its iniasity. Never has the utter ruthlessge<s of this too little publicised aspect rf the war been better told—the chaos of a midnight torpedo, the burning nfl. the clutching sea, the struggling ja, the terrible injuries, the hopelasness of a woefully inadequate escort force trying to locate the mureering submarines. Here there are jgnism, obscenity, dourness, humour, one unforgettable passage Monsarat describes the terrible decision Encson had to make when a U-boat ns located right under the "pitiful sirvivors of a stricken ship. OS Iceland, Compass -Rose meets her swift doom in the middle of the night. Itae were only 11 survivors, 11 froan. oil-choked men. who had just that extra determination and spark of Be to survive where the other 60 perished. - , On to 1943, and a brand new shin of i brand new class—the frigate Saltah. Now the sea war is coming a httle nearer parity though ships sunk still outnumber the submarine kills by 20 to one. The reader meets /new set of officers (only Ericson and Lockhart survived that torpedoing), a new crew, and again shares their experiences and thoughts. In this part of the book the highlight is the convoy to Russia outrageously punished by the weather, bombs, submarines, and destroyers, and which finally meets a stony, suspicious welcome from the Hessians themselves. These are the grim moments. But there is humour and a warm humanity running all the way through. Eyebrew may be raised at some of. the conversation and the stories recounted, but they have the sure touch of reality about them. Nothing is counterfeit. There is a magnificent passage about the three months the Saltash spent refitting in the United States. It is spiced with rib-cracking anecdotes that perfectly illustrate the different outlook between Americans and Englishmen. And finally, after five and a half storm-lashed years, came the sweet moment of victory when Ericson tad his crew led in three surrendered submarines.

Monsarrat never forgets the vital people ashore. There is the placid, proud wife of Ericson, the efficient lovely Wren named Julie whose personality suddenly makes the war a experience to Lockhart, the raddled women of Bennett, the newly named wives of Ferraby and Morrell -who later joined them when Bennett developed a mysterious duodenal ulcer, there is the tragedy of Gregg who de•erted his ship to grimly follow up his adulterous wife. "The Cruel Sea” is throughout a Wuificent tribute to the British Nwy and mercantile marine, a worthy «®memoration of the 30.000 British nailors and 3000 British ships which went to the bottom of the Atlantic in terrible years. There are no heroics: only deeds. It is good to know ®at what Britain accomplished then ■ so vividly brought home to the world through his book. Monsarrat, who is 41 years old, is ®srned, and has a son of nine, was “ffiself commissioned to a corvette in ®ly 1940. He served from then until commanded a frigate and without wibt his career is largely that of “jckhart. who was also a freelance realist. This is Monsarrat’s twelfth “ok, but the first to enjoy anything y* than a very mediocre success. He yrote its 150,000 words three times “ewe he was satisfied.