LUCKY CADETS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 January 1944, Page 3

LUCKY CADETS

FOURTEEN NEW ZEALANDERS PART IN ACTION AGAINST SCHARNHORST. SOON AFTER ARRIVING IN BRITAIN. (Special P.A. Correspondent.) LONDON, January 13. To take part in the great naval battle resulting in the sinking of th’e Scharnhorst, only two months after their arriving in England from New Zealand, and during their first seagoing trip in a warship, was the luck of 14 cadets who are training to take commissions. Their job in the battle was supplying the guns of H.M.S. Sheffield, which fired several salvos at the Scharnhorst, hitting her with the second salvo.

They are Ordinary Seamen W. E. Brown (Auckland), R. W. Jones (Auckland). W. Jarvic, E. W. Hindle, E. Brayshaw, W. R. Hocking, D. H. Davies (■Wellington), R. Bell (Matamata), L. C. Linehan (Tauranga), B. E. Lamb (Christchurch), H. D. Bell (Lake Wanaka), K. G. Perrin (Palmerston North), F. P. Brady (Napier.) and A. H. Donovan (Dunedin).

Hindle said: “The captain kept the ship’s company informed of the course of the action by reporting it over the ship’s loudspeaker system. For the most part we were kept too busy to see anything, but once I was detailed to carry bread from the bakery to the galley for the evening action meal. I could then see on the horizon the Duke of York and the Scharnhorst exchanging salvos. You could tell the Scharnhorst flashes by the different type of cordite she was using.” Brown said: “Most of us managed to see the final stages of the battle, which in the distance, looked like a fireworks display. The Scharnhorst was firing in all directions at everything, including star-shells. We did not, of course, see the Scharnhorst go down because it was dark and she was too far away, but there was a great cheer when the captain announced she had been sunk"

At a Russian poi’t Ordinary Seamen E. H. Hart (Wanganui) and R. Burrell (Palmerston North) wepe transferred to the Sheffield from a destroyer. They are in the same course as the others. All eventually yzill undergo further training in H.M.S. King Alfred, where hundreds of New Zealanders have already been commissioned.