As we boarded the ship we were searched bodily and our luggage was taken from us. So were any other items of value such as watches, rings etc. We were taken down to the lowest deck on the ship and some of us were given hammocks and then barbed wire was placed across the stairwell which led to the upper decks. The next morning the ship started to move out of the harbour. And we were finally on our way. The only portholes that existed was in the latrine so we took it in turns to look out through the latrine porthole and every one was allowed one minute look-see. It worked out that the ship was moving due west in a zigzag sort of a pattern obviously in convoy. This went on for two days, when on the third day somebody remarked that the sun was not in the same position as before. Then we realised that the ship must have turned south. Apparently, the captain had sealed orders, to be opened on the third day and that is when he was told not to go to Canada but to Australia, which of course we didn’t know.

A couple of days later we arrived on the West coast of Africa at a little port called Takoradi. The ship took on water and supplies there and we went on towards Capetown. I found out afterwards that one of our boys had been sick and put in the sick bay, where apparently he had managed to steal one of the officers’ uniforms. While berthed in Capetown he tried to march off the gangplank in this officer’s uniform which unfortunately was about two sizes too large for him and of course, he got caught. Later on we found him back in the hospital room, but barely recognisable. They must have taken him down to the dungeons and beaten him with the end of the ropes until he was beyond recognition.

This was of course done by the guards who were recruited from jails. They were ex-convicts, basically the scum of the earth, and all people that the army and the navy would not have. An army man called O’Neil was in charge of the guards. He was eventually court-martialled and dishonourably discharged. On our trip through the Indian ocean we were allowed twenty minutes exercise every day. And these guards thought it was great fun to sit on the railing, throw the empty beer bottles on to the deck until they broke, and then call us for exercise. They pushed along with their rifle butts over the broken glass and they thought it was great fun.

This went on for a number of days until one day, one of our guys couldn’t take any more and as he was running over the deck he just jumped straight over the rail.

Within the next week the sea was getting rougher and rougher and it so happened that 80 % of us were seasick, but I wasn’t one of them – I must have been a hardened sailor by now. So, as rations were fairly tight this was the best time for me because there was plenty of food around nobody wanted to eat. After this I decided to join the kitchen staff. The air on our deck actually got so bad, that in the end, the Captain decided to lower a huge canvas tube which had a sail attached to the top to give us a little bit of fresh air so that we could survive.

The sea started to calm down and half way across the Indian Ocean, one afternoon, there was an unearthly bump. And the back of the ship was virtually lifted out of the water and this is when we realised that we must have been torpedoed.

The ship gave a big shudder as apparently the screws must have came out into the air and shook the whole ship. But after awhile it settled down again and on we went. Shortly before this happened our guards were busy slashing open our suitcases which were locked and pulling out anything of value and clothes and other personal items were thrown overboard and so were the suitcases.

And this turned out to be our blessing in disguise. Apparently the U-boat saw the debris floating in the water, which were our clothes and our suitcases, and they surfaced and picked it up. And when they saw there were clothes with German labels in them, the decide there must have been P.O.W.s on board ship, turned around and went home, and left us alone.

Half the things that went on on the ship I never knew until afterwards, when I heard it from people who were in other parts of the ship, like the hospital.

It was nearly five weeks when we finally pulled into Fremantle harbour where we took on new rations and the food greatly improved. We finally had fresh fruit and we could use the showers for as long as we wished. A few days later we landed in Melbourne, just for the day, and on we went. Five days or six days later we arrived in Sydney – Darling Harbour.