Merchant Navy Radio Officers

Frank ARMSTRONG, Radio Officer, 1944-46

(1926 - 2004)

During the war, Frank wanted to join the Merchant Navy, but the only way that he could get in was to qualify as a Radio Officer. He was just 17 when he attended radio school in John Dalton Street in Manchester from October 1943 to May 1944. After he got his "ticket" in May, he had two ships in 1944, the SS Empire Bounty (Anglo Saxon Petroleum Co.) and the MV Kaia Knudsen, a Norwegian ship.

     He spent Christmas 1944 at home, and was sent to the Marconi Office in Southampton, where he was told to join the British Statesman (British Tanker Company) at Cowes. The next morning, he caught the ferry to the Isle of Wight at 8:00am, but the ferry didn't sail until 2:00pm because the fog was too thick. By the time they finally arrived at Cowes, it was too late to go out to the ship. It was the next morning before he finally joined the British Statesman and discovered that she was loaded with fresh water. They were there for a month loading water into special water tankers called "chants" that were being sent to the beaches in Normandy. He then served on the British Lord from March 1945 to January 1956, when he was made redundant.

     Frank then resumed his apprenticeship in engineering, which he had given up to become a radio officer. He went back in the Merchant Navy as a junior engineer on the City of Lucknow. Then followed various ships, from the meat boats of Houldes, tramping on a Liberty Bookers of Liverpool, Yeo Wards of Liverpool, John Holts of Liverpool, to the American-built Jeep sailing for Corys.

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