A ship is more than a hulk of wood and iron. It is a living thing that breathes, feels, and fights. It is a piece of history that sails into the future.
– Admiral Horatio Nelson of the Royal Navy.
At seven bells in the afternoon watch, Charles and I step aboard the afterdeck of HMS Belfast. There is no wailing of bosun’s pipes, sprung to welcome us aboard. No stamp and clash of Marines presenting arms. No doffing of hats, no white-gloved sideboys, no parade of midshipmen. We are simply two more civilian tourists coming aboard.
The snowy sweep of the deck, its long, parallel joints paid with tar-black oakum — “the Devil to pay and no tar hot” — unfolds before us, white beneath the pale, fighter plane blue London sky. The bronze pendant of the Thames unfurls forward and aft, framed astern by Tower Bridge and sweeping around the bend upstream towards London Bridge. The water laps against the grey steel hull with a rhythm that speaks of the ship’s enduring strength and resilience.
From the stern jackstaff, the White Ensign flutters: white, red and vibrant blue against the cityscape beyond, a symbol of nautical history that stretches from the days of the Empire to the modern financial hub that London has become. The HMS Belfast once spent her days cutting an endless furrow through the vast, encircling spaces of the ocean. Now, she stands proudly moored in the heart of the city, its colours a testament to a journey from the open seas to the confined, yet no less grand spaces of this urban environment.
For Charles, this is a homecoming of sorts. In his youth, he served as a junior officer aboard the Belfast’s sister ship, HMS Edinburgh. Although his military career eventually took him into the Army instead of the Navy, I can tell from his expression that he feels completely at home here on the afterdeck of the Belfast. An officer greets us, bids us welcome and we begin to explore.
The HMS Belfast is a Town-class Light Cruiser. Commissioned in 1939, she had her first taste of war during the blockade of the German fleet in the North Sea. But before she was even a year old, she struck a mine and almost sank. Returned to the shipyards of Belfast from whence she came, she was repaired and strengthened, with increased firepower — she carries 12 six-inch guns and 12 four-inch guns — and state-of-the-art (for the 1940s) electronics and radar. Thus equipped, she joined the Atlantic convoys, protecting their ships on the Murmansk Run, dodging ice floes and chasing U-boats through the cold seas and wintery nights.
She took part in the action that sank the German battleship Scharnhorst during the Battle of North Cape: the second-last engagement between battleships in history. From there, she joined the D-Day landings, hurling salvos of high-explosive at the Axis forces dug in behind the beaches of Normandy. And it is a sonic reenactment of this action that Charles and I encounter in the ship’s aft gun turret.
A steep ladder takes us from the deck to a steel door at the rear of the turret. As we step inside, the heat comes at us like with the force of an exploding incendiary. In this cramped space, not much bigger than the interior of a modern SUV, 26 men worked to load, direct and fire the turret’s three 50-calibre BL 6-inch Mark XXIII guns. Now, the turret is empty save for Charles and I and the disembodied voice of a naval gunner describing the scene as he and his comrades fired round after round on D-Day. The sound is hypnotic; a clockwork rhythm of men and metal sending death into the sky.
“Gun back…breech open…shell in…rammed home…cordite in…breech closed…gun laid…fire.”
The men all move in a slick, well-practised routine. Seven men work each gun, all moving in sequence like parts of a clock, synchronised like a machine.
“Gun back…breech open…shell in…rammed home…cordite in…breech closed…gun laid…fire.”
With each report, the deck plates beneath our feet vibrate. The volume increases with each repetition and the sound of a gun captain counting off the time overlays onto the chant of the gunners.
“Gun back…breech open…shell in…rammed home…cordite in…breech closed…gun laid…fire.”
“One…two…three…four…five…six…seven…Fire.”
“Gun back…breech open…shell in…rammed home…cordite in…breech closed…gun laid…FIRE.”
With the last discharge, the deck plates heave beneath us. The report is deafening, then fades to a distant, discordant roar as the last shell hurtles towards its target. I am sweating just from recording this incredible noise on my phone. I can’t imagine what it must have been like inside this turret with all the guns firing: the camaraderie, tension and adrenaline of this crowded space. Dante’s Inferno afloat. The physical discomfort I feel, while merely a shadow of what the gunners would have endured, brings me a closer understanding of the fortitude and resilience of these long-ago sailors.
We step down a series of gangways and companion ladders, bending beneath bulkheads and following coloured markers through the ship’s steel labyrinth. We look into the medic’s office, the galley, the wireless room and the forward magazine. Everything is polished, spic and span, shipshape and Bristol fashion. There is a palpable sense of order, with every rope and rivet in its rightful place, as if the crew has just stepped away for a spell. The ship seems to still exude life and vigour, prepared to go back into action at a signal flag’s notice.
My cousin’s eyes are alight with memories of forgotten scenes and sensations from his days at sea. With a mix of nostalgia and pride, he runs his hands over the cold metal and living brass. In a compartment somewhere below decks, on the larboard side of the ship, a dozen hammocks are slung from hooks in the bulkheads.
“We used to sleep in these aboard the Edinburgh when we were in the Med,” says Charles. From time immemorial, sailors have slept in their allotted 14 inches of space: the width of a hammock and its wooden spacers head and foot. “Rise and shine,” “shake a leg,” “out or down.”
As we make our way through the ship, Charles talks about the drills and routines of shipboard life and the thrill he felt at being part of something much larger than himself. I hear a slight hint of regret in his voice as he speaks, describing how his eyesight fell below the minimum requirements for a career in the Navy and his subsequent transition to Army officer training at Camberley.
Nevertheless, his time at sea, although short, obviously left a deep impression on him. His descriptions of life aboard the HMS Edinburgh bridge the gap between the two vessels and the former life he led. His stories bring the HMS Belfast to life, each anecdote painting a vivid picture of life at sea.
Eventually, we make our way to the bow of the ship. The view back along the deck, past the superstructure with its bristling aerials, gun turrets and radar domes is striking; a perfect blend of past and present. The iconic silhouette of Tower Bridge floats in the background: still a symbol of London’s enduring spirit. The Thames spreads between its buttressed banks, with the warship upon which we stand maintaining its role as a silent sentinel: a perpetual guardian of the modern city.
The bow itself, which once cleaved the oceans of the world, is a meeting point of past, present and future. It is a link between the ships of the line — the “wooden walls” of the fleets that defended Britain during the Napoleonic Wars — and the world of modern warfare where technology and steel intersect.
Yet the essence of those olden days of England’s past remains in the modern era. Naval discipline, hierarchy and language are all part of a lineage that stretches back to the age of sail: from the tar and timber of HMS Victory to the steel corridors of HMS Belfast.
Another companion ladder leads up to the bridge, the nerve centre of the ship. With its gleaming brass fittings, binnacle compass, control dials and communications handsets, the bridge is still rich with symbolism and significance. It was from here that the Captain (and sometimes an Admiral) made crucial decisions, charting the course and fate of the ship and its crew.
The polished wood of the Captain’s chair, with its commanding view of the Thames, exemplifies leadership and courage. I photograph Charles sitting there. For a moment, he embodies the naval commander he might have become, his gaze fixed on the horizon.
His army career, of course, was stellar, with tours of duty in many theatres of the world and roles on military committees that shaped modern Europe. Yet as he sits there, I can see the alternate path his life might have taken if he had stayed in the Navy. Indeed, all our lives follow paths that often change course from the plotted charts we imagine.
It is a fitting place to end our journey aboard this ship of the line. As we have explored the warship, we have in some way stepped across a bridge of time that spans the history and traditions of naval life: from HMS Victory to the steel heart of HMS Belfast. Pro tanto quid Retribuamus.
It is two bells in the First Dog Watch. The sun is slanting across the Thames. The tide is making. The city gleams in the afternoon light. We make our way aft towards the gangway, past the White Ensign, still fluttering proudly in the warm breeze, and step ashore in good order.
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