Browse content similar to The Arctic Convoys. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
in the Second World War. Robert Hall has met the few survivors who | :00:04. | :00:14. | |
:00:14. | :00:16. | ||
met on the top-secret voyages. On a narrow road in Scotland's north- | :00:16. | :00:22. | |
west Highlands a group of veterans look through the rain-streaked | :00:22. | :00:27. | |
windows of their minibus for a glimpse at the landscape they first | :00:27. | :00:37. | |
viewed as young men. They wear the white berets which mark their | :00:37. | :00:43. | |
service on the Arctic convoys. Four years facing storms, ice and enemy | :00:43. | :00:50. | |
attacks as they battled true to re- supply their allies in Russia. | :00:50. | :01:00. | |
Sometimes you feel sad because can the ships were lost and you saw | :01:00. | :01:03. | |
that you are alive yourself you happen to be one of the lucky ones | :01:03. | :01:11. | |
that made it. Churchill called them the bravest men afloat and yet they | :01:11. | :01:14. | |
are still fighting to convince their own government that they | :01:14. | :01:20. | |
deserve a medal. As we were on the convoys we thought this is health, | :01:20. | :01:28. | |
this is absolute hell. But I don't ever want this to almost again. I | :01:28. | :01:33. | |
looked back and I saw - that was when it was the proudest moment of | :01:33. | :01:43. | |
:01:43. | :02:08. | ||
my life, you know, to have done They are fewer and more frail as | :02:08. | :02:18. | |
:02:18. | :02:20. | ||
each year passes. But the calf this wind swept hillside cannot be | :02:20. | :02:23. | |
ignored by those who sailed into dangers from which so many never | :02:23. | :02:33. | |
returned. (Lament plays) Government the cold did not get you the kpwer | :02:33. | :02:37. | |
mans would. It was described ooze a view side mesh are mission, that is | :02:37. | :02:47. | |
:02:47. | :02:55. | ||
how bad they were. -- the Germans. I'm 86 and when I went down at 18, | :02:55. | :03:05. | |
:03:05. | :03:40. | ||
I remember it. It was a horrible 70 years ago this was crowded with | :03:40. | :03:44. | |
ships all waiting to begin as what Churchill described as the "Worst | :03:44. | :03:53. | |
journey in the world". The largest convoy taken to Russia is feeling | :03:53. | :03:56. | |
its way through the danger belt north of scanned naive yafplt this | :03:56. | :04:02. | |
is the roof of the world which saw Antarctic sea battle between Nazis, | :04:02. | :04:07. | |
torpedo droppers and submarines. In September 1941 the British Navy | :04:07. | :04:11. | |
launched a secret operation code named Derbish. The convoy which | :04:11. | :04:16. | |
sailed north-east was the first to plough through trefrp yus Arctic | :04:17. | :04:26. | |
:04:27. | :04:30. | ||
waters to the Russian points.. The waep Johns and supplies the German | :04:30. | :04:38. | |
described as enough to equip an army. A lifeline to an ally, badly | :04:38. | :04:47. | |
in need of supplies and far from the sheltered bays of Loch Hugh. | :04:47. | :04:57. | |
This is guarding the Loch during the war and that was their look- | :04:57. | :05:03. | |
outpost behind us that and that was the amount nation. John Murdow | :05:03. | :05:07. | |
McKenzie then eight years old remembers the ships gathering in | :05:07. | :05:13. | |
their last safe Anchorage. There used to be over 100 ships inside | :05:13. | :05:19. | |
there at the one time waiting to go on the convoys, to different parts. | :05:19. | :05:24. | |
Most going from Russia directly at that time. Exciting times for an 8- | :05:24. | :05:30. | |
year-old boy or not? Very. We never thought it was a war, it was just | :05:30. | :05:40. | |
:05:40. | :05:44. | ||
great sport. Under these skies young men enjoyed their final hours | :05:44. | :05:53. | |
of shore leavinant of the perils which lay ahead. -- leave inant of | :05:53. | :06:03. | |
:06:03. | :06:08. | ||
the perils which lay ahead. When we left here I was an hour west. We | :06:08. | :06:13. | |
sent off - we set off north and that gale gradually deteriorated | :06:13. | :06:19. | |
into a hurricane. I have never seen seas like it. They had been told | :06:19. | :06:23. | |
they were sailing into the most dangerous waters in the world. Up | :06:23. | :06:28. | |
to a fortnight in the teeth of gales which howled across seas so | :06:28. | :06:38. | |
:06:38. | :06:50. | ||
cold they could kill a man in minutes. The seas were so heavy any | :06:50. | :06:55. | |
minute you thought you were going to be swallowed up, it was so bad. | :06:55. | :07:00. | |
One of the things you had to watch on the look-out, you had your big | :07:00. | :07:05. | |
hat an everything on, but if by chance your nose started running | :07:05. | :07:14. | |
and you had the sniffles then that would freeze so it was like having | :07:14. | :07:20. | |
a nose full of needles, that is how painful it was and its was painful. | :07:20. | :07:24. | |
Ice was everywhere on the decks had to be chipped off in case the ship | :07:24. | :07:34. | |
:07:34. | :07:39. | ||
turned over. Ice everywhere and not only outside even inside the ship. | :07:39. | :07:45. | |
We had 2 in muchs of ice inside the living quarters. So if you lived | :07:45. | :07:49. | |
with ice all around us and we went out onto the deck, once again ice, | :07:49. | :07:55. | |
and the one thing we had to be careful of that is if you touched | :07:55. | :07:58. | |
anything metal with your bare hands then you left your skin behind and | :07:58. | :08:08. | |
:08:08. | :08:17. | ||
that was painful. The chill wind whipping the headlands 70 years on | :08:17. | :08:26. | |
may stir memories of voyages during which warmth was a painful dream. | :08:26. | :08:36. | |
:08:36. | :08:39. | ||
Hymn to the Lost at Sea) But the old men blinking away the rain | :08:39. | :08:44. | |
survived more than the Arctic's wintery grip. Hash with the going | :08:44. | :08:49. | |
down with the sun an in the morning we will remember them We will | :08:49. | :08:54. | |
remember them. Attacks by aircraft and submarines I watched really | :08:54. | :09:00. | |
came in right down the columns in some cases sometimes even lower | :09:00. | :09:04. | |
than whether I - where I was standing on board the shifplt it | :09:04. | :09:08. | |
was nothing to see them go past - the ship. I could even see the | :09:08. | :09:14. | |
helmets they were wearing. 2,000 miles the cargo ships and | :09:14. | :09:24. | |
:09:24. | :09:24. | ||
their naval escorts were shadowed by an enemy waiting to pounce. | :09:25. | :09:28. | |
Exhausted look-outs scanning the waves and the skies but the tell- | :09:28. | :09:37. | |
tail signs that could bring death in seconds. And second torpedo hip | :09:37. | :09:43. | |
and people were shout sing, few were hurt, you just wanted to jump | :09:43. | :09:49. | |
overboard because you thought the ship would sink any minute. I did | :09:49. | :09:56. | |
see one ship go down. I came if starboard side and it was just | :09:56. | :10:03. | |
landing down, no sign of debris, no sign of survivors and as it went | :10:03. | :10:06. | |
down it just smoothed out, you would look back and there was | :10:06. | :10:16. | |
:10:16. | :10:29. | ||
nothing there. We never went down below from the time we started to | :10:29. | :10:33. | |
the time we finished, never went below. We had stewards bringing us | :10:33. | :10:43. | |
:10:43. | :10:46. | ||
up food and drink. (Sirens) They came down one after another and | :10:46. | :10:50. | |
there were five bombs aimed at us and certainly all hit the ship and | :10:50. | :10:55. | |
one of the bombs went into the cargo hold because we were carrying | :10:55. | :11:00. | |
car get as well, and there was ammunition there. And the ship just | :11:00. | :11:10. | |
:11:10. | :11:12. | ||
exploded. And I was gone. I don't know if you could imagine metal | :11:12. | :11:18. | |
bombing but when the ship was hit and the steel was torn asunder it | :11:18. | :11:28. | |
:11:28. | :11:28. | ||
really made the most horrifying screech and made you sick inside | :11:28. | :11:32. | |
(Screaming) Panic-stricken, I pulled something up hanging on my | :11:32. | :11:38. | |
right arm and it was a body, a chap hanging onto my arm and he had a | :11:38. | :11:42. | |
bit of shrapnel ride down the middle of his head. I looked at his | :11:42. | :11:47. | |
head, there was nothing I could do for him an he just drifted away. | :11:47. | :11:53. | |
You could see it was a large bomb. It was the survivors carried by the | :11:53. | :11:57. | |
waves. You heard the crash and people crying for mother, they were | :11:57. | :12:01. | |
crying out for their mothers, crying out for help. There was | :12:01. | :12:07. | |
nothing else you could do but see the red lights popping up and down. | :12:07. | :12:12. | |
I was swimming around and I looked, I could see the ship coming up the | :12:12. | :12:17. | |
bend and it just went down like that. I want told the people were | :12:17. | :12:20. | |
in the water but nobody answered me, you know? I could not get any | :12:21. | :12:28. | |
answers. I looked out to see the outline of a ship, and it was very | :12:28. | :12:36. | |
dark, there was a lot of smoke about. I swam towards the ship and | :12:36. | :12:41. | |
shouted out - it was very dark, I don't think anybody could see me, I | :12:41. | :12:45. | |
shouted out, threw a line over, I grabbed the line and slipped off | :12:45. | :12:53. | |
the line and was covered in oil fuel. My hands, my eyes, in my face. | :12:53. | :12:59. | |
And I was pushed away if the ship. I thought "Well, that's it". And | :12:59. | :13:03. | |
for some reason a wave came along, took me up the side of the ship and | :13:03. | :13:12. | |
he grabbed me.. The others were clinging to the rafts. The sea was | :13:12. | :13:16. | |
so cold, you had ropes hanging down from these rafts which they would | :13:16. | :13:20. | |
cling to and try to pull themselves onto the rafts. They could to do | :13:20. | :13:24. | |
this because their hands would slip down the ice so they would slide | :13:24. | :13:31. | |
back into the sea. It was undoubt think saddest day in my life. -- | :13:31. | :13:41. | |
:13:41. | :13:53. | ||
Those who climb this rocky climbs with the veterans do so to honour | :13:53. | :14:01. | |
the thousands who never returned to Loch Hugh. (The 'LAST POST' PLAYS) | :14:01. | :14:06. | |
Yet, as the bugel sounds once more, there are nagging doubts over had | :14:06. | :14:11. | |
the UK has done enough to acknowledge their courage and | :14:11. | :14:17. | |
suffering. It is an extraordinary story and they were very, very | :14:17. | :14:21. | |
young, and they found themselves in these horrific conditions where | :14:21. | :14:29. | |
quite apart from the enemy they had to contend with the cold. | :14:29. | :14:36. | |
# Amazing grace, how sweet the sound... They deserve every kind of | :14:36. | :14:46. | |
:14:46. | :15:08. | ||
respect, admiration and recognition. In the English port of Harrage a | :15:08. | :15:12. | |
pilgramage begins. A friends ship born at a time when supplies from | :15:12. | :15:22. | |
:15:22. | :15:24. | ||
overseas helped to bring a nation back if the brink. (Bombing) (Shell | :15:24. | :15:30. | |
fire). In 1941, threatened by the German advance Russian forces were | :15:30. | :15:35. | |
running desperately short of supplies. The 78 Arctic convoys | :15:35. | :15:39. | |
brought four million tonnes of food, munitions and fuel to Russia's | :15:39. | :15:49. | |
:15:49. | :15:51. | ||
northern ports. In Mansk where a huge memorial towers above to say | :15:51. | :16:01. | |
:16:01. | :16:02. | ||
no one has forgotten the 101 allied vessels which were lost. We cherish | :16:02. | :16:09. | |
all the pages of this war. The page of Russian convoys is one of the | :16:09. | :16:16. | |
major in the history in the schoolbooks. So our children know | :16:16. | :16:20. | |
that and certainly have grown up - and gone-up people remember it or | :16:20. | :16:25. | |
were told the stories by people -- grown-up people - were told the | :16:25. | :16:29. | |
stories that were witnessed by people like that so I'm quite sure | :16:29. | :16:39. | |
:16:39. | :16:43. | ||
it will not be forgotten. Over the years it will be remembered. | :16:43. | :16:48. | |
there is more to these reunions than the bands t smiles t flowers, | :16:48. | :16:52. | |
the British veterans who bow their heads at the Flame of Remembrance | :16:52. | :17:01. | |
wear the bright ribbons of Russian medals awarded by a grateful nation. | :17:01. | :17:06. | |
What annoys me and what annoys many of my ship mates, many of the | :17:06. | :17:12. | |
veterans is that albeit they thank us all the time, people in the West, | :17:12. | :17:17. | |
countries in the West, relatively speaking never seem to appreciate | :17:17. | :17:22. | |
that Russia lost 27 million men in the war. I mean, they were giving | :17:22. | :17:28. | |
the Tuesday blessings and everything for -- giving us the | :17:28. | :17:38. | |
:17:38. | :17:43. | ||
blessings and everything for 3,000- Today on the River Thames in London | :17:43. | :17:49. | |
visitors can tour one of the last survivors of the Arctic convoys t | :17:49. | :17:55. | |
Light Cruiser HMS Belfast is a way of reminding new generations of hat | :17:55. | :17:58. | |
these ships and their crews went through Annette those who have | :17:58. | :18:02. | |
survived to tell the stories claim they are still waiting for formal | :18:02. | :18:12. | |
recognition of their courage and their sacrifice. Every morning at | :18:12. | :18:16. | |
his home overlooking Portsmouth's naval base commander Eddie Grenfell | :18:17. | :18:20. | |
now 91 opens fresh emails from those who believe the British | :18:20. | :18:25. | |
Government has failed in its duty to the men who served on the Arctic | :18:25. | :18:34. | |
run. Commander green felling has spent 15 years leading the campaign | :18:34. | :18:39. | |
-- Grenfell -- for a British medal to be awarded It is the only thing | :18:39. | :18:44. | |
that has occupied my miefpbltd I can tell you that when I'm -- mind. | :18:44. | :18:50. | |
I can tell you that when I'm given duty to carry out thin really | :18:50. | :18:53. | |
devote myself to doing the job and that is what I have done with the | :18:53. | :19:03. | |
:19:03. | :19:13. | ||
Arctic campaign. I would love if the government saw fit to give us a | :19:13. | :19:19. | |
medal. It would gladden my heart in a way. Really, that we had finally | :19:19. | :19:29. | |
:19:29. | :19:36. | ||
been recognised and they were awful The veterans who parade at this | :19:36. | :19:41. | |
time of remembrance wear campaign medals marking service around the | :19:41. | :19:47. | |
world past and present. Services in the Arctic is represented by a | :19:47. | :19:53. | |
small badge awarded in 2005 which campaigners regard as inadequate. | :19:53. | :19:59. | |
My goodness, we fought for four and a half long years in the Arctic and | :19:59. | :20:03. | |
surely we deserve some sort of recognition, certainly not a clasp | :20:03. | :20:09. | |
or a badge, a medal like every other campaign. The suffering they | :20:09. | :20:13. | |
had was absolutely indescribable. They kept their heads, they kept | :20:13. | :20:19. | |
themselves together, I think that as a Group D veterans of the | :20:19. | :20:24. | |
convoys are probably more close- knit than you can find than any | :20:24. | :20:27. | |
other group of people. The memories are very, very strong and they | :20:27. | :20:33. | |
still want to push some of these ideas through. I think that the | :20:33. | :20:43. | |
:20:43. | :20:45. | ||
70th anniversary is the moments to do these things. The young men who | :20:45. | :20:51. | |
sailed back past the guns at Loch Hugh had survived the froze city of | :20:51. | :20:55. | |
Arctic weather, witnessed the destruction of ships, and had lost | :20:55. | :21:00. | |
so many close friends. Small wonder that the experiences of their | :21:00. | :21:10. | |
:21:10. | :21:14. | ||
journey called them to this day. was on a rescue ship. I prepared | :21:14. | :21:24. | |
:21:24. | :21:25. | ||
the dead for burial because quite a few die on this ship. Difficult 200. | :21:25. | :21:29. | |
When I joined up it was pride to do my duty and do something tore the | :21:29. | :21:39. | |
country. Sometimes I think what I wise to do that, you know? If hi my | :21:39. | :21:48. | |
time over, of course I would do it again, yes. Being at sea is not a | :21:48. | :21:54. | |
nice thing. You satisfy flag and the service is nice, and there is a | :21:54. | :22:04. | |
splash and somebody's life is gone. And I come up here to see this | :22:04. | :22:09. | |
stone and I'm actually back there. Just standing at that stofpblt I do | :22:09. | :22:14. | |
not see the stone, I see something else -- stone. I see that flag | :22:14. | :22:22. | |
being held onto and a man disappearing. The MoD is reviewing | :22:22. | :22:32. | |
the veterans request but time is short. Convoys mounted to smash | :22:32. | :22:39. | |
their way to the coast. Homebound convoys limp back wounded deaths | :22:39. | :22:47. | |
icy grip embraced them most. Europe's storm... Do As Eddie | :22:47. | :22:53. |