Ronnie

This afternoon I have been doing a little research on Royal Navy (RN) ships. Specifically I have been looking at information on minesweepers. The first half (or so) of my current work in progress is set during WWII. Most of the novel takes place in Russia and other chunks of what was the USSR.

One of my characters comes to know Russia and Russians by serving on a RN vessel operating out of Murmansk and Archangel. Interestingly a number of RN ships particularly minesweepers spent months at a time operating from Russia, often returning to the northern ports over several years.

Now before anyone leaps to the conclusion that I am trying to recreate something like Monsarrat's The Cruel Sea, I most emphatically am not. I like to write from differing points of view. In Veiled in Shadows (hopefully creeping closer to publication) for example I look at the events in Germany and Western Europe through the 30’s and 40’s from viewpoints as different as those of an SS officer and a Holocaust survivor. So my RN officer (his name is Ronnie by the way) is planted in the Soviet Union to give an outsider’s viewpoint.

Most of the research I am doing now will never directly appear in the novel. However, it is important to me to know as much as I can about a character. In fact, it seems I have to become intimate with them before they speak their stories to me. So I know quite a lot about Ronnie’s background. He is from a well to do family with a loving sister, a socialite mother and a distant father. Like a many young men in the RN during the war he has been thrust in over his head. He is in his early twenties but he has been given a command (albeit a small one) largely on the basis of a yacht-masters certificate he obtained before the war. This actually happened to quite a number of young RN Volunteer Reserve officers during the war.

Today in my imagination Ronnie has been guiding me through some of the material available through the wonders of the internet. We have been looking at the vessels of different classes such as Halcyon Class and Flower Class (aren’t they amazing names).

HMS Britomart a Halcyon Class minesweeper. Photos for this post are from Wikimedia Commons.

Then quite by chance (or perhaps Ronnie was nudging me) I found the HMAS Castlemaine site. Here in Melbourne is one of the few WWII minesweepers that still exist. Now to be sure HMAS Castlemaine is a Bathurst Class and so different to the vessels Ronnie would have served on, but she is similar enough to allow a far more accurate feel than any number of photos or plans could ever give.

HMAS Castlemaine a Bathurst Class corvette

As an aside for those of you who don't know HMS stands for Her (or His during WWII) Majesty's Ship while HMAS stands for Her Majesty's Australian Ship.

So if you ever read about Ronnie meeting Valentina at a dance in Archangel and if Ron has a bruise on his brow, you might wonder why? If he does it will be because he showed me on the Castlemaine how he cracked his head by not ducking as he left his cabin.

Can anyone guess where I might be going next weekend?

Uninvited Guests and a Little Fire.

As I said last night I have recently discovered The West Wing. Well today I was watching more in an effort to keep myself occupied. In episode 14 of the third season, the character Leo McGarry, tells an anecdote about the burning of the White House during the War of 1812. In the anecdote a detachment of British troops arrive to find the tables set for dinner, being practical they sat down and ate dinner before following their orders and setting fire to the building.

In August 1814 the War of 1812 had been dragging on for two years. Neither the British nor the Americans had been ready for war and neither had been able to achieve a decisive result. With the defeat of Napoleon in 1814 the British suddenly found they had the possibility of bringing more troops from Europe to increase pressure on the fledgling USA.

One of the tactics the British chose was to land an expeditionary force in Maryland to threaten Baltimore and Washington. The Secretary of War John Armstrong, misjudged and assumed the British would only attack Baltimore when in fact their plan was to strike at both.

This meant only a scratch force of a few hundred American regular soldiers together with 6,500 militia were mustered to march out to face the approaching column of 4,500 Veteran British soldiers and sailors. The Battle of Bladensburg was fought on the 24th of August 1812. From the start it was a disaster for the American forces, due to poorly coordinated leadership the American forces were quickly routed.

With no effective leadership, the fleeing militia units actually fled through Washington leaving it essentially undefended. The hero of the hour, from the American perspective, was the First Lady Dolley Madison. Deserted as she was, she kept her head and ordered the salvage of such portable treasures as she could before departing just ahead of the arriving British forces.

WARNING! Any American readers who are likely to hold the actions of a distant ancestor against me, should immediately desist in reading this post. Hopefully, if you stop now we can remain friends and you can resume your perusing of my blog at a later date.

Still reading? Well this is the dark secret from my family archive, my Great-Great-Great-Grandfather (in other words my Grandfather’s Great-Grandfather) was present at the battle and afterwards at Washington. This is where it gets difficult, my forebear a junior officer by the name of William Anley was there and he was not on the American side.

Young William was then serving on HMS Tonnant the Royal Navy (RN) flagship of the North American Station. As a junior officer he was part of the RN shore contingent that accompanied the British Army at the Battle of Bladensburg and at the subsequent burning of Washington.

So there it is, one of my ancestors is complicit in the burning of not only the White House, but of the burning of Washington’s public buildings. American readers of my blog do you hold it against me? Hopefully, given the time that has passed since we can just let bygones be bygones.

The bicentenary of the event is coming up on the 24/25 of August 2014. Does anyone think I should attend?
I do like a good celebration – this was my bonfire on the Queen’s Birthday long weekend last year.

Uh, maybe on second thoughts I’d better not.