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Yours Aye... Norrie Millen

Progressed to the Ulster after initial training (at 15) at HMS St Vincent and electrical training at HMS Collingwood.

Foreign runs ashore I recall were Malmo (Sweden), Hamburg, Belfast (some fighting ashore, ratings were instructed to wear uniforms on the 1st night, after the ‘fisties’ we were allowed to wear civvies!).

Spent plenty of time around the Scottish coast and lochs (Fort William etc) with navigation training officers.

Norrie just to let you know that Oxford county Navy Veterans association Woodstock has set up a new web site please offer any suggestions as you go through I would like your opinion Thanks Danny Sutherland

Was AMP HMS Hartland Point or Triumph on Singapore station 1964 to 1966. Found this site researching ships tied along side Triumph. Several others were with Killisport at the time unfortunately pennant numbers are not visible.

Regards
David

I was looking on the internet for some photos of my old ship 'Ulster' and came across your web site.

I served on the 1960/61 commission (the one after you) as an LME (or Killick Stoker if you like), and have attached a ships company photo taken in Hamilton, Bermuda around about that time.

Sadly, I don't possess any more photos of our commission or the ship itself, which is a shame as I am sure that there must be some still around out there.

I liked the photo of you standing by the LIMBO though, that brought back some memories.

I live in Torquay, which is a coincidence, as I note that you hold your reunions here.

Faslane

Do you remember Faslane 68/9. We were QMs and neighbours. You were a PO and I a LS. Seems a long time ago. Just been in contact with Mike Ingram (ex Ulster) who is an RNA colleague of mine.

Now then Norris (Pity he cannot spell my name) me old shipmate have just joined the above association, of which I believe you are a member, we all got together at Blackpool for the AGM on 24th APR, Anne and Andrew spoke about you and said you were unable to attend due to unforseen circumstances. Since I last had contact with you I have come back to the UK from Jersey in the CI, to live near Joddrell Bank in Cheshire, we are now back on the internet and since we have lived here I have had contact with Mike Kapusinski {Kappa} who was in our mess on the Loch Killisport, he has also joined the LCFA and with any luck I intend to go down to his neck of the woods to meet up with him sometime at the end of this month or start of June. I think you wrote somewhere sometime that the trip on the Killisport was one of the best you had, well it was the same with me and although the memory fades I still wonder what happened to all those good oppo's that I made. One day I hope to meet up with you again even if it is at the next 'Lochie' meeting. Do you still live in Canada?

I would just like to tell you how much I enjoy your site. My father was a leading hand on the Ulster in the Med. We immigrated to the U.S. in the late sixties. My father passed in 1998 but I know he would have enjoyed this site. I have a pen and ink of his that he drew of her and would be happy to make a copy for you if you are interested. If you receive this message please let me know your particulars and I will send it to you. Take care.

John Everidge

Ulster was my first ship after leaving Ganges in 1956. We spent the first 3 months on board moored alongside Swiftsure in Rosyth doing NOTHING until we finally went to sea for the "Summer War" of 1957 and took part in what was probably the last "steam past".

I left the RN after 10 years with no regrets having been treated like shit by the officers. What finally decided me to get out was HMS Bermuda 1949 - 53. South Africa was great but the ship was a hot metal tin box and the final straw was water rationing on the equator, all except the officers who actually had fresh bath water!

The picture should be me as Rum Bos'n. The barrel leaked so we had to use a metal one!

My Dad, Alf Broadbent was an Able Seaman on HMS Ulster from 1942/43 until the ship was Kamikazed in the Pacific. The ship was repaired in an American dry dock in the Leyte Gulf and he was demobbed in Sydney, Australia where the ship was laid up.

Have you any photos of the crew during that period that you could email me.

OA/5 Arthur Noel John Pearman D/M 943573 Always known as Noel or Shorty, at the time I served on HMS Ulster.

I joined the ship in Bermuda in January 1959 and left the ship in August or September (I think) the same year, from Montreal.

I was returning to Plymouth to finish off my training as an OA. I was accompanied by the seaman who collected our mail. He I believe, had finished his time and was going home. We sailed on an Italian Liner and took for ever to cross the Atlantic.

From the crew list I only recognise COA Ken Barnes. Stroke you Know. I last saw him in 1965. He had retired and was working in Devonport Dockyard. That would make him about 84 years old now.

There was also an OA3. I think he slept in the diving store with the diver. I don't recall his name but he was a very slight build and very tall. His responsibility was the 21 inch fish and the anti-submarine mortars whose name I do not recall. Two mountings of three mortars mounted aft that rolled and pitched as opposed to train and elevate. They fired the bombs over the bridge and about 1,000 yards ahead of the ship. The timing and fusing was such that the target was caught, sandwiched between two triangles of bombs about 50 or 100 vertical feet apart that viewed from above made a hexagon pattern.

I came across your website this evening while browsing the ships my late father served on during his service in the Royal Navy (1934 -1960). He was a Chief Petty Officer on board Ulster when she went to the West Indies in 1958. I was only 10 at the time but remember him sending us lots of letters. I also remember listening with my mother to a farewell radio broadcast before the ship left for the West Indies. I noticed that my father's name was missing from the crew list on your website, obviously an oversight, or possibly he joined the ship after the crew list was made up. Interestingly enough I came across HMS Ulster about 1971 when she anchored off Tobermory on the Island of Mull. By that time I was a police constable stationed at Tobermory. She was obviously an old ship by then but it gave me a thrill to see her, the last ship my father served on before he retired, although he spent the last year of his naval service in charge of the Fleet Club at Rosyth.

I am working with the webmaster of the site for HMS Wager (1944) - see www.hms-wager.org.uk - to make the site not just the story of this one ship but useful to anyone seeking to know more about HM destroyers of that period. My father served in HMS Wager from 1944-47.

Do you have a copy of the Bernard's Naval Tailors little blue Commissioning Booklet for HMS Ulster? Information and plans it contains will have some relevance to HMS Wager.

I wonder if you knew my father, Sydney Rutherford Christie? He drowned when in the Seychelles in 1975 whilst serving aboard HMS Blake. I’m just looking for information about him - what he was like - good or bad. There’s nobody else I can ask. Kind regards, Julie Christie (eldest daughter).

Webmasters Note:
If you have any information that can assist Julie, please send me a webmail by clicking on the “Contact Webmaster” tag.

I am a former member of commissioning of HMCS Assiniboine which commissioned in Sorel, Quebec on Aug 15/56 and also a former member of commissioning crew of HMCS Kootenay which commissioned in Vancouver on 7 March 59. I lost both crew photographs in a house fire and would like to have them replaced- If anybody can assist me, please leave a message for webmaster who will forward for us to make contact.

Its been a long time since we were on the ULSTER. Now living in Melaka in Malaysia.
John [Jock] Bain

Dear Mr. Millen my brother served on the Ulster on the opening of the St Lawrence I have my brothers medal, his name was Peter Hutcheon [Webmaster note – He was our butcher] he came from Aberdeen Scotland. I have some photos but would like some info on my brother’s time in the navy

Peter Schofield
email: schofieldpeterg@msn.com
Subject: HMS Ulster 62/64 Commission

Hi Norrie,
I was a Junior Seaman Gunner on the 62/64 commission. I wonder if anyone can remember the first night on board?

I ended up in the early hours of the morning standing on on the jetty in my underpants, Burberry and shoes with no socks. Two of us had to boundary cool the ships side as there was a major fire in the galley. Not a bad introduction to shipboard life for a Junior on his first ship. The rest of the commission was brilliant especially the year out the West Indies for a 16 year old boy. Who could wish for a better start to his naval career.

If anyone knows me, please get in touch at the above e mail address. I went on to spend 30 years in the navy retiring as a CPO(OPS)(M)

For the past 27 years, Falmouth RNA have organized Sea Sunday in Falmouth, on the third Sunday in July, this year on 18th July. At the recent Area 4 meeting at Bridgewater, I distributed notices and response pro-forma to those Branches in attendance. As 2010 is the "Year of the Seafarer", (and also the 60th year of the RNA) we hope to make this year's event one worth remembering.

I note that you have now taken over as Branch Secretary of Torbay RNA. Would you be so kind as to publicize the event on the various websites that you manage. Further details can be supplied on request, and we would welcome anyone (particularly Branch or Association Standards!) with a maritime affiliation.

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