Oral History Gallery

Propulsion Conditions 1 - You would perspire something chronic 1940s

Name: Gordon Dance

Service: 1944 - 1947

Rate: Stoker Mechanic

Branch: Engine Room / Marine Engineering

Gordon Dance joined the Navy in 1944 and trained as a stoker at HMS Imperieuse. His first sea-going ship was HMS Newcastle in 1945, which took him to the Far East. He worked in ships boiler rooms, controlling the amount of steam the boilers supplied to the engines for different powers and speeds. The role of a stoker then was manual and physical, with few automatic or remote controls.

Gordon describes what it was like being a stoker in the 1940s and the conditions he worked in.

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

Extract Text (Duration01.35)

Q: Where Stokers known for any particular characteristic?

A: Yes. Mad. It's a known thing. A very, very bonding crew onboard boats. Nobody crossed them, don't ask me why, but nobody crossed them, and if they wanted anything off a stoker, go down stoker's mess deck, and it was guaranteed to be the cleanest mess on the boat, guaranteed. Because when you were going in and out of airlocks into engines rooms, airlocks into boiler rooms, you would perspire something chronic. You could wring... especially when you're in the Far East, Middle and Far East. You could wring your clothing out and it would be pure sweat that would come out of it, and if you didn't wash and clean everything all day, every day, you would soon find out. You'd have anything like... the skin between your toes and underneath the balls of your foot and that would go dry because all the salt would be down there drying the skin out. I've seen blokes with their feet literally bleeding, I've had my own literally bleeding because of that, and I used to paint it with the stuff called gentian violet, oh it was horrible. But it worked.