Warfleet Road 1934, Dartmouth
Warfleet Road 1934, Dartmouth Ref: 86228
Memories of Warfleet Road 1934, Dartmouth
Warfleet
I first came to Dartmouth in 1966 as a member of the Vancouver Boys Band. We were a 39 piece military style marching/concert band. All of us in the band fell in love with Dartmouth. We were hired to play for the Carnival in June and the Regatta in August. I returned with the band in 1968 and 1970. On one of the trips, a Mr Dwyer gave Arthur Delamont, the conductor of the band, a history book on Dartmouth and he passed it on to me. It sat on my bookshelf for years, years that saw me become a band conductor and later a writer. At some point I picked the book up again and couldn't put it down, absorbing all the names and the lore from John Hawley to Francis Drake to Thomas Newcombe. I knew all the roads and high streets and low streets from my adventures in the band and made the trip up the Dart often, past Agatha Christie's house, all the way up to... Read more
Dartmouth & local memories
Read and share memories of Dartmouth and Devon inspired by Frith photos.
Britannia Royal Naval College, Dartmouth
I joined the College in Sep 1965 at the last moment so they were not really expecting me despite the fact MOD Navy told me to proceed. I was not a brilliant pupil, but ready to give it my all. I was not the pattern that they were hoping to mold into the standard officer material. Despite the fact that I had swum all my life, I turned out to be a 'backward' swimmer. I was also a 'backward' flasher as it applies to reading morse coded flashing light messages. I was also a 'backward' sailor when it came to passing proficiency tests on the navy's boats. and so on. I did graduate the Basic Training, but had to put considerably more effort in these tests than did the average recruit it seemed. I 'enjoyed' the rest of my five years afloat with the Survey Navy, until other things called for my attention ashore.
