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Tenuous, nostalgic royal connection.

I remember well the day XXKing CharlesXX was was born! EDIT: It must have been his sister, Anne. She was born in the month of August, he in October. We would NEVER have been on holiday, in a Rothesay October.....

My pal & I, mere youngsters, were on holiday in Rothesay (Scotland - not one of the other ones). We were racing each other in the bay, rowing hired little one-man skiffs: Made our way out to 'inspect' and poke our oars at the submarines lying alongside the depot ship 'Montcalm'. It had been a permanent fixture there for many months. Just after we set out to head back towards shore, suddenly there were whistles blowing and some commotion on the ship. Sailors poured out on deck and lined up in a formation. We thought it was great fun to gesture, yell and jeer at them from our little boats. Then the gun turrets swung round in our direction and BLAM - a full broadside!!!. Blanks of course but the shock almost knocked us into the water. Charlie - EDIT: Princess Anne - had been born - and that's my whole connection to the royal family.
SW-User
cannons on the way in.... cannons on the way out. you've seen it all!
Really · 80-89, M
@SW-User Haha, great comment.
Really · 80-89, M
I've edited my previous post because I had connected my incident with the wrong royal. It must have been Anne's birthday, not Charlie's.

I web-searched the ship 'Montcalm'. It had been a passenger ship, requisitioned and refitted with 7 six-inch guns as well as much anti-aircraft armament. According to the website, she would have been renamed "Wolfe" by the time of Anne's birth, but I knew the ship as Montcalm. Don't know where I got that from. Maybe the name hadn't yet been painted out?

https://www.naval-history.net/xGM-Chrono-28Depot-HMS_Wolfe.htm

Here she sits with 2 subs alongside, exactly as I remember.


Remembering those days it's hard to believe that a 13 year old with no lifejacket could rent a flimsy boat and row out on the briny, unsupervised - or that he could pull alongside an RN sub and poke it with his oar, attracting no attention. How complacent we must have been in the big new peacetime.
:o wow thats amazing! Jeez you musta seen alota stuff
GovanDUNNY · M
Your as auld as the hills
Really · 80-89, M
@GovanDUNNY Aye, laddie :)
Barny52 · 56-60, M
That’s amazing

 
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