Through a Canadian Periscope by Julie H. Ferguson

Author:Julie H. Ferguson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dundurn
Published: 2014-01-27T16:00:00+00:00

Lt. Jack Cross, RCNVR, while serving in P512 at Pictou, NS, before he took Perisher.

Cross collection

Edward A.D. Holmes had already got substantial submarine experience under his belt before he took his SOTC, having served as a liaison officer in the Dutch 021 in the Mediterranean, where he experienced attacks on Italian convoys and the sinking of a U-boat. Holmes was awarded the Netherlands Bronze Cross in June 1942 for his valour, skill, endurance, and devotion to duty.

As soon as he joined P512, her British CO nicknamed him “Uncle” because he was the eldest on board. Holmes and Cross soon became good friends and when Holmes got married in 1943 to a Canadian, he asked Cross to be his best man.

P512 was the first lend-lease submarine to be assigned to Canadian ASW training. The boat was very old, displaced 680 tons (616.8 tonnes) and had internal main ballast tanks. She could dive up to two hundred feet (sixty-one metres) and had a maximum speed of 13.5 knots on the surface and 10.5 knots submerged. The ship’s company was comprised of four officers and twenty-nine men.

P512 worked out of Pictou and Holmes found it a tedious job sailing each morning into the Northumberland Strait and running prescribed courses at set depths while the trainee asdic operators endeavoured to locate them. Rarely was the submarine allowed to depart from this strict routine and employ evasive tactics of its own. Cross and Holmes remember lots of paperwork, though for two days they assisted the RCAF in making an instructional film on submarine recognition, as well as a movie called Freighters under Fire, in which P512 played the part of a U-boat.

The British CO, Lt. John Ogle, RN, gave Holmes and Cross plenty of opportunities to learn ship handling and they practised coming alongside, entering and leaving harbour, and driving the boat on the surface.

Ogle returned to England after becoming engaged to Cross’s sister, and in April 1943 Holmes also left P512, going to P553, initially as her torpedo officer, and later as first lieutenant. Cross remained in P512 as her number one while she was ping-running for the Allied escorts at Bermuda, but by October 1943 he was standing by HMS/M Vigorous with her CO. The captain turned out to be none other than John Ogle, his future brother-in-law.

While on P553, Holmes met Colin Perry, another Canadian submariner, and together with their captain, Lt. “Rocky” Hill, RNR, they operated out of Halifax through the winter of 1942–43. The crew put up with most uncomfortable living conditions. P553 was unable to come alongside after the daily exercises, but had to anchor off the shore in St. Margaret’s Bay. There was no pleasant house to accommodate them, as there had been in Pictou, and they lived on board the submarine. When the sea froze in early 1943, the ship’s company was miserable, but was given no respite. At the beginning of June, P553 returned to Pictou to continue the work in better acoustic conditions until the winter, but by now Holmes had left.

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