22 NAVY NEWS, JULY 2010


Mersey marines honoured


aplomb as locals bestowed their highest civic honour on the Navy’s elite infantrymen.


City officials in Liverpool granted the freedom of the great port city upon RMR Merseyside... freedom which was promptly celebrated by the part-time Royals with a march through the city.


At the head of that parade, appropriately, was the Band of HM Royal Marines.


Behind them came their reservist comrades with their new freedom scroll (pictured right) carefully rolled and placed on a plush red cushion and carried by a Royal Marine ahead of the marching platoon.


THE 60th birthday year of green berets on


Merseyside ended wit h


titled) Merseyside Centre Royal Marine Forces Voluntary Reserve back in 1949 aboard HMS Irwell at Morpeth Dock in Birkenhead. Irwell has long gone... as has the Merseyside Centre Royal Marine Forces Voluntary Reserve. The latter has rematerialised as RMR Merseyside at East Brunswick Dock in the newish naval regional headquarters; it has detachments in Manchester, Nottingham and Birmingham.


The march followed a service at the Chur Our Lady and Saint Nicholas.


at the Church of


The commandos paraded past the Liver Building and along the Strand before heading to the town hall for a reception.


RMR Merseyside began as the (snappily- operations over the last decade.”


“The original relatively benign and rather blunt training has been honed over the decades to a commando dagger-like sharpness, which has enabled reservists across the unit to deploy on almost continuous


reservists from Merseyside – four-fi fths of the unit’s trained strength – deploy alongside their full-time Corps comrades.


In an average year, around 100 commando


“From our formation 60 years ago, the role of the reservist has changed immeasurably,” said Commanding Offi cer Lt Col Rory Bruce.


Rocks of ages


MEMORIES may fade, but deeds are immortal. With the sun beginning its descent on an early winter’s afternoon, Cdr Mike Knott and former Royal Marine ‘Curly’ Elstow read the inscriptions on wreaths left around a cairn on Pebble Island.


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The simple pile of rocks and white wooden cross are the monument to the men of HMS Coventry, lost a dozen or so miles from this spot on Pebble Island in the Falklands 28 years ago. In 1982, Curly was a green beret serving as coxswain of one of HMS Broadsword’s sea boats.


destroyer Coventry, acting as forward pickets to protect the bulk of the invasion force in Falkland Sound from Argentine air attack. May 25 – Argentina’s national day and Curly


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Elstow’s 22nd birthday – was a day of maximum effort by the Fuerza Aérea Argentina. After downing two Skyhawks with Coventry’s Sea Darts, the two ships came under sustained attack from low-level Argentine bombers. Broadsword was struck by one 1,000lb bomb which bounced off the ocean, through the fl ight deck and wrecked the Lynx, but did not explode.


Coventry was not so fortunate. She was struck by two 1,000-pounders. Both detonated, wrecking the computer room, operations room and both engine rooms. Within 20 minutes, the destroyer capsized and sank.


The frigate was sailing in company with


Curly Elstow pulled 37 survivors from the South Atlantic, plus fi ve lost souls; in all nineteen men were killed, plus MEM Paul Mills who died nearly a year afterwards as a result of injuries sustained. A generation later, and now retired from the Corps, Curly joined the ship’s company of HMS


Pictures: LA(Phot) Simmo Simpson, FRPU East


Portland for a memorial service over Coventry’s wreck; the destroyer lies on her side in around 350ft of water.


presentation, revealing his memories of the Falkland’s confl ict, candidly relating the realities of confl ict at sea from his perspective as a young Royal Marine who’s own ship was bombed.” Earlier, in company with HMS Clyde, Portland’s sailors headed to San Carlos and a service of remembrance at Blue Beach Cemetery to men lost during the landings at this bleak spot in 1982.


“He also gave a spellbinding slideshow


“Curly’s fi st-hand account of the action that resulted in the loss of the Coventry – and his frank description of the realities of confl ict at sea – made the memorial service a particularly poignant event,” said Cdr Knott.


Following the service aboard the Type 23 frigate, on a six-month South Atlantic deployment upholding Britain’s commitment to the Falklands, Cdr Knott, Curly and a few ship’s company fl ew ashore to the Coventry monument. r


For Portland, the tributes to the islands’ liberators 28 years ago continued in the capital Stanley, with sailors paying their respects at the Liberation Monument. Pictured below are ET(ME) Joey Leqetta, LCH Sam Neil and POET(ME) Emmanuel Hardman reading the names of the Royal Navy’s fallen on the memorial.


There are a few men of 1982 still serving in the Royal Navy of 2010, among them Clyde’s CPO Brumfi eld and Portland’s PO(AWT) John Moody; although not present at the landings, both sailors were involved in the aftermath of the confl ict serving aboard HM Ships Liverpool and Sirius respectively.


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