Officers’ married quarters had been completed in the nearby village of Rhu and a large estate of ratings’ quarters established behind the town of Helensburgh. This, however, was not very well built and in due course was to become very much a bleak, soulless place for families where the father could be away at sea, out of contact for several months. Although the officers’ quarters had won an architectural prize, the exterior of most of the buildings looked like giant chicken coops and were ill-designed to cope with the winter weather of the west of Scotland.
In line with the United States’ model, the base boasted very comprehensive recreational facilities, including a petrol station and cinema which were to quickly prove commercially unviable. When off-duty the British submariner — unlike his US counterpart — spent as little time as possible in the base, preferring the very limited offerings of the Helensburgh nightlife or venturing further afield to Glasgow, some forty miles away.
On joining Odin, Conley experienced disappointment. The submarine was about to undergo annual inspection and all hands were focused upon bringing the boat up to the highest levels of cleanliness prior to proceeding to sea for two days of exercises when she would be put through her operational paces. Therefore, initially he felt himself to be a bit of a nuisance. Besides which, although Odin’s accommodation was considered adequate enough for sea-duty, it was the practice of all sub-marines in port to accommodate the crew ashore in barrack accommodation, leaving only a duty watch onboard overnight to deal with the routine running and security of the vessel, or to meet any arising emergencies. This tended to add further to Conley’s sense of isolation and he experienced ‘a fairly ragged time’, being detailed to help the completion of painting and cleaning the torpedo compartment, much to the embarrassment of the senior rating in charge. Also, greatly to his chagrin, he was instructed to remain ashore for the operational sea inspection and received the displeasure of his commanding officer when he was not there on the jetty to meet Odin when she returned to harbour unexpectedly early.
He had, meanwhile, been decanted from the shore wardroom accommodation to the 1938 vintage depot ship Maidstone that, prior to the base being established, had been the Third Submarine Squadron’s shore support facility. Moored alongside, this venerable old ship had great character and there was a tremendous sense of camaraderie and spirit amongst the submarine crews billeted in her accommodation. Dinner in the wardroom was always a convivial occasion, a fair amount of drinking being buoyed by the ebullient presence of a number of Canadian and Australian officers on exchange appointments to British submarines whilst their boats were under construction. Also present were the officers of the Israeli submarine Dakar, until recently HMS Totem, who, conducting work-up prior to departure for Israel, added a friendly international dimension to the gatherings. Rather unusually, the commanding officer and first lieutenant of the Israeli submarine were brothers. Very sadly, a few weeks later Dakar was lost with all hands in the Mediterranean en route to her new home. The wreck, in deep water, was not located until 1999, but the cause of her sinking has never been established. Conley had got to know some of Dakar’s junior officers and this tragedy was a poignant reminder that submarining could be a dangerous profession, a cold douche to add to his nonchalant reception aboard Odin.
The depot ship’s repair and maintenance staff were cheerfully helpful, a welcome contrast to the surly civilian dockyard mateys whose apathy and lack of urgency was legendary. Indeed, all departments of the Maidstone were committed, as was traditional, to deliver a level of support which the much larger shore staff of Neptune initially found difficult to replicate. Unfortunately, Maidstone left Faslane soon after Conley’s arrival and, as the shore wardroom was now full, he moved into a cabin onboard the old landing ship Lofoten, which provided overflow officers’ accommodation until the base facilities were complete.
By this time Conley was wondering if he and submarines were mutually suited. He was not to feel ‘part of the team’ until the Odin again put to sea after the Christmas leave period, whereupon responsibility was heaped on him. In company with other submarines, Odin left Faslane for exercises off the northwest of Ireland. Influenza swept through the ship’s company and owing to shortages of fit watch-keeping officers, Conley soon found himself conducting watches on his own in the control room when the submarine was deep. His mentor and training officer was the Odin’s first lieutenant, the late Vice Admiral Sir Geoffrey Biggs, who quickly recognised Conley’s abilities. On more than one occasion Lieutenant Biggs came on watch with Conley and discreetly disappeared, leaving the young sub lieutenant to it. Biggs was not only a good delegator, he was intelligent and capable and a great character; the two men were to serve together on a number of subsequent occasions.
Conley was soon to learn the hard way that diesel submarines spent a lot of time on the surface. Bridge watch-keeping in the winter off the British coast could be a very cold, wet experience. Watchkeepers slept in damp clothes to dry them off for their next duty period and, as the junior officer, Conley had been allocated the most uncomfortable of the seven wardroom bunks, in which it was almost impossible to sleep in rough weather. Here, jammed into the curve of the pressure hull and sharing the space with the brackets which supported the weight of the bunk above, he further pondered the wisdom of his career choice.
On completion of the exercises, Odin was programmed to make a courtesy call to Newcastle upon Tyne and headed for Cape Wrath. She had been scheduled to fire a torpedo at the small island of Garvie, situated off the Cape and used as a target by all three armed services. This ‘proving warshot’ with a live torpedo was, for some reason, cancelled and, as the weather deteriorated, Odin ploughed her way eastwards towards the Pentland Firth on the surface. This proved an exciting experience, with the rising westerly wind, now approaching storm force, blowing against the westerly setting tide of over 8 knots. The seas this generated were phenomenal for their steepness, and for a while little progress was made through the infamous very turbulent area — Merry Men of Mey — as one of the two main propulsion motors had failed, owing to a defective lubrication oil pump. A jury-rigged Black and Decker heavy-duty drill was ingeniously set up by the engineers to drive the pump, enabling the motor to be restarted, and ran continuously for the next thirty-six hours.
Clear of the Firth, Odin swung south into the North Sea on the night of the Glasgow ‘hurricane’ of January 1968, during which twenty Glaswegians were killed. On watch at 0230 as the storm was at its height, with the wind speed gusting at over 100mph, visibility was down to a few hundred yards. On Odin’s bridge the seas were breaking over Conley and his lookout. Radar performance was also poor thanks to the ‘sea clutter’, the echoes returned from the myriad surfaces of waves in their immediate vicinity. As a result, any other vessel would only have been detected at very short range, but fortunately there was little shipping around.
With access to the bridge through the conning tower airlock, and with air for the engines being supplied by the snort induction system, both Conley and the lookout were locked out of the submarine to prevent the control room flooding. When it came to his turn to be relieved at 0430, Conley experienced real trouble locking back into the submarine, as on climbing down to the airlock he found it flooded up by the breaking seas, which had filled the enclosed space in which the hatch was located. Attempts to pump it out proved fruitless, as every time he opened the upper hatch to climb in to the lock, the sea poured in after him. He therefore decided to stay in the chamber whilst it was pumped empty. Crouching at the top of the airlock ladder, his knees in water, suffused in the added surrealism of red lighting and with the pump drawing a vacuum, causing the seawater around him to start vaporising, he was very glad when the airlock was emptied and the control room crew swung the lower hatch open.