2014 Venture Reunion—Update Spring 2013 G reetings from Ottawa to all members of the Venture Association. It is time to get everyone up to date on the exciting developments which have taken place since our reports last fall. The Venture Commemorative Plaque It is of course here in Ottawa and we had it on display during the last Hooley in late October. Pic- tures were posted to the Venture website with the Committee gathered around it. The exciting news is that by contributions received, it is almost now two thirds paid for and Dick Duffield is ready to take your donation to push it on to 100%. Please check the website for the options available to you to participate in this important initiative. In due course we will advise how to order your own plaque, full size or quality miniature, or laminated print. Recently, I had an opportunity to provide Rear-Admiral Mark Norman, the designated, new Commander of the RCN, with an aide-memoire describing our plans for presentation of the plaque at the reunion dinner on Saturday evening, 20 Sep- tember, 2014. So, step one completed. Reunion Planning The Committee meets again on 02 May in the Crow’s Nest at “Bytown”. The focus of the meeting will be to hear the results of our recent and final survey. You were asked to respond by 15 April to the questions relating to, first of all, whether or not you plan to attend and then, with a positive answer to that, to go on to the other questions about your preferences to assist the plan- ners doing a final draft of the entire reunion programme. Go to http:www.hmcsventure.com for further information. If you have not already done so, please respond to our request, we need your input! If you have to respond with a “no” we fully understand, but please tell us one way or the other. Early indications from the Survey show significant interest. I feel quite positive about our prospects that by late April, we shall be able to confirm that the reunion in 2014 is on. Please stand by. After our next meeting, we shall be promulgating a revised programme which will reflect your preferences. Registration The Co-registrars will be ready to roll out the registration forms in the early fall, 2013. Look to the Venture website and The Signal for details. And see the website www.hmcsventure.com for much, much more, including draft programs as we go along, and lots of memorabilia, photos, etc... April 2013 the Signal THE NEWSLETTER OF THE VENTURE ASSOCIATION The Signal is published about twice a year by the Venture Association. Send Letters to the Editor and pay dues (by cheque payable to The Venture Association), c/o Gordon Longmuir, 903-168 Chadwick Crt, North Vancouver, BC V7M 3L4; e-mail: [email protected]. Changes of address and other personal information should be sent to your Class Rep (see p 8) with a copy to the Regis- trar. AND: go to the Venture Website for breaking news: www.hmcsventure.com . The webmaster is Darryl Harden (Class of ‘65), e-mail [email protected]. If you do not care to continue to receive this newsletter, let me know by post or e-mail.
Transcript
2014 Venture Reunion—Update
Spring 2013
G reetings from Ottawa to all members of the Venture Association.
It is time to get everyone up to date on the exciting developments which have taken place since our reports last fall.
The Venture Commemorative Plaque
It is of course here in Ottawa and we had it on
display during the last Hooley in late October. Pic-
tures were posted to the Venture website with the
Committee gathered around it. The exciting news
is that by contributions received, it is almost now
two thirds paid for and Dick Duffield is ready to
take your donation to push it on to 100%. Please
check the website for the options available to you
to participate in this important initiative. In due
course we will advise how to order your own
plaque, full size or quality miniature, or laminated
print. Recently, I had an opportunity to provide
Rear-Admiral Mark Norman, the designated, new
Commander of the RCN, with an aide-memoire
describing our plans for presentation of the plaque
at the reunion dinner on Saturday evening, 20 Sep-
tember, 2014. So, step one completed.
Reunion Planning
The Committee meets again on 02 May in the Crow’s Nest at “Bytown”. The focus of the meeting will be to hear the results of
our recent and final survey. You were asked to respond by 15 April to the questions relating to, first of all, whether or not you
plan to attend and then, with a positive answer to that, to go on to the other questions about your preferences to assist the plan-
ners doing a final draft of the entire reunion programme. Go to http:www.hmcsventure.com for further information.
If you have not already done so, please respond to our request, we need your input! If you have to respond with a “no” we
fully understand, but please tell us one way or the other. Early indications from the Survey show significant interest. I feel
quite positive about our prospects that by late April, we shall be able to confirm that the reunion in 2014 is on. Please stand by.
After our next meeting, we shall be promulgating a revised programme which will reflect your preferences.
Registration
The Co-registrars will be ready to roll out the registration forms in the early fall, 2013. Look to the Venture website and The
Signal for details. And see the website www.hmcsventure.com for much, much more, including draft
programs as we go along, and lots of memorabilia, photos, etc...
April 2013
the Signal THE NEWSLETTER OF THE VENTURE ASSOCIATION
The Signal is published about twice a year by the Venture Association. Send Letters to the Editor and pay dues (by cheque payable to
The Venture Association), c/o Gordon Longmuir, 903-168 Chadwick Crt, North Vancouver, BC V7M 3L4; e-mail:
[email protected] . Changes of address and other personal information should be sent to your Class Rep (see p 8) with a copy to the Regis-
trar. AND: go to the Venture Website for breaking news: www.hmcsventure.com . The webmaster is Darryl Harden (Class of ‘65), e-mail
[email protected] . If you do not care to continue to receive this newsletter, let me know by post or e-mail.
Hey, you know you’re getting old: I just read the second item listed on the Home Page [Ed note: see www.hmcsventure.com ]
about Huron’s propeller being dedicated to the museum. I said to my self, “hey that is my old ship”, served on it for a little over
two years and was still officially aboard and part of it’s complement when it was decommissioned. They forgot all about me.
Then I finally realized it was the H.M.C.S. Huron that succeeded the ship I was on. I was on the preceding ship that served dur-
ing the Second World War. Sure didn’t have screws like that one, but my ship had a max speed of up to 40 knots. I like my old
ship just fine. Take care all. See you at the reunion. Yours aye,
Phil Levy, Class of ‘60
[Ed Note: I only put out the Signal, so I am not responsible for the website, which is ably handled by Darryl Harden; we come
together whenever I put out a fresh Signal – we put up a link on the website rather than mailing it out to all 500 Venture
alumni. Glad to see members peruse the website on the way to the linked Signal.
Thanks for the message; that piece on Huron elicited quite a lot of comment: yes, there were two Hurons, the “newest” built in
1972, mothballed in 2000 and paid off, I believe, in 2005. The other three in that class, Iroquois II, Algonquin II and Athabaskan
III, are still in service. My first ship as a Sub was Athabaskan II from 1958-59; she was paid off in 1969.]
From Ottawa, ON
Interesting reading as always. We all are grateful that you are keeping the ship on an even keel.
In reading about the Huron display in Calgary, I thought I should mention related activities. My brother and I, on our summer trip
this year… stopped in Calgary where my sister-in-law took us to the Military Museum. It has come a long way with its static dis-
plays but the Huron propeller was of particular interest. Also of interest was one of the plaques saying Huron had commissioned
in Halifax when Verna and I attended the commissioning in Sorel December 16th, 1972.
I am quite involved in the Canadian Naval Technical History Association and developed the CNTHA website (www.cntha.ca)
about 8 years ago. ...You may want to check out the Huron item that starts in the "What's New" section. During our visit to the
Calgary Museum, I had a pleasant visit with the Naval Archivist. You can let me know if you think a "Signal" article could have
its genesis here. Some day we may want to add a CNTHA link to the Venture website. I'll chat with Darryl. Yours aye,
Don Wilson, Class of ‘56
[Ed Note: I am sure our webmaster will be happy to add a CNTHA link to the Venture website.]
From Ottawa, ON
I appreciate immensely the good wishes that have come my way these last two weeks. The Signal does a great job and will be
missed when it has to go. Thank you very much for your kind words earlier this month and your participation with Venture over
the years.
Best wishes !
Ray Phillips, RAdm (Ret’d), XO of Venture 1954-56 and Honorary Captain, Class of ‘56
[ To which I replied in part: “My pleasure, sir. Venture was a formative experience for all of us; … . You may recall that we worked together on the “New Fighter Aircraft” committee with Paul Manson some years later when I was at External and you were at Treasury Board – now that was the way to pick an airplane – the CF-18 is still flying, and the F-35 is now, finally, being questioned, even by the Tories… .
And I do expect to be [editing the Signal until it “has to go”, which I expect will not be any time soon.
Canadian Naval History Reading Lists: Marc Milner [Ed Note: this list has been around for some years, but is still a good guide to the best books on Canadian Naval History. I’d welcome additions to it and will print an updated list from time to time]
Maritime Affairs asked several naval historians to give us their interpretations of what might constitute a good reading list for either a specific theme within Canadian naval history or just for general reading. The first view is that of Professor Marc Milner of the University of New Brunswick who provides what he describes as the ten most useful books on "the first half of Canadian naval history." In future issues we will publish other lists and eventu-ally we might try to find consensus on what the well-stoked Canadian naval library should hold.
Milner's Top Ten
These are the books which I find myself returning to again and again, and so I suspect form something of a corps of
texts on the history of the RCN from 1910 to 1950. The list reflects this historian's interest in policy, politics, and
operations, and in the small ship A/S war. As a result, it leaves out much of the colour and memoir literature, and
much more besides -- all of which is useful and adds to the field. Indeed, I can think of only a couple of books on
RCN history that I would not recommend. The only order reflected here is the randomness of the texts on my desk.
Gilbert Tucker, The Naval Service of Canada, 2 vols. Is still the best source for much basic information. Although much
new material has emerged on the formation of the RCN and World War I era, Tucker's Vol. 1 has some wonderful ma-
terial, while Vol. II with its emphasis on policy, ship acquisition and shore developments remains alone in its field.
Joseph Schull, Far Distant Ships. For all its shortcomings -- popular, superficial, lack of analysis and context -- this re-
mains the only comprehensive history of the RCN in World War II. Much of the colour and detail is simply found no-
where else; and it does cover everything.
Michael Hadley and Roger Sarty, Tin Pots and Pirate Ships. A comprehensive, scholarly account of the Navy up to 1918.
Given the limits of the documentary evidence for World War I and the knowledge these scholars possess of the docu-
mentation and work done on the Navy prior to 1914, this will remain the standard text on the Navy for the 1910-1918
period for my lifetime and probably longer.
Ken Macpherson and John Burgess, The Ships of Canada's Naval Forces, 1910-1981. An indispensable source, and I use it
constantly. The information it contains is incredible, both in the brief ship histories and equally importantly in the
appendices in the back. The single most important reference work ever published in Canadian naval history. My only
complaint is that I wish it was small so that it would be easier to use.
Jim Boutilier, ed., The RCN in Retrospect. This is a marvellously useful collection of essays covering a broad range of is-
sues, in this case largely -- although not exclusively -- by Old Salts with some excellent insights.
W.A.B. Douglas, ed., The RCN in Transition. As per Boutilier, except this collection is primarily by academics working in
the field. Good stuff, handy reference.
Michael Hadley, U-Boats Against Canada. The World War II inshore war in all its facets: a periscopic view of the war, the
inshore operational and strategic responses to the assault, and the wider political context as well. It's all here -- and
what is not I tried to cover in The U-Boat Hunters.
Alan Easton, 50 North. The only Canadian naval mem-
oir that rates the distinction of a "classic". While other
Canadian memoirs tend to have "how I grew up in the
Navy during the war" as their theme, Easton's is a liter-
ate and mature reflection on how the war was fought.
Mac Johnson, Corvettes Canada. A collective memoir of
the small ship war, based on over 200 interviews. More
importantly, it is based on a thorough and comprehen-
sive understanding of the existing literature on the At-
lantic war and on its phases. That understanding in-
forms and shapes the material in a way which most
such collections miss entirely. An excellent place to
start reading about RCN history and a very useful ref-
erence for any library.
Michael L. Hadley, Rob Huebert, and Fred W. Crickard,
A Nation's Navy; In Quest of Canadian Naval Identity.
The third in a wonderfully useful and interesting collec-
tion of essays covering a broad spectrum of activity.
Excellent material in a handy reference -- again.
HMCS Ottawa
off Sunshine Coast, BC, March 2013
Newsletter of the Venture Association
April 2013
5
Visit Canada’s Naval and Military Museums
HMCS Haida National Historic Site
Pier 9, HMCS Star, 658 Catherine St, Hamil-
ton, ON L8L 4V7
Musée Naval de Québec, 170
rue Dalhousie, Québec, QC G1K 8M7; Tele-
phone: (418) 694-5387
www.mnq.nmq.org
Shearwater Aviation Museum 12 Wing, P.O. Box 5000 Stn Main
RCN International Engagement Bulletin For those with an interest in international strategic issues, Marpac puts out following “bulletin” daily; it replaces
the previous daily summaries produced by Jim Boutilier’s excellent staff at Marpac headquarters for the past sev-
eral years. To subscribe, send an e-mail to: [email protected] or write to: International Engagement,
MARPAC HQ PO Box 17000 Stn Forces, Victoria, BC V9A 7N2 Canada.
UNTD 70th Anniversary Celebration
T he dates for the 70th anniversary celebration are fast approaching — this joint UNDP/ROTP event will
take place in Victoria June 6-9, 2013, and may be of interest to a number of Ventures who have had the
pleasure over the years to be associated with UNDP/ROTP alumni. The Naval Officers’ Association of Can-
ada is assisting in the program, courtesy of Jim Boutilier of Marpac. Registration for that program is to be
found at
https://www.eply.com/NOACAGM2013 .
For additional information, contact the organizing committee via:
as I watched from my clifftop home By David Gurr, Class of ‘56
(Originally published in the Victoria Times Colonist June 5, 2009 and reprinted here courtesy of the author)
T omorrow marks the 65th anniversary of D-Day, the beginning of the invasion of Normandy by Allied Forces ntduring the Sec-
ond World War. The assault on the heavily fortified beaches was the largest air, land and sea operation ever undertaken. By
the end of the battle, more than 4,000 men were dead, including 340 of the 14,000 Canadians who attacked Juno Beach.-
Sixty-five years ago, on the sixth day of this sixth month, U.S. army rangers scaled the cliffs at Omaha Beach in Normandy. I think
I must be the last person still alive who watched them rehearse it. I was eight, living in a villa on top of a cliff in Dorset (the villa
looked like the hotel in Fawlty Towers.) The closest village was a mile away. Behind our house, the fields were mined, guarded by
barbed wire and scarlet signs with death's heads on them. On the beach below the house, a searchlight battery was manned by a
mini-platoon of soldiers in khaki battledress and steel helmets, who smoked cigarettes by day and stabbed the sky every night. Oc-
casionally they stabbed a German bomber. Sometimes, they let me sit in the seat and turn the handle that kept the beam on target.
It was a lot of fun, but serious too. I had my own battledress and helmet. The battledress was made by my mother. I was the only
male in a house full of women. My mother, her two guardians (a pair of maiden "aunts" in their late 60s), my baby sister and a
nanny: Doreen, a young girl from the village. There was a second villa next to ours, but it was empty for the duration.
The first exciting surprise was coming home from my day school in Bridport to find the empty villa full of American soldiers with
black paint on their faces. There was also a tank at the bottom of the hill of Cliff Road leading to our house. The tank was to stop
cars, but, as I had a bicycle, the tank driver let me through.
The second surprise was an army officer talking to my mother, the aunts and Doreen. He was standing in the sunroom, which had a
view out over the English Channel. The officer said that "something very special" was going to happen. It would take about 10 days.
We could stay and watch it but we couldn't use the telephone, or write letters, or go to the village. When the aunts said, "What about
shopping?" the officer told them the army would do it. He also said that if we did use the telephone or write letters, the army would
know and we would have to leave the house and be taken somewhere else until the Very Special Thing was over.
The aunts said of course they would do their duty. (They used to stand to attention when the wireless played God Save the King or
the Hallelujah Chorus.)
My mother -- who had an American GI boyfriend while the man I thought was my father was away in Ceylon with the Royal Ma-
rines -- was cross, and Doreen was frightened because her family wouldn't know why she didn't come back to them on her Saturday
afternoon off, but the officer said the army would explain that. It was difficult to sleep because of the excitement of having a 10-day
special holiday. The next morning I got up early and crawled out along my favourite ledge of the crumbling sandstone cliff to try to
find an egg in the burrows of the puffins who nested there. The U.S. Rangers arrived at that moment. They came out of the sea in
an amphibious half-tank, called a DUKW. Then they fired rockets with ropes that went right past my ledge. The ropes had anchors
on the ends that dug into the turf on the top of the cliff. Then the Rangers climbed up the ropes. (Forty years later I watched them
do it again. You can too if you get a video of John Wayne winning the war in The Longest Day. The footage used in the film was
actually shot on my beach. (If the camera had been a little to the left you could have seen me on the ledge.)
At the end of the 10 days, all the American soldiers in the next-door villa and their DUKWs went away. I cried a lot because one of
the soldiers had a Russian name and sang me songs like The Volga Boatmen. Some of the soldiers used to take out photos of their
own children and look at them.
Then thousands of gliders flew over the minefields behind our house. We heard gunfire all day long. That night there was a big
storm. A carrier pigeon landed on the ledge of my nursery window. The pigeon had a band on its
leg. The same army officer came back the next day and thanked us all for not disobeying the rules, and took away the pigeon. He
said it was very special too.
This year in May, I went to see the other side of the English Channel -- the side where they truly did do something Special. I also
went to the farthest southern tip of Sicily, and up through Italy, to a war cemetery at Forli, where the man who my mother later
said almost certainly was my real father, lies buried. But all that, and the utter solemnity of the American Cemetery above Omaha
Beach -- where I had no way of telling how
many of those soldiers next door, with their painted black faces, who looked at photos of their children, or sang to me, became names
now inscribed in white stone -- all that is part of an adult story.
After various Blitz, Evacuation and D-Day boyhood adventures, David Gurr emigrated to Victoria in 1948. He served in the Royal Canadian Navy for 17 years, then designed and built West Coast houses before deciding to write novels.
