Something extraordinary happened the other day. As the newly appointed PR and Recruitment member for the Spalding Branch of the Royal Naval Association (RNA), I received an unexpected phone call. The man on the other end of the line had recently moved to my village and mentioned that he was already a national RNA member, but he wanted to join the local branch. Coincidentally, we were having a meeting that very night, so I arranged to pick him up as he wasn’t familiar with the area yet.
He gave me his full name, which didn’t ring any bells at first, but we agreed I’d collect him at 6:30pm so we could chat before the meeting started at 8pm. As we began talking, he casually mentioned that he had served on HMS Kedleston. That instantly caught my attention because I had served on the same ship during my time in the Navy. What made this even more remarkable was when he revealed that he had been known by his nickname – “Flogger.”
It was a flashback to over 50 years ago. I looked at him more closely and it hit me – we had been shipmates, but back then, we only knew each other by nicknames. The surprise didn’t stop there. He pulled out his wallet and showed me pictures from all those years ago. Among them were pictures of our ship, HMS Kedleston, and a picture of me on shore leave with my mates. But what really left me speechless were two pictures of the ship’s dog, Rebel.
When HMS Kedleston was decommissioned and the crew went their separate ways, we had to decide what to do with Rebel. In the end, I was the one who made the decision to bring Rebel home to live with my family. Seeing those photos, memories flooded back, reminding me of a time long past, now brought full circle in the most unexpected of ways.