William Banks
After leaving 12th Submarine Flotilla in late 1944, Willie Banks was appointed Captain Landing Craft Mediterranean, serving through to July 1945. In January 1946 Banks was made commanding officer of the New Zealand cruiser HMNZS Achilles. He then moved to HMS Osprey, in charge of anti-submarine warfare training at Devonport. Banks’s last appointment was as naval advisor to the government of Ceylon before he retired in 1952. Banks died in 1986 aged 86.
Adam ‘Jock’ Bergius
Awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his diving during Operation Sabre, Bergius left the navy and married. According to Max Shean, Bergius ‘raised a thoroughly Scottish family of five’. He was a director of the famous whisky blenders William Teacher & Son, and a keen yachtsman. Bergius is one of the last surviving participants in XE-craft operations against the Japanese and currently lives in Scotland.
Ken Briggs
Briggs was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, married and returned to Australia. He worked in Perth for the British United Shoe Machinery Company before moving to New South Wales where he lived until his death in the early 2000s.
William Britnell
Willie Britnell was awarded a Mention in Despatches for his service as a passage crew skipper. He married an HMS Varbel Wren and moved to Canada, where he worked in brewing.
Guy Clarabut
Awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for operations in the Far East, Clarabut left the navy in 1955 and joined his family firm, Crescent Shipping. He was also a director of Hays Wharf, a Deputy Lieutenant of Kent and Commodore of Medway Yacht Club. Clarabut died in 2002 aged 82.
Vernon ‘Ginger’ Coles
Awarded a Mention in Despatches for Operation Sabre, Coles remained in submarines for several years after the war. Leaving the navy in 1958, he joined the civil service and worked in Malaysia where he was in charge of removing sensitive radar equipment from RAF Penang Hill. Coles was later appointed engineer in charge of the American base at RAF Greenham Common before moving to Newbury where he worked for the dredging company Van Oord UK. A vocal and popular supporter of veterans’ affairs, Coles was president of the Royal Berkshire Submarines Association and the HMS Faulknor Association. He also appeared on several television programmes about wartime midget submarine operations. Ginger Coles sadly passed away during the writing of this book in May 2014, aged 94.
Beadon Dening
Awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his part in Operation Foil, Dening went up to Oxford after leaving the navy. He then joined the Colonial Service, with postings far from the sea in Sudan in 1948–55. Dening was an Administrative Officer in Uganda, 1955–65, and Local Government Advisor in Swaziland, 1966–69. He married in 1972 and died at the age of 75 in 1999.
Fell stayed with HMS Bonaventure until 1947, bringing the vessel back from the Far East. He was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire the same year for his inspired leadership of 14th Submarine Flotilla in its actions against the Japanese. Fell then joined the Admiralty’s Boom Defence and Salvage Department, organising the clearing of wartime wrecks from the British and Mediterranean coasts until he retired in 1948. Fell continued to work for the Admiralty as a civilian, supervising salvage operations until 1960, including clearing Port Said following the Suez Crisis. He was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1957. Fell wrote two books about his wartime experiences: The Sea Surrenders (1960) and The Sea Our Shield (1966). Tiny Fell died in New Zealand in 1981 aged 84.
James ‘Jimmy’ Fife
Fife commanded Submarine Force, Atlantic Fleet between 1947 and 1950, and then was Deputy Chief of Naval Operations. His last appointment was as US Naval Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean, ironically serving under a Royal Navy HQ commanded by Lord Mountbatten. After retiring from the US Navy in 1955, Fife was director of Mystic Seaport Museum in Stonington, Connecticut. After his death in 1975 at the age of 78, Fife bequeathed his estate in Stonington to the US Navy, who turned it into a recreational centre. Fife’s memory was further memorialised with Fife Hall at the Naval Submarine Base New London and the USS Fife, a destroyer that was in service from 1980 to 2003.
Ian ‘Tich’ Fraser
In addition to the award of the Victoria Cross, Ian Fraser was honoured by the United States for Operation Struggle, being made an Officer of the Legion of Merit. In 1947 Fraser left full-time naval service but he remained with the Royal Naval Reserve until December 1965, retiring as a lieutenant commander and holder of the Decoration for Officers of the Royal Naval Reserve with Bar. In 1953 he and his brother Brian managed to get hold of some surplus frogman gear and formed their own company, Universal Divers Ltd, helping to pioneer civilian diving. He published his autobiography in 1958.
In 1980, Fraser was made a Younger Brother of Trinity House and in 1993 an honorary freeman of the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral. He remained married to Melba for the rest of his life, his family growing to include six children, thirteen grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren before he died in 2008 aged 87. Tich Fraser’s VC can today be seen on display at the Imperial War Museum, London.
Bernard ‘Ben’ Kelly
Awarded a Mention in Despatches for Operation Sabre, Kelly moved to Scotland after the war. He never married and lived in Edinburgh until his death in the early 1990s.
James ‘Mick’ Magennis
Mick Magennis was the only Victoria Cross winner of the Second World War from Northern Ireland. This made him something of a celebrity on his return to Belfast from the Far East: he and his new wife Edna were presented with £3,600 by the grateful local citizenry. The city fathers were, however, not grateful enough to offer Magennis the freedom of the city, probably because he was a working-class Catholic. Unable to handle the fame his VC brought him, Magennis had soon spent all the donated money and left the navy in 1949. Shortly afterwards he even sold his VC, though it was later returned to him free of charge. In 1955, he left Northern Ireland with his wife and four children and moved to Yorkshire where he worked as an electrician until he retired. Mick Magennis died of lung cancer just hours before the Royal Navy Philatelic Office’s issue on 11 February 1986 of a first day cover honouring his bravery during Operation Struggle. Magennis was 66 years old. Since his death Magennis has been honoured with a memorial in the grounds of Belfast City Hall in 1999 and a blue plaque in the city’s Great Victoria Street in 2005. His VC is displayed at the Imperial War Museum, London.
Max Shean
For successfully severing the Japanese underwater cables off Saigon, Max Shean was awarded the Bar to his Distinguished Service Order. The United States also honoured him with the Bronze Star Medal, another indication of how important the operation was to the Americans. Shean was discharged in September 1945 and returned to university. He then worked as an engineer with the City of Perth Electricity and Gas Department, then the State Electricity Commission, until he retired as manager in 1978. Shean had also returned to military service when he rejoined the Royal Australian Naval Reserve; he retired as a lieutenant commander in 1956.
Shortly after his retirement from the State Electricity Commission in 1978, Shean sailed his yacht Bluebell from Australia to Britain to compete in the Parmelia Race that was part of the Western Australia 150th anniversary celebrations: from Plymouth via Cape Town to Fremantle. Shean won the open division race. While in Scotland he met Willie Banks. Tiny Fell, then living in Wellington, New Zealand, ordered Shean to report each stage of the voyage to him. After his victory Shean received a reply from Fell. It read, simply, ‘You splendid man!’ Shean went on to publish his memoirs in 1992 and died in 2009 aged 90.
Jack Smart
Awarded the Distinguished Service Order by the British and the Legion of Merit by the Americans, Smart moved to Canada in 1954, becoming a stockbroker in Vancouver and later Victoria. His Canadian friends dubbed him ‘The English Gentleman’ because of his quiet and retiring manner and reticence about discussing his wartime exploits. He married twice and was an active supporter of the arts. Jack Smart died in Canada in 2008 aged 91.
William ‘Kiwi’ Smith
Awarded the Distinguished Service Order for Operation Struggle, Smith was promoted to Lieutenant in December 1945. Six months later he transferred to the Royal New Zealand Navy where he commanded a succession of ships. By 1959 he was a commander and skipper of HMNZS Shackleton and hydrographer of the navy. Appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1968, in 2006 ‘Kiwi’ opened the Commander William Smith Building named in his honour at Devonport Naval Base, Auckland. The building houses the RNZN diving team and school. Smith, 91, lives in Wellington.
H.P. ‘Pat’ Westmacott
Westmacott was awarded the Bar to his Distinguished Service Cross for Operation Foil. He was commanding officer of the submarines HMS Sceptre (1946–47) and Spirit (1947) before several appointments at the submarine training base HMS Dolphin. In 1955 he was promoted to commander. Westmacott ended his naval career in 1966 as Naval and Air Attaché Lisbon. He died in January 1995 aged 73.
IJN Takao
On 21 September 1945 Captain Takeo Ishisaka formally surrendered the Takao to British forces in Singapore. The Japanese made rudimentary repairs to the vessel in the weeks following the successful attacks by the XE-1 and XE-3. Her main guns remained inoperable. Towed out to the Straits of Malacca by two British tugs, the Takao was sunk by gunfire by the cruiser HMS Newfoundland off Port Swettenham (now Port Klang), Malaya on 27 October 1946. Her wreck remains there to this day.
IJN Myoko
The Myoko never was attacked by the British, a final operation planned by Captain Fell being cancelled due to the atomic bombings of Japan. Captain Hokao Kagayama surrendered his ship to the Royal Navy on 21 September 1945. She was scuttled by naval gunfire off Port Swettenham (now Port Klang) on 8 July 1946. The wreck is still there today.
Some of the others
Nobby Clarke recovered from his hand wound and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his bravery during Operation Sabre. Henry Fishleigh received the Distinguished Service Medal and passed away in December 1996. Harold Harper was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, as was Dennis Jarvis. In 1945 the XE-1’s passage skipper Edgar Munday was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire for ‘skill, efficiency and outstanding devotion to duty’. Frank Ogden, XE-3’s passage skipper, also received the MBE. Walter Pomeroy received the Distinguished Service Medal and died in April 1991. The indefatigable Charles Reed was awarded one of the highest awards for non-commissioned personnel, receiving the Conspicuous Gallantry Medal for Operation Struggle.