H.M. Motor Torpedo Boat 718
“Something Special”
Operational report “Scarf”
Mention of Scarf in the War Diary
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Operation SCARF
MTB 718's first operation took place on Saturday 15th April in company with the Senior Officer's boat, MGB 502 (Lieut. Cdr. P.A. Williams RNVR). His boat carried six SOE agents as passengers for Beg-an-Fry, north-east of Morlaix, whilst ours was the cargo boat, with nine suitcases and one motor tyre!
Our Captain had previously accompanied one of the other boats to gain experience of what was required. We were accompanied by the very experienced South African officer, Lieut. Jan McQuoid Mason, the CO of MGB 318 and a complete surf-boat’s crew from his boat. The specialist SOO3 Navigator with us was Lieut. M.P. Salmond RNR.
We had been given a short briefing by the CO before we sailed from Dartmouth at 2000 hours. I am sure we were all somewhat apprehensive at the prospect of being in close proximity to the enemy, but with just the right touch, Ronnie Seddon concluded with "And if any of you are feeling a bit scared, well you are not alone". The passage over to ‘the other side’ was made at 20 knots until midnight when with bright lights seen burning from lle de Bas and Sept Isles suggesting that there might be enemy shipping about, speed was reduced to 18 knots, and down again to 10 knots approaching the anchorage ¾ mile from the distinctive Les Boeuf rocks off Beg-an-Fry. Two surf-boats left 718 which was anchored three cables to the eastward of 502, and they having reached the latter by 0153, the little flotilla of four boats led by Sub. Lieut. D.N. Miller, another South African, set off towards the pin-point. To those of us anxiously waiting on the bridge, it was an uncanny situation and one felt exhilarated almost by the audacity of it all; so close to the enemy coast, so quiet and unbelievably peaceful. The surf boats, having put the agents and their baggage ashore into the safe hands of the VAR organisation, embarked six men, three women and one small boy returned to MGB 502 by 0252, and the two belonging to MTB 718 were with us a few minutes later.
Two of the ladies were Suzanne Warenghem and Blanche Charlet, both SOE agents who had escaped from the infamous Castres prison, where the Germans held hostages from whom they would select a number to be executed as reprisals for attacks on their forces. Mlle. Charlet and four or five of the men came back to Dartmouth aboard 718.
Both 502 and 718 weighed anchor at 0306 and course was set for the return passage at ten knots.
At 0336 three ships were sighted on the port bow, very low in the water and were identified by Lieut. Cdr. Williams as either LCT’s or gun coasters. He passed this enemy sighting signal by the inter-ship S-phone to our Captain, with instructions to increase speed to 15 knots. The enemy ships appeared to be stopped, but when the two British boats were at a range of about 500 yards abeam, the Germans challenged, first 718 then 502, with a ‘V’ by small, white light. MGB 502's signalman, George Colledge was ordered to make ‘KA’ in reply, this meaning "Hold on, we’re fetching the Captain". There was a pause then there was a burst of gunfire lasting no more than fifteen seconds.
The SO considered that complete silence might mislead the enemy into thinking that we might, after all, be friendly ships, and certainly there was no more firing from them. With 502 increasing to full speed and 718 only able to make 19½ knots due to a defective starboard engine, we were temporarily out of visual contact, but as soon as this was established, 502 reduced to 15 knots and we caught up. Regretfully, in this short action, Able Seaman William A. Sandalls was badly wounded in the arms, chest and stomach and died before Sub. Lieut. Miller and a rating could get him into 502’s charthouse. There were no other casualties in 502, nor any in 718, although we had received one hit on the port aft towing plate.
The return trip was thereafter without incident and we reached Dartmouth at 0848 on the Sunday morning, 16th April 1944. Both ships entered harbour with ensigns at half-mast, and whilst 718 went straight up to berth alongside Westward Ho!, 502 turned to port to land Able Seaman Sandalls’ body at Dartmouth Railway Jetty where an ambulance was waiting.
Thus ended our first operation in MTB 718, and the initial feeling when we left the pin-point that perhaps there was not too much to worry about with this clandestine work, was quickly replaced by knowledge that it could be a quite dangerous business, even fatal.
Bill Sandalls is buried in the War Graves section of the cemetery in his home village of Charlbury in the Cotswolds, and I have visited it four or five times.
Suzanne Warenghem became Suzanne Charise when she married André who was in the American equivalent of the British SOE. They were friendly with George Colledge (the Signalman of MGB 502 which brought her out of Beg-an-Fry) and his wife Jill. I met this charming couple at George’s home in Coventry a couple of times and heard first-hand of her ordeal in Castres prison and the escape therefrom.
On return from SCARF 718 was out of action for twelve days. Apart from the damaged port after towing plate, the boat had sustained one engine damaged when the Dumbflows had been put in and three engines were defective with broken supercharger transmission drives, involving two new engines and major repairs to a third. On 21st April, the twin 0.5" guns were lowered and two days later Captain Slocum came to look us over. We were mobile again on 28th April when the W/T Log records being at sea during the forenoon and again on the 30th for gunnery practice. Presumably this was in Scabbacombe Bay, where we certainly were engaged in more exercises on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 6th May.
On May 10th we went further afield with American P.T. Boats 71 and 199 in company and sharing W/T watches with them. Our Captain’s log shows ‘718 on exhibition en route. Impressions of P.T. boats station keeping and shoot’, but what exactly the impressions were we are left to ponder.
Our destination was the Helford River where there was a very interesting DDOD(I) set-up. In charge, as CO of HM Yacht Sunbeam II, a three-masted, square-topsail schooner, was the surf-boat designer, Lieut. Cdr. Nigel Warington-Smyth RNVR who was designated Senior Officer Inshore Patrol Flotilla. This was a cover name for a motley collection of eight French fishing boats and one British-built look-alike trawler, MFV 2023, with a speed of 18-20 knots. These boats were operated to the Bay of Biscay to rendezvous with agents who came out with French boats fishing there. The Helford River is a very pleasant spot and our first day there was spent appropriately in holding a regatta and bathing etc. On 12th May, 718 was out all day, with the surf-boats crews learning how to handle their craft at Prah Sands, where conditions are similar to those on the Breton coast; we were back at Helford by 1700 hours on this Friday evening and the word was that we were returning to Dartmouth on the morrow.
The Chicken Run
Early on the Saturday morning, the crew - or at any rate most of the crew - were surprised to see a boat come alongside and two policemen step aboard and report to the First Lieut. Apparently some chickens belonging, as luck would have it, to the RNO Helford (Resident Naval Officer) had been posted as missing, and the police had been asked to investigate as to whether they had somehow found their way on to one of the visiting boats. The engine-room department, whose members lived separately in two small messes down aft, did not seem quite as surprised as the rest of us, it must be said. There were so many nooks and crannies aboard a ‘D’ boat, that the ‘Plods’ were not long in coming to the conclusion that they would have more success in looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. Suspicion was not enough, they needed proof and so they wearily gave up and left, seeking others to help them in their enquiries.
Once they were well away, the foraging party responsible for this outrage had to own up to the First Lieut., and he in turn reported to the Captain, no doubt in some trepidation as to how he would react to news that some of his ship’s company, having spotted the poultry as we had come up the river, decided to return in the dinghy after dark in order to put chicken on the menu. After such questions as: "Do we have these chickens?" (“Yes"). "Where are they?" ("In the bilges under the for’ard tank space"), and some straight-faced deliberation, Ronnie Seddon announced his decision. Yes, chicken would be permitted on the menu that evening, provided that en route from the Helford River to Dartmouth, all traces of feather and bone would be eradicated. We sailed there and then, and for the next few hours, the delicious aroma of cooked chicken wafted around 718. On arrival at Dartmouth, it was decided that alongside the water boat - we wanted the fresh water tanks replenishing anyway - would be preferable to being alongside the Westward Ho!, where the secret would not be secret for very long. Thus the log records, “pleasant, guilty meal alongside the water boat”, and by the time 718 tied up alongside the depot ship there were no aromas, no bones, no feathers, - and no chicken.
Two days later, 718 returned to Helford, stayed overnight, and returned on the 16th with MASB 36, which had somehow lost her mast, in tow; the tow-line parting twice as we made back to Dartmouth.
