John Pledger: Early Suspicions

"The Harare, which was the ship I joined, was a fully riveted ship of the older type. She'd been blown up by a mine once already before I joined her and had been patched up, and off we went over the Atlantic in a convoy of about 50 ships. And we had the most atrocious weather. It was mountainous seas and fog and ice and everything under the sun, and the ship creaked and groaned like nobody's business. It rather frightened me actually. But the old salts on board said 'Don't worry lad, it's alright. She's a riveted ship. She's not one of these new fangled welded ships and the more she creaks and groans the happier you should be. Because with those welded jobs, they don't creak and groan, they just break in half more or less."