A trio of friends are gearing up for a very special anniversary on May 8, when they will celebrate the 80th anniversary of VE Day.
Now living together at Admiral Jellicoe House in Portsmouth – a home caring for Royal Navy and Royal Marines veterans and their partners – Alan Jukes, 101, Mabel Kidney, 99, and Robin Bootle, who will turn 101 on June 2, all served during the Second World War and have vivid memories of their experiences.
Robin, from Canterbury, Kent, was 16 when he joined the Navy, serving aboard HMS Suffolk from 1940-1945 and fighting in the Battle of the Atlantic – the long running struggle to control the Atlantic Ocean’s shipping lanes.
One of his most poignant wartime memories is of the sinking of the German battleship Bismarck.
On May 27 1941, Robin helped rescue four German sailors from the water, saying: “I was pleased to help. They were entitled to be alive, they were young men like me.”
First disabled by British aircraft on May 26, the Bismarck was attacked and sunk by British battleships, with over 2,000 crew members dying and 111 survivors rescued by British naval men, including Robin – who kept in touch with three of the four officers he saved.
“Apart from the language – they were the same as us and we respected each other,” he says.
A Royal Navy man for 22 years – spending time in the Fleet Air Arm as a pilot, spearheading the Navy’s aviation missions, he retired in 1967 with an impressive haul of medals.
“They are a reminder of everywhere I’ve been – The Far East, Burma and my service in the war. It makes me proud,” he says.
Married to Roma, who died in 2022, the dad-of-four moved into the care home last year, where he is regularly visited by his children, 10 grandchildren and eight great grandchildren.
Growing up in Portsmouth, Mabel became a WREN at 17, hoping to see the world.
Stationed at Lee-on-the-Solent, she says: “It was four years after war broke out and I wanted to do my bit to help. Initially, I thought about getting a job in a factory as most girls were doing, but my mum was a bit snooty about me doing that kind of work, so I joined the navy.
“I hoped to get an overseas posting, but ended up five miles away from home!”
She clearly recalls the build-up to D Day and the allied invasion of Normandy on June 6 1944.
She says: “We were coming home after an afternoon in the barracks, and we saw all this activity along the road. There were all these soldiers in their tanks and all these lorries on the side of the road.
“Nobody knew anything or what anybody was doing until the next morning. We got up at 7 am and it was so eerie, like a ghost town. Everyone had gone overnight on the ferry to France.” She also treasures memories of the friends she made.
“Girls from all over the country – people from up north and Scotland – they were like foreign countries to us,” she laughs. “I’d never heard of the Northern accent. And we also had the American soldiers here.”
And she loved the big band music of Glenn Miller that the GIS brought with them – recalling nights out at wonderful dances in her Wrens’ uniform at the Lee-on-the-Solent Tower Ballroom, which was sadly demolished in 1970.
“The US troops brought their pop music with them, to make them less homesick. I remember how much we loved the Jitterbug dance – that was thanks to the Americans. My favourite Glenn Miller music has got to be Moonlight Serenade – just beautiful, “ says Mabel.
She also shares a sad memory about a young Welsh sailor who was her partner at the dances.
“He went to war and I didn’t see him again,” she says. “His friends returned and I asked where he was – one told me ‘you won’t see him Mabel’ and he screwed up his face. From that I could only assume he had come back very seriously injured. His friend would not say any more.” A stewardess, helping senior officers during the war, she recalls making big batches of sandwiches and fruit bags for sailors going to France.
But their returning numbers would be shockingly depleted. She would ask where the men were, but says: “The sailors who returned refused to answer and just turned their backs on me. “It was very sad to be serving someone one minute and then the next never seeing them again. It happened a lot. “ During the six years of war, 50,000 naval personnel died, 15,000 were wounded and 7,500 were prisoners of war.
Recalling VE Day 1945, Mabel – who married Peter, a sailor, four years later, continues: “I was on duty, but I could hear all this cheering. I couldn’t join in because I was working. You had to carry on, whatever was happening. The next day, the sailors gave us a tot of rum.”
A second gunner on HMS Scylla, ex-Royal Marine Alan recalls a terrible day when the ship in front was torpedoed by a German war ship and British seamen were flung into the icy water – their ship blown apart.
“That was the worst day of my life,” he tells The Mirror.
“My captain had issued the command full steam ahead, saying ‘we’re going to rescue the men in the water.’ But then the Admiral told him, ‘no we’re not going in – there’s too many U Boats. We’ve got to get out of here.’
“So we sailed through them. I’ll never forget their faces as they waved their arms from the water, expecting to be saved. But we couldn’t do anything. “
HMS Scylla was carrying vital equipment to Lemansk, Russia, to help the fight against the Nazis, so they couldn’t take any risks.
But the harrowing memory remains with Alan, who grew up in Rottingdean, East Sussex, and joined the Royal Marines in 1941, aged 18.
From 1941 to 1945, Alan was often aboard one of the allied ships sailing from Scotland and Iceland to Russia, to supply food and weapons.
In total, 78 convoys sailed to and from Russia and more than 3,000 seamen lost their lives to the freezing conditions and attacks by German submarines and aircraft.
Awarded the Sword of Honour as Second Lieutenant in 1946, nearly 70 years later, in 2014, he was invited to the Russian Embassy in London to receive one of only 3,000 Ushakov medals awarded to UK veterans – issued by Russia, for his efforts in the Arctic convoys.
A Royal Marine until 1973, rising to the rank of Colonel, Alan, whose wife Caroline died in 2021, left his Devon home and moved into Admiral Jellicoe in 2023.
“I travelled the world with the Royal Marines—Washington DC and also in the Far East,” he says. “Memories I will treasure. Because of my career, I’ve had a fantastic life.
Looking forward to a VE 80 Garden Party for residents and their families on May 8, organised by the Royal Naval Benevolent Trust charity, that runs the care home, Mabel is particularly looking forward to hearing wartime classics, including Moonlight Serenade, played by a musical trio. She says: “That will make everyone smile.”
At Reach and across our entities we and our partners use information collected through cookies and other identifiers from your device to improve experience on our site, analyse how it is used and to show personalised advertising. You can opt out of the sale or sharing of your data, at any time clicking the “Do Not Sell or Share my Data” button at the bottom of the webpage. Please note that your preferences are browser specific. Use of our website and any of our services represents your acceptance of the use of cookies and consent to the practices described in our Privacy Notice and Cookie Notice.
