Seth Churchill

[seth churchill]

SHIPS NAME AND SERVICE RECORD

Full Name

Seth Churchill

Discharge Book Number

R 867498

Department

Deck

Your Rank/Rating

Cadet

Which Ships were you on and When

Otaio
Sussex

Notes:

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[David John Busveids]

Really fine name that Seth.

[Tom Carnduff]

Hi Seth. As a cadet with NZS, I too served on the Otaio and Sussex. I joined Otaio as a deck cadet in September 1964, voyage 14.

[Gordon Gray]

I Joined the dear old Sussex in March 1961, my first with NZS and interesting to say the least. Five days out from liverpool all hell broke out about midnight ,bells ringing, blokes rushing around the alleyways etc, reason? scavenge pump on fire, apparently quite common on the H boats. Leaving Panama bound for Wellington and a few days later 7th eng has altercation with 2nd eng who ends up with a black eye and 7th is sent back DBS to UK as soon as we arrive in Kiwi. Held up all around the kiwi coast, wonderful times for most of us but not a certain engineer who very unwisely dipped his wick in the wrong place and no amount of penicillin could cure him, so he had a very long and painful voyage back to UK. Leave Auckland about 10 pm homeward bound to the usual sounds of "Sussex by the sea" being played over and over again and about 3 days out bound for Panama we discover a gentleman who had imbibed too much with the crew and forgot that he had a wife and kids back in Auckland, so he learned how to clean and polish things on a ship. About 14 days out from NZ the old man comes rushing into the radio room and asks if we can contact a Rangi as we are just about out of butter, cheese etc although we are carrying several thousand tons of the stuff, we do and I wonder what happened to the chief steward at the end of the trip. . We carry on regardless and finally make it to Avonmouth via the USA , after a boring weekend and moving slowly out of the dock bound for Liverpool when the SA Morgentster in a big hurry to come into the dock gives a big kiss on the starboard side and rakes us the way down,all in slow motion thus giving me time to enter my cabin pick up my camera and take a couple of "action" photos. Never a dull moment.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

Hi Gordon
I was on the Kiwi coast when you were there on the Sussex, had great times from Ma Gleason's and the Auckland Hotel down to Ducky's in Dunedin.
If you still have those pics of that collision any chance of putting them on site.
Des