Working Parties
A warship was never maintained by one branch alone.
Every sailor aboard HMS Glamorgan had a specialist trade and a normal place within the ship's organisation. Sonar ratings hunted submarines, engineers maintained machinery, radar operators watched the screens and gunners looked after weapons. Yet, alongside those specialist duties, there was another constant requirement.
The ship still had to be cleaned, maintained, moved, supplied and prepared.
For those tasks, the Royal Navy relied heavily upon working parties.
A working party was exactly what it sounded like: a group of sailors temporarily brought together to complete a particular task. The members might come from different branches, have different qualifications and normally work in entirely different parts of the ship. For the duration of the job, however, they became a single team with one purpose.
The system was practical rather than complicated.
Ships are large machines exposed constantly to weather, salt water and heavy use. Paintwork required attention, stores had to be moved, ropes and equipment had to be handled, and countless jobs existed that were necessary but not directly connected to any individual's specialist trade.
During a visit to La Spezia, HMS Glamorgan provided a typical example.
While alongside in the Italian naval base, the Buffer noticed an Italian frigate being worked on across the harbour. His attention turned towards the appearance of his own ship, and soon two members of the Torpedo Anti-Submarine branch found themselves selected for an upper-deck maintenance task.
There was nothing unusual about the selection.
The two sailors concerned were not paint specialists. They were TAS ratings. Their normal work involved submarines, sonar and anti-submarine warfare. Nevertheless, they were sailors aboard a ship, and the ship required a job to be done.
The fact that another department normally looked after the area did not prevent a working party being formed.
The Radar Plot ratings who encountered the newly assembled team pointed out that they had already painted the mast the previous week.
The answer from the Buffer was straightforward.
"Then do the bugger again, and get on with it."
It was not an argument about ownership. It was simply the practical application of naval life. A task existed, personnel were available and the work would be completed.
This approach extended throughout the Service.
A sailor's specialist qualification did not mean that every other task aboard ship belonged to somebody else. Everyone contributed to the general running of the vessel. A trained specialist could still find himself carrying stores, assisting another department, working on the upper deck or taking part in any number of routine activities required by the ship.
That was not regarded as a distraction from the real job.
It was part of the real job.
The same principle applied during larger evolutions. Replenishment at sea, entering and leaving harbour, damage control exercises and emergency situations all required sailors to work together outside their normal daily routines. The ship did not stop being one organisation simply because everyone had different specialist responsibilities.
The strength of the system was its flexibility.
A modern observer might see a collection of specialists being asked to perform tasks outside their immediate expertise. The Royal Navy view was different. A sailor was expected to be useful.
Specialist knowledge mattered enormously, but it existed within a wider expectation that every man aboard would contribute wherever required.
That was how a warship remained ready.
The painting of a mast in La Spezia harbour was hardly an important event in itself. It was just another small maintenance job carried out during a deployment. Yet it demonstrated a much larger truth about naval life.
A ship could not function if everyone only did the narrow task for which they were trained.
It functioned because sailors understood that sometimes the job in front of them was simply the job that needed doing.
Primary source: RN-008
RN-E-143
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