FIGHTING SEA FLEAS

[Music] e the Royal Canadian Navy wages the Grim battle against enemy shipping and the North Atlantic the Mediterranean and the channel it fights in Corvettes frots destroyers but none of them are faster or deadlier than the motor torpedo boats 70 ft long and packing a mighty Wallop the mtbs and their crews are young tough and imaginative able to withstand bone breaking jokes at high [Music] speed today from their bases in Britain then Lieutenant McLaren DSC from Montreal Lieutenant maybe from Toronto Seaman drack Brown of Swift Current of skatan and other Canadians are Manning two flotillas of mtbs two flotillas of mechanized surfboards carrying heavy Armament challenging ships many times their size German destroyers flank cers and ebots all run from the vickas oran 2B guns and the sting of their torpedoes Sean Jones examines the torpedo tube getting it ready for this deadly fish FR toore feet from its finin to the tip of its menacing Warhead the officers of the mtbs who live and fight in close contact with their men are familiar with every gun and detail of their ships Lieutenant Glenn kba makes the daily inspection of the ship he knows so well water water everywhere and every day a deck to swap look [Music] out from bridge to gal from bow to stern she's manned by Canadians and they love her rum yo ho ho and a bottle of and it's three fingers for each rating a good tot of rum goes a long way in staving off those North Sea chills but if you're a Temperance man you get an extra thrin a day it's a great moment when stand easy is piped and mail from home is handed out those blue Air letters you know mean a lot to a fellow far from [Music] home division two to proceed for for with to intercept ebots operating on the Convoy route to Anor Lieutenant Commander Tony law and his men know ebots well they know ebot Armament ebot tactics and ebot treachery know them at Firs hand in ebo alley as they call the English Channel they know how the German ebo packs track down the fishing smack the straggler the old tramped steamer sneak in to make their kill tonight then the course is set for ebo Alley lieutenants Joe bampton and Vern Barlo and Glenn kot are anxious to close with the [Music] Enemy the air is still as ice this even evening the men climb into their oil skins and laugh and kid and maybe think about their wives and homes far away and Canada their mascot spam is put ashore that dog has no place in a pleasure jint like [Music] this the final orders are given the lines are slipped the mtbs are [Music] ready [Music] out in the T panel at last they plunge along at an easy 22 knots fast convoys of tro ships carrying Canadians Britain and Americans to battle in the 3x6 cabin with the engines coughing their poisonous gas the watch below gulp A hurried cup of tea sleep if they can and [Music] wait [Music] eot got through to the Convoy tanker torpedoed off West Tinder [Music] Bank the strategy now is to intercept the ebots to engage and Destroy them second May mean Escape for the enemy johnan plots the shortest Course North 06 8° they're doing 45 knots now crashing through the Blackness nothing ahead of them but the Unseen enemy 30 Seconds To Go [Music] sir [Music] a [Music] object get ahead another ebo blasted out of the sea then as a sign to all they proudly Hoist the Nazi flag under the white entrance [Music] but always with the pride of battles won there comes the loss of good Fighters good [Music] friends tired and weary they disembark their young old faces betray their feelings an eye for an eye a life for a life until Germany is [Music] beaten no they will not forget and as the age-old words are spoken ashes to ashes dust to dust one chapter in the lives of this MTB crew is ended their comrades are at peace but still at War The Little Ships roar their challenge to the uots and Raiders still threatening the Convoy Lanes there are more battles to be won other oceans to be swept clean from narvi to anworth from Keel to halex from Vancouver to Yokohama Atlantic and Pacific Canada's fighting sea pleas speed forward to the day of [Music] victory