Читать книгу Very Special Ships - Arthur Nicholson - Страница 8

PREFACE

THE fast minelayers of the Abdiel class have fascinated me since I was in my teens and somehow ran across Tom Burton’s Warship Profile No. 38. They still do, more than forty years later. They truly were ‘very special ships’, a title admittedly inspired by Patrick Beesly’s books Very Special Intelligence and Very Special Admiral.

I still revere that Warship Profile, but a 48-page booklet could not tell all the many amazing stories about these ships and the men who served in them. I have tried to include as many as I could find and I have no doubt missed some, but it is in the grand scheme of things that some stories are recorded and some are not and some are more easily found than others.

The story of six ships operating in many different places at once does not lend itself to purely linear storytelling and the organisation of the book’s chapters reflects that. The alternative was to tell each ship’s story one after the other and the book’s first draft was actually so organised, but fortunately Julian Mannering of Seaforth Publishing thought this form of organisation better. The author is very pleased to have Seaforth publish this book.

Part of the magic of the fast minelayers is their handsome appearance. The choice of photographs, some of which have been published before but many have not, and the superlative if not stunning artwork of Eric Leon, are designed to celebrate their appearance as well as to help tell their story. The photographs include most of the wartime commanding officers of the fast minelayers and some of their officers and crew.

Making no claim to be the best or the only one able to tell the story of the fast minelayers – though I am a step-relation to Captain John S Cowie, a figure in the story – the author nevertheless hopes to have done them and the men who served in them justice.

My main regret is that this project has taken so long to come to fruition. There are now very few men of the fast minelayers left. May we remember them, as well as the men who served in them but who are no longer with us.

Arthur Nicholson

San Antonio, Texas USA

May 2015