HMAS Leeuwin

6 Apr 1983

So there we were, 25 years ago. As I write this I think of the words raw, naive, young, away, green, scared, proud and one of the first phrases that we learnt ‘new grubs’. Yes, we were all of this and as we proved over the next 9 months much more. We came to Leeuwin for a number of different reasons: a future, the adventure, to get out of school, to get into school, to get a job, but what ever the reasons, we were all there together.

It was a big move for most of us to have to pack up and move to Perth. Being a Victorian we said our goodbyes at the airport and joined the other interstaters, (some of who were already in trouble) and flew across to Perth.
We were met by the Navy at the Perth airport, then onto buses and onto Leeuwin. There were three buses and the one I was on was broken, very broken. I did not know that a bus could be so broken, by the description that Saity gave that night. I had heard of the line “swears like a sailor”, and now on my first day I was seeing it in action.

Off the buses, pick up our bags and ‘fall in’, was the order given. What the hell is that? After some fumbling around, we ‘marched off’ in our civvies with bags in hand, to F block our new home. Petty Officer Grant explained what F block stood for and he told us not to forget it. I still haven’t. It was about midnight when we made our beds and got to sleep. We were up in 5 hours time and the adventure had started!

The next few days were haircuts with snips, kit ups, meeting friends and a big wake up call. No leave for 4 weeks and ironing lessons with ‘Shorty’, the nuggetty QMG who also teaches us marching and rifle drill. The day started with early morning pt at 6am, showers, breakfast, falling, parade, double down to school with schoolbags and berets, stand easy, school, double up to lunch, double back to school, double back to F Block, sport at 1630, scran at 1730, rounds at 1900, ironing, cleaning, homework and lights out at 2200. No wonder we can all get so much done these days!

We started duties and learnt to fit all the above in, and more. It may have been gangway tricks, café, or sunset - we all did something – unless you had a ‘chit’. There was a separate rank structure – and as new grubs we could not get lower, but we were all in it together. In 1983 I recall OH& S at the senior sailors mess. Peel this 20kg bag of spuds – the knife is really sharp and here is a packet of bandaids! Lucky OH& S had advanced from there.

We learnt to eat navy food – scran. We would stand in line and be ‘jacked’ and have to wait longer. That was life as a new grub. Every so often someone would drop a plate and then the cry ‘ANIMAL’ would be shouted. Down with our fighting gear and a few laps of the parade ground, then back to our meal. We also ate maggot bags, drank goffas, played the pinnies and watched the flicks at the school on Saturday nights.

If we could get out of things we would – especially early morning pt and duties. We would complain and whinge as the lights came on at 0605, informing us that pt was on. They would make us run, swim, do push ups, sit ups, squats, stretches and we would turn up in strange selections of pt gear – the only time we could. We became very familiar with the parade ground. I estimated that the parade ground was 100 meters square – I would hate to think how many we laps we did – including doubling at high point arms.

We had expeds to Rotto with spooky Religious Instruction and war games around the camp. We did work camps at Stirling and at Leeuwin, and the lucky few were able to carry drinks at the Sheffield Shield Cricket.
All we wanted to do was to get out of Leeuwin, go on leave, and escape to somewhere – cinema city, Freo, Flappers (flying Angels Club) or maybe to our sponsor’s house - if you had one. In order to get off the base we would have to have perfect room and or kit musters. Floors would have layers and layers of polish and our cabins we were marked on a daily basis.

Our shoes, boots and anything else that we could spit polish would have a mirror reflection. Our shirts were so thick with starch they nearly cracked when we put them on. Our white sports shorts could stand up on their own and the sales of starch must have gone down when Leeuwin closed. We were inspected at every available chance – being run in if you were not up to scratch. We would sometimes spray the polished floors with starch and entice someone (by hitting them with our Beret) to our room entrance way, where they would slip over, only to be whacked by the others in the room with their berets. Yes, we were young.

After six months we were allowed civi privileges. Up until that time we were only allowed to wear our uniform off the base unless you had a sponsor. It was nearly strange to see ourselves out of uniform.

We played a multitude of sports – anything and everything that they wanted us to play – even if we couldn’t. They gave us shake ups for class pt that would try and break us – 16ft long metal benches and bricks were a few of the things that were inflicted on us – the benches above our heads doing laps around the ovals. We had Father Max as our Aussies rules coach – a Collingwood supporter who was passionate about Aussies rules and God. To a degree he was a bit of a mentor – (I wasn’t RC either).

As we went up the pecking order and were ‘shits’ our confidence grew. On one Friday night we had the ‘Great Escape’ - over the back fence. Roll call was done by the duty LS and sure enough a stack of JR’s were missing. One person was out to get us LSNP/COX Binnecamp. From my memory he saw two JR’s cross the road in the revision mirror , did the u turn and that was when the cars collided. I don’t know who the JR’s were who were closing but all the ‘escapees’ were in the shit.

I would think one of the funniest things to happen at Leeuwin was the fly incident. I don’t think it was long after the great escape we had a few of the boys getting pissed in the central park in Freo. CPO ‘Mary’ Vallis was really getting stuck into us with a clear lower deck out the back of the block. It was getting warm and maybe only a few weeks before we were due to pass out. There were bricks and concrete all around us and we may have been standing there for a while 15 – 30 min. We were getting a bit fidgety – and the flies were starting to build in numbers. You tried to blow them away or wink to get them off your face, but then you would have to have a swat at one. Well, Mary just went off – telling us not to move and not to worry about the flies, when one flew into his mouth and he choked. Even the rest of the divisional staff had a laugh – and so did we.

Phil Campbell