In the Navy

The branch’s headquarters, nestled on the banks of the River Leam in Adelaide Road, looks deceptively small from the outside.

But a tour of the premises presents a wealth of “priceless” memorabilia, which signifies a pride in Britain’s maritime past and present not normally associated with a Midlands town.

Alwyn Jones, the branch president, served in the Royal Navy from 1950 to 1957 spending the most notable of this time as an acting petty officer on the hunting submarine HMS Tally-Ho.

Of the club’s 400 members, about 120 are ex-Navy or Royal Marines and Mr Jones described the connection they still have with the services.

He said: “None of us feel we’ve ever left the navy, we have a motto which says ‘once navy always navy’ and it’s true.

“There’s no doubt about it you never forget the service, I didn’t do all that long but it has stuck in my mind and I never regretted any of it and none of these lads do.

“Once we’ve had a couple of drinks we do what we call ‘swinging the lamp’, which is telling a few stories.

“It has been my social life for 40 years.

“We have marvellous outings, trips to other branches and go to reunions it is fantastic.”

The association was formed shortly after the Second World War by former seamen and was originally called the Royal Navy Old Comrades Association before it changed its name in 1950.

Members were allowed to join if they had been paid by the Admiralty.

Leamington’s branch was one of up to 500 across the world and founder members, including the former World Middleweight Boxing Champion Randolph Turpin, held their first meeting in 1948.

The branch had a nomadic existence until the 1960s when it moved into what is now Oddfellows Hall in Clarence Terrace before it bought the lease for its current premises from Warwick District Council in 1969.

Mr Jones said: “We’ve been here ever since and we’ve worked very hard.

“We don’t have to get anybody in to do work because we’ve got our own members.

“That’s how we’ve struggled through and we’ve gone from strength to strength.”

The branch is now the last former servicemen’s organisation in the town with its own club.

Developed from a once disused building, the club is kept in immaculate condition mainly by the efforts of a working party, which meets every Wednesday morning.

Despite all being in their 70s or 80s the handymen still put the skills they learned during and after their navy days to good use.

They paint, clean and tidy and climbing a ladder to carry out repairs on the roof is not beyond them.

Albert Southam, who served on the aircraft carrier HMS Unicorn in the Korean War, said: “You just get satisfaction out of knowing you are keeping the club going and then coming here on a Saturday night to have a dance.

“Our time in the navy has given us the comradeship to get the job done.

“It kept me out of trouble and I loved navy life, the only reason I demobbed after nine years was because my first wife did not want to be married to a silly sailor.”

Dances are held at the club every Saturday night featuring music from the 1940s and 1950s, which are open to all.

Branches from all over Britain, who do not have their own premises, often use the building for reunions.

Members of Warwick and Leamington’s RAF Association also meet at the club, as do those from the Royal British Legion.

The branch has a ladies section and male voice choir attached, which both of which raise money for charities.

Jim Osborne, the branch’s vice chairman and a former Royal Marine Commando, runs the Pop Dunbar Trophy - a series of darts, dominoes and cribbage matches - between the Leamington and Rugby branches played in memory of a former serviceman.

“It gives me the pleasure of meeting other service personnel”, Mr Osborne said.

Memorabilia at the club includes old photographs of current and former members in their seafaring days, ships’ crests, models and paintings.

The riverside bar displays hundreds of cap tallys for the ships on which members have served.

Rooms and areas have been given nautical names such as midships and the quarterdeck

A roll of honour on the ballroom wall records members who have died and there is also an area dedicated to HMS Peacock, whose former crew hold reunions at the club.

Ron Capers, the branch’s vice president, served on the battleships HMS Howe and HMS King George V between 1946 and 1950.

He said: “I’ve been a member since 1950 and I don’t go anywhere else.

“If you go down the pub there is nobody in them while if you come down here there is always someone to talk to.”

Mr Capers was the branch standard bearer for 12 years, responsible for carrying the standard to remembrance services at the cenotaph in Euston Place.

He said he hoped the branch’s connection with the Leamington Sea Cadets could inspire more young people to join the navy and bring in more members to continue its legacy.

He added: “During my time in the navy I got a good education and learned about friendship and discipline, which is the main thing.

“There is not as much of that today.”

HMS Leamington: a brief history.

Among the most prominent items in the Leamington branch of the Royal Naval Association’s collection are the crest and bell from the HMS Leamington.

Built by the US Navy, the destroyer was originally called the USS Twiggs and joined Division 16 of the Pacific Fleet in October 1916.

As a result of the anti-military climate after the First World War the Twiggs was decommissioned and stayed inactive until 1930.

When Germany invaded Poland in 1939 the Twiggs was used as part of the neutrality patrol operations around the United States eastern seaboard and Gulf ports.

By the summer of 1940 Britain was alone in its struggle to prevent German hegemony in Europe but US President Franklin D Roosevelt responded to Winston Churchill’s appeal and transferred 50 overage destroyers to the Royal Navy in exchange for 99-year leases on strategic bases in the Western Hemisphere.

The Twiggs became HMS Leamington in October 1940 and operated out of Plymouth under the leadership of Commander W E Banks.

She conducted escort missions across the Atlantic into 1941 and helped the destroyer HMS Veteran to sink the German U-boat U-207 of the east coast of Greenland on September 11.

Leamington added another ‘kill’ to her record when she and three other destroyers sunk U-587 in March 1942.

In November of that year the merchant ship SS Buchanan was sunk by U-24. Leamington located the last of the freighter’s four lifeboats and took aboard its 17 uninjured sailors.

By the end of 1942, Leamington had been transferred to the Royal Canadian Navy and was employed in the defence of shipping in the western Atlantic.

At one point the ship reached Halifax coated from bridge to foc’sle deck covered in ice up to ten feet thick.

This was the last action Leamington was involved in and after the war the navy loaned her to the USSR.

The Soviets renamed her Zhguchi, which means ‘scorcher’, and she served under their flag until 1950 before being returned to England to be broken up for scrap.