Wholesale Steep Atlantick Stream by Robert Harling

[Globe Pequot Publishing] First published in 1946, this atmospheric memoir of the Battle of the Atlantic offers one of the most original accounts of war at sea aboard a corvette, escorting convoys in both the North and South Atlantic. The author, an RNVR lieutenant, experienced the terrors of U-boat attacks and the hardships of icy gale-force winds contrasted with the relief of shore runs in ports as far apart as Halifax and Freetown. The narrative begins with Harling’s voyage from the Clyde to New York on the Queen Mary (or QM, as she was known during her martial career), on route to join a newly-built corvette in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He was to be her First Lieutenant, and his service at sea started in the spring of 1941, just as the Battle of the Atlantic was entering its most crucial stage. During the first east-bound convoy he was to experience attacks by U-boats, the loss of merchant vessels and a steep learning curve as the ship’s crew struggled to live in the harsh wartim