 First UK edition | |
| Author | Nicholas Monsarrat |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | War novel |
| Set in | Battle of the Atlantic,World War II |
| Publisher | Cassell & Co, London |
Publication date | 1951 |
| Publication place | United Kingdom |
| Pages | 416 |
| OCLC | 1011639873 |
| LC Class | PZ3.M75.73 billion |
The Cruel Sea is a 1951 novel byNicholas Monsarrat. It follows the lives of a group ofRoyal Navy sailors fighting theBattle of the Atlantic during theSecond World War. It contains seven chapters, each describing a year during the war.
The novel, based on the author's experience of serving incorvettes andfrigates in the North Atlantic in the Second World War, gives a matter-of-fact but moving portrayal of ordinary men learning to fight and survive in a violent, exhausting battle against the elements and a ruthless enemy.
The action commences in 1939.Lieutenant-Commander George Ericson, aMerchant Navy andRoyal Naval Reserve officer, is recalled to theRoyal Navy and given command of the fictitiousFlower-classcorvette HMSCompass Rose, newly built to escortconvoys. His officers are mostly new to the Navy, especially the two newsub-lieutenants, Lockhart and Ferraby. Only Ericson and thepetty officers are in any way experienced.
Despite these initial disadvantages, the ship and crew work up a routine and gain experience. Bennett, thefirst lieutenant, a mean and shirking disciplinarian with a penchant for bullying and canned sausages ("snorkers"), leaves the ship ostensibly for health reasons, and the junior officers are able to mature, with Lockhart gaining promotion to first lieutenant.
The crew cross theAtlantic many times on escort duty in all kinds of weather, often encountering fierce storms in one of the smallest ships built to protectAllied convoys. The men endure the ship's constant rolling and pitching in the huge waves, freezing cold, the strain of maintaining station on the convoy on pitch-black nights and the fear that at any second a torpedo from aGermanU-boat could blow them to oblivion. Somehow the tradition of the Royal Navy and the knowledge of the importance of their work carries them through.
They continue the monotonous and dangerous but vital duty of convoy escort, and after one particularly difficult convoy they use all their hard-won knowledge to sink a German submarine. They are nearly sunk several times until in 1943 they are finallytorpedoed and forced to abandon ship. Most of the crew die in the freezing waters, but Ericson, Lockhart, Ferraby, and a few others are rescued the next day; however Ferraby suffers abreakdown forcing him to go to hospital.
Ericson, now promoted tocommander, and Lockhart, now a lieutenant-commander, take command of a new ship, the fictitiousRiver-classfrigate HMSSaltash. (In the film adaptation, the ship is calledSaltash Castle and is portrayed by theCastle-class corvetteHMS Portchester Castle, as no River-class vessels were available.)
The Royal Navy is now finally gaining the upper hand over the U-boats andSaltash adds to the growing number of kills due to Ericson's determination and patience.
In chapter seven the ship receives a message ordering it to "remain on patrol in vicinity ofRockall" as the end of the Second World War approaches in 1945, and as finally hostilities were declared ended, a well-known quote:
The beaten foe emerged.
All over the broad Atlantic, wherever they had been working or lying hid, the U-boats surfaced, confessing the war's end. A few of them, prompted by determination or struck by guilt, scuttled or destroyed themselves, or ran for shelter, not knowing that there was none; but mostly they did what they had been told to do, mostly they hoisted their black surrender flags, and stayed where they were, and waited for orders.
They rose, dripping and silent, in the Irish Sea, and at the mouth of the Clyde, and off the Lizard in the English Channel, at the top of the Minches where the tides raced; they rose near Iceland, whereCompass Rose was sunk and off the north-west tip of Ireland, and close to the Faeroes, and on the Gibraltar run where the sunk ships lay so thick, and near St. Johns and Halifax and in the deep of the Atlantic, with three thousand fathoms of water beneath their keel.
They surfaced in secret places, betraying themselves and their frustrated plans: they rose within sight of land, they rose far away in mortal waters, where on the map of the battle, the crosses that were the sunken ships were etched so many and so close that the ink ran together. They surfaced above their handiwork, in hatred or in fear, sometimes snarling their continued rage, sometimes accepting thankfully a truce they had never offered to other ships, other sailors.
They rose, and lay wherever they were on the battlefield, waiting for the victors to claim their victory.
Two rose toSaltash, off Rockall.[1]
With the war ended,Saltash returns to port as a guard to several German submarines that have surrendered.
A secondary plotline concerns Lockhart's poignant romance with a beautifulWomen's Royal Naval Service officer.
Nicholas Monsarrat's own career was the model for that of his character Lockhart, aFleet Street reporter in the 1930s, commissioned as anaval reservist. Monsarrat spent the war in anti-submarine escort ships, rising to the rank of lieutenant-commander.
Over half a century later, the historianPaul Kennedy still considered Monsarrat's fictionalisation of his experiences as the best and most authentic guide to the mentality of the wartime escort commander.[2]
The novel was made into the filmThe Cruel Sea in 1953, directed byCharles Frend and starringJack Hawkins as Commander Ericson andDonald Sinden as Lockhart.
BBC Light Programme produced a radio dramatisation written by Stephen Grenfell and starredJack Hawkins which was broadcast on 23 February 1955.[3][4]
BBC Radio 4 has produced two radio adaptations of the book. In September 1980, a two-hour dramatised version starredRichard Pasco as Ericson andMichael N. Harbour as Lockhart, and withTerry Molloy as thecoxswain ofSaltash. Recording took place with the assistance of the captain andship's company ofHMS Brighton and the captain ofHMS Scylla. The narrator wasMartin Muncaster. In March 2012, another two-hour version, starredGwilym Lee as Lockhart and Jonathan Coy as Ericson. Dramatised by John Fletcher and directed by Marc Beeby, this adaptation went on to win 'Best Use of Sound in an Audio Drama' in the BBC Audio Drama Awards 2013.
In 1998BBC Radio 2 released a three-hour full-cast dramatisation audiobook as part of the BBC Radio Collection. The novel was adapted byJoe Dunlop. The cast includedDonald Sinden (Narrator),Philip Madoc (Ericson),Paul Rhys (Lockhart),Michael Maloney (Ferraby),Helen Baxendale (Julie Hallam),Emma Cunniffe andJack Davenport. The novel is also available as an audiobook.