London, GB | Formerly of New York, Buenos Aires, Fife, and the Western Cape. | Saoránach d’Éirinn.

Portsmouth Pachyderm


Leach (centre) on being made cadet captain at the Royal Australian Naval College in 1944

A delightful episode is relayed in the Daily Telegraph’s obituary of the late Vice-Admiral David Leach of the Royal Australian Navy.

Leach was the last RAN Chief of Naval Staff to have served in the Second World War but the incident in question dates from the 1950s when he was at the gunnery school in Whale Island in Portsmouth Harbour here in England:

In 1955 he was the course officer for a class of sub-lieutenants who decided to have some fun on their last morning parade, on April 1, by bringing a circus elephant on to the island. The duty officer, warned of the elephant’s approach by the bridge sentry, thought that his leg was being pulled and gave the order to let the pachyderm proceed.

Subsequently the class marched on to the parade ground with the elephant in their midst, surmounted by a mahout dressed as a sub-lieutenant. The beast, being well-trained, picked up the band’s marching step nicely, but Captain “Bunjey” Rutherford, the saluting officer in command of Whale Island, was not amused.

Leach had not been party to the April Fool’s joke, but later that morning, when he took the class results to the captain, he had placed Sub-Lieutenant L E Fant at the top. Rutherford was still not amused, demanding “Fant? Fant? Who’s this feller, Fant?” When the news reached the Admiralty, the Second Sea Lord took a personal interest and called Rutherford to announce, somewhat unkindly: “This is a trunk call.”

R.I.P.

Published at 10:50 am on Thursday 27 February 2020. Categories: Errant Thoughts Military Tags: , .
Leave a comment

NAME (required)

EMAIL (required)

WEBSITE (not required)

COMMENT

Home | About | Contact | Paginated Index | Twitter | Facebook | RSS/Atom Feed
andrewcusack.com | © Andrew Cusack 2004-present (Unless otherwise stated)