You're in the Navy Now

When Alan Higgins joined the Royal Navy at the outbreak of World War II, he was not yet sixteen years old. But his youth could not save him from the horrors of war and he was soon serving aboard the cruiser HMS Edinburgh. On May 1st 1942, HMS Edinburgh was sunk by a German U-Boat in the icy Barents Sea but Alan miraculously survived. However, this wasn't to be the last of Alan’s troubles and he narrowly escaped death during the bombing of a station in Russia. He experienced more peaceful spells in North America and Bermuda, but most of his war took place in the Mediterranean and he found himself dodging bullets and bombs during the Battle of Anzio in Italy. Later, as a crewman of a landing craft at the Normandy D-Day landings, Alan was forced to saw off a fellow sailor’s shattered leg with a bread knife. Despite the terrible danger, Alan survived the war and has now written You’re in the Navy Now, a richly-descriptive and good-humoured account of his unbelievable years in the Royal Navy.