That French submarines were fitted with a special tank to carry their vin rouge ration is also true. Anyone who wants to learn more about the life of a Royal Navy Liaison Officer serving aboard Free French submarines should read the memoirs of Sub. Lt. Ruari McLean RNVR (Rtd.), entitled Half Seas Under, published in 2001. It is excellent!
Acknowledgements
My thanks again to Captain Iain D. Arthur OBE RN, a former Captain (S), Devonport, who has acted as my technical adviser. Where I get it right, it’s down to him. Where I’ve got it wrong, I wasn’t listening.
About the Author
David Black is a former Fleet Street journalist and television documentary producer. He spent much of his childhood a short walk from the Royal Navy Submarine Memorial at Lazaretto Point on the Firth of Clyde, and he grew up watching the passage of both US and Royal Navy submarines in and out of the Firth’s bases at Holy Loch and Faslane. As a boy, the lives of those underwater warriors captured his imagination. When he grew up, he discovered the truth was even more epic, and so followed the inspiration for his fictional submariner, Harry Gilmour, and a series of novels about his adventures across World War Two. David Black is also the author of a non-fiction book, Triad Takeover: A Terrifying Account of the Spread of Triad Crime in the West. He lives in Argyll.