He Said, “I Saw Stars”

Looking at the picture of the smiling man on the wall memories came flooding back. She and Mollie, Irish nurses, went to the St. Patrick’s night dance in St. Joseph’s church hall, when he was introduced to them by John Doran. He danced with both. Afterwards, he walked back with them along Milton Road, Mollie to the Infectious Diseases Hospital and she across to St. Mary’s Hospital. “May I see you again? When are you free?”. That night she wore a blue silk dance dress.

The second meeting she could distinctly recall, walking over Copnor Bridge.

He said, “I have something wrong with my eye. I must see a specialist”.

“Who?” she asked. . She had seen many specialists.

“Mr. Inman at the Eye and Ear Hospital in Grove Road”.

Much later, he told her “Mr. Inman seemed more interested in my sex life than in my eye.”

Due to another’s negligence, four years earlier he got a blow on the eye from the handle of a pillar drill. His exact words were “I saw stars”. He reported it at the time. When he went back to get details, he was handed an immense book and they said, “Find it yourself!” He roughly remembered the date – it was recorded in one line.

“How did you discover that you had an eye disease?”

“When I was playing billiards badly. Bert Butler said ‘Joe, you are losing your grip’. The next day I got some grit in my good eye, and I found I could not see out of my other eye”.

The Dockyard accepted responsibility. The excision took place in Haslar Naval Hospital where he wore sky-blue naval patients uniform. There he was inspected by Admiral Fisher(afterwards a friend of the author Jan Morris). This man made a great impression on him.

Recently, Mollie said ”I remember you visited him and you spoke of walking over Haslar Bridge”. In those days we walked.

He got no compensation but was kept on at work as an electrical fitter who worked on many of the great British warships, including the Hood in 1935, when she was in dry dock. The kitchens were on the quay-side, and he had to install electricity, so that the crew could eat.

This was the time when many workmen would only discover that they were sacked when their tool boxes were stacked at the dockyard gate. The trade unions and the local M.P. (Frank Judd, now Lord Judd) tried to obtain compensation, and failed.

Rose Lynch 23-Nov-2004