‘Batchley and Beyond’ – Chapter 27 of Redditch’s Roger Lippett’s life story

INSPIRED by ‘a very full life’ Redditch man Roger Henry Lippett has written a book on his life which began living on the Batchley Estate. He went on to serve in the Royal Navy and wants to share his story.

He was born on January 30 1939 on the council estate, with his dad’s name Henry, being given to him as his middle name.

Here he sheds light on his life family and friends as a social record of sorts that may be of interest to his children, grandchildren and the people of Redditch.

Although he said he had never achieved great wealth or fame he felt his life had moments worth recounting.

In his words: “I now live in the beautiful city of Plymouth in Devon but I will always be a Batchley boy.

“Far have I traveled, and much have I seen and this is my story, serialised in the Redditch Standard.”

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Chapter 27 

THE REMAINDER of my time in the Navy was in the HMS Defiance base except when I was finally drafted to HMS Drake for discharge at the end of 1978.

Whilst at Drake, the powers that be decided to send me to HMS Sultan (marine engineering school) at Portsmouth to do a course in welding.

I enjoyed this course and found out I had a natural aptitude for it so it was not long afterwards that I was recalled to do an advanced course which involved welding a wide range of different metals

I proved good at this, to me a good weld was like a work of art in molten metal. I was then put forward to do the nuclear welding aptitude test which I passed.

My mind now in 1978 was focused on the fact I would soon be discharged from the only life I had known from the age of 15 and I wrestled with what to do for the rest of my working life as now, approaching 40 years old, I still had a family to consider.

I decided on a course of action whereby I would attach myself to a North Sea oil drilling firm and investigate the possibilities of working in the oil industry, the firm was P&O Offshore Services operating from Aberdeen.

The next day I met a representative named Dick Etheridge at the airport, where we flew to Sumburgh and then, by helicopter to the oil rig ‘Uncle John’ where I would be working for the next few weeks.

Once my spell on the rig was completed, I was still left wondering if any offers would come of it.

I continued working from HMS Defiance still wondering where my future lay. I considered working in HM Dockyard and underwent a medical there which I passed.

Then one day on November 14 1978, a letter from an address in Arundel, Sussex.

It was from Iain Rodger and went on to explain that his firm carried out vibration analysis on oil rigs and oil tankers and went on to offer me an interview in Arundel.

I accepted the offer and drove to Arundel on Monday, December 4, and four days later I received a letter offering the post of vibrational analyst which I accepted.

Little did I realise the mad job I had let myself in for.

The next two years would be the most exciting, scariest, uncertain, years of my life – an eventful period but one I would not regret.

On December 12, I joined HMS Drake for release leave and there I handed in my various items of loan equipment such as my gas respirator, my anti-flash gear, my lifebelt and my webbing equipment and went through all the formalities of discharge.

I left the barracks and the Royal Navy on discharge leave ten days before Christmas.

So this was it. There was no parade, no fanfare. After 25 years, I handed in my ID card and walked out of the gate and waited at the bus stop outside HMS Drake for a bus home.

I had joined the Navy as a 15-year-old and now I was 40 years old and warily facing a world I was not accustomed to.