Minesweepers were among the less glamorous naval vessels during the Second World War, but the work they did was vital. Ewart Brookes’s novel is closely based on his own experience commanding a minesweeper patrol ship.
His hero, Lieutenant William Haley, RNVR, is at first disappointed to be transferred from a position as First Officer on the Culver, a destroyer, to command of a minesweeper. He pictures it as ‘a grubby little trawler’ – since most minesweepers were converted fishing vessels. Yet the appalling news that the Culver had been destroyed by a mine soon after he left convinces him of the crucial importance of the minesweepers’ work.

The story is set in one of the most crucial periods in British history, just after Dunkirk, while the Battle of Britain was being fought viciously in the air, and invasion was still a real possibility. Haley is on the Arandite, part of a The squadron’s’s job was to keep crucial areas off the south coast clear, to allow other naval vessels to move freely. German aircraft in occupied France were uncomfortably close, and determined to harry the sweepers in their work.

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