Portrait of a Sailor: Peter Herbert Owen, Royal Navy Midshipman

When the naval war came, it brought a harshness and violence that had not been expected. For most naval personnel it also brought a very steep learning curve, as many of them had never seen conflict before. Much of the interwar period had been spent on training cruises, goodwill visits, and tours. The younger members of ships' companies were uninitiated in the ways of war and had only experienced them through their elders and reading the histories and memoirs of the First World War and before.