In Nelson's day when half the persons serving in His Majesty's Navy were pressed men, very few sailors knew how to swim. Things are different nowadays because everyone's a volunteer and one of the things every sailor has to do before s/he can serve at sea is pass the navy's standard swimming test.

Now I love the sea, but I've never been much of a swimmer. That's not to say I couldn't swim then or can't swim now. In fact I'm quite at home in the water, even deep water, but an Olympic swimmer I'm not.

They told us about the swimming test, “It's just a splash in the pool, lads. A little swim. No need to worry.” They lied!

The allotted day and time for this new trial arrived and we dutifully marched through the camp to the swimming pool with a towel, a pair of swimming trunks, a boiler suit and a pair of boots tucked under our left arm.

We stripped out of our No 8 uniforms, put on the swimming trunks, then the boiler suit (buttoned all the way up to the neck) and finally pulled on and laced the boots. The idea was, we were supposed to jump into the pool and swim a quarter of a mile then remove the boots. I remember thinking this was going to be hard, but hey it's only a quarter of a mile, I'd make it.

Next we were supposed to tread water, remove the boots, tread water again. For five minutes. No touching the bottom, no touching the pool sides.

Then we had to swim again: another quarter of a mile. Shit this was going to be really hard and I wasn't so sure I could do that.

At the end of the second swim we were supposed to tread water again, remove the boiler suit, tie the ends of the legs and sleeves to form air-traps and make a float. All the time, treading water. Bollocks, I was going to fail, I just knew it.

With our newly formed float we had to swim again, using the aid for additional buoyancy, for a further half a mile. I knew I must have gone pale because Buster asked me what the matter was? I told him. He smiled, “You'll be alright mate, don't worry.”

I did worry. I worried a lot.

The PTI blew his whistle and we all jumped in: the pool was open air and the water was bloody freezing. I started swimming. Someone had hold of my feet and was dragging my legs downwards. I looked behind me, no-one there. My feet were still developing a life of their own and trying to reach the bottom of the pool. Bugger!

I swam harder, reached the end of the pool and turned. I closed my eyes because my arms were starting to hurt, dug deep and swam harder. A whistle blew and I realised I'd completed the first part of the test.

I struggled with the boots trying to tread water waving opposite arm and leg while reaching down to undo one boot. It didn't work too well, so I tried undoing the left boot, treading water with the limbs of my right side. I eventually managed to get the boots off by drinking half the contents of the pool while sitting on the bottom. My boots were merrily walking along the pool floor, but I was free. I felt light, renewed, I could do this. I trod water. I started swimming again.

The second quarter mile was much easier than the first. I found myself being whistled at several times because I'd missed the first indicator that my quarter was complete. Thank God.

I trod water and undid the buttons on the boiler suit. Getting the thing off my arms wasn't as easy as I'd hoped now that it was wet: the denim clung to the skin as though glued. Was everyone else suffering? I certainly hoped so!

I tied the arms and legs, then smacked the open top down into the pool to trap air. It worked! I looked. It hadn't worked too well. I tried several times, but couldn't seem to inflate all the limbs. Shit. I was knackered and would have to go with what I'd got.

You can trust me when I tell you that I tried to swim the last part of their 'splash in the pool'. You can also trust me when I tell you that I failed. I have no idea how near, or far, I was from the finish point, but I'd reached exhaustion point. I'd never learned to swim the easier, less energy sapping strokes and had relied on my own peculiar version of the front crawl: that was my big mistake.

The only thing left to me now was to join 'remedial swimming' classes, in my own time of course, if I wanted to go to sea. I joined. I learned to stroke breasts in the pool, a life-skill that has come in handy on many an occasion since.

The moral of this story is: if some hairy arsed sailor ever invites you to go for 'a splash in the pool' tell him to piss off, unless of course you enjoy drinking chlorinated water that some bugger has probably pissed in!