num_pages: 368
description: Chance Meeting is a story of part of the author's life dealing with growing up in a northern coal mining town where, at the age of six, he came to terms with the loss of his mother during child birth. He was then, together with younger and older siblings, brought up by a strict father who taught them domestic duties and other character building traits. At the age of seventeen, Lawrence joined the Merchant Navy. For the next forty-two months, he tramped the seas and oceans of the world on nine different company ships and enjoyed every part of it. Lawrence writes about the seas, the ports and countries visited and the many characters he met, both on ship and on shore, where in one port he was propositioned to join in gunrunning to a Middle East country. Throughout those years, Lawrence carried a camera and recorded the ships, some of their crew and the ports they visited. From the photographs and entries in his discharge logbook he is able to write those hips and characters with good recall. Although enjoying his life at sea, Cupid intervened and Lawrence left the Merchant Navy to join the Metropolitan Police. Having passed the entrance exam he was turned down as he had not completed the statutory two years' National Service. In his rejection letter from the office of the police commissioner, he was advised to join the Royal Military Police, where he would receive the training that would guarantee entry into the force when he next applied. The first part of his story ends with Lawrence gaining entry into the Royal Military Police.
language: English
title: Chance Meeting
titlecomplete: Chance Meeting
publisher: Upso