HOW THE PLYMOUTH COMMAND GOT ITS TWO PROVERBIAL NAMES

The Royal Naval Plymouth Command had two endearing names which we sailors always used and with great affection. Unless you choose the word Pompey, the Portsmouth Command has no such cryptic endearments and 'Chatty Chats' for the now long gone Chatham Base was hardly imaginative. Chatham was in the Nore area of the UK and thus was in the Nore Command. The Nore is a sandbank at the mouth of the Thames Estuary.   It marks the point where the River Thames meets the North Sea, roughly halfway between Havengore Creek in Essex and Warden Point in Kent. However, when you have read this page, have a look at another Naval Command Port - see end of page.

* There is a book called JACKSPEAK which attempts to define so called naval slang and sayings. It gets many things wrong and one example is its definition of the word Guzz.

"GUZZ is called so because it was a radio callsign in WW2"  -Ugh !!!!!!!!!

Plymouth or Devonport  called GUZZ or Guzzle.  Firstly, there never was a radio callsign GUZZ for anything in the RN, shore or seagoing. Certainly from the early 1920's, Plymouth had just two callsigns: one, at Devils Point was GYO* and the other at Mount Wise was GZX - SEE MAP ABOVE.  Since radio was still in its infancy in those days despite Captain Jackson's experiments in the Diligence in 1898, any callsigns issued {SEE ship radio callsign system pre and post 1912} once issued, would have been kept to avoid confusion until communicators became fully au fait with the new fangled system. As time went by and both the RN and the MN grew in size, callsigns {3 letters for shore and 4 letters for ships} in the range GU** were issued to MN ships only, whilst GU* became the callsigns of civilian coastal stations around the UK. This was the case carried over into the 1950's.  By the late 1960's [1968] one, and one only, MOD ship had a callsign with GU** and that was the RFA Tarbatness GUAJ.  In the 1970/80's, several small warships were given GU** callsigns, and the nearest thing to GUZZ was the patrol vessel LINDISFARNE [P300] with GUYZ  closely followed by the sweeper BRECON [M29] with GUZA  - the frigate PHOEBE [F42] was allocated GAZZ.  Later, just after the end of WW2,  Plymouth's/Devonport's shore callsign changed to MTI - Plymouth's/Devonport's  Local Command Net [LCN] and the Devil's Point station closed leaving Mount Wise.  After WW1 two new events were introduced. First that ships and shore authorities were grouped into AIG's [Address Indicator Groups with a radio callsign] and second that shore naval authorities were given radio callsigns, but only to expedite the delivery of signals from sea in W/T format namely ACP 124.  These authorities did not use the callsigns themselves as they were assigned an MSO [Main Signal Office] only and not a W/T [Wireless Telegraphy] or V/S [Visual Signalling] office.  None of these callsigns began with the letter 'G' {or, but later on, the letter 'M'} and typical of these was perhaps the most famous, namely Admiralty {used before MOD[N]} which was 'HZKC' with S/M2 [Captain of the 2nd submarine squadron] for example as 'BSES'.  There were many hundreds of these authorities both home and abroad, sixtyeight in Portsmouth alone, and each had a four letter callsign which began with a letter other than 'G'.  Finally, Devonport was known as GUZZ long before WW2, and ask yourselves, which of the 50'odd shore authorities [WITH FOUR LETTER CALLSIGNS] in the Plymouth Command was nominated the callsign GUZZ [although NONE is the answer] but to make sense it would have to be either HMS VIVID which became HMS DRAKE or Captain Keyham Barracks [CBC] which became COMBRAX Devonport or ????? etc etc. 

*Devils Point Radio operated on three frequencies. GYO on 2.804MHz CW -- GYO2 on 3.326MHz CW -- GYO3 on 1.111MHz MCW and also acted as a D/F station.

This entry comes from the "Plymouth.info/Royal Naval Barracks" website QUOTE Over the years there has been much debate about how or why HMS Drake gained the nickname of "Guzz".  During the 1970s it was revealed by a retired Royal Navy Wireless Operator that "GUZZ" was the call sign for the Wireless Station then situated at Devil's Point, Stonehouse.  UNQUOTE.

  This revelation is nothing less than tragic for it has conned many generations of naval folk into believing his story and to say the least, it was a mischievous act of merely wanting something to say, regrettably, the first thing that came into his head. The point to make is that ## Devil's Point ## was a shore W/T station, and all shore W/T stations from start to finish had THREE LETTER callsigns. This picture of callsigns [use your scroll bars when opened and and then click on the BACK BUTTON to close it on completion of viewing to return to the page proper] is taken from the 1930 edition of Indicatifs D'Appel.

## DEVIL's Point ## Of some general interest to naval people especially families of.......! Getting close to warships entering and leaving harbour and especially big ones or exciting ones, nuclear submarines for example, and with our largest warship ever in Portsmouth, the in-build HMS Queen Elizabeth, there is much demand for viewing spaces. There are only two available to the general public, one on the Round Tower at the entrance to Portsmouth Harbour [get there early...very very early with coffee, sandwiches and warm and waterproof clothing to hand, and for Plymouth [Devonport] the same applies to Devil's Point although there are generally more spaces[s] available. With a good set of binoculars set to high power the view is stunning, and remember that you might spot your loved one [with the glasses] but chances are that he or she won't spot you so wear something very visible and brightly coloured and relax your inhibition and become ANIMATED!! Your loved one, cannot, unless the XO [the executive officer who is second in command] is in a good and jovial mood, and  knows that the port admiral is away on his/her 'hols and won't be watching [indeed, looking for] procedural errors and unacceptable naval discipline breaches, wear something distinctive or become animated until after the vessel is moored alongside its appointed jetty or pier! That's the time when you can all go wild and enter 'party mode'.

Note the callsign for Devils Point which in 1946 was reassigned to the Admiralty for use by Whitehall Wireless. Commercially, there were several THREE letter callsigns {not shown in this publication but in the 1932-1935 editions onwards] having the letter 'U' as the second letter but the third letter never went beyond the letter 'V' - i.e. GUV. So, no GUZ or GUZZ or any other combination.  It is somewhat disturbing that Sparkers [and some more aware Buntings] many of whom did their Part I training at Ganges, and went into the Fleet to continue Part II and Part III training, where they [Sparkers] were taught [and subsequently used] Morse Code circuits including ship-shore,  local command nets and commercial station working, have gone along with the myth of GUZZ being a WW2 callsign assigned to the Plymouth Command and more specifically to the Devonport Naval Base. Amazing !

My definition of the word GUZZ is also supported by an article in the Warrant Officers Gazette of the 19th century Devonport Edition. And finally, before we move on to 'Play-up-Pompey' what do you think about a more official naval source, which states that GUZ [sic] was named after Cornish/Devon cream teams, of all things.  Truly unbelievable especially for hardened GUZZ men like myself - I am lost for words, EXCEPT for an anagram of DEVONPORT which = N O T   P R O V E D - note, first coined on this website. This is what the RN Museum tells its gullible readers;-

This is their web page http://www.royalnavalmuseum.org/info_sheets_nicknames.htm

and this is what they say about GUZ {sic} and other ports:-

QUOTE

PORTSMOUTH - “POMPEY”

• Bombay was part of the wedding gift of Catherine of Braganza to Charles II. Portuguese seaman saw a resemblance between the two ports and may have called Portsmouth “Bom Bhia” which to English ears sounds like Pompey.

• Dame Agnes Weston was describing the murder of the Roman general Pompey at a lecture to a naval audience. A member of the audience exclaimed “Poor old Pompey!” and this phrase stuck.

• A drunkard’s slurred pronunciation of Portsmouth Point (where there are many taverns popular with sailors)

• Ships entering Portsmouth harbour make an entry in the ship’s log Pom. P. as a reference to Portsmouth Point (this being to long). Navigational charts also use this abbreviation.

• La Pompee was a captured French ship moored in Portsmouth and used for accommodation. (Captured 1793 and broken up 1817). There is a Yorkshire term “pompey” for prison or house of correction.

• Volunteer firemen in the eighteenth century (known as pompiers) exercised on Southsea Common.

• In 1781, some Portsmouth sailors climbed Pompey’s pillar near Alexandria and became known as the “Pompey boys”.

• The pomp and ceremony connected with the Royal Navy at Portsmouth led to the adoption of the nickname, “Pompey”.

 CHATHAM - “CHATS”

• Derived from an old word for “louse”, implying that Chatham manned ships were lousy.

• Chatham manned ships were referred to as being “happy and chatty” by sailors from other ports (derogative term).

• “Chats” is short for Chatham.

DEVONPORT - “GUZ”

• Short for “Guzzle”, relating to the West Country’s love of c cream teas of scones, jam and clotted cream. If YOU believe THAT, YOU'LL believe ANYTHING!

© Royal Naval Museum Library, 2000 

SEE ALSO POMPEY_WHY_IS_IT_SO_CALLED