The Bayside Bulletin continued with the story. Former cook Francis Sheldon-Collins had very little good to say about Captain Burnett. According to him, the crew were more than a little concerned about Burnett's lax efforts at action station drills. The previous commander had the crew at that practice at dawn and dusk of every day.
However, the ship's log showed daily action drills, but Sheldon maintained they hadn't. How did they get the ship logs if everything went down with the Sydney, unless the logs were taken off the ship at regular intervals.
Also, Burnett had ordered the auxiliary life boats removed. These were made of empty flour tins and other drums to be used if the ship sank and the regular life boats were damaged by gunnery fire.
Sheldon said that on another occasion, Burnett had allowed the Sydney to get within a kilometer of an unidentified vessel, all the while with no signal to go to action stations.
I'd Have to Say That Sheldon Was Not a Big Burnett Fan. --Cooter
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