Why Sir Tom, 100, wished diary was lost with his ship

IT WAS the diary 17-year-old Tom Baird would have been happy to see sink with his torpedoed ship - but both have survived for another 82 years.

- Sarah Ward

The midshipman hated being made to keep the journal as part of his training that led to a 41-year Navy career in which he headed the service in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Sir Tom, knighted in 1980, was 100 last month and told how he hoped the daily record would be lost to Nazi air raids.

He had joined up in August 1941 in Plymouth and had to write down his experiences, so the diary provides a first-hand account of the teenager's view of the Second World War.

Scuttled

Sir Tom retired with the rank of Vice-Admiral in 1982, just before the Falklands War.