Todd war diary, 3 August 1914-29 February 1916 / Arthur Todd - Page 164
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[Page 164]
We got back to Halifax on the nineteenth and arriving at night found a great beam blocking the entrance. It was an anti-submarine measure and practically made the Harbour Huntight. We were held up while this was opened and incidentally were nearly put ashore by the energetic military gentlemen on the surrounding forts who continuously played their searchlights on to our bridge and blinded the Navigating Officers.
This time we didnt foregather with the rest of the brood at Bedford basin but lay lower down near the town proper and leant up against a wall at the Royal Canadian dockyard. We were now told off to act as guardship being nearer the entrance and each night our miserable little steamboat about the size of an ordinary healthy torpedo was sent out to the entrance to watch for submarines.
They mounted one maxim gun and towed an explosive sweep which no one knew how to explode. Against any submarine she would have lasted just as long as it took the Huns to train a gun on her.
The Officer in charge hated the job it was bitterly cold and with the rest of the crew he huddled