Royal Navy veteran of nearly 50 years who travelled round world retires

The physical training instructor – and more recently expert on the service’s digital transformation – has finally decided to call it a day, 46 and a half years after first walking through the gates of HMS Raleigh.

Vic ‘ran away to go to sea’ aged just 16, joining as a regular seaman, but after just a few years decided he wanted to become a physical trainer.

Once qualified he was posted to aircraft carrier HMS Invincible – still being completed at Barrow – where as well as keeping shipmates fit, he was in charge of the ship’s money-spinning souvenir shop.

Vic, 62, left Invincible before she took part in the Falklands conflict, but was sent to the islands in peacetime to help run a rest and recreation centre for personnel posted to the South Atlantic shortly after the 1982 war.

Two years at the naval base in Hong Kong (HMS Tamar) in the late 1980s proved a life-changing experience as the Parson family – Vic, his wife Yve, and daughters Vicky and Becky – adopted a then eight-month boy, Lei.

Returning to the UK, Vic continued his charity work, met the Queen Mother while serving aboard HMS Ark Royal, received the MBE for his service and community work and was put in charge of training new generations of naval physical trainers

His 26 years of experience were called upon to help bring brand-new frigate HMS St Albans into service in Portsmouth – a job he describes as ‘one of the best of my career’.

Since then he’s helped to shape how the navy crews its frigate flotilla and, since 2011, he’s been involved in a raft of personnel projects, not least digitising many ‘paper-based’ activities to make things easier for sailors.

Vic said: ‘They tell me 46 years is a long time, but I can honestly say the time has flown by. I have seen and done more than ever I would have in civvy street – I truly believe I have fulfilled my original ambition of seeing the world and more.’

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He was presented with a valedictory certificate signed by First Sea Lord Admiral Sir Ben Key and Rear Admiral Jude Terry.