The Cadet Braithwaite

This week, Chris and I have really enjoyed this fascinating extract from the diaries of one of the crew of the Egidia, which in the early 1960’s, was the berth of the young man pictured above. We read:
“We had a selection of mates and engineers and four cadets, the most notable of the latter being one called Braithwaite who had a happy knack of always landing in some awkward trouble and always involving some unlucky bystander.”
The diary then returns to him again:
“The Cadet, Braithwaite, was still finding troublesome things to get involved with and one day I was his unsuspecting victim.
One of the crew had been accused of stealing some article from another crew member and Captain Thomson was holding Court – Navy-style. One by one he was calling them into his day room for interrogation and during this time the call came for ships store and each witness was allowed to proceed individually for his requirements and return for further enquiries.
Apparently, one crew member had just returned with his cigarettes, beer, coca cola etc. when it was his turn to appear before the Captain. He laid his stock down outside the Captain’s door and went in.
Braithwaite was the attendant at the Captain’s door to send in the ensuing witnesses and I was coming up the stairs with my cigarettes when he nodded towards the crewman’s coca cola, indicating I could take a bottle for drinking when I got to the radio room. I thanked him, did so, and went upstairs. Then pandemonium.
My presence was required by the Captain. It transpired the sailor belonging the goods, who was under inquisition for theft (the main suspect), had been dismissed by the Captain and as he left by the doorway, had spotted one of his coca colas missing and immediately turned indignantly complaining that he, wrongly accused of theft, had now himself been robbed.
This put the Captain’s case in great jeopardy and he questioned the Cadet, Braithwaite, who said, quite blatantly, but truthfully, that I was the one who had taken the sailor’s coco cola. I explained the situation to Thomson, the Captain, who quashed all the charges against the sailor. I do not know what he said to Braithwaite, but it would go over that one’s head, anyway.”
Is it me, or is the Good Soldier Svejk alive and well in Dunbar in the early 21st Century??