I had the pleasure of serving with Jack in Ark Royal ('87-'89 ish) and enjoyed his company immensely. The old saying "They broke the mould when...." most certainly applied to him and, unlike some of his colleagues, there were no airs and graces, what you saw was what you got!
Two things spring to mind: the first was his uncanny ability to avoid being detected, by the ever patrolling XO, having a kip in his cabin, at any time of the day. Clues that alerted the XO were the closed door of a cabin also in darkness. So Jack used to leave his door open with just the curtain pulled across, leave the lights on and pull the neatly arranged bed clothes/duvet completely over him (rumour has it the he had removed some of the central bed springs to reduce the profile!). I don't recall him ever being busted - well not for that sin anyway!;
the second relates to one of his few failings - he was rubbish at poker (5 card draw, dealers choice on wild cards etc.)! To cut a long story short, during a game initiated by a certain 848 B Flt looker (after a serious lunchtime sesh at anchor off the Yorkshire coast), having started out playing for pennies we ended up with a max bet per person per hand of £20. By the end of the afternoon/evening Jack owed lots! I was happy, however, to accede to his request not to cash his cheque (for more than £100) until the beginning of the following month!!
Good luck with the book,
lmgaylard 