This week's visit behind the security fence of Helston's naval base, RNAS Culdrose.

Royal Naval Air Station’s chaplain Mark Dalton is known affectionately by the sailors as ‘the Bish’.

This heartfelt, if irreverent, nickname - a shortened version of ‘bishop’ - could apply to any chaplain in the navy. And for Chaplin Dalton, who heads the air station’s chaplaincy team, church and multi-faith prayer room, it is a term of endearment.

“I know when people come to see me, the first thing they see is the dog collar or my epaulettes, but I also hope they see, actually, I am quite normal,” he said. “That’s one of the best compliments I can have – when we’re at sea and they say, 'Actually Bish, you’re alright’."

As an ordained minister in the Church of Scotland, Chaplin Dalton oversees the Sunday service as well as the occasional wedding or baptism. However, his day-to-day work centres around providing extra support to the sailors. Often this can be as simple as just having someone to talk to outside of the chain of command.

He said: “Chaplains don’t have a rank, or actually they acquire the rank of the person they are speaking to. That means I can speak to the newest recruit in the navy or the First Sea Lord and be on the same level.”

Chaplin Dalton, from Helensburgh, near Glasgow, joined the navy when he was 16 as a trainee aircraft engineer. Two years later was his first posting to Culdrose and, after another year, he took an interest in the Bible and the spark formed that he would pursue a career in the church.

“I just had this notion about being a minister,” said the 46-year-old. “It had never been on my radar because I’d always wanted to join the navy since I was 12 or 13. My dad was in the navy and I’d always heard his stories.

“I hadn’t been able to sleep at the time and I realised one night that if this was the way it was going to go I should just say ‘yes’, and that night I had a good sleep.”

He then left the navy and studied divinity at university in Aberdeen before finally passing the qualifications to become a minister of the Church of Scotland. Then he joined up again, but this time as a chaplain.

His career has seen him posted at naval bases across the country and serving on ships on deployment around the world. His wife and daughter still live in Scotland while he completes his deployment here in Cornwall.

“I thought I might be more useful to God in the navy as a chaplain, having had that experience of being in the navy already,” he said.

“The navy, by and large, is fairly accommodating of the Bish because when you’re thousands of miles away from home and you’ve had bad news or something has happened, the one person you can talk to in confidence is the chaplain. My work here at Culdrose is similar. Sometimes it’s just like being on a large ship.”