The only ‘happening’ in Hailsham was the Saturday dance in the Corn Exchange. Somehow we picked up a clarinet player, Sergeant Amstell. He was from the Heavy Coastal Artillery. This was a huge twelve-inch cannon mounted on a railway bogey with eight wheels and pulled by an engine. It was shunted back and forth along the South Coast wherever the German Invasion threatened. The gun crew lived in a converted railway carriage. The things they did! Late night, if they were short of fags, they’d actually drive the whole train, gun and all, to Hailsham Station, nip into The George, a quick pint, ten Woodbines, then back again. When Sergeant Amstell played with us at the Corn Exchange he’d drive the train three miles to Hailsham, park it at the station siding for the evening, then drive it back after the dance. Ridiculous!
Now, whereas wartime Hailsham offered boredom of an evening, nearby Eastbourne offered a greater variety of it. As a local said “There’s nothing wrong with Hailsham, there’s always the streets.” On nights off Harry and I would thumb a lift to Eastbourne. As empty vehicle after empty vehicle went by we realised what a lot of bastards people were. A Canadian truck approached. When I saw it was not going to stop I waved it farewell. Immediately the truck stopped, backed up, and out jumped a furious noisy-voiced Canadian officer. He was incensed that I dared wave the truck farewell, “I’m not having any two bit private being a smart alec at my expense.”
“Oh there’s no expense sir,” I said, “I did it free.”
“It’s forbidden for military vehicles to stop to give anyone a lift.” Having had his moment of power he drove away, taking his tiny mind with him. What can you say or do to a person like that? I mean, I was wishing he’d get killed the first day in action. My God, he started a chain reaction from then on I never gave any Canadian officer a lift, ever. Aren’t I a swine? (Heh-heh-heh-heh.)
Our first visit to Eastbourne led us to a pub from which issued forth music. The customers were all squaddies and their girls. The music was supplied by three elderly gentlemen on a small rostrum. Piano, violin and cello. They made desperate attempts to be ‘with it’ by playing ‘In the Mood’, ‘Beat me daddy eight to the Bar’ etc., but one felt that death was nigh. Suddenly, in the middle of a tune, the violinist downed his violin, started to collect the empty glasses which he took to the bar.
“What an original arrangement,” said Harry. “Sixteen bars solo, then eight bars collecting empties. This could open up a whole new field of entertainment.” I agreed. “What’s wrong with sixteen bars solo, then eight bars painting the landing, and another eight bars chopping wood. Great.”
Harry spotted it. The fiddle player only got down to collect the empties when the tune went into more than three flats. We spent the rest of the evening listening for the key changes; “This is it, he’ll start collecting ‘em now,” said Harry gleefully, as the maestro did exactly that.
Ever on the search for money, we’ asked the landlord if he’d like us to play some Jazz one evening. He was a tall, very fat man. His face so red it appeared to have been sandpapered. He liked the idea but, “I’ll have to speak to the Missus. Florrie!” Florrie arrived from the dark recesses of the saloon bar. “Jazz?” she said, “isn’t that the noisy stuff?” We assured her that it wasn’t. It was finally agreed we would be given a try-out the coming Saturday. There was no money, but we could have drinks on the house, and we didn’t have to collect the empties. It was nearly the last Saturday of my life.
Eastbourne and excitement are foreign to each other. Peacetime Eastbourne with its frail old ladies or russet-faced gentlemen dozing in wicker bath-chairs varied little from wartime. The town .had been evacuated. The great wedding-cake hotels were boarded up or occupied by the Services. A few diehards remained. You’d see them mornings, sitting in bus shelters reading The Tames, or ladies in deck chairs knitting Balaclavas. “Which war are we knitting for, Penelope?” They all objected to the triple skeins of barbed wire that ran the length of the sea-front disappearing towards Bexhill and Beachy Head. Who in their right mind would want to attack Eastbourne? It would get the town a bad name. They were still trying to live down the fact that Van Gogh once stayed there. I mean, trying to chop your ear off. It wasn’t good enough.
Saturday night saw D Battery band swinging away there. The pub was really full, people passing heard the Jazz, and of course came in. The landlord was delighted. Never had such a crowd. People were standing jammed against the walls. The original trio were fully employed collecting the empties and looked much happier doing it, especially the violinist, whose name I discovered was Percy Ants! We had to play it, ‘I can’t dance, I’ve got ants in my pants’. Bang. Bang. Bang. Three shots rang out, a woman screamed. Bang. The wall mirror behind me shattered. There was a struggle going on in the entrance door. More women screamed (it might have been men but I didn’t have time to check). Bang again, and I hear a projectile whizz past me and thud into the wall behind. It was a Scottish Tank Gunner, who had been thrown out because of offensive behaviour. Outside he drew his pistol and fired through the door. He had tried to get in, but a French Canadian soldier grabbed his pistol arm, and was now holding it pointed to the ceiling. This all happened in a flash. Recalling the heroism of the ship’s orchestra on the Titanic, I went on playing. Turning round, I discovered that neither Edgington, Fildes nor Kidgell had heard of the Titanic affair and had gone. Kidgell had dived through a door that just happened to be marked ‘Ladies’. There were understandable screams from the occupants within. Edgington and Fildes had rushed to the bar and demanded free drinks. The offending soldier was finally disarmed; the Military Police arrived and took him away.
Out of the ‘Ladies’ ran several females in various states of undress, followed sheepishly by Doug Kidgell. Things settled down, and we went on playing, but this time much quieter. If anything more was coming, we wanted to hear it. I visited the pub about three years ago. The place had been tamed up and Watneyised. The old landlord was gone. No one remembered him, nor the gunfight. The rostrum and the old piano were there. I went over and touched the keyboard. It was like patting an old horse you once knew.
The Great Fight at Robin’s Post
Florrie, the landlady at the Eastbourne pub we played at in 1941, as I remember her
LARKHILL
Things had been going too smoothly to continue as they were, it really was time we had another bout of applied chaos. It came in the shape of a sudden rush to Larkhill Artillery Camp, Salisbury, hard by Stonehenge. It was January 1942, and quite the bitterest weather I could remember. We arrived after a Dawn to Sunset trip by road. Salisbury Plain was blue-white with hoar-frost. I sat in the back of a Humber Radio Car, listening to any music I could pick up from the BBC and banging my feet to keep warm. We arrived tired, but being young and tired means you could go on all night! Ha! Having parked the vehicles, we were dismissed. The signallers were shown to a long wooded but on brick piers. We dumped our kit on the beds, with the usual fight for the lower bunk, then made for the O.R.’s mess and began queuing. It must have been the season for schemes, as the whole place was swarming with gunners. We were given pale sausages, not long for this world, and potatoes so watery we drank them. The camp had masses of hot showers and we spent a pleasant hour under them, singing and enjoying the luxury of hot water. There were the usual comments about the size of one’s ‘wedding tackle’: ‘Cor, wot a beauty’, or ‘he’s bloody well hung’, or ‘Christ, his poor wife’, etc. After a quick tea and wad in the N.A.A.F.I. we went to the large cinema Nissen hut. It was The Glen Miller Orchestra in ‘Sun Valley Serenade’, and it was a feast of great Big band sound plus at least ten good songs. Sitting in the N.A.A.F.I. later, we tried to recall them; it was this way that we learnt most of the tunes for the band’s repertoire. Seated at the piano, Harry tried to play some of the tunes from the film.
“Play Warsaw Concerto,” said a drunk Scottish voice.
At dawn the next day the Battery set off on the great, ice-cold, frost-hardened Salisbury Plain. Most of us had put on two s
ets of woollen underwear, including the dreaded ‘Long Johns’. We were to practise a new speedy method of bringing a twenty-five pounder gun into action. Ahead of us would go a scouting O.P.; somewhere on the Plain four twenty-five pounders drawn by quads would be moving in the direction of a common map reference, all linked to the O.P. by wireless. Ahead the O.P. would establish itself at a point overlooking the enemy. Immediately, the O.P. would send out the signal ‘Crash Action East’, or whichever compass point applied; the information was received by the gun wireless, whose operator would shout out to the gun officer the order received. The gun officer, standing up in his truck would shout to the gun crew, ‘Halt, Action East’. The quad would brake sharply, the gun crew in a frenzy unlimber the gun, and face it east; while they were doing this the O.P. would rapidly send down the Rough Range of the Target. As soon as the gun crew had done this, they fired. In our case, from the first order to the firing of the first round was twenty-five seconds. This was the fastest time for the day.
That night, in high spirits, we of the signal section decided to raid the specialists. After lights out some fifteen of us, faces blacked up, wearing balaclavas, carrying buckets of water and mud mixed to a delightful consistency, crept towards the specialists’ hut. I remember being first in. In the ensuing fight I was mistaken for a specialist and got a bucket all to myself. For the next two hours there was a game of hide-and-seek among the huts as the specialists under Bombardier Aubery sought revenge. It was just too bad about Lieutenant Hughes, sitting quietly in the dark of the officers’ toilet—he got a bucket of mud full face.
The next ten days saw us going through rigorous training. The weather was bitterly cold. I saw Sid Price smoke a cigarette down to the stub, and burn the woollen mitten on his hand without feeling a thing. On the last day, B Subsection were firing smoke shells, when one got jammed in the breech. Sergeant Jordy Rowlands was in the process of removing the charge when it exploded in his hand. When the smoke cleared Rowlands was looking at the stump of his wrist with his right hand ten yards away on the ground. There was a stunned silence and then he said, “Well, I’ll be fooked.” Apart from initial shock he was o.k., but for him the war finished on Salisbury Plain. The severed hand was buried where it fell by Busty Roberts. As he dug a small hole Driver Watts said, “You going to shake hands before you bury it?” Busty’s reply was never recorded.
That night there was an Officers’ and All-Ranks’ dance in the Drill Hall. We all worked hard to extricate all the best-looking A.T.S. girls from the magnetic pull of the officers and sergeants. Alas, we failed, so we reverted to the time honoured sanctuary of the working man—Drink. We finally reached the stage of inebriation when we were willing to do the last dance with any good-looking Lance Bombardier. Next day, Saturday, the last day at Camp, we were allowed into Salisbury. I went to see the Cathedral. I’ll never forget the feeling of awe when I walked in. A boys’ choir was singing something that sounded like Monteverdi. The voices soared up to the fluted vaults as though on wings. The morning autumn sun was driving through the stained-glass windows throwing colours on to the floor of the nave, the whole building was a psalm in stone. It all made. me aware of the indescribable joy derived from beauty. “Cor, it’s bloody big, ain’ it?” said Smudger Smith. He was right. It was bloody big.
There was a beer-up that night, and another dance. After 23:43 hours I don’t remember anything. Next day we returned to that jewel of the south coast, Bexhill.
Larkhill: Crash Action Winners
LEARNING TO DRIVE
The time had come, the Army said, to speak of many things, like teaching us to drive military vehicles; the reason was, we had new vehicles arriving at such a rate they were outnumbering the drivers; so, several of the Signal were selected for tuition, among them yours truly.
It was done under the supervision of Bombardier Ginger Edwards. It was not unpleasant. Every morning the trainees would be bundled in the back of a fifteen hundredweight Bedford truck and driven to a deserted country road, and instructions started from there. Allowing for the possible stupidity of the pupils the instructions were shot through with insults. The spelling is based on Bombardier Edwards’s enunciation. “This end is the front end, the back is the arse end. This round object mounted on a spindle with three spokes is the steering wheel. Any questions? No? Good. Now this vehicle is like a human being, it has ter be fee-ed the right ingredients for it to go. Understand? The ingredients are One, Pet-er-ol, Hoil and Water, each one ‘as its own hole for pourin’ in, if you put it in the wrong ‘ole it will cease to function,” and so on. After the technical briefing we were each given a go at starting the engine and proceeding in first gear. Most of us, got the hang of it very soon, all save Gunner Edgington; he managed to perform mechanical feats with the truck that were just impossible, i.e., Edgington at the wheel, truck ascending a steep gradient, Bombardier Edwards says, “Now go down to first.” Edgington disengages from fourth and some how goes into reverse, but so smoothly, it was not until we had travelled backwards ten yards that the mistake was discovered. I myself had a moment of fear. We were approaching a T junction. “Turn left here,” said Edwards. I did, but it was a trick, the road ended almost immediately in a rough field and it was intended to test my braking ability. I jammed my foot on to the brake, missed it and, went on to the accelerator, the truck shot forward down a two foot ditch; as we hit the field I pulled the wheel to the left to get us back on to the road, but for love nor money I could not get my foot off the accelerator. I just prayed. All the time there were yells and threats from the bouncing occupants on the back of the truck.
Finally after fifteen nightmare seconds, we hit the road again, where I managed to put my foot on the brake. There was dead silence then Edwards and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.
Another memorable moment was again Harry Edgington. Driving along the front at Hastings, Bombardier Edwards decided to test Edgington’s reflexes. “(wick, stop, there’s a child in the road,” he shouts. “No there isn’t,” said Gunner Edgington.
From motor vehicles we went on to Bren Carriers, they were marvellous, they’d go anywhere, and didn’t we just do that. Having passed all the tests, we were promoted to Driver Operators, which meant as from 24-10-42 I was a Class Three Tradesman Driver/Operator, so I got a few shillings more per day.
JANKERS
Jankers can be painful. It usually means confined to barracks and menial tasks like, “Soldier! Pick up that menial cigarette-end.” My first jankers was for causing a fire. In the hard winter of 1940, coal fires were forbidden except on Sundays. But I was freezing on a Saturday. My bed was on the first floor, directly in line with the North Pole. The window was over the coal shed. With some rope and a length of bucket it was simple; Edgington went down, filled it, and I’d haul up. Suddenly, with a full bucket ascending, a snap inspection! “Orderly Officer! Eyes Front!” (Where else?) I turned, managed to face him, arms behind me. I nearly got away with it, but Edgington gave a tug on the rope to haul up, and I was pulled backwards out of the window. The game was up. I blamed Edgington. Edgington blamed me. We blamed the Germans, Florrie Ford and finally the Warsaw Concerto. Captain Martin gave us a roasting: “It’s a degrading trick depriving other men of their fuel ration! Indeed, it’s a disgrace!” he said, standing with his back to a roaring coal fire on a Monday. Most jankers time was spent lagging the plumbing; this was called ‘up yer pipe’; another fatigue was peeling spuds. We delighted in peeling spuds to the size of peas. It made no difference, they cooked the peel as well.
It’s not too difficult to become a military criminal. Not shaving, dirty boots, calling a sergeant ‘darling’, or selling your Bren Carrier. Any Sunday, down Petticoat Lane, you could find some of the lads selling lorries, jerrycans, bullets, webbing. “Git your luverly Anti-Aircraft Guns ‘ere.” It got so that Military Depots were shopping there for supplies. Often London-based regiments sent their (quarter Blokes out for ‘a gross of three-inch Mortars and a dozen bananas’.
It was common knowledge that Caledonian Road Market was a German supply depot. The true story behind Hess: he flew here for cut-price black-market underwear for the S.S., but on arrival he chickened out when Churchill told him the price, unconditional surrender. An easy way to go ‘on the hooks’ was not saluting commissioned ranks. “Ewe har not salutin’ the hofficer—ewe har salutin’ the King’s huniform.” Gunner Stover took this as Gospel. At reveille he would wake Lieutenant Budden with a cup of tea, turn, face Budden’s uniform hanging on the wall, salute it, and exit. “There’s no need to take it that far, Stover,” said Budden.
“I can’t help it sir—I come from a military family—if I didn’t salute that huniform—I feel I was livin’ a lie sir.”
“But,” reasoned Budden, “when no one’s looking there’s no point.”
“Beggin’ your pardon sir—but there is! Many a time, when I’m alone, cleanin’ up your billet, when I finish, I face your best battledress—and I salute it—no one sees me, but deep down I know I’m on my honour, alone with tradition.”
“How long have you been in the Army, Stover?”
“Thirty-two years sir.”
“Very good,” said Budden.
We had ‘Saluting Traps’. A crowd of us round a corner smoking would get the tip ‘Officer Coming’. We would set off at ten-second intervals and watch as the officer saluted his way to paralysis of the arm.
DIEPPE
On August 18th, 1942, we were learning how to shoot Bren and Vickers machine-guns at Fairbright. The range was on the cliff facing out to sea. Our instructors were from the Brigade of Guards. We stood at ease while a Grenadier Guards Sergeant told us the intricacies of the “Vickers 303 Water-Cooled Machine-Gun. I will first teach yew which is the safe end and which is the naughty end. Next, I will show ew how to load, point and fire the weapon. Following this, I will dismantle the gun and reassemble it. It’s not difficult; I have a three-year-old daughter at home who does it in six minutes. Anyone here fired one before?” I had, but I wasn’t going to fall into the trap. Never volunteer for anything in the army. So the day started. It was worth it just to hear the military repartee. “What’s the matter with you man, point the bloody gun at the target, I’ve seem blind crippled hunchback shoot straighter than that! Don’t close yer eyes when you pull the trigger! Remember Mummy wants you to grow up a brave little soldier, doesn’t she? You’re firing into the ground man! We’re supposed to shoot the Germans not bloody worms! Steady, you’re snatching the trigger, squeeze it slowly, like a bird’s tits. Left-handed are you? Well, I’m sorry we can’t have the weapon rebuilt for you, you’ll have to learn to be right-handed for the duration.” Then, to little Flash Gordon, who got in a hopeless mess trying to load the Bren. “No no son, tell you what, you go and stand behind that tree and say the Lord’s Prayer and ask him to tell you to STOP WASTING MY BLOODY TIME!” The day was alive with these sayings.