National service

[fleetwood 10]

After reading all your posts, my memory starts kicking in, Vimy, Bagdad etc. You guys seem to remember which T.R. and the name of lines you would be in,given your trade. Likewise I took a nostalgic trip to Catterick a few years ago, could not get my bearings and could'nt indentify anything, one thing was for sure though the Signals had gone, I suppose many other buildings had also disappeared along the way. One thing I do remember about my National Service days there if you couldn't manage a 36hr or 48hr pass on a particular weeked the next best thing was an evening out at the N.A.A.F.I. club, as I recall it was a modern building with cafeteria, reading rooms, they might even have had overnight accommodations and best of all they had a dance hall with a small live band, I think the ladies were allowed in free on the assumption they would partner the lonely soldiers. As far as I remember the club was in Darlington or just outside. Does anybody remember this? and does it exist tday? One other thing on my trip, I visited the Green Howards museum, an older lady that was operating and the curator of this small museum and had lived around there forever gave me a few historical facts on the area. The huts where we had spent our basic training, had not been originally built for the Crimean war as I had thought, but had been built for the first world war, silly me!

[prioryx 10]

After reading all your posts, my memory starts kicking in, Vimy, Bagdad etc. You guys seem to remember which T.R. and the name of lines you would be in,given your trade. Likewise I took a nostalgic trip to Catterick a few years ago, could not get my bearings and could'nt indentify anything, one thing was for sure though the Signals had gone, I suppose many other buildings had also disappeared along the way. One thing I do remember about my National Service days there if you couldn't manage a 36hr or 48hr pass on a particular weeked the next best thing was an evening out at the N.A.A.F.I. club, as I recall it was a modern building with cafeteria, reading rooms, they might even have had overnight accommodations and best of all they had a dance hall with a small live band, I think the ladies were allowed in free on the assumption they would partner the lonely soldiers. As far as I remember the club was in Darlington or just outside. Does anybody remember this? and does it exist tday? One other thing on my trip, I visited the Green Howards museum, an older lady that was operating and the curator of this small museum and had lived around there forever gave me a few historical facts on the area. The huts where we had spent our basic training, had not been originally built for the Crimean war as I had thought, but had been built for the first world war, silly me!

 

 

 

The NAFFI club was at camp centre near the Post Office and the cinema and the RMP HQ.

I have just received the Shutter Telegraph from the Signals association and there is poem in it which looks to have been written during WW1. I had an uncle told me that he was employed to erect the huts and then the Sandhurst blocks.

[Texas 10]

The only time I ever went in the NAFFI club at Camp Center was after being in basic training for a couple of weeks. I felt lousy, we'd just had the TAB2 and I put it down to that. It turned out to be Tonsilitis. They had these pint glasses of orange juice, anybody remember them? I had one and it came straight back up, so the threw me out for being drunk. An MP sergeant took me down to Baghdad Lines in a truck and straight into the Guardhouse. That was the worst time I had in the Army.

They soon cottoned on that I wasn't drunk and let me go back to the billet. I finished up in the Military Hospital wearing a blue suit with the red tie.

[fleetwood 10]

All you military types cast your mind back. Did any of you guys pass through London on your way overseas or wherever around the 50's, this is what I want to know, does anybody remember the part of the underground/tube that was used as a transit depot for personnel waiting to make connections to other destinations? We spent a couple of days there prior to flying overseas and if I'm not mistaken, on our return also before going for demob. To me it seemed like a hell hole, it was hot with the walls streaming with condensation and sweat. I don't know how deep it was (but seemed all the deeper for the hundreds of staires we had to climb,) I know we were not allowed to use the elevator, that was reserved for the officers and the like. We were in our sweaty battledress, I remember some Canadian soldiers (with envy) in there thin gaberdine uniforms. My questions are, when did this come to being? Was it used in the same capicity or a shelter during WW2? Did this eventually become part of the London underground system again? I might add you could hear the rumbling of the trains like they were coming through the walls.

[Texas 10]

That would be Goodge Street. Our demob group(only seven or eight of us)stayed there overnight on arrival back in the U.K.we just dumped the kit and were gone. Straight down Tottenham Court Road and the fleshpots. I didn't get back until three in the morning, along with my escort. ( I was supposed to be under open arrest).

I dont know when it closed but closed it is. All I can recall were bunks along the walls of a long corridor. There didn't seem to be anyone in charge, a Corporal gave us travel documents to Newton Abbot. And we got the lift.

[fleetwood 10]

Thanks TEXAS I hope there are more posts on this topic.

[Floridablade 11]

I was operated on in for a hernia in a military hospital in Wakefield ( Pinderfields ) then posted to Kingston upon Thames to recuperate. The camp was in the park and all we did all day was play football or hockey and physical torture. The 1948 Olympic games were held in London in 1948 and the camp was going to be got ready for the competitors, imagine that, so we spent days painting the huts. I had been a painter and decorator before being called up so I was given a free hand, I painted a country's flag on each door and all the huts in olive drab. I was then posted to Strensall outside York awaiting posting and there I came across a WO2 from the Arborthorne estate who gave me 2 weeks leave providing i took some grub to his house. There was nobody in the camp except the permanent staff, no bedding, nothing so I just went back on friday to pick up my pay along with hundreds of others and then went back home. Every Friday that WO2 gave me a ton of grub which kept his and our family going until they finally posted me to Gibraltar.

[sweetdexter 10]

I was a painter and decorator

 

Floridablade ,Who did you work for?

[CMax 10]

I would have been called up for National Service but I signed on for extra years so I could join a Military Band.

I served for two years in Hong Kong !958-60.

Looking back they were years that were very informative, and broadened my mind no end.

Not a complete waste of time .

I was glad I was there.

What do other 68's year olds and older think?

 

Was doing national service from Jan 1956 to jan 1958. Went to suez crisis in November 1956. Made a man out of me. I wouldn't say everyone should do nat. service but the yobs of today should be put through a similar regime for a period.The tv series 'Bad Lads Army' is typical of what they should be put through

[Floridablade 11]

I did as I indicated before from Korea left in 1956 on the Empire Fowey.

[Floridablade 11]

Which unit were you with in the suez crisis, I was with 3 div. Signals, Colchester . Went to Suez on a supply boat from Barry docks in Wales.

[buck 11]

I was a Navy regular at RNAS Worthy Down in 1956 when a few conscripts were coming into the service. Most went to the army or RAF. On this occasion, one of the rookies was the son of a major steel magnate from around Sheffield, and ranked an Ordinary Seaman. He flew back to camp one weekend in his private Miles Gemini, twin engined airplane. The officers were not amused, and promptly banned it. Officers never did like ratings having better cars or anything then. My pal had an Armstrong Siddeley, and couldn't get a parking permit. I got one for my Austin 7 and used to ferry him to his car.