Floridablade   11 #37 Posted August 29, 2007 Yes we were in the same squad, as I said earlier i was sent to Pinderfields to have a Hernia op. so I didn't finish my basic training until later, in fact I think I left after a couple of weeks. I remember a lad called Clay from Rotherham because his number was 21033317 and his name rhymed with mine KAY. Remember the Iron which was raffled off and the corporals mate always won it.  I went to Richmond Park after coming out of hospital to recouperate and get the Army huts ready for the 1948 Olympic games, just imagine that compared to the pampered " athletes " today. The Barracks in Pontefract is now a T.A, centre.  So you were skiving in Germany while I was doing my bit in Gibraltar having to put up with that warm sunshine and Spanish women. Life just isn't fair,is it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Texas   10 #38 Posted August 30, 2007 I had occasion to pass nearby Catterick a few years ago so I made a detour to have a look at Baghdad Lines. Obviously it had changed enormously. The old barrack huts are no more, replaced by what looked like dwellings with a ground and upper floor. When I was there in 1951, the saplings, which bordered the road and Vimy square, are now mature trees, obviously. The big barrack blocks of Vimy are gone, its all different. I nearly went to have a look at 2TR, but after driving around a bit I began to lose my way, so I packed it in. The huts at 2TR, I remember were older than the ones at Baghdad, and more vandalised by generations of troops passing thro'. The winter of 51-52, when we were there, I remember taking the wood off the toilet cisterns to make a fire. We had one of those little pot-bellied stoves and that was it. Man, it was cold up there. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Floridablade   11 #39 Posted August 31, 2007 After we had finished corps training we were put into some old barracks with windows long gone and doors hanging off. Catterick in the winter of '47 was brass monkey land so in order to save coke for heating and cooking most of the troops were given leave, we were the mugs who stayed behind.  We spent most of the day out on the moors digging out farmers who sometimes fed us, sometimes didn't in which case we scoffed the stale sandwiches. There was no coke for the belly stoves so we started breaking up the barracks, which was the old H wooden huts. The Sergeant Major on parade the next morning told us in no uncertain terms that if he saw one piece of wood taken from the " living " quarters somebody was for the high jump.  On parade the next day he wanted to know who had taken the side off his office, and who had stolen his coke. We were threatened with the most dire punishment like a nice cosy cell in Colchester or even the local gaol. We were told that until the bxxxxxxd owned up we would not be allowed out of camp, the threats were meaningless since we couldn't be much worse off.  When I look at some of these kids today and hear their cries I wonder what they would do in a trench in a Korean winter. I was there after the war 1954 but I heard all the stories my previous regiment, 1st R.N.F went through. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Texas   10 #40 Posted September 2, 2007 How did you all go on with shooting on the ranges? I did the preliminary's with the .303 on a stand, just to practise using the sights, then I didn't see a rifle until I started basic training proper with the 51-14's. I remember the first time I ever fired a .303, on the 30 yard range. I must've moved back about 4 to 6 inches after squeezing the trigger, and I went immediately stone deaf. Lord knows where the round went. We did five rounds and all I got was an inner. I never did become any good at shooting, about average I suppose. Later on we went on the 1,000 yard range. I was hip to how they used the sling at Bisley, wrapping it around the elbow to give more control, also I took my helmet off. It didn't go down very well with the Officer in charge. I managed to squeeze a couple off though before he realised. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
sweetdexter   10 #41 Posted September 2, 2007 At one time our band was 'Over Strength' so some of us where added to the Drums strength to make everything look Pukka. Because of this we had to be 'Reclassified' on the Lee Enfield 303.. By some quirk,( which was probably par for the course in the Army) I was classified as 1st class. Having probably the worst eyesight in the regiment made this a joke. We where once on riot patrol with the Drum Corps. I think it was the Nationalist Anniversary We walked in formation down a street in Hong Kong . In front where some guys with a banner that said in Chinese characters "Disperse or we fire". My position was at the end a a line sighting the rooftops looking for snipers.(Because of my 1st class designation) If the Chinese had known they would have been ******* their pants laughing. I would have been lucky to hit a barn door at 10' Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Arundel   10 #42 Posted September 3, 2007 I did quite well with my rifle range shooting. Finished up with my crossed rifles arm badge for "Marksman" Don't think it brought me in any extra money.. When in Germany later with the Airborne Artillery I was part of the 6 pounder anti-tank gun team and had a great time knocking the turrets of old german tanks on the ranges. All in all, I seemed to enjoy my National Service - it taught me a lot. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Harleyman   12 #43 Posted September 3, 2007 I did two years in the Rotyal Artillery a year and a half of which was spent in Malaysia (then Malaya). Not only did we spend time without end on the gunnery ranges we also had to do patrols with the Aussies in the stinking fetid jungles like the infantry mob do. It rained every morning around 2 AM and there were snakes, leeches, millions of mosquitos and scorpions all around us. There were also some communist guerrilas still operating in small scattered groups but we never met any. I loathed every day I spent in that country. The only girls who would have anything to do with us were the whores and bar tarts and the British civilians who managed the rubber plantations ignored us completely. Once we went up to the Cameron Highlands for a change of climate and there was a beautiful British style pub there owned by some English people Right away our officers made it quite clear that it was for officers only. No "enlisted riff raff please" When the troopship arrived in Singapore to take us home I must have felt like some newly liberated world war 2 prisoner of war.  Did two years of this do me any good? Yes it did - in a way. When I came out I could stand on my own two feet, support myself and not take crap from anybody. National Service made boys into men but it could also be a school of hard knocks too. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
sweetdexter   10 #44 Posted September 3, 2007 I did two years in the Rotyal Artillery a year and a half of which was spent in Malaysia (then Malaya). Not only did we spend time without end on the gunnery ranges we also had to do patrols with the Aussies in the stinking fetid jungles like the infantry mob do. It rained every morning around 2 AM and there were snakes, leeches, millions of mosquitos and scorpions all around us. There were also some communist guerrilas still operating in small scattered groups but we never met any. I loathed every day I spent in that country. The only girls who would have anything to do with us were the whores and bar tarts and the British civilians who managed the rubber plantations ignored us completely. Once we went up to the Cameron Highlands for a change of climate and there was a beautiful British style pub there owned by some English people Right away our officers made it quite clear that it was for officers only. No "enlisted riff raff please" When the troopship arrived in Singapore to take us home I must have felt like some newly liberated world war 2 prisoner of war.  Did two years of this do me any good? Yes it did - in a way. When I came out I could stand on my own two feet, support myself and not take crap from anybody. National Service made boys into men but it could also be a school of hard knocks too.   The younger forumers who do not know what Jim Austen is talking about may want to try and find a Movie 'Virgin Soldiers" A British movie made in 1969 about National servicemen in that part of the world during 50s-60s Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Texas   10 #45 Posted September 3, 2007 The post by jim austen sounds like a bit of real action. I was lucky myself, I didn't see any really. Did see the storming of the Police Post in Ismalia in Egypt though, by the Lancashire Regiment I think. I remember just after that incident, there was a real flap on. Everybody was on high alert and all civilian transport (Egyptian), was being stopped and searched for weapons and explosives, etc. We were ordered to stop all cars and buses in our area, not an experience I'd recommend, especially the buses. Some of the Officers loved it, charging around and shouting, waving revolvers. Mind you, I would've been the same, if I'd been an Officer, they didn't have to get on the buses. All that kind of thing went on for months to a greater or lesser degree. I got to carry a rifle around with no rounds in it, my best friend it was, or so I was told. And I thought it was my knife and fork. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Harleyman   12 #46 Posted September 3, 2007 I read the book "The Virgin Soldiers" that Sweetdexter mentions. Did not see the movie. Whoever wrote the book was writing from personal experience. That's very obvious. Unlike the soldiers in the book we were not there during the Emergency. It had ended just over a year before I got there although as I mentioned there were still a few die hards hiding out in the jungles.  The army was a huge bureaucracy back in those days. Most of us thought the drill sergeants and corporals to be graduates of the Marquis de Sade Academy for Sadistic Practices but looking back on it all after so many years the fact is that they had a rotten job to do. They had to try and turn thousands upon thousands of unwilling national servicemen into something resembling professional soldiers. Young men who wanted to be anywhere else but in an Army recruit training camp.  At the time though I firmly believed that they were in fact a bunch of sadists.  In training camp I was detailed to be ablution orderly (latrine cleaner) on my 21st birthday of all days.  A few days later my sister came all the way up from London to Oswestry, Shropshire to visit me. Back then that was almost a full days journey and she had to hitch a ride from the train station to the camp. When she arrived at the guardhouse the duty NCO told her she could not see me because of "Army Regulations" I did not know she was coming. This was before most people had home phones and eons before mobile phones. She was only eighteen then and was quite shattered at this refusal and broke down into tears. Later that day the NCO informed me of her attempt to see me and I wondered why he had bothered to tell me about this after the fact. Defintely an act of sheer sadism I thought.  The army had some tricks up their sleeves when it came to postings. While at the RA Depot I took a course in firing range practices and tecniques. We were all bound for West Germany then but we were told that the top seven scoreres in the class would get a choice of posting. Soldiers returning from Germany told us to avoid at all costs a posting there due to the amount of BS they had experienced. Soldiers coming back from Hong Kong all said it was a great place to be posted to. I and my two mates came in the top seven and all put in for Hong Kong. The sergeant told us not to put Hong Kong on the form but instead FARELF (Far East Land Forces). Same thing as putting in for Hong Kong he assured us. Having written the fateful FARELF word the next thing we knew was that we were all off to Malaya. A posting that was known to be even worse than west Germany.  Now so many years later I have come to the conclusion that like all great big bureaucracies the army back then was not intentionaklly sadistic. Just merely insensitive. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
sweetdexter   10 #47 Posted September 3, 2007 The Lancashire Regiment was not formed till 59-60. It was an amalgamation of The Ist Battallion South Lancashire Regiment and 1st Battalion East Lacashire Regiment. There were other Lancashire Regiments at that time. The Fusiliers and The Loyal Regiment,others I cannot remember. All except the Fusiliers had there Depot at Fullwood Barracks Preston. I think Acker Bilk played clarinet in the Loyal Band. Maybe it was Kenny Ball on Cornet,anway someone who went on to greater fame played in the Loyal Regimental Band. Incedently The leader of the N.D.O( Northern Dance Orchestra ) in the 60s sat in my chair in the East Lancashire Regimental band sometime before I joined. I think it was Bernard Herman Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...
Texas   10 #48 Posted September 4, 2007 Funny you should pick that up. It was the Lancashire Fusiliers I meant, didn't they wear a red cockade behind the cap badge? I think it was Leslie Thomas who wrote 'The Virgin Soldiers'. Back to basic again, our Sergeant at Vimy was a Sergeant Thompson. Actually he wasn't all that bad off the square but on it he was the typical *******. Tall guy, reminded me a bit of Christopher Lee in vampire mode. He had those kind of teeth and eyes, scared the crap out of me, thats for sure. What with the teeth and a voice resembling a jet plane taking off, he was good at his job. We were just like any other intake I guess, but he made a point of telling us that we were the biggest shower of s*** he'd ever seen in his life. There were about twelve squads at Vimy doing basic. Ours had the usual characters, didn't know their left from their right, couldn't coordinate their arms and legs, couldn't stand up straight, couldn't LIFT a rifle, but I'm telling you, when good old Sergeant Thomo' had finished with us we actually won the bloody drill shield. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites Share this content via...