Attenshun!

Doug Ross wrote...

I did my National Service with the RAF from June 53 to 55. After being kitted out during the first week of entry at RAF Padgate it didn’t seem so bad as expected.

Most of our time was spent marking every bit of our kit with your service number, and spit and polishing the toe-caps of your new boots, until you could almost see your face in them.

However, at the end of the week, our flight intake were to be transported by bus to RAF Hednesford near Walsall, where we were to do our eight weeks square-bashing. (We were the last flight to kitted out at Padgate).

No sooner had we arrived at Hednesford, when suddenly all hell was let loose with umpteen Drill Instructors (DI’s) yelling their orders to get off the bus at the double etc.

We were then taken to our allocated billet by our corporal DI where he started to lay the law down to us, unfortunately a young lad standing next to me fainted and fell to the floor.

Two of us went to pick him up, and as we did so, we heard the DI say in snarling way, “ It’s a good job he didn’t split his head and dirty my clean floor”.( Charming, welcome to the RAF)! Yes, we did all those clever things like, scraping the brush handles clean with a razor blade etc, polishing the floor till it shone and keeping it shining by sliding on felt pads, NEVER walking on the floor in your boots!! Whilst in your locker, shirts and vests were arranged BLUE:WHITE:BLUE:WHITE etc.

However, I can honestly say that, after a delayed completion to my training due to having my Appendix removed, (Brought on by the that particular mornings' Physical Exercises) courtesy of the RAF, I actually enjoyed my time in the Service, especially after completion of my Technical Training as an Electrical Fitter with the rank of Junior Technician, and the eventual posting to RAF Ouston ( now Albemarle Barracks) outside Newcastle.

This being due to a compassionate posting as my father was very ill at that time.

Ouston was home to the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, 607 Fighter Squadron at the time I was there (1954/55), and was equipped with 15 Vampire Jets, 2 Meteor Jets, a Spitfire and Tiger Moth.

Being an Auxiliary Squadron , all servicing to the aircraft was done during the week, so they were ready for when the Auxiliary Pilots came in to do their weekend Flying Training.

One of the highlights I was fortunate to enjoy was when I got the chance to fly in one of the Meteor Jets during one weekend when the Auxiliary Pilots were doing their target firing practices at the Target Drogue which was towed by the Meteor.

After a steep climb on take-off so as to eliminate dragging the Drogue too long across the ground we headed to the Farne Islands where the target practices were to take place.

As I turned to look back, there was this Vampire Jet baring down into the attack firing at the target when in range.

I was glad that the target was being towed 800 feet behind us, but you could just imagine what it must have been like if this had been the real thing and the target was you.!!

Another highlight of my time with 607 Squadron, was when Ouston held the BATTLE of BRITAIN at home to the Public celebration in 1954. I was a member of the Duty Crew that weekend which involved looking after all of the visiting aircraft as well as our own, which were there to entertain the Public. It was a hectic time but great fun.

The camaraderie at RAF Ouston was great even when we had to do the odd bit of bull from time to time, especially when competing with the Officers in the squadron sports.

On the occasion when Ouston had the AOC’s Inspection Day, afterwards a camp dance would be held in the NAFFI with busloads of girls brought in from Newcastle.

Maybe I was lucky, but I did enjoy my National Service in the RAF.

Posted by: Doug Ross  | February 12, 2008 7:29 AM

George Milligan wrote...

Report to RAMC Depot, Keogh Barracks, Hytchett, nearest station Ash Vale. That was the instruction that came through my letter box in 1952. So began two years out of my life. The memory lingers on.

In 1952 I and many others arrived on Ash Vale Station, a dull January day, the truck which was waiting whisked us off to Keogh Barracks.

In one day we were transformed, we go the usual kit, denims, knife fork, spoon, etc. I remember they gave us brown paper and string with instructions to pack our civilian clothes and send them home. “You will not need those anymore,” they said. We did not.

The first night many tears were unashamedly shed. We were bewildered.

Then commenced three months of intensive training. We learned in three months what it takes three years to learn. Then came the passing out parade, postings, we were ready for war. So the Powers said.

Postings, I drew Malaya. We were literally the virgin soldiers, many left - some never came back.
Arrived Neeson transit camp.

Then up country to Perak State, Malaya. They gave us a rifle and 10 rounds of ammo with instructions not to fire if fired on, but to lie down in floor of train till hostilities ended. What a war this was to be.

They called us the Can’t Manage a Rifle Squad. RAMC backwards.

Arrived BMH Kamunting (now a police station) where for the next 18 months I nursed Ghurkas with snake-bits, gunshot wounds.

Once had a full ward of Ghurka boys with mumps. My most vivid memory is of nursing a young 18-year-old national serviceman through the night who has been injured by a phosphorus bomb - I’ll never forget it.
I looked after one lad who had drunk iodine so as to avoid guard duty.

Oh, what days they were. We had change of air in the Cameron Highlands. Leave, two weeks in Penang (luxury that). We weathered the monsoons, sweated, had our free ration of cigarettes - 50 a week - we learned a bit of the lingo.

We served the Corps and strangely, came to like it. All the time marking off the days - I still have the calendar somewhere, then, duty done, time for home.

England here we come. They even asked us to sign on. No way. But some did and one lad remained behind and went into one of the monasteries to be a monk. But we boarded HMS Dunera at Singapore for home.

Civvy Street again. I had worked for two years with women in charge of me. Nursing Sisters, I vowed never to work with them again. I ended up working with them again - for the past 30 years in hospital service. National Service changed my life.

Before it I was a grocer. Since I have spent my life in the hospitals, strange as it may seem, I would do it all again.

Posted by: George Milligan  | February 12, 2008 7:32 AM

Ron Shepherd wrote...

Feb 19, 1948: Reported to Fenham Barracks for six weeks training.

April 1, 1948: Posted to Regiment of the Royal Engineers at Barton Stacey, in Hampshire.

May 4, 1948: Sailed from Liverpool on the MV Staffordshire bound for the Middle East, via Gibraltar, Pierus, Solonika, Haifa, arriving in Port Said.

May 20, 1948: Went by train down to Suez.

June 4, 1948: Moved from Suez back to Port Said and then by train to Benghazi.

I was trained to build Bailey Bridges, in mine clearance and bomb disposal.

I was also in Tripoli and Tobruck.

Ron says he enjoyed the discipline and travel of National Service.

Ron was demobbed in 1950.

Posted by: Ron Shepherd  | February 12, 2008 7:32 AM

Tom Lough wrote...

Your article on National Service brought back memories - good and bad.

September 1951, an 18-year-old student plucked from the bosom of his protective parents. I remember my father’s words of wisdom, as he said his goodbyes to me on Newcastle Central Station.

With a tear in his eye, he hugged me and said “watch what our doing.”

This could have had several connotations but I think it was meant as advice on sexual behaviour.

Like Mike Barron I also did my 12 weeks square-bashing at Padgate and what a miserable time that was.

I remember being on the parade ground on the first day and a drill sergeant drawing our attention to the Water Tower.

He said if you find this experience too much for you and you want to leave early you can jump off there.

It seems that a couple of recruits had committed suicide from the Tower in the past. I don’t know whether that was true or not.

It was at Padgate where my character building, self discipline and survival instincts began but what an ordeal!

The endless marching on the square, the weekly visit to the assault course, the rifle range without any ear protection (I’m sure that must have been where my right eardrum was perforated).

Home comforts were non-existent and the food was atrocious.

Mike’s description of the “wartime huts” is accurate enough but he should have also mentioned the polishing and maintaining the lino floor and how we shuffled about on pieces of cloth to keep up the shine and not scratch it.

Weekly kit inspections were a nightmare in case any of your kit was missing.

If you lost a piece of kit you “nicked” someone else’s because at the end of the line the one who was “left-short” get extra fatigues - usually the cookhouse or “jankers” (reporting to the guardsman in full kit at certain times of the day).

There was no right of appeal or right to redress if you were wrongly disciplined.

There was a strong feeling of injustice but you had to accept it and then forget about it.

The bonding that developed amongst these young conscripts was tremendous - probably because we were all in the same s... and together.

After Padgate I was sent to AF Yatesbury in Wiltshire to be trained as a Radar Operator.

I can assure you that the Wiltshire Downs in Jan/Feb 1952 was not the place to be. Washing and shaving in cold water in freezing temperatures and going to bed fully clothes (including the overcoat and beret) to keep warm.

As a Geordie I loved my New Year’s Eve at home - ‘first footing’ with my mates - girls and boys together. New Year’s Even 1951/52, myself and a couple of mates were about to leave our billet to go to the NAAFA from a ‘knees up’ when the duty sergeant burst in about 7pm, “you, you, you to the cookhouse now. “But sarg, it’s New Year’s Eve.”

His reply was that we should have been “long gone,” he was the duty sergeant and he needed men in the cookhouse so get on with it. We managed to get away form the cookhouse about 11.30pm. Just made it to the NAAFA for “last orders.”

After trade training, I was posted to Germany where I spent the next 18 months ‘keeping tabs’ on the air traffic movements of aircraft in Eastern Germany controlled by the Russians.

The Germany experience was much better. Civilian cooks with a small choice of menu - “not take it or leave it.” We were fortunate with our accommodation too as we were housed in an ex-Wermacht building - four beds to a room in a stone built building.

I suppose each of us has to reach our own conclusions as to the merits of National Service. I’m undecided; sometimes I extol its merits for character building, discipline, fitness, making men out of boys etc..

At other times, I wonder what I could have done with those two years in civvy street.

Posted by: Tom Lough  | February 12, 2008 7:33 AM

Joe McHenry wrote...

Hi,
I was posted to Fenham Barracks in Newcastle late summer 1957 to April 1959 - two of the happiest years of my life. We shared the Barracks and guard duties with the Northumberland Fusiliers.
I was in the Royal Army Pay Corps and worked up at Blakelaw at the offices there. The people of Newcastle were very welcoming and generous to us National Service lads, many of us had never been away from home...
Could you recommend a book of photographs of old Newcastle 1957-1959?
I doubt I would recognise the modern city it has become.
Thanks
Joe

Posted by: Joe McHenry  | April 13, 2008 12:03 AM