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A Taylor At War - Ch 1, Parts 5 & 6.

This post is part of the "Granddad's War Stories" series.  Double-post this week (these two sections were both on the short side).  Aren't you lucky people?!

Chapter 1 - Home Service.

Part 5, A new start.

My morale was low as I travelled to take up my new appointment as Assistant Adjutant to a newly formed Regiment.  Adjutants and their Assistants look after the administration of a Regiment and although they have numerous operational duties, these are mostly affecting personnel and logistics.  I didn’t want a desk job.  I wanted the sharp end.

The Adjutant was a nice chap but was more interested in horses and women than his adjutantle duties.  The Chief Clerk recognised in me a fellow-craftsman and the two of us ran the administration to the delight of the Adjutant and the fury of the Colonel.  It could not last and the Adjutant was sacked and a very nice Lecturer in Psychology from Edinburgh University took over.  A period of peace and harmony ensued.  We moved up to Bradford in Yorkshire with Batteries and their Troops covering every airfield in the country.  Soon we moved to a delightful little village near York called Askam Bryan and took over the big house in the village.

I had now been at Regimental Headquarters for nearly a year and I felt that time was passing me by so I decided to speak to the Colonel.  He was a Regular Indian Army Officer with 1914/18 War experience.  He knew everybody in the War Office!

“Excuse me Sir, may I speak to you on a personal matter?”

“Yes,” he said looking up.

“I feel that it’s time for me to go out to a Battery.”

“Yes?”

“I’m not looking for a promotion to Lieutenant, I just feel I’d like a transfer in the same rank to learn more.”

“Yes.”

“Thank you Sir.”

“Yes.”

One day about a month later the Chief Clerk said to me: “I feel you would like to read this letter which the Colonel has just signed.”  My eyes nearly popped out.  It was a memo from the C.O. to me appointing me second in command of a Battery with the immediate rank of Captain.  I looked helplessly at the Chief Clerk.  “The Boss knows them all up there, Sir,” he said by way of explanation.

I departed for my new job at Lowthorpe near Driffield which is near Bridlington in East Yorkshire, with three Beautiful shining pips on each shoulder and a light heart.

__

Yessssssss!  Go Granddad!!  I've learned from Grandma that he joined up at a time when many in Northern Ireland didn't - and you can see his determination here to bounce back from his disappointment and play an active role in serving his country.  I've been picturing characters as I go along (everyone does that when they read I s'pose) and in that little cameo from the Colonel he was this robust old man with a huge bushy white 'tache and rosy cheeks - a kind of military Santa!

I've had to look up the order of Army ranks on Wikipedia in order to work out the significance of this latest promotion.  He basically moved up two rungs in one go.  Top stuff.  Anyway, back to the story...

Map updated with Granddad's movements from these 2 sections. I've annotated it a bit now.Bigger one here.

Part 6, Digging in.

The job of second-in-command of a Battery is to deputise for the Commander (a Major) and to take charge of operational training and to supervise the Quartermaster’s Department.  These were the remaining two fields in which I had not had practical experience and I looked forward to getting it.  In addition, the Major was a splendid chap who had been a tea-planter in Ceylon.

It was a very happy time despite beng involved in a very inefficient defence system know as A.D.G.B. - Air Defence of Great Britain.  All our guns were looking after the defence of airfields and enemy attacks were few and far between.  The men grew static with long hours trying to spot aircraft which were not there.  The top brass (which was static itself but didn’t know it) tried to remedy the situation by getting the chaps to whitewash dustbins and grow flowers around gun sites.

Then we got wonderful news.  We were to be part of the order of battle for the invasion of Europe.  Training was to start immediately in matters relating to mobile warfare, following which we were to receive basic infantry training.  All old men (40 and over) were transferred.  By the time we had finished, our oldest Officer was aged 30, and he was always referred to as “the old man.”  The policy was correct because active warfare for regimental officers is utterly exhausting both mentally and physically.

Since I was in charge of training, my day had really dawned.  I was packed off to Wimborne Minster in the New Forest, there to be taught with great efficiency all aspects of mobile gun warfare.  I found it fascinating and took to it like a duck to water.

__

See, I told you they were short sections.  I'm liking Granddad's healthy contempt for authority that's started to show through here.  Hardly surprising, is it?  Imagine sitting in an Anti-Aircraft Battery and receiving a telegram from HQ... your heart beats faster "is this THE call?"... no.  Its an instruction turn dustbins into makeshift ornamental gardens!  It beggars belief.  I'd have probably thought it a hoax.

Granddad was actually a pretty keen gardener, but he'd have hated being instructed to waste time.  I think pretty much everyone hates that.  At Nonsense we've just taken someone on, and I'm conscious of not filling up Nick's time with this kind of "filler" stuff.  I reckon the only people who like being given pointless tasks are school kids.  When you're at school, anything that's not a lesson is basically brilliant.  Even fire alarm drills.

Also, a little thing I've noticed is how Granddad always refers to people by the previous job, before being in the Army.  We had a University Lecturer and a Ceylon tea-planter in those last two chapters.  (The latter was a Major, so I'm assuming he owned a tea plantation in India, rather than walking round picking leaves.)  I think this is partially because Granddad is deliberately not mentioning names, but also because that's how everyone saw themselves at the time.  Just ordinary people taking time out from ordinary jobs to fight the Nazis.  It's something that's easy to forget with all the talk of ranks, guns, orders etc.

I can sense the story is about to kick off now, so I'm pretty excited.  As a family, we once went to Normandy with Granddad and Grandma to Normandy, to see where he landed - it was near the 40th anniversary of D-Day at the time.  Mum / DaD... any photos from that trip?  Might need 'm to spice up next week's post.

A Taylor At War - Ch 1, Part 4.

This post is part of the "Granddad's War Stories" series.

Chapter 1 - Home Service.

Part 4, Lowest form of human life.

I had often heard that a Second Lieutenant was the lowest form of human life, never believed it, but was about to prove it true.  Sergeant-Majors knocked Sergeants.  Sergeants knocked Bombadiers who knocked Gunners who didn't mind because they were no gentlemen.  Captains and Lieutenants knocked Second Lieutenants on every possible occasion and they, poor things, had nobody to knock except Sergeant-Majors and not even a General would dare to do that.

I arrived at Trent Bridge Cricket Ground on a Saturday to join my new Regiment.  I was met by the Adjutant (a Captain) who said breezily to a Lieutenant "This is Taylor the new chap.  He will take over B Troop on Monday.  In the meantime see he gets fixed up."  The Lieutenant leered at me unpleasantly and said "Good.  You can take Church Parade tomorrow" and departed leaving me to "fix up" myself.  The next morning I was faced by a squad of cleaned-up gunners and a Sergeant, who obviously expected me to do something.  I hadn't the least idea what to do.  I could have given them a learned discourse on ballistics, explained how metal fatigue leading to "droop" affected gun barrels or how to construct an Ottway Pit, but I had no idea how to get the squad moving towards the Church.  Fortunately, the Sergeant was a decent chap and gave all the orders for me and we got to Church.

Then we were in to the next crisis.  The chaps were all marched into the Church and the Vicar then led me in and placed me all alone two pews in front of the soldiery.  I was a Presbyterian and knew that Episcopalians kept jumping up and down, kneeling and standing up, without cause but probably with a reason, but the trouble was I didn't know the reason.  I felt 30 pairs of eyes glued to my shoulder blades as the squad prepared to take their cue from me.  But salvation was at hand.  A lady about the age of my own Mother was in a pew to the right and with complete insight, which only a mother has, saw my problem.  I never took my eyes off her for the whole service and stood up and kneeled with an efficiency that would have pleased an Archbishop.  Going out she said: "So nice to see you Lieutenant."  Then winked.  One of my favourite ladies that, whoever she was.

I took over my Troop next day and was surprised to find that they had never been commanded by an Officer, our breed still being in very short supply.  I was suddenly faced with all the domestic and operational problems of a Troop of 70 men and 6 guns and only the vaguest idea of how to go about it.  I realised the big gap between the academic and the practical and there was nobody to help me.  I did my best, but was floundering horribly.

The Troop was moved from providing protection to a factory on the River Trent to the R.A.F. bomber station at Scampton near Lincoln and I didn't enjoy it.  I was the only soldier in the officers' mess and was always referred to as "The Brown Job," because of the colour of my uniform.  The tensions were very great.  We would all have an evening meal together and the aircrew were silent as they thought about the coming "prang."  I'd watch them go off - bomber after bomber in quick succession with one roar blending into the next.  And then a profound silence.  At dawn the roaring started again as they came in.  This time not continuous.  Two, one after the other.  Then a gap.  Then one.  At breakfast I'd notice the empty places.  There were always empty places.  Always.

One day one of the pilots suggested that I should look at my gunsites as a bomber pilot would see them.  So he took me up in his Hampden Bomber.  It had a glass nose in front into which he put me and proceeded to practice dive-bombing.  It caused much merry laughter in the mess and I resolved never to go up in an R.A.F. plane again.

A Hampden Bomber, complete with glass bubble for scaring green Lieutenants.

My Battery Commander decided that he didn't like me and I was sacked.  I saw his point.  But he never even said farewell.  He just sent me a travelling warrant and orders to join another Regiment which was forming.  Not long after, the Regiment I had left was sent to Singapore, immediately went up country in Malaya, met the Japs coming down and was decimated.

__

Hmmm.  Ended on a bit of low note that one, didn't it?  Near miss stories interest me - there's always so many of them for every conflict or catastrophe.  If Granddad hadn't been so under-qualified to command a Troop, I might not be here today.

In fact Granddad's entire time with that Troop seemed fraught.  It must've been so demoralising coming to breakfast with less and less people there each morning.  I can't even begin to imagine what its like.  (In fact, the only parallel I can draw is when one's football team suffers a string of losses and each one feels worse than the last - what a pathetic comparison!  I've led such a cosseted life, haven't I?)

The shortage of Officers reminded me of when you're at school and you get a substitute teacher!  Normally, as kids, you give them a bit of a hard time - but you also unconsciously do a lot to help them out, sitting down in the right place, even telling them what you did in the last lesson... but imagine if you'd never been taught before!  It would be chaos.

And obviously I grinned at the idea of Granddad being terrorised by a cheeky R.A.F. pilot.  It would be pretty scary - but he already had the nickname The Brown Job, so soiling himself wouldn't have made things any worse!

I've been updating my Google Map of Granddad's movements too.  At the moment its still a collection of pins - I want to change those to numbers eventually, and draw on lines in between, but that's gonna take a bit of faffing.  Here's the map (click the link underneath to see it bigger and better).

View Larger Map

Latest work from Nonsense

Here at Nonsense, we've just completed our latest bit of work.  It's for ActionAid UK, and our brief was to get more people to take the "Who pays? pledge", stating that they want to see tougher regulation of how UK supermarkets treats suppliers in developing countries.  So that, in a few weeks, ActionAid can present a big list of names to the Competition Commission (who are set to report on UK supermarkets soon).

I'm gonna resist the urge to bash the likes of Tescos, Sainsbury's etc on this blog.  (Largely because ActionAid do a much better job of that than I ever could here.)  Nor will go off on one about how good a cause it is... that should be obvious.

All I want to say is that we're pretty proud of this.  Rather than build a campaign to get people to sign the pledge, we decided that we'd give people the opportunity to really get involved, by making their own mini-campaign for us.  Here's mine:

This has the obvious benefit of getting people more involved in the Who pays? movement from the start.  And, the thing I really like is how it works as a "distributed widget-y campaign thing" - i.e. members of the public are going out and getting sign ups for us, by embedding it their blogs like I have, or using the clever tools to send it to all their Facebook friends.  It's something I've noticed a few people have been thinking about since Iain Tait posted on his blog about how difficult it is to get good stuff out there these days.

As well as the techie stuff, our friends at Fuse also did the animation work, which I'm sure you'll agree looks beautiful (nice one B-Man!).  When I get time I'll post about being open about collaboration (I've got a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the 'White Label' culture - which strikes me as largely unnecessary).

Anyway, please-please-please-please can you all watch my campaign, sign up, and then make your own and get it out there?  Cheers!

Free Smoothies For Life.

Very clever photo Copyright Me (2008).

Occasional beard-wearer and Innocent Smoothies creative supremo Dan Germain is looking for a full time writer to join the nice folk down at Fruit Towers.

Obviously this is an awesome job, so I won't bother saying why.  Dan's plea is here.  And here's the job bit on the Innocent website.

Douglas & Gordon - the truth.

The other day I wrote about estate agent Douglas & Gordon's decision to ditch DM.

Chief amongst my concerns was to find out whose idea it actually was.  The website claimed Ivor Dickinson - the MD - had the idea.  I found a couple of agencies that listed them as clients (and one company that makes doors!).  So I did a bit of digging.

This started with a call to D&G Head Office.  The secretary was incredibly helpful, and gave me the name of The Ideas Factory - design agency that did the flyer - and I got in touch with design director Will Nice.  Will (whose middle name should be "Is-Genuinely") confirmed that Ivor did have the idea all on his own - although Ideas Factory had been "banging on at Ivor to get green", so they deserve a bit of credit.  (Actually, their design work is good too, so they get lots of credit.)

Then I emailed the man himself.  Ivor didn't disappoint, talking about how there'd been initial resistance to the idea within D&G at first but "Luckily D&G is not very democratic and I've ploughed on regardless"!

If their testimonials page is anything to go by, the gamble is paying off so far.

The issue is, of course, longevity.  Essentially this move by D&G is a stunt - a very good one, but once its dripped through people's mental sieves, where does that leave D&G?  At the moment, there's no evidence this is part of a wider campaign, which would be a shame... hopefully we'll see more from them.

A Taylor At War - Ch 1, Part 3.

This post is part of the "Granddad's War Stories" series.

Chapter 1 - Home Service.

Part 3, To be an Officer and a Gentleman.

The Officer Cadet Training Unit at Llandrindod Wells was scattered throughout the Spa in the hotels all of which had been taken over by the Army.  Our parade ground was the street.  Of all Army Institutions, O.C.T.U.s were the most feared.  The sword of Damocles hung over Cadets who could be returned to their units (R.T.U.) if they did not face the grade.  About 20% did not.  The Battery Sergeant Major made the point very clear on the day of our arrival.  He walked slowly down each rank, stopping in front of every cadet and examined him from highly polished toecaps to sweaty brow.  Finally he stood out in front and addressed us thus:-

"My job at this 'ere place is to turn you lot into Officers and Gentlemen." spoken in the soft voice of sweet reason, which we all knew merely preceded the scream which would follow - "And from what I can see it's going to be bloody well impossible."

I enjoyed O.C.T.U.  It was like a mixture of university and technical college.  There was a library for study, our rooms had writing tables for the same purpose, the gun-sheds were open in the evening for further and voluntary examination of the intestines of the enormous 3.7 gun to the relatively small Bufors 40mm.

A 3.7 inch Anti Aircraft gun as used by British troops in WWII - courtesy of Wikipedia

The lecturers were mostly badly-wounded chaps from various theatres of war or blokes who had been Dons in other places.  We listened, discussed and debated and in time were required to give lectures ourselves.  But over everything, in it and through it at all times we were expected to display the turnout and smartness of the Brigade of Guards.  However, we had some privileges, which included the wearing distinctive white shoulder chevrons and white hat bands, brown boots instead of the usual black and permission to carry one pot of our own marmalade into breakfast.  Off-duty we wore grey flannels, checked sports coats and soft caps set straight on our heads.

A strict eye was kept on our social life.  We were not expected to drink beer excessively, visit vulgar dance halls or associate with loose women.  Married Cadets were allowed to have their wives living in he town so they were alright.  There was only one answer for single chaps and that was to acquire an A.T.S. (female soldier) of which there were dozens at the O.C.T.U., all specially chosen for their suitability to associate with almost-officers and probable-gentlemen.  However, it was well known and throughly understood that any slight indiscretion would lead to a very black mark and any major infringement to immediate R.T.U.  I acquired a delightful lass from Lancashire called Stella who remained with me until I helped her get an incoming Cadet as I left!

Half-way through our training we were mobilised in an emergency which lasted for two days.  Somebody had decided that the Germans had landed in the British Channel area.  I spent the first night in reserve, sleeping on a coal tip and the second day and night in great comfort in somebody's house in Builth Wells.  My job was to peer down the river Wye and make sure that no Germans were paddling in it.  Fortunately, the house had a big bay window overlooking the river, so I opened it, thrust my rifle out of it, packed plush pillows behind my back and allowed the family to bring me hot sweet tea at frequent intervals.  Afterwards there was a row because of the time it had taken to issue rifles from the Armoury to the Cadets, which led to the publication of an order from the C.O, which quickly gathered fame throughout the whole armed forces.  It read:-

"In future, Cadets will sleep with their rifles.  That includes married cadets living out."

About a month before the end of our training we were informed individually if we had passed, with the simple words "You can go and order your uniform."  Off we rushed to Moss Bros. who were well used to the situation and played up to it.  "Good afternoon, Sir.  Has Sir come for his uniform?  Now Sir, this is what most Officers are wearing Sir."  Sweet music.  No longer "'orrible little man," "dozy little soldier."  Now - "Sir."  The instructors did not call us "Sir," but ceased yelling at us.

The great day arrived when the notice went up stating that our commissions had appeared in the London Gazette.  One of our Troop gained a distinction, four of us (including me) were "above average" and the remaining forty passed.

Found Granddad's commission in London Gazette's excellent archive.  Top right-ish, dated Dec 6 1940.  (Click image for bigger.)

I was posted to a regiment H.Q. in the Trent Bridge Cricket Ground Nottingham.  The postings were a mystery, because we had been asked for volunteers for overseas and all the single men (including me) had volunteered.  In the event, A to M were posted overseas and N to Z were allocated to home stations.  A to M contained most of the married men!

One hour before we were due to go to the railway station we took the traditional walk in pairs through the town, twenty yards between pairs.  Cadets, N.C.O. Instructors and Squads on the march all had to salute us and we unashamedly enjoyed it.  We were then taken to the station in cars and one remembered one's arrival when we were crammed like sheep, twenty into the back of a lorry.

On the station platform the Sergeant-Major shook hands with every one of us, saluted and said:-

"Best of luck, Sir."

__

Now we're really getting moving with the story.  I love all the detail here about the clothes they wore and stuff - you can feel Granddad's excitement as prepares to become an Officer.  And as for being a gentleman?  Well, his treatment of "Stella" is a lesson to us all!

That whole scenario with the ladies seems so odd.  I can't get my head round it.

I was really chuffed to find the entry in the London Gazette.  It provides no extra detail at all (other than what must be Granddad's Army number), but I got a real thrill from seeing his name in print.  There's a bunch of shorthand with the entry, but I don't know what most of it means.  Any idea anyone?

My favourite scene has to be Granddad making himself comfortable in the bay window of someone's house, rifle pointing out of the window!  Granddad was someone who always looked at home.  In my mind he's sitting there, holding his neck with his right hand for comfort (a trait I seem to have acquired when I read), or perhaps eating an apple with a sharp knife - quietly content.

Of course he could have been really grumpy that he'd been sent to a backwater, late, with an old rifle to look for fictional Germans... but my romantic view of it just seems to fit better.

Anyway, this is fast turning into a research project, because each chapter I read throws up more questions.  So, yesterday I got the necessary forms to get a copy of Granddad's Army record.  It should list all his promotions, medals etc.  But apparently they don't give many actual details of events.

Hardly surprising really.  How the hell do you keep tabs on an organisation of 1,000s of people, spread over 1,000s of miles, fighting, getting killed, getting promoted... without using computers?!

Anti DM

London estate agent Douglas & Gordon has stopped doing DM.  And they've sent people one last thing to tell them so!

Eye catching headline.  And the copy on the back is nice too.

I don't really want to do any DM bashing here.  For me, people's attitudes to it are changing.  The result is the future of the medium is in less, more specialised stuff, higher quality pieces - and as with any medium we use, we just need to be aware of its relationship with people when we use it.  (I think I'd care more if we had a media buying dept!)

Anyway, back to estate agents.  They're the worst at bombarding us with crap, so I was impressed with the bravery here.  And obviously that means Douglas & Gordon come off as refreshing in the sector too. 

So I wanted to find the agency responsible, and started with the website.

A simple banner took me to straight to something I thought was great.  An open letter from the MD of D&G, Ivor Dickinson.

Its a really nicely written piece that outlines his reasons for dispensing with DM.  In fact its so well written I want to believe it actually was written by the MD.  Cynical me - but I think most people wouldn't even question it.

Think I'll email Ivor, point him in the direction of this post, and ask him who did the campaign.  My search found several agencies that list them as clients,two of which - i-am and Phoenix - look likely candidates.

Knorr

Thank god! Knorr's soup is all soup, with no added non-soup. Must be healthy...

FIFA Street 3 - short film.

FIFA Street is a console game where you play a ridiculously supercharged version of football, doing tricks that aren't physically possible in real life (like all games from the EA Sports "BIG" series).  So, it seems logical of W+K Amsterdam and EA Sports to make a little video of what-it-would-be-like-if-you-really-could-do-all-that-stuff:

Nice, isn't it?  There's not a really fresh creative idea here.  "Computer game goes real world" feels like it has been done before.  But the concept is particularly relevant for such an outlandish game and its executed very nicely indeed, so should drop the jaws of the kids its aimed at.

I also think the absence of a 'message' at the end is great.  It doesn't feel like an ad, with BUY BUY BUY at the end, or a wanky strapline like "Feel the street" or something.  Its more like a nice bit of branded content, made simply to entertain - which I like.  Very Nike.

The website has a cool style too.  Although its a bit lost on me because I haven't played the FIFA Street series, so I can't really comment.  (Pro Evo all the way for me.)  Still, its worth a look to see how the designers coped with having to do a caricature of Peter Crouch.  How do you exaggerate his height?!

A Taylor At War - Ch. 1, Part 2.

This post is part of the "Granddad's War Stories" series.

Chapter 1 - Home Service.

Part 2, A greasy gunner.

    "I'll never forget the day I enlisted on the spree

    To be a greasy gunner in The Royal Artillery

    Oh - me 'eart is aching and a-breakin'

    To be in civvy street once more

    But there's going to be inspection in the mornin'

    And the Battery Sergeant Major he'll be there----"

So the ditty called "The Gunners Lament" starts and as I toiled through basic training I thought it apposite.

We arrived by train from London, conveyed by lorry to the barracks and went straight into one end of the machine which took our civilian clothing, clad us in ill-fitting battle dresses, heavy boots ("'ow do you want 'em - too large or too small?"), and supplied with numerous other objects including "drawers woolen long" (long-johns) and "housewives" (sewing sets).  Then through a line of medical chaps who looked at and tapped everything and then injected us with Anti-Typhoid and Anti-Tetanus and finished with a vaccination by way of an encore.  We were then herded over to a hut and told we were "G Troop" - all 30 of us - and we were given 2 days off.  "What a kind army" we thought.  By the early evening, limbs started to swell, temperatures to rise and everything from acute pain to major discomfort experienced.  Our first lesson; "never trust 'em."

Basic training presented no problems for me.  I had already been basically trained in the Campbell College O.T.C. [Officer Training Corps? - Rob] and so was able to concentrate on gunnery which was new to me.  Unfortunately, this was theoretical because we had no guns.  The absence of weapons was frightening, especially with an invasion from France a probability.  We were issued with bayonets tied to broom-handles and six inch nuts welded to short iron bars.  As one gunner said: "Get me an 'orse, show me a tank and I'll charge the bloody thing."

My twenty-nine mates were mostly Welsh miners and dockmen and a rough lot they were.  Their priorities were absolute:-

(i.) beer, (ii.) women, (iii.) food, (iv.) sleep, and strictly in that order.  By careful observation I learnt from the inside, the truth in the old jingle -

    "Wot I sez is this 'ere

    Don't muck about wiv a workin' man's beer."

My three months basic training at Devizes were invaluable, because by the time I left I knew and practised the 24 basic skills of defying authority, being caught, but having a cast-iron defence.  I knew it ALL from the inside, a fact much deplored by many gunners at a later stage when I had turned game-keeper.

I also learnt a lot about gunners. I learnt not to muck about with their priorities providing they were doing their soldierly duties well.  I learnt that a man's "mate" was sacred to him.  I think that this must have arisen from standing together against the coal mine bosses.  For us, as soldiers, it was a wonderful attribute.  A soldier whose mate is careless is a dead soldier.  Survival depends on complete trustworthiness of every member of the team.

I also learnt that the gunner shares everything.  It is as natural as breathing.  It is expected.  If anyone received a cake, it was divided into 30 pieces.  If anybody had bad luck, everybody (all 29) did something for him.  Similarly, if someone had outstanding good luck he immediately became aware of 29 pairs of thirsty eyes.  Like the time I got a refund of income tax of £12.  A fortune.  By morning it was gone, which didn't help me absorb the next letter from the Inland Revenue saying they had made a mistake and I owed them £12.  On the advice of my mates I replied saying I couldn't return the money because we had drunk it.  You see £12 was a fortune.  We were paid only two shillings a day.  That's 10p!!

During our first week they decided to sort out religious denominations.  All three troops (90 of us) were put on parade.

"Fall out all C of E and fall in over there," roared the Sergeant Major.  70 men fell out and fell in.

"Fall out all R.C.s and fall in over there," he roared.  10 men fell out and fell in.

"Fall out all Methodists and fall in over there," he screamed.  8 men fell out and fell in.

I've never felt so naked in all my life until the moment when the other chap (Atheist) was immediately dispatched to the C of Es.  Then I was alone.

"What the 'ell are you?"  the Sergeant Major snarled.

"I'm an Irish Presbyterian Sir," I replied.

That floored him.  Off he marched to the Officer in charge and after deep consultation he returned.

"What did you say you was?" he asked softly.

"An Irish Presbyterian Sir," I replied.

"There haint no such thing," he roared triumphantly - "Join the Methodists."

So I did, until I found out that the Methodist Church was three miles away and we had to march there and back.  I took a poor view of this and went to see the Sergeant Major and explained that Methodism was not really the same as Presbyterianism.  A wicked gleam came into his eye.  “Seems to me, son, you don’t know what you is, so you needn’t go to church parades.”  All in a lovely soft voice.  Then he broke into his usual bellow “so report here every Sunday and clean Battery H.Q. out proper - and when I say proper I means proper and by ‘it’ I means the whole Battery Office.  Fall out. Quick march.  Left right.  Left right.”

I already knew and practised the gunners’ maxim “Never volunteer for anything.”  Now I had learnt two more valuable lessons.  “Never stand alone conspicuously.”  And, “Never trust a Sergeant Major if his voice soft and his manner friendly.”

We had no Jewish gunners in this Training Regiment.  I did, however, have one later in the war.  A kindly, gentle chap not built for warfare:  I gave him a happy niche as the stores clerk where he could count socks and boots all day and I could rely on him to make only minimum issues, and those with ill grace.  One day, going through an Army Instruction I read that Commanding Officers could indent for unleavened bread for Jewish personnel at festival times.  I called for the Battery Quartermaster and asked why we didn’t indent for Solly.  “He doesn’t like it Sir,” he said.

“Order it,” I said.

We did and at every Jewish Festival I had unleavened bread and marmalade for breakfast and very good it was too.

But back to the Training Regiment.

In spite of my banishment from formal religion I turned my Sunday cleaning duties to good use.  The Battery H.Q. clerks soon got to know me, gave me tea and I helped them with little jobs like spelling and word interpretation.  Thus, I soon got into the coveted position of “knowing what is going to happen.”!

So I was popular with all.  The oppressors and the oppressed.  In Army terms that is Nirvana.

I learned the four of the 90 were going to be recommended for transfer to Cadet Unit for officer training and that I was one of the four.  I attended a Board before three officers with red tabs.  I got the short sharp treatment.

“Where did you go to school?”

“Campbell College, Sir.”

“Never heard of it - where is it?”

“Belfast, Sir.”

“Oh - there.  I see.  What sort of school is it?”

“A public school Sir.”

“Nonsense boy, they don’t have public schools in Ireland.”

In spite of this problem, my report from the C.O. must have been good because I and three others found ourselves on a train with travel warrants to an unknown place called Llandrindod Wells, somewhere in the middle of Wales.

View Larger Map  Granddad's Journey - map will develop as the story does!

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Phew!  That's a lot of typing for a headline merchant.

I recognise the Sergent Major character.  Granddad used to turn into a nicer version of him when he was left to look after me and my brother Dave.  He'd bark orders at us, call us "'Orrible" and generally be as demeaning as you can be to a 7yr old and a 4yr old.  We, of course, absolutely loved it.

Every morning, we'd start the day as Private Robert and Private David.  Granddad would promote and demote us throughout the day - depending on how we behaved.  So, if I cleaned my teeth well, I was instantly bumped up to Lieutenant, for example.  But if Dave, say, picked his nose, well, he'd be referred to as 'Private' until he'd redeemed himself.

Every night, we'd go to bed as a Major, or Brigadier.  And every morning, awake to find we'd been demoted all the way to Private again.  Call us slow witted, but I'm pretty sure the unjust nature of Granddad's ranking system never occurred to us.  We just pootled about with our 'uniforms' on.  These were, looking back, hilarious.  We had a plastic bucket and spade each, and wore the buckets as helmets and held the spade by the handle at our waists, with the blade resting on a shoulder like a rifle!  (Mum / Dad - if you could scan a photo of this I'll post it.)

Update: Got the photo!
Private Robert Joseph Mosley, age 4ish

I'm also interested in my Granddad's views on religion.  Although a religious man in Northern Ireland, he was always completely welcoming of anyone's view - and I've always sort of believed that this was partially due to his experiences in the Army.  So I'm looking forward to watching that thread develop - I'll write more about that another time.

Sorry this one was a bit late!