How Britain Kept Calm and Carried On (10 page)

Many servicemen on the Home Front found themselves billeted with civilians. My parents took in men from the Royal Signals who were stationed at a nearby telephone exchange. One
of them stood six feet eight inches tall, and was universally known as ‘Nelson’, after the column, I suppose. Another, a Russian, was some kind of electronics genius. He was also an
accomplished musician who spent his off-duty hours playing classical music on the family piano, to the delight of my parents and his army colleagues alike. Until, that is, he made a dramatic exit.
One hot summer’s afternoon, two military policemen hammered on the front door, looking for the Russian. Seconds later, he leapt out of the open front-room window and fled down the street, the
Redcaps in pursuit. My parents never saw him again and never learned of his fate, although my mother soon discovered that, as he made his escape, the mysterious Russian had grabbed a row of pearls
given to her by her cousin Fred who, before the war, had been a rubber planter in Malaya. He was now languishing in the notorious Changi prison after being captured by the Japanese while serving in
the territorial Johore Volunteer Engineers.

‘Oh well,’ she said later, ‘I suppose the poor man was desperate.’ She hadn’t a clue as to what the Russian had done to attract the attention of the authorities,
and she didn’t really care. She always had a soft spot for a rebel and the Russian’s role in bringing a little colour into an otherwise drab and difficult world was more than sufficient
compensation. For years after the war we had his business card, printed in the Cyrillic alphabet. Sadly, through several house moves, I lost it long before becoming interested enough in his story
to research it further. I still do have, however, a pre-war Russian banknote that he left behind. Perhaps it was some kind of payment for the pearls after all.

From all accounts, the soldiers were welcome guests but, a few weeks after I was born, Nelson and his fellow signallers took leave of our house. Nelson kept in touch, returning to visit a few
times after the war. I have the faintest recollection of this giant in khaki, so I assume he must have remained in the services. Before he left us, however, Nelson had one more duty to perform. A
couple of weeks into January 1945, I was baptized at St Werburgh’s Church in Derby, a few yards from where the German POWs had been recaptured three weeks earlier. Nelson was there, acting as
a proxy godfather for Uncle Jack, my father’s brother and a Desert Rat who had fought in the Royal Artillery with the Eighth Army at El Alamein. Uncle Jack was by now serving in Palestine;
for some reason, the army wouldn’t let him come back just to be my godfather. The best he managed was a Christmas card from Bethlehem, which was nice.

Even animals served, and in 1943, the People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals created the Allied Forces Mascot Club in order to recognize animals and birds that were serving the Allies during
the war. A cat called Andrew became the club’s mascot. Andrew did not himself go to war, but as he was stationed in London he had to endure air raids on the capital, although it was reported
that he kept calm and carried on sleeping through most of them. But he also seemed to know when a V1 rocket attack was due and when Andrew took cover, everyone else knew that it was time to do so.
Weighing more than six kilos, he was a fawn-and-brown tabby with a spotless white front, tummy and ‘socks’. But, best of all, he boasted an inverted ‘V for victory’ on his
nose. Winston Churchill no doubt approved.

I was a photographer in the forces and my assistant and I had been working in an army vehicle depot. The officer in charge was telling us how a vehicle that would not start had
them all baffled until somebody noticed that a small bit of dried mud had sealed the reserve fuel tank, covering the small hole in the fuel cap, thereby stopping the air from entering and allowing
the fuel to be drawn through to the engine. Well, the following day we were assigned to an army scheme that was in progress on Bodmin Moor and, making our way across the moor in a very remote area,
we came across an American army ambulance that was broken down. So we pulled up and asked what was wrong, and the driver and his mate said that when they switched over to the reserve fuel tank the
engine showed no life at all.

I tipped my assistant the wink and he strolled round the vehicle to check for mud on the fuel cap. We were in luck . . .

My mate quietly knocked the mud from the cap and we both walked to the front of the ambulance. We told the driver and his mate that we had not long returned from filming in Africa and that,
while there, we had picked up some witchcraft that might help him. We told them to stand by the ambulance and rest one hand on the bonnet while raising the other hand in the air. They were to
repeat after us the special magic words that we would recite. We went down on one knee and began to recite a load of mumbo-jumbo that we made up as we went along. After a while, we stood up and
confidently told them that the engine should now start. On the second push of the starter, low and behold, the engine sprang to life. You should have seen those Yanks’ faces! They gave us
chocolate and some other gifts and drove off full of praise for African witchcraft. We found out later that the two British cameramen who had learned witchcraft from Africa were the talk of the
American unit.

Chas Keith, Malton, North Yorkshire

It was just after Dunkirk, at an airfield near the Norfolk coast. Everyone was jittery. I was a lance bombardier on an anti-aircraft gun. My mate was a bombardier. All units
were at a stand-to. Everyone, including the locals, was wondering, ‘Where will they land?’

Early one evening, my pal and I went for a walk and a pint. Having discussed what everyone assumed was the imminent invasion, we arrived at a small local pub and decided to start it on our own.
Outside the pub rested a bike and inside, one country worker talking to the old landlord.

‘The invasion has started,’ said my friend. ‘Give us two pints.’

‘Get these chairs outside,’ he ordered, which I did.

‘And get these pictures off the walls!’

‘What for?’ said the landlord.

‘The maps go there,’ I said. ‘This is now Division HQ.’

All of this was carried out at great speed – including drinking our beer. I’d stacked the chairs and pictures against the wall.

‘They should be arriving shortly! Let’s take a look.’

Gazing professionally down the road, I said: ‘What next, bombardier?’

‘Every man for himself,’ he said, jumped on the bike and was gone.

I took to my heels and ran after him . . .

L. R. Dyke, Great Yarmouth

It was in late 1940 that I was on a course at Harlesden. We were bedded down in a disused factory and had to provide a guard during the night. More a case of the usual
‘bull’, actually. I was on one night when, at about 10 p.m., a plane could be heard approaching at quite a low height. He suddenly appeared overhead and commenced to fire a burst of
tracer down the High Street. Of course, we were not supplied with any ammo, although only the good Lord knows why. So I rushed into the company office and yelled: ‘Quick, sarge, give us some
ammo, there’s a bloody Jerry out there.’

My thought was, of course, that with the plane at such a low altitude, I might be able to score, at least if only to let the blighter know that someone down there was alive to the danger.

The sarge replied: ‘The ammo’s in the safe!’

‘Well, for Pete’s sake, open it then!’

‘Can’t – the orderly officer’s got the key.’

‘Well, call him!’

‘He’s not here. He’s gone to the pictures!’

Stan Lynn, Woodford Green

As an army officer undergoing flying training in 1942, prior to taking up duties flying army aircraft, I had reached the stage where it was time to do my first solo
cross-country flight. My progress up to that stage had been achieved in shorter time than the rest of my group, so it was not without some cockiness that I climbed into the cockpit, taxied across
the airfield and took off on my first flight out of sight of my instructors.

My course was a three-legged one and I completed the first two safely but, during the third leg something affected my judgement and I realized that my navigation had gone wrong. After circling
around I made a big mistake, I began to zigzag and after about two hours’ flying, with one eye on my fuel gauge, I began to wonder how much longer I could remain airborne.

It was then that I saw, under my port wing, what was obviously an aerodrome – although not my own! Happy again, I headed into wind, made a reasonably good landing, got out and began to
saunter across to report my arrival. But it was only as I entered the building that I realized my position – an army type reporting to the RAF that I was lost.

However, they did their best not to show me too plainly that they were amused and I was given a meal and some drinks, while arrangements were made to advise my chief instructor. Only later did I
really become embarrassed – when a plane arrived from my Flying Training School, with two pilots, one of whom was to fly me back to base.

Alan Cox, Epsom