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THE BURMA CAMPAIGN - PART 1 - THE LONG JOURNEY TO BURMA

By: AgeConcernShropshire

Person in story: Dennis Bell
Location of Story: UK , South Africa , India & Burma

This story is transcribed by me Graham Shepherd , from notes following discussions with Dennis Bell , and will be added to the site with his permission . He understands the sites terms and conditions . Dennis kept a diary of his activities until he reached Rangoon when life got too hectic !

On 5 June 1941 I left Penley in Shropshire to voluntary enrol at the RAF Recruitment Office in Shrewsbury as a carpenter in ground staff operations . I was transferred to Padgate near Warrington and then onto Redcar where they were using the racecourse for my four week basic training . We were housed in civi billets .

My first posting was to Grangemouth in Scotland as a member of the 18 OTU ( officers training unit ) We spent most of our time driving fuel bowsers to refuel Spitfires . The billets were excellent with table cloths and flowers on the tables in the dining area . The tables seated twenty four people so as one table filled you moved onto the next one , which could mean that you did not sit next to your mate . On one occasion my mate took the last seat on one table which meant that I had to start the next table . I was so annoyed that I eat my sweet first - I was still a young man from out in the country . One of the men asked what was the matter and I said ‘ I’m eating my meal as I want to !

In January 1942 I was transferred to Brancote which was a very big peacetime station . It had super accommodation and sports facilities . It was a bomber station and had Halifax , Lancaster's , Stirlings and Wellingtons based there . Approx. 50% of both the flight and ground crew were Polish . I was allocated to the joiners shop , and my first job involved making and installing collapsible tables into Wellington bombers , to hold the latest navigational and radar aids . But room was very scarce , so the tables had to be suspended on wire cables so that they could be hoisted upwards to allow crew to pass by . After a few months I put in for trade tests , and went to Morton-In-The - Marsh, and then returned to Brancote with my qualifications . About one month later I received my draft notice for overseas posting .

Following leave I was posted to West Kirby where we were issued with ‘ tropical kit ‘ , and on 27 July 1942 set sail from Liverpool on HMS MOLOGA a large cargo ship and sailed up the Clyde to Grennock . We left there after a couple of days with three other troop ships , HMS Sheffield , a cruiser and six other cargo boats . Three days out we were blacked out and heard gun fire - unfortunately HMS Sheffield had shot down a Sunderland by mistake . A number of bodies were recovered and given burial at sea . A couple of weeks later we came across a small boat but the three occupants were dead , and these were also buried at sea . On 10 August we sighted land which turned out to be Freetown , we anchored up for threedays to take on supplies . I contacted Malaria , and was confined to the ships hospital . Our next port of call was Cape Town , but the last eight hours sailing was very rough - the worst
that I experienced during the trip . We got a very good reception from the locals - but the segregation of whites and blacks was an eye opener . Saturday morning ashore we were all taken on a route march for three hours - it was needed after being couped up onboard ship for weeks - it was an amazing sight seeing 5000 troops marching. Every Saturday morning at 11 0’clock a gun fired on Table Mountain . Everything stopped for two minutes silence , including our march .On 29 August we went to the Cape August Buildings where we were met by the Charlton family who took us for a drive around Cape Bay and Table mounting . They offered to post my mail home , and an amazing coincidence was that when they had been in England four years earlier , they had stayed at the Black Lion Hotel in Ellesmere , local to my home .

On 30 August we moved out of Cape Town , and as we sailed out a very well known lady singer sang Land of Hope and Glory to us all as we left . I was very sorry to leave it was such a beautiful place . We now had a convoy strength of fifteen ships as a destroyer and other RN ships joined us at nightfall . We were then joined by more ships which came out of Durban , and learnt that we were heading for Bombay . Sailing in the tropics we slept on the top deck in hammock's and in the moonlight the horizon was 10 miles away and you could see ships on the horizon - good for submarines !

After another uncomfortable experience of living on board the ‘ MOLOGA ‘ , we arrived in Bombay on 20 Sept. 1942 .

I was very pleased to disembark from the ship , since still being a young country man , I found it difficult to believe that people could be treated like we were on board ship . I was on deck 5 , two decks below the water line and the prop shaft passed directly under us so we experience a constant heavy vibration . Our accommodation comprised of seven inch planks for seats and cross legged tables and we had to sleep amongst these , either sitting up , lying on the table or on the floor or in hammock's above the tables . There were 24 men per table in a space of 18 ‘ by 2’ 3’’ . Not quite what I had been used to ! Immediately above us was the washroom about twelve feet square , which consisted of a four foot diameter circle with a drain in the middle with a two inch galvanised pipe at picture rail height with small holes in it acting as a spray - ice cold salt water running night and day . There was a large drum of soap in the corner , but soap and salt water don’t mix , it was like grease which was difficult to get off .

The day we berthed in Bombay was a memorable one for me , since it was my twentieth birthday , but we had to stay on board for two days because they had no where to accommodate us . It was 110 F on deck five and we had no water for the two days . They then acquired Bell tents and we pitched in the sand dunes at Beach Candy , where we were given 20 rupees - about 1/3 d .

The 2nd October was Gandhi's birthday and they were expecting demonstrations . There were over 9,000 police in Bombay , but the police station was burnt down . Whilst in Bombay I went to the cinema to see ‘ Weekend in Havana ‘ , and was amazed to find that all the trains were diesel electric and built in Trafford Park and went to Poona where they changed to steam to go to Calcutta . All the drivers wore white overalls , hats and gloves - quite an impressive sight .

On 24 October we went to Victoria station Bombay and boarded a thirteen coach train with a ration wagon at the back heading for Calcutta . We stopped at Allanabad next morning for a ‘ bully beef ‘ breakfast the food being brought to us by two detached men for the day . There was always a 5 gallon‘ Dixie ‘ of fresh tea available in the carriage .We were given I lb . of tea a day and hot water was got from the engine . We arrived in Bangalore on the 28th and Calcutta on the 29th . The following day we transferred to the narrow gauged rail to Meherpur and then had an eight hour journey by paddle steamer down the river Padma to Chandpur .

We were then taken by train to Ajartala in the Bengal jungle , a 9 day journey , where we stayed for a month building a runway using mobile linked track . We lived in bamboo huts and everything was made from bamboo . We received our pay here but there was nothing to spend it on . There was a regular train which ran along the camp boundary to Camilla about thirty miles away and we used to hitch a ride on the foot plate , but when this was discovered it was stopped .

We left Ajartala by train on 23Feb 1943 for Chittagong , the major port for the ‘ Burma Campaign , arriving on 26 Feb . where we stayed for some time . We experienced night raids on Chittagong on 1st and 7th March followed by a daytime raid on March 8th . I recall killing a 5 ft snake in our billet on 20th March .

Our officers joined us here , and they were all very nice and understanding people . We formed the No. 1 Forward Equipment Unit - FEU , the first unit in the Royal Air Force 224 Group SEAC .

This was my real starting point for three years of the BURMA CAMPAIGN - Part 2 will follow .

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