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This story was submitted to the People’s War site by RICHARD FIELD on behalf of JIM ELLIS-BEECH and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

By Jim Ellis-Beech
(as related to Richard Field)

My war did not involve me in a single injury or confrontation with the enemy, yet I think I did play a role which must have had an influence on many of the toughest and most daring actions of the war.
As a PT sergeant instructor, part of the elite Physical Training Corps, I was responsible for the tough and exacting training of hundreds of marines and commandoes.
I joined the army in September, 1938. I trained at Woolwich with the Royal Artillery and my first posting was to Harrogate as a gunner. I was later picked to be an assistant PT instructor.
Here we had two large gymnasiums for PT training but as soon as the war broke out one of these, and possibly both, were requisitioned for a completely different use.
They were converted into accommodation for the couple of hundred aliens (mostly German nationals) who had been living in North Yorkshire and who were now rounded up and incarcerated for the duration of the war. I seem to remember most of them seemed to spend most of their time playing chess!
They were, of course, kept under constant armed guard.
On one occasion one of the guards coming off his two-hour turn of duty came into the guardroom and quite accidentally fired off his rifle. The Germans, of course, heard the shot and were terrified. They thought we were starting to shoot them!
After two years in Harrogate, where all the PT had been done outdoors when we lost our gymnasiums, I went to Aldershot and train for the elite Army Physical Training Corps. The course was really tough, and of the 30 who started the training only five got through. I was lucky enough to be one of them.
From here I was posted to Dalry, in Ayrshire. My job was to train recruits and also to teach unarmed close combat to civilians at a nearby steelworks.
I remember telling the trainees that, while I was demonstrating, they should not resist. Most complied, but one individual did resist quite forcibly while I was showing him the Japanese stranglehold, and as a result of this half swallowed his tooth plate, leaving only one tooth hanging out. I got some pliers and pulled it out!
Then I got posted to Achnacarry in another remote part of Scotland. My job was to instruct in knife fighting, rock climbing and unarmed combat.
Near to our camp was a famous avenue of trees, planted at the time of the Jacobite rebellion in 1745. The estate workers were planting the trees when the fighting started and left the job unfinished to go the join the battle. This meant the avenue of trees was never completed, and to this day it remains unfinished. The avenue is magnificent, a prized bit of national heritage and the pride of the local laird.
One day a young officer from the Pioneer Corps decided to base a training exercise around the trees. He told the men to climb the trees and break off branches so as to make bivouacs underneath, which they duly did.
It was later that day that we heard that the laird and his estate agent were coming round to make their annual inspection of the trees. We panicked, and the officer instructed the men to dismantle the bivouacs, gather up the branches they had used, re-climb the trees and wire them back on!
Amazingly, this seemed to restore the trees to their former glory. However, we heard later that day that the visit was going to be put back a fortnight. By that time, of course, all the branches were going brown, bending and beginning to fall off. Was there trouble!
The trainees came to the camp as marines and, if they survived the course, went back to their regiments as commandoes Many of these men went on to take part in some toughest actions of the war, and I like to think our training prepare them well for it
Part of the training was speed marching, which covered 25 miles and involved walking for half a mile and then running for half a mile, all with heavy packs. This happened once every week, so it kept me very fit. Our CO, Colonel Coleman, used to join us for at least 10 miles of these exercises.
From here I went out to West Africa, and as a Sergeant PT instructor I had the job of toughening up African troops.
The recruits came from the bush and the headmen would be ‘dashed’ to send us 20 or 30 recruits. The problem was that once the men had been issued with a uniform, boots and a blanket, most of it disappeared within a few days — sold at the local market!
I was in Egypt when the war ended. I particularly remember VJ Day. Although I didn’t ever drink or smoke I ended up that day at 3am sitting on a lavatory with a bottle of crème de menthe in my hands!
In the war I never got wounded or even came into contact with the enemy. But I am proud of the role I played in toughening up many brave young commandoes who went on to fight in some of the fiercest and most courageous actions of the war. Sadly, of course, many of them did not come back.
Not long after the war I was singled out to perform at the Royal Tournament and later at the Albert Hall Festival of Remembrance. My Corps claimed I was the only man in the British Army capable of performing the feat of skipping while lying on my back!
I retired from the army with the rank of warrant officer in 1962 after 24 years service.

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