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The following is an account of the wartime experiences of my father in law Robert Flexen.

Bob was born on the 5th of June 1925 at Stratton near Cirencester in Gloucestershire.He attended the Cirencester Grammar School between 1934 and 1941. Despite his father being the sports master at the school, Bob didn’t exactly excel with regard to sporting achievements! He also found himself hospitalised in Cheltenham for a brief spell in 1935 where he underwent an ear operation. During his school holidays Bob had some job experience working on farms and in the early years of the war he found himself in the role of a part time A.R.P. messenger. Then in 1941 aged 16 Bob left Cirencester Grammar ready for the world of work.

Having already registered for either war work or further education he found himself directed to the former with full time employment at GPA Ltd. This was a small factory in the Chesterton area of Cirencester that was producing plastic parts for the Bristol Aircraft Company. These parts were destined for use on both Beaufighter and Beaufort aircraft. At the beginning of the summer in 1942 aged 17 he joined the Headquarters platoon of the Home Guard based at the barracks in Cecily Hill and began taking part in drill, guard duties, exercises and map reading. He also became a ‘runner’ in the intelligence section of the 3rd Battalion ‘C’ Company of the Gloucestershire Regiment.

A year on in June 1943 he was graded A1 fit in his army medical and the following month he was called up. His initial training course was at the No. 8 Primary Training Centre, East Yorkshire Regt. Barracks at Beverley where he spent 6 weeks. Following this he was posted to the R.A.M.C. Depot and Training Establishment at Crookham, near Fleet in Hampshire for two months training and then another extra month of advanced corp training. With this first period of training completed Bob left Hampshire for his first period of leave on the 21st of October.

Refreshed from his visit home Bob was posted to No. 180th Field Ambulance, 47th London Scottish Division. This Division, better know as the ‘Bow Bells’, was then housed in a tented camp in the grounds of Hollandsfield House at Weststoke near Chichester. More intensive field training began along with fatigues exercises and anti-gas training. Bugle training was also provided but due to his ear problem Bob failed this. Then on the 2nd of January 1944 Bob had a second period of leave, this time for nine days.

During his leave the unit was moved and on his return Bob found himself reporting back to camp, this time ‘up’t north’ at Robin Hoods Bay in Yorkshire. The unit then began to take part in large-scale exercises on the moors in preparation for (though they did not know it at the time), D-Day. Tanks, heavy guns and planes were all in use as well as live ammunition. Bob was moved to the ‘stand behind squad’ with the unit H.Q. at Fulingdale Hall, carrying out guard duties, fatigues et cetera. Fulingdale Hall is of course better known today as an early warning station. Once the exercises were completed, ‘A’ Company returned to Robin Hoods Bay and soon found themselves on regular route marches to Whitby and Scarbourgh. Alas they had little time to admire the seaside as they marched up and down the cliff paths carrying loaded stretchers with full packs on their backs. Then in April the unit was returned south in convoy and they spent an uncomfortable night camped out in the stands at Doncaster racecourse. Spending an equally uncomfortable night were a large group of German POW’s who were housed in a large cage in the centre of the same racecourse. From Doncaster they departed to a staging camp at Yatterton in Oxfordshire en route finally to Southampton.

At Southampton a tented camp with slit trenches was set up at Milbrook Park. The slit trenches were occupied during air raids and from them Bob and his comrades could hear and see the anti aircraft guns in action. The unit was also given a high rank inspection during parade at Millbrook Park and immediately after this they were put on a ten-mile route march. From Southampton the unit moved westward to Bournemouth and were billeted at the Glenby Hall Hotel. While here Bob took part in a large 36 hour exercise which was to test the scheme for evacuating casualties during D-Day. Infantry men were dressed and labelled as casualties (some with realistic looking red paint wounds) and these had to be evacuated from the docks to a large pre-war mental hospital at Park Prewitt. After the exercise everyone was yet again on the move and Bob left the grand surrounds of the Bournemouth hotel for another tented camp this time at Pershaw, close to Winchester. He under took various detachment duties at Winchester Hospital, C.R.S. Swathly and C.R.S. Montisfont Abbey. This last station was used to house malaria patients many of who had served in the Middle East. The men based here had come from ‘sealed camps’ and were to be some of the first troops to land in France on D-Day. Because of this Bob was not allowed to talk to any of them and had to sign the Official Secrets Act. The troops themselves were placed under special guard in the wards.

A few days before D- Day, Bob and his group were collecting casualties from the sealed camps and a little later from Southampton Docks. It was at this time that they saw their first battle casualties, wounded by either enemy bombing or from a ‘feeler’ raid in France. One poor chap that Bob attended to complained of pains in his feet and when Bob pulled back his blanket he discovered that his feet were missing! The off - loading of wounded at Southampton continued for about a week after which a captured French airfield was used to fly casualties out.

From Southampton the unit moved once more to Wiltshire and pitched tents in a field near a village called Bauton. Duties were carried out at a railhead siding just outside Shriveham Station, with more casualties being unloaded from ambulances and put onto trains heading north. These wounded troops we first flown from France to airfields in the Cotswolds (i.e. Down Ampney, Blake Hill and Broadwell) where they would be placed on to ambulances, the less seriously wounded being put on to buses. Then they were driven to the railhead and loaded on to a train. Often two or three trains would be loaded a day, the most being five trains within 36 hours. If the weather was particularly bad then no trains went out. Cases of head injury were taken straight to a specialist Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford by ambulances travelling at no more than 25 m.p.h. Bob can recall doing one or two such trips as an orderly. Other duties included stretcher and blanket collection and being on guard duty when back at camp.

The unit was eventually replaced and went back to field training, often with newly qualified doctors. The unit was stationed in Sussex at Wakehurst Place near Haywards Heath. Bob’s A ‘Coy’ were housed in huts within the grounds. It was at this period the unit was transferred from the 47th Division to the 55th Lancaster Division, known as the ‘Red Rose’. Due to actions in France reinforcements began to leave the unit. After the battles at Arnhem, 30 men including Bob were on draft as replacements for a field ambulance lost during an air landing by gliders. However due to his ear problem Bob was not sent. The unit was then sent on a seven day long march from Winchester to Canterbury F.S.M.O. carrying stretchers and with their steel helmets on, stopping at night to bivouac. At the end of the 7 day exercise (January 1945), Bob went on a period of leave.

On returning from his leave it was back to training exercises and dodging bombing raids and attacks from V1’s or ‘buzz bombs’. One flying bomb came down close to Divisional H.Q. but Bob never heard much about the aftermath or whether there had been any casualties?

In March 1945 Bob was granted 14 days of embarkation leave after which he reported back to the R.A.M.C. Depot, C Coy Holding Company. From Southampton he sailed for India via the Suez Canal onboard H.M.T.S. Strathmore, a pre war P and O liner. The voyage took 3 weeks, disembarking at Bombay on the 21st of April 1945. It had been a very boring journey spent mainly on the lower decks of the ship. In the early morning Bob and his colleagues marched through this famous gateway to India, a route taken by many troops before in the Service of the Raj. Etched in Bob’s memory are the sights and smells of the poor quarter as he passed through, with ragged men sleeping near drains and amongst piles of rubbish.

Arriving at the local railway station they had sometime to sunbathe before boarding carriages with uncomfortable hard wooden benches and open windows. Eventually they arrived at the depot based at Deolaly, a place which has given its name to people who have become a little touched! Bob wasn’t there too long before he was posted to Trimulgherry in the Decan Plain. This was a large hospital, the 127th I.G.H., used for all ranks. Bob was not actually hospital trained but he soon found himself put on ward duty and learning on the job. The majority of the work on the ward was being done by Indian orderlies. Bob worked mainly with the patients, applying bandages, giving out medicine, washing patients and bed making.

The Decan is perhaps one of the hottest places in India and Bob found himself having to change his shirt at least 2 to 3 times a day. Bob was still there when V.E. came and along with some friends and a doctor they were sent to man a first aid tent amongst the huge crowds celebrating the victory over Japan. Luckily they hadn’t many people to treat and in the evening there was a very large fireworks display. This included a large tableaux screen with images of the King and Queen that remained lit for ages while all around it fireworks were taking off. A celebration dinner was also planned for officers and civil dignitaries. Bob was sent off as part of a detail to collect flowers for this. These they obtained from the iuizam (head man) of Hydrabads head Indian gardener. Bob discovered that the head gardener of Hydrabad had studied at the Royal Agricultural College at Cirencester in 1932.

Another move came between the 20th and 22nd of June 1945, with Bob to be promoted on arrival at his new unit to the rank of corporal or sergeant. On the journey south Bob’s unit had to spend a couple of days at a transit camp. As the senior member of the unit due to the length of his service, Bob was put in charge of five other soldiers as their journey continued on a non troop train. They had to change trains later that night when they reached a place called Manmad. With 6 to 8 hours to wait for a connecting train to Madras they all tried to get some sleep on the platform. From Madras their journey continued by ferry to Ceylon (Sri Lanka), rounding the Palk Strait and eventually landing at Trincomalee on the Island’s east coast. Bob was to spend a week in yet another camp while at Trincomalee, finding time to write home. Unable to say in his letter where he had arrived at he knew that his parents would easily guess when he mentioned that it was the place where his grandfather (his mum’s father) had been born. It was also here that Bob should have been joining the 54th I.G.H. but it had been disbanded. Instead he was detached to the 48th I.G.H. at Kandy. The 48th was the hospital used by the ALFSEA H.Q. (under the command of Earl Mountbatten). Bob was placed on some wards but mainly in the role of regimental police and also quartermaster stores. Once when on duty at the hospital gate he had to vet the pass of a young naval officer with the title of Prince Philip of Greece (later the Duke of Edinburgh). He was also detached to 35th B.G.H. in the capital Colombo for two weeks. Another duty he undertook at 48th I.G.H. was looking after the hospital chapel both as sacristan and batman to the chaplain.

Then on the 6th of August 1945 and three days later on the 9th, America dropped atom bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At the same time, though Bob and his pals were unaware of it, plans at been set for the invasions of Malaya and Singapore. The plan was given the code name ‘Operation Zipper’ and it was to take place within a month.

A number of units were formed to go into the p.o.w. camps and help allied prisoners held in them. These units were called R.A.P.W.I’s (Control Staff Repatriation of Allied P.O.W. and Internees) and Bob’s unit was No.2 Control Staff R.A.P.W.I. This unit was formed at Madras to join the invasion fleet when word suddenly came through of Japans capitulation. With the surrender of Japanese forces Operation Zipper did not proceed as originally planned, so instead of being an invasion force it became a reoccupation task force. Bob’s unit was then told that it would be flown out but this did not happen and eventually they sailed in the hospital ship H.M.H.S. Amarapora back to Trincomalee, where a huge armada of warships had been gathering. Among the ships assembled were warships including H.M.S. Nelson, cruisers, aircraft carriers, troop transports and submarines. It reminded Bob of how Southampton looked on D-Day. The unit eventually arrived off Singapore on the 5th of September 1945 and while at anchor they watched as L.C.I.’s and L.C.T.’s went ashore with troops of the 5th Indian Division , also know as the ‘Ball of Fire’. The Amarapora docked that evening at Keppel harbour being the first un-armed ship to do so.

After disembarking Bob’s unit commandeered the customs house as their H.Q. and he found a few hours sleep on the floor of a garage! Later that night he was detailed along with twelve others to work in the hospital at the infamous Changi goal. He was given two isolation wards to look after at the goal. These isolation wards were all long bamboo huts with earth floors and palm frond coverings on their walls and roofs. Doors and windows were just simple openings. The Japanese guards still remained at Changi and did so for about four days until they were disarmed. It took about ten days to evacuate the huts and then they were burnt down using flamethrowers. Bob also had duties at the Sime Road goal, a camp used to house civilian internees.

With the camps evacuated Bob returned to H.Q. and was detailed on office work and later to the regimental police. After this he became an air ambulance orderly on Dakotas. He made three return flights, two to Batavia (Jakarta) in Java via Pelambang in Sumatra and one to Don Mung in Bangkok, Thailand. Each return trip was with thirty or so ex — p.o.w.’s or civilian internees. At the end of 1945 No.2 Control Staff was disbanded.

Next Bob found himself attached to the Q.M. Dept of the 69th Indian General Hospital and in charge of native labour squads, some of which included Japanese sailors. One task they were set was to clean up a hospital that had been used by the Japanese as a barrack. After six months in June 1946 yet another series of moves to new units took place, firstly to the 93rd I.G.H at Katong and then to the 47th B.G.H.. The 47th was originally at Singapore General Hospital and was later moved to the military Queen Alexandra Hospital. Duties were similar as at previous hospitals with ward work and quartermasters and regimental police work. Then on July 20th Bob spent two weeks at Pewang recuperating after being in hospital as a patient. Returning to duty, the remainder of 1946 was spent in Singapore and in the following spring of 1947 Bob was granted United Kingdom LIAP leave. He departed Singapore onboard H.M.T.S. Eastern Prince and some weeks later docked at Glasgow. Having spent time with his family in Gloucestershire he set sail for the far east on the 3rd of April from Southampton on H.M.T.S. Strathnaver, arriving three weeks later on the 26th in Singapore. Immediately he rejoined the 47th B.G.H., carrying out new duties in the skin treatment department clinic and ward.

Finally on the 16th of June 1947 Bob set sail to the UK for demob onboard H.M.T.S. Johan Van Oldenbarnevelt, a former Dutch liner. He disembarked at Southampton on the 10th of July and was demobbed two days later from a depot at Aldershot. Finally after a period of leave, Bob was released from military duties in October 1947.

After the war Bob taught pottery and is now living in happy retirement in Warkwickshire.

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