大象传媒

A SIGNALLER鈥橲 STORY 鈥� PART I: SCOTLAND TO BURMA

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer from Age Concern, Dorchester on behalf of Alastair Stewart McGhee and has been added to the site with his permission. Mr McGhee fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

鈥淚 was 14 when the war started. I was at Hillhead High School, Glasgow and then, when my father, who was a Minister in the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, moved to Doune, Perthshire, I continued my education at McLaren High School in Callander near Doune. This was in 1938.

I was still at school when the war started. In 1942 I took my Highers and then, on reading a pamphlet from the War Office that was circulated to schools, volunteered straight from school to join the Royal Signals, but they wouldn鈥檛 take me until I was 18 the following year. So in April 1943 I went up to Oxford to Christchurch College, to take a 6 month course for a Technical commission in the Royal Signals. At the end of this course, the Office Cadet Training Unit (OCTU) was not ready to take us - a lot of us had volunteered and so there was a queue - so we were sent up to Catterick to join the Training Battalion there to train as Operators Wireless & Line. In 3 months we all passed out as D3 Operators. However the OCTU still could not take us so we carried on training and eventually gained the B3 Operators qualification which meant we were fully qualified to operate a radio set on our own. The OCTU still being unable to take us we were posted to field units.

I ended up in 61 Division near Ashford, Kent in April 1944. This was just when the Buzz Bombs had started in earnest and we were right under the route of the V1s. We were stationed at Boughton Lees near a big house which is now a hotel, but then it was where 9th Armoured Division were stationed just before D-Day. 61 Division was a 鈥渟poof鈥� division 鈥� it didn鈥檛 exist. We were carrying out wireless transmissions with pre-set messages at pre-set times in order to fool the enemy that the invasion was to take place in the Pas de Calais (Dover-Calais crossing).

During this time I attended a Driving Instruction Course, which included a course on the Internal Combustion Engine, and I obtained my Army Driving Licence. This made me a Driving Operator and I was put in charge of a wireless truck. At 5 pm each evening, drivers had to carry out vehicle maintenance on their vehicles so I got roped in for this. There were 16 tasks to perform over a period of 2 weeks. I also took and passed another Trade Test to go from a B3 to a B2 Operator 鈥� with an increase in pay. As I was an Officer Cadet earmarked for a commission, if any NCO was away on a course or whatever, I would be given their job to carry out. For instance, if the MT Sgt was away, his job was passed to me, if only temporarily, and so on. The 2nd Front had started and it seemed to me I was going to miss all the action 鈥� such is the stupidity of the young ! I had been good at French at school and thought that getting to France would make me proficient in French. I got tired of waiting and decided to cancel my application for a commission. I landed up in front of my CO who played hell because I had cost a lot of money to train 鈥� through University etc. However, eventually he had to accede, and a few days later I was posted 鈥� but landed up in India, not France !

I travelled to the Clyde to board a ship. We were one of the first convoys to go through the Mediterranean (before this ships had to go round Cape Horn, South Africa). Then we passed down the Suez Canal and finally landed in Bombay, India. I thought the Suez Canal was very narrow. It was hot travelling down it and even hotter when we got to the Red Sea. It was Nov/Dec 1944 and I was 19 years old. The Centre I was taken to in Bombay was called Kalyan. At Christmas 1944 I was posted to a place called Comilla, north east of Calcutta which was a 5-day train journey across India from Bombay. At Comilla I was posted to 254 Indian Tank Brigade. To join the Brigade I was flown into Burma by Dakota. This was an interesting journey as I happened to be up at the front of the plane and the flight deck door was kept open because of the heat. Consequently I could see through the pilot鈥檚 windscreen. I could see nothing but trees, miles and miles of trees as far as you could see. The plane was getting lower and lower and the engine note kept dropping. I began to think we were in trouble but suddenly a space appeared below us and we dropped into it. We bounced and bounced as we landed and stopped by swinging the plane鈥檚 tail round. The jungle had been cleared by cutting the trees down to ground level and then wire mesh had been laid across the flattened stumps and that made the runway. The first thing we saw as we landed were two Japs, one dead and one captured. Very few Japs were captured as most were fatalistic and would fight to the death rather than surrender. It took another 3 days by lorry to catch up with my Brigade because the Big Push had started and they were down the Kabaw Valley (the valley of death). We reached the famous Bailey Bridge across the Chindwin and I caught up with 254 Tank Brigade just across the river and joined the Signals Squadron. The Indian Army Brigade was made up of one British Regiment and two Indian Regiments. Although we were a Tank Brigade there were no tanks ever at Brigade HQ. All, including the Signals Squadron, were in soft vehicles, ie we were unarmoured.

When I first joined the unit I was helped to set up camp. We went into the jungle and cut some bamboo to construct a bed. To do this we needed 4 short pieces each with a 鈥榊鈥� configuration at one end, and two long pieces. The four short pieces were placed in empty 鈥�50 cigarette鈥� tins that were filled with paraffin. The paraffin-filled tins stopped insects crawling up the legs of the beds. These 4 short pieces were the legs of the bed. Other short pieces were used to cross-brace the legs. The two long pieces of bamboo rested on the Y sticks and a ground sheet with eyeholes round its edge was placed across the poles and secured by lacing wire through these eyeholes underneath. Because we were Signallers there was always plenty of wire ! In Burma the jungle was steamy and hot and filled with nasty crawlies 鈥� snakes, scorpions and stink beetles. The stink beetles were large, flying beetles which sprayed liquid and if this dropped on you it caused huge blisters to form on your skin.

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