大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Bernie Hawkins and has been added to the website on behalf of Alexander Payne with his permission and he fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

I arrived at Colaba Camp, near Bombay, in September 1943 for the second time in my life 鈥� the first was in 1919, at the age of four, as my father came home from the 1st World War and volunteered to return to India, taking my mother, my brother and me with him.

I had joined up as a regular soldier with the Hampshire Regiment in 1932 and left as a Lance Corporal in 1938. I was called up as soon as the War started in 鈥�39, rejoining the Hampshire Regiment as a Signals Instructor. By September 1943 I was a Sergeant in a mobile radio section of the Royal Corps of Signals, to whom I had transferred in 1941.

We were billeted in Colaba Camp awaiting our vehicles and equipment (which was one of the first convoys to come through the Med after it was cleared). My days were occupied by giving driving tuition to some of my section.

On one occasion I was in the road directing one of the learners when I saw an officer approaching. Imagine my surprise when, as we drew closer, I recognised him as a man named Mortimer who I had last seen as a private soldier. He appeared not to recognise me, but having put him in the picture, he of course had to admit he knew me. We arranged to meet that evening and we did a tour of the bars in Bombay, and again the following night. I never saw him again as we had our marching orders to move a few days later.

During the last week in Colaba Camp, I was detailed to pick six men and myself and report to the Crown Film Unit that was stationed close to Bombay Docks.

We were taken to an idyllic bay about 30 miles from Bombay and were filming for two days. Our job was to act as a relief force and we had to approach from the sea and make for standing cover about 50 yards up the beach. What they never told us was that they had planted thunder flashes in the standing cover and, as we approached, some unseen moron pressed a plunger and the whole place erupted. We were covered with turf, sand, and it seemed half of India! As we were annihilated, they went on to win the War!

The film was never shown and much later I wrote to someone in Bombay and they told me the Film Unit had been destroyed by fire and all film stock had been lost. It wasn鈥檛 until 1993 that I saw the following article in the Burma Star Journal. I never found out, but have always assumed that it must have been a victim of the following:

鈥淭he Great Bombay Explosion

鈥淥n Friday April 14th, 1944, smoke was detected coming from the Number 2 hold of the SS Fort Stikine as she was being unloaded in the Bombay Docks. In addition to the $2,800,000 in gold bars, 8,700 of raw cotton and thousands of drums of lubricating oil, she was carrying 1,318 tons of live raw explosives.

鈥淲hen she exploded, she flattened 300 acres of the Bombay Docks, turned 12 other ships into scrap iron, showered destruction over an area a mile wide and created a tidal wave that lifted the stern of a 4,000 ton ship 50 feet into the air and left it on the roof of a shed. The full death count is unknown to this day. At the time, HMS Sussex was in dry dock a mile south of the centre of the explosion. L/Craft Infantry 120, 173, 114, were in dry dock about the same distance in the opposite direction (MVC) (776).鈥�

Going back to 鈥淐apt. Mortimer鈥�, it was after arriving at the 14th Army HQ that I was telling the camp RSM of my meeting with him and he informed me that the so-called officer was a signalman who had committed some offence and had been sentenced to a term in a military prison, from which he had escaped and the police had been looking for him.

The last I heard of him, a friend in Bombay sent me a cutting from a local newspaper which said that he had been caught after a series of him blackmailing some officers鈥� wives. I never heard of him again.

Leaving Coloba Camp, we travelled across India by road and at intervals there were staging posts to draw rations, fuel, etc. 鈥� also usually a canteen where you could buy food. It was in one of these that an Indian waiter came up to me and said, 鈥淎re you Payne sahib?鈥� I said yes and he said 鈥淚 knew your father in the 4th/7th Dragoon Guards.鈥� I can only think he had recognised me as I had looked like my Dad at the age of 28.

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