大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Roger Marsh of the 鈥楢ction Desk 鈥� Sheffield鈥� Team on behalf of Reg Reid, and has been added to the site with the authors permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

The Lighter Side of War

By
Don Alexander

CHAPTER 2a: 39th Ack-Ack Newark, Notts. R.W. Reid, D. R. Langford and Winthorpe Halls

On 1st September 1939 the German army invaded Poland and two days later, honouring their treaty obligation to the Poles, Britain and France declared war on Germany.

The Sheffield lads forming RASC 39th Ack Ack got their call up papers again and were sent to Newark.
Practical lads with a mechanical bent who could drive or could be taught to drive lorries, were based at Langford Hall, requisitioned by the Army, a minor stately home standing in red-brick Georgian splendour in large grounds, capable of containing dozens of army lorries.

Names Reg remembers from those far-off days are Privates George Bennett, Pete Underwood, Will Wright, Stan and Wilf Smith, Frank Turton, Jack Osborne, Davenport, Spurr - all based at Langford Hall, all with cutlery, steel or engineering backgrounds - except George Bennett, who was a joiner in Civvy Street. The NCOs included a Sergeant Smith, so there were three Smiths at the Hall.

Jack Osborne, cutler, was the first casualty of their war. He was teaching one of the learners who lost control of the 3 ton Bedford, changing gear too near to a very sharp bend. They drove straight through someone's front window. Jack, with a broken leg, was the only person injured.

Another minor stately home, Winthorpe Hall, built in limestone, with a parapet running right round it, standing in smaller grounds a few miles from Langford Hall, was also requisitioned by the Army. This was now the RASC 39th Ack Ack HQ. The palatial second floor housed the officers' mess and rooms for the officers who included Allcard (of the engineer's tool making firm Easterbrook, Allcard), Beswick, Craig, Grey and Boot (of the builders Hy. Boot). Sundry NCOs, plus privates Reg Reid, Ron Gregory, Ray Cheetham and a Sheffield University professor with a double-barrelled name, who was in line for a commission, were billeted in the attic.

Reg and the Prof. were in charge of the only lorry, a Bedford three-tonner, at Winthorpe Hall, and after they had learned to drive it, were made busy, delivering equipment to various searchlight units scattered across the East Midlands and South Yorkshire.

At one unit in Lincolnshire Reg could have become their war's second casualty. As he and the Prof. approached the cookhouse, he was nearly cut down by what we would now call `friendly fire'. A nervous guard called out, "Halt, who goes there?" and fired his rifle at them even as he spoke the words. We'll give him the benefit of the doubt and say he didn't intend to squeeze the trigger as he spoke!

The Prof's overcoat had flapped in the breeze and the shot whistled through the khaki material of same flap, right between Prof and Reg.

They agreed not to say anything about the incident, but someone had heard the 303 shot, reported the guard, and he was court-martialled.

If they were out on jobs that took them from early morning to late evening, the cook at Winthorpe prepared them sandwiches. At some point of the journey in open countryside, the Prof. would take both lots of sandwiches and ceremoniously throw them to the birds. "I'll take you to a nice restaurant instead Reg - I'll pay of course". They would then call at a nice restaurant of his choice - Davy's or Tuckwood's in Sheffield, or ones in Lincoln, Hull, Nottingham or Derby.

These treats for the birds in the fields and for Reg were astounding in wartime. Adding weight to the old adage, `It's not what you know, it's who you know'.
The eccentric Prof. then went for his commission in the Infantry and Reg never saw him again.

What about Ron Gregory? He wasn't long at Winthorpe - barely had time to get to know a local girl before he was gone. He too left the RASC for a commission in the Infantry - probably KOYLI, the fast marching, 180 paces a minute, 3 paces a second King鈥檚 Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.

He was an impatient lad and wanted to be in the thick of any action. Reg had expressed his father's foreboding, but Ron felt it wouldn't be any more dangerous than driving in convoys with the RASC. These could just as easily be picked off by an enemy - especially from the air; they could be sitting ducks.

They hadn't dwelt on what might happen though, but with the optimism of youth, had agreed to meet up after the war to get to Bakewell and meet the girls. If those two had by then met other lads too bad - there were other fish in the Wye! Ron planned to buy a motorbike too, and they planned runs into the Peak and beyond. The world would be their oyster.

Ron's new girlfriend's mother lived on the very road that ran from Winthorpe to Newark, and he had given his friend her address before they parted. There was an open invitation for Reg to call in for tea. They had parted with some sadness but young men in those days didn't show emotion. They didn't even shake hands, and what about little Ray Cheetham -he who had signed on at Edmund Road Drill Hall on 24th June 1938, and had got in the army by standing on his tiptoes? What was he doing with Reg as the sole privates among the brass and NCOs of Winthorpe Hall? Well, he'd been given the job of Lt. Boot's chauffeur. One of two higher-ranking officers had army Humber limousines chauffeured and cleaned by lads at Langford. Lt. Boot was paid by the Army to use his own car, a Jaguar. He put four cushions on the driver's seat so that Ray could peer over the steering wheel when driving.

Later in the war, Reg learned that Ray Cheetham worked in South Africa conscripting natives into the British Army. He had a natural sympathy with the underdog and befriended a bastard black lad from a village where the lad and his mother were ostracized because of his illegitimacy. He promoted the lad to corporal whereupon he was then shown respect in the village, and his mother beamed with pride - her son an NCO in the British Army!

Once Ray, with conscripted black lads in the back of his lorry (with specially raised and cushioned driving seat), passed a runner and stopped to give him a lift. He told the lad, "Bang on the roof of the car when you want to get off," and continued on the rough road, more of a track, at about 20 mph.

After a few miles the lad banged on the roof and immediately jumped off before Ray could stop, and broke his leg. The lad hadn't realised that Ray would be kind enough to stop! Ray took him then to army medics. That's the story of pint-sized Ray Cheetham and we've drifted many thousands of miles from Newark, but it shows you the vast reaches of the British Army and Empire at the time.

Back at Winthorpe Hall, near Newark, Reg was now without his mucker, the Prof.
You may be aware of the `Organised Chaos' of the Army. Its ability to put a square peg in a round hole. You know the kind of thing.
"Are you a musician?"
"Yes Sah!"
"Then shift that piano laddie."

It could be called lateral thinking, though the phrase wasn't around then. Would you expect Reg with his skill as a biker and love of motorbikes to be made a despatch rider? Well, surprise - he was! T/68784 R.W. Reid D.R. 39th Ack Ack RASC.

He ran despatches around the Midlands, but mainly to an army base in Hucknall and with mail and messages between the RASC Halls at Winthorpe and Langford on an army Matchless 350cc. He kept his Excelsior Manxman `for best'.

Stan Smith, who'd volunteered with Reg and Ray Cheetham in June 1938 at Edmund Road Drill Hall, loaned his 350cc BSA and Wilf Wright his 600cc Ariel Square Four to the army for the standard amount -of three shillings and sixpence per week.

There was then a delivery of fifteen new big 500cc Ariel `Red Hunter' bikes and Reg was put in charge of these. They weren't short of bikes, but the lads, like the Home Guard, had done their square bashing and had trained with wooden rifles!

In Civvy Street, Reg had been a very shy youth - on the old Sheffield trams with two rows of wooden slatted seats along each side, he used to blush if he caught someone's eye. Me too. I can sympathise with him. I'd look up at the `No Spitting' sign, down at the floor, back at the passing scene or forward to the driver's cabin - or pretend to sleep - anything to avoid someone's gaze.

Army life hadn't yet conquered this basic shyness, but he did show entrepreneurial flair. He reasoned that it would be good for the fifteen 鈥楻ed Hunter' motorbikes to get some usage, so he hired them out with a full tank of army petrol to the lads at half a crown (2s 6d, (12陆p) a day, for them to get to Sheffield to see their loved ones on their days off. It became a common sight - two lads on a single seater bike, the one at the back, legs dangling as they roared down the drive and out of Winthorpe Hall.

Happy days of the `phoney war': Germany from the west and Stalin's Red Army from the east had conquered and split Poland between themselves in one month. Everyone now awaited Germany's next move. Meanwhile, on the long quiet road to Newark from Winthorpe, George Bennett was showing Reg how to stand up on a motorbike, Reg adjusting the twist grip tensioner so that the throttle stayed open - this way they could go at a steady 25mph standing up, arms outstretched, steering the bike by swaying left or right.

One day when Reg had finished his rounds and was returning on the selfsame Newark to Winthorpe Road, he decided he ought to take up the invitation and call in at Ron Gregory's girlfriend's mother's house. She greeted him like a long lost son - fruitcake, biscuits and tea in china cups. He was lifting his third cup to his lips, little finger held out politely, when she said, "Do you know, Reginald, two of your Army boys pass by on this road both standing up, arms held out, on a motorbike - at such a speed? So dangerous. Aren't they silly beggars? -I've a mind to report them to their C.O. before they kill themselves."
Reg spluttered, then contained himself: "Sorry to tell you - I'm one of those silly beggars!鈥�

Pr-BR

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