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Ivor Ball was born in Ripley in Derbyshire in 1923. He was the son of Joseph and Lily Ball from Heath Road at Ripley. He had three sisters and two brothers, his brother Leslie was in the Notts/Derbys Sherwood Foresters Regiment. Ivor was in the 185 wing RAF Drivers Motor Transport section whilst serving in India. Below is his account of his first three months in India.

On the 17th July 1943 we left Liverpool for an unknown destination. After calling at Freetown, Capetown and spending five days at Durban we arrived at Bombay on 12th September 1943. From there after 10 days rest we were sent to Calcutta in the so called third-class carriages which were no better than cattle trucks. That journey took four days and we were ready for the two days rest we had after it. I had been posted to 185 wing which was then at Kalahandi but since moved to Fenny and then Diggery. Instead of going there, my posting was cancelled and with 67 other lads under Warrant Officer Felgate started convoying lorries to different RAF Units in India. The first run was from Calcutta to Nersa by train and from Nersa to Calcutta with four wheeled drive chevrolets. The train journey took about 36 hours in the same so called third class carriages and although three Hindu''s were killed by the train we arrived at Nersa as fit as could have been expected under such conditions. We left Nersa the same evening for Asansol, a village 20 miles away. That night we first experiences sleeping in the backs of our lorries. The following morning we load with coal and after tiffin (cup of tea time) set out for Benhura a convoy staging camp. We reache dthat alright but it was dark and while parking, two lorries get bogged. The next day we set out for a RAF camp called Diggery. We got there at Tiffen Time so after having a good feed we pushed on for railway settlement called Kharagpur where we had to wait for a train for a week. During that week two lads were drowned while bathing in a nearby pond. Two hours of artificial respiration and heart injections was of no avail, the boys were buried the next day. After seven days we drove the lorries onto railway tracks and after 12 hours we arrived at Calcutta and delivered our vehicles.

Our next trip was Nersa but instead of bringing the lorries to Kharagpur and coming from there by train we came direct to Calcutta, stopping for one night at Budwon and got to Calcutta the following night. After a short rest a WO told us that we were to be on a longer and more dangerous trip to Imphal. This time we picked up our lorries at Calcutta on the 23rd of October 1943 and drove to Barrachpore Sidings where the 37 lorries were put on a train. We left there at 01.45am on the 24th October 1943 and after a day on the train we arrived at Santarkar on the 25th October 1943 where we changed over onto a narrow guage train. All the vehicles could not get on the one train so some had to wait for another train the following day. Our party reached Bongaigaon at noon on the 26th October 1943 and proceeded to a rest camp to wait for the other vehicles. On the 27th October 43 all the convoy crossed the Brahmaputra and spent the night at Kalpana. From Kalpana we drove to Gauhati on the 29th October 1943. There the lorries that had not already got jeeps on the back loaded up with barrels of tar. At this camp we were warned to be careful of tigers at night as a number had been reported in the vicinity. Altogether, we spent two days at Gauhati and then on the 30th October 43, we set out for Nowgong. This stage was hilly and here we saw some very beautiful scenery although there were some nasty bends in the road. At Nowgong, we parked in a lane and were confined to that spot as cholera raged in the village. So we were pleased when we started for Numaligarh on the 30th October 43. But at Numaligarh we were disappointed. we parked in the jungle and we had no water supply no latrines and no cookhouse accommodation. My mate had two tigers prowling around his lorry that night so he was glad when we set out for Dimapur on the 1st November 43. That road was very bad and we were delayed for two hours because a bulldozer on a trailer had gone through a bridge. On the 2nd November 43, we started the last and most dangerous part of the journed through the hills to Imphal. This was 130 miles of the the worst roads I have ever driven on, it was all twist and turns as well as climbing all the time. At Tiffin Time all the empty lorries were sent back and only the loaded lorries were to go through. For the next two days we unloaded our lorries at Imphal all the time realising we were close to the Japs. On the 5th November 43, we returned to Dimapur and spent the night in th lorries. On the 6th Novemebr 43, we moved into the 52 rest camp.

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