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With no organised work to do, the days passed slowly, but we were at least becoming used to the heat, the country, Indian Army ways or rather the British Army ways in India, for there was indeed an Indian Army! The bullfrogs and crickets no longer kept me awake at night, and I had seen the odd snake and scorpion, as well as the flying foxes which hung in the trees lining the main Poona to Bombay road. When dusk fell, the foxes or bats as they really were would begin flying around on their 2ft wing span and squeal endlessly as they hunted whatever it was they fed on. I was pleased to know we were not included!
The most annoying pest — after the mosquito of course, was a flying beetle which would settle on a mosquito net and for some reason push its head in and out against the net, until it had made a hole about ½ inch across. The beetle didn’t go through the hole, but moved to another part of the net to make another one, so I figured that the mosquitoes were paying the beetles somehow!
Our only recreation in camp, apart from the organised Tombola sessions, was football and the scratched up matches were always played in the evening. The days dragged by, with only rumours being heard about when we were going to be moving out, and we just couldn’t understand why we were still sitting at Dehu doing nothing.
A few days later all our speculation about reasoning for staying at Dehu, was ended, when the morning parade was unusual in that everyone in the unit was called in, and the Major gave us the news that some new kind of bomb had been dropped on a Japanese city, Hiroshima. He told us that this ‘atomic’ bomb was such a terrible weapon and had caused such damage and loss of life that the war was virtually over. The unit would not be moving up into Burma, or anywhere else. 19 Vehicle Group was to be disbanded. I had to be pleased that the war was over, even though for me, it was the usual story — more smoke in the wind!
Later on we heard about the second bomb which was dropped on the city of Nagasaki, and of the Japanese surrender. We were all agreed that this new type bomb must be one hell of a thing, but we had no idea just how terrible it was, so everyone thought that using it was justified if it meant the end of the war. At a later date a lot of us were going to question that view, but right then I felt I had been dealt the Joker again, for I would really have liked to get operational somewhere — even in Burma
Dick and I talked one night about the effect of the bomb and I found that he felt much the same as I did about Burma, but when he pointed out that thousands of Allied troops had almost certainly been saved by the bomb, using it seemed to have been justified, and we agreed that we were probably really lucky not to be going to Burma now.
I found that Dick, who was a couple of years older than me, had had the same problem and I had in getting into the Forces from a reserved occupation. I think Dick came from Gainsborough.

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