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Donald Service - Born 1922

I was 17 when the war started. We had a family business in the town — fruit and veg. It was mostly in the East End. There were four brothers and 3 sisters ( 2 were married). Of course all the brothers were the age to go into the forces. My older brother who was 20 got called up with the 6 month conscription. So that meant we had to shut a shop in Cathcart St. After a while another brother got called up and he ran the shop in Lynedoch street so my oldest brothers wife came into that shop. I was next to go. I was in the Cartsburn shop and the girl I worked with (who I eventually married) took over the shop when I went. It was very difficult running a fruit and veg business during the war. There was no or very little imported fruit, some oranges from South Africa which went to children for their health.

My oldest brother didn’t have to go away. The MP Hector McNeil got him off. That was what saved the business.

I got registered in 1941 and I should have been away that year but I don’t know what happened as I didn’t hear anything for a whole year so I didn’t go away until September, 1942. I was in the airforce and went down south I then got posted overseas and was there for about 3 years. I was in the ground crew

The boat I went onto in Gourock was an American troop ship — the Argentina. There was about 6/7 thousand on that boat. You got 2 meals a day. I never saw a seat on that ship, you either stood or sat on the deck — for 35 days. We washed in salt water, there was no fresh water other than what filled our bottles to clean our teeth. It took 35 days to get to Durban. We were at a transit camp there before being transferred onto the Eastern Prince. We went from Durban to Suez , stopping at Aden on the way. I was posted back down to Aden for 2 years. They counted it as 3 years so you only had to do 1 more year in the middle east. I was a driver there — a lot of people couldn’t drive in those days but I’d passed my test. The RAF duties were coastal command. The German and Japanese submarines came into the Indian Ocean and our crew patrolled this area.

I drove a lot between Aden, Palestine and Iraq. Through the Sinai desert with supplies with the 51st motor transport. Alexandria was a place where you were lucky not to lose something off your truck.

In Aden we had watched a steamroller flattening petrol barrels and were quite puzzled. Once we got to our barracks we found that these flattened barrels made up the roof of our billet.

There weren’t many roads at the time. They tell me it’s different now, 2 lane highways. I was lucky to get through it. I never saw action except on the convoy to Durban when there were a few emergencies here and there. I saw a picture in a magazine of an American who had served in number 6 commando that my brother had been in and that was how I knew where my brother had been. I hadn’t had any news of him till then.

Aden was red hot but there was no malaria, very humid. Egypt was drier but round the Suez Canal there was malaria. The bugs and flies were terrible. You could stop in the desert and not see a thing but as soon as you opened a tin of food there would be flies everywhere.

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