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From: Douglas Whybrow, Lyme Regis, Dorset DT7

In 1937 I had a friend, he was two years older, and we had ambitions like many young men at that time to become pilots in the RAF, but they were greatly oversubscribed at that time. With much talk of war in a burst of patriotism we decided to join the Cheshire Yeomanry and we enlisted on 9th November that year. I was only fifteen but put my age up to seventeen; it was not questioned.
We trained with horses at summer camp for two weeks in 1938 and 1939, then on 31st August 1939 we were mobilised (and handed in our sabres for sharpening!), and 3rd September assembled to hear the declaration of war at 1100. The regiment was to be shipped immediately to Palestine, with horses, and those under the age of eighteen were to be dispersed to various units along with those who were over the age limit, forty-six I believe. It was not uncommon for men who reached the compulsory retirement age to wait six months and then apply to join with a fictitious age, they were always accepted.
On 5th September three of us were us were put on a train with orders to report to the Embarkation Commandant, Avonmouth. We travelled in our correct — our only - uniform: Breeches, puttees, boots and spurs, with highly polished bandoliers, and in the absence of our sabres, carrying whips. The embarkation staff were just organizing themselves in the old railway station on the South Pier - the station had been built to serve the passenger traffic on Fyffes banana boats, and apart from the sand-filled corrugated-iron blast wall that had been erected around it, it was a fully-equipped station in miniature. We eventually found someone to take an interest in us, and our unlikely apparel caused so much amusement to two regular RASC clerks that they nearly fell off their flimsy folding chairs as tears of disbelieving laughter dropped on to the regulation blanketed trestle table. They promptly sent us to the end of the South pier convinced that such a show of military strength must be reinforcement for the regiment guarding the harbour entrance with Lewis guns.
We were firmly rejected and it was quickly discovered that we were to join the embarkation staff and assist in the dispatch of the BEF to France to a plan called the W4 plan. (That was something that came into my life in an unlikely way when I was posted to the war office eight years later).
We were billeted in old dilapidated storage sheds on the South pier, we slept on the draughty wooden floor with two blankets per man and we continued to do so for seven weeks until palliasses and straw appeared. (It was late 1940 before beds were issued). We supplemented the poor food by frequent visits to the Dockers’ cafes just outside the dock gates. There a portion of faggots and chips and a mug of tea cost less than a shilling; they were well patronized. We were also allowed to use the canteen within the docks, which sold huge mugs of tea and buns. There was little call for anything else as the working men mostly brought their own snack lunches.
About two weeks after we arrived a notice appeared in Part I Orders for anyone who could type to report to the orderly room. I had been with a firm before the war where the managing director had provided the finance for anyone who wanted to go to night school. I went and chose a course that involved business studies and that included, optionally, learning to type properly. The MD prompted me to take the typing course saying that it would benefit me throughout my life - how right he was!
Proud of my prowess with the typewriter I reported to one of the original reception committee, one Private Sexton, now more human and humorous, and whom I was to meet later in the war. Sexton, a regular soldier, explained that the progress of the war was being hindered because the unit had not been making the proper returns to the local garrison headquarters and there were three brand new machines and only he could bash one with any reasonable speed. He gave me a hand-written document and asked me to type it. I was in good practice, and by a happy coincidence the machine was the same model that I was familiar with- an Imperial. Touch-typing was greeted with astonishment and it was the start of a modestly successful army career that saw promotion to corporal, then sergeant, and finally to be the COs clerk, all within six months. With it came the incredible pay of eight shillings and sixpence a day - more than £20 in 2004 money and a small fortune when it was virtually 'all found' and extra messing was only sixpence a day in the sergeants mess.
Avonmouth was very vulnerable because it was in the top ten in the world's highest tide rise and fall, and the Luftwaffe began bombing almost every night, doubtless seeking the lock gates, although a massive amount of damage was also done to the town. I was outside the blast wall one night when a bomb dropped nearby and I was flung against the wall and deafened for some time. I was to learn later in the war that my eardrums were perforated.
Our CO, Major L J Castle, OBE, MC, took a Drake-like attitude to the war and every afternoon in that glorious summer of 1940 he played golf at nearby Shirehampton. This brought a certain amount of conflict with the local garrison commander who probably knew what was going on, and the war office in its frequent phone calls. Castle was a great chap, never failed to come and visit the unit when a heavy raid was on to see that all was as well as it could be, and he worked late in the evening; we all liked him. However ultimately it was decided that he should be retired (he was approaching seventy), and he arranged my posting to a unit where he said I would have the opportunity to go for a commission. In the event the CO at that unit was incredibly pompous and having been indulged by the WW1 officers at Avonmouth, we quickly were at loggerheads. (Among the officers at Avonmouth were (then) Captain Tom Adlam, VC, and several other well-decorated officers)
The CO refused to forward my application to have a WOSB interview and he also refused my application to transfer to another unit of the Royal Engineers (to which we had been transferred from the Cheshire Yeomanry). It was not until an ACI came out asking for volunteers to become glider pilots; with the warning "All applications will be forwarded", that I was able to try to move on. The first thing that happened at RAF Padgate was a medical examination when I discovered that I had perforated eardrums and was rejected. A sympathetic interview with a board of WW1 officers resulted in a WOSB interview and posting to 148 Infantry Training Brigade at Wrotham, Kent, and subsequently to a RE OCTU in Scotland.
After commissioning I went for combined operations training at Wemyss Bay and Arran, always with a good soaking in the cold Scottish seas, and eventually appointed AMLO (Assistant military landing officer) in No.12 Beach Group, landing with the 1st Canadian Division on the beach at Bark West (Maps available) on 10th July 1943. We had some excitement on landing, mainly watching the naval bombardment, which included a monitor ship with 15" guns. Whatever it did to the Germans it frightened the life out of me!
We moved up steadily until the battle was won. I was unfortunate to be posted on various missions because, I was told later, that I was regarded as something of a loner and rebellious of authority. (I really had been spoiled by those WW1 officers at Avonmouth!). In the course of these moves I managed to contract all three types of malaria. Eventually I collapsed whilst we were resting at the town of Accireale. After a spell in hospital during which, unable to keep large draughts of Quinine down, it was being pumped in by syringe. I was clearly an unsatisfactory case and I was flown out on a stretcher with others to convalesce in Tunisia and Algeria. It was some time before I returned to Italy.

There is much more to my story but I think I have written enough. . .

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