大象传媒

At the age of 14 years and 4 months, I started work on the railway at Barnstaple Junction on August 20th 1942.

I was originally employed as number-taker recording all freight traffic details, in and out of the station yard.

At that time the American forces had just arrived and their R.T.O (Rail Transport Office) had been opened on the station. It was a curved galvanised roof hut where the station master's house stands.

It was soon recognised my task was the same as one of the American soldier's, Corporal James G Owen, from Allentown, Pensylvania U.S.A and he liked to go dancing at the local hops in the evenings. So, on these occasions I would duplicate my records and leave a copy on his desk for him to enter up in the morning. Occasionally, his O.C, a major, would catch me leaving these copies and I would get a cigar for dad, or gum for myself.

Ammo' and petrol trains were top of his list. On occasions Jimmy came to Sunday lunch at home. As you know, Devon was the most militarised county in the U.K and it was sometimes difficult to cycle to work along the North Walk, (that is now where the Barnstaple civic centre stands) because of the packed tanks and armoured vehicles before D-day. The area around Braunton to Woolacombe was packed with forces, Chivenor with airmen. The area between Braunton and Saunton was like a Kelki canvas town with Scottish and American troops and Woolacombe had been taken over by the Americans. To cater for these troops a special train of ten coaches used to leave Barnstaple Town station at 10.30 pm daily.

It was aptly named "The Boozer" and ran to Wrafton and Braunton only. It was recognised it would be impossible to collect tickets at these stations, so the front doors of the town station were opened at 10.00 p.m. The passengers would then have to purchase a single ticket for 5d at the booking office window and then hand it to whoever was doing the collector's job that night at the door leading on to the platform and the train standing there. I was often detailed to do this job and usually behind me on the platform were two R.A.F. police, two American Snowdrops and two Army Redcaps. Any objections to relinquishing their ticket were met by a hand over my shoulder, grabbing the collar pulling forward and a truncheon on the back of the neck.

The last three compartments were reserved for the unconcious lads. Often the train would leave with passengers on the roof or hanging between coaches. After departure some of the ladies of the night would quietly slide away into the darkness of black-out.

D-day arrived and overnight it was almost a ghost town but then followed the unpleasant part. Trains bringing wounded Yanks back for attention to places such as Lee Abbey. Coming in to the Junction these pulled in to the 'up' platform to allow transfer to ambulances. Then I and other porters had the task of cleaning the coaches and seating. I would have been 16 then but it was all part of the job. Our first priority was to dive through the coaches to pick up any 'K' rations left behind. These were brown compact cartons about 10" x 5" x 1" and contained cigarettes, matches, gum, sweets and other goodies, absolute treasure at that time. Having collected the treasure the task of restoring the coaches to normal began. Blood and muck everywhere. Not a pleasant task and I sometimes wonder what a 16 year old would say nowadays. In the circumnstances I think they would adjust because it was a case of having to do so.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.