大象传媒

BROTHERS IN ARMS

This is a contrast between the war experiences of my two brothers. Both are now dead. Henry was four years older than John. John was 10 years older than me so they were a different generation to me. They told me their stories after the war.

HENRY
In 1940, Henry volunteered to join the R.A.F., before being called up for national service. He asked to be, and was accepted as a pilot. As pilots were in such short supply (Battle of Britain and all that), he was shipped out to Rhodesia, as it was then called, for pilot training. Strangely, all British pilots were ordered to take out Rhodesian nationality, I don't know why.
On completion of his training, Henry ferried fighter planes from southern Africa to Egypt, for combat pilots to fight with, but he soon became a combat pilot himself. He fought in the North African campaign, the Sicilian campaign, and the Italian campaign, before transferring back to England just before the Normandy landings. He was part of the "umbrella of steel" protecting the landing forces.
He continued fighting in the French campaign, but during this time, changed from flying Hurricanes, to flying Typhoons. Typhoons carried pods under the wings holding rockets to destroy enemy targets. Henry was no longer being used to support ground warfare, but was given a roving commission, to seek and destroy any enemy target behind enemy lines. Prime targets were trains. He told me that he was once roving and saw a train in the distance. As he drew close it disappeared into I tunnel and stopped there for protection. So Henry flew to the exit end of the tunnel and blasted it with rockets to block the exit. Then he flew to the entrance end of the tunnel and blasted it, trapping the train in the tunnel.
Although his plane was damaged many times he was never injured, and returned safely to base, except on his last mission. It was just two weeks before the end of the war in Europe, when he was shot down behind enemy lines in Germany. It was a dangerous time. The Hitler Youth were still very active and hanged, from lampposts, any allied aircrew who were unfortunate enough to fall into their hands. Henry hid for a few days in a pine forest but when his emergency rations ran out, he had to find food and shelter and a radio to locate where the front line had moved to. He came across a canal on which there was a small barge. Smoke was coming from the little smoke stack (food!), and there was a small aerial (radio!), but the barge was about six feet from the bank. Henry took a chance and jumped the gap, lost his footing and landed in the water. An elderly couple came out, took and dried his clothes, fed him, let him listen to the radio, gave him some of their meager rations and helped him on his way. It wasn't just because it was the end of the war. They genuinely wanted to help him, he felt. He walked his way to the American lines and away from any further involvement in the war. Henry was one of Britons war heroes.

JOHN
John was called up for national service towards the end of the war. He volunteered for the Royal Navy, and was accepted. Two weeks before he was due to report to Portsmouth, he received a letter telling him he had been selected to be redirected to the South Wales coal mines for his national service. He was one of the so called "Bevan Boys". He sent them a polite reply saying that he would do anything but that he would not go down the mines. A few days after he was due to report to Wales, two policemen (yes, two) knocked at our door and arrested John for failing to report for national service. He was taken in front of a magistrate and give three months (yes, three months) prison in a young peoples detention centre, known at the time as Borstal. He was released after two months for good behavior, but on the day his official sentence ended, he received a letter calling him up into the army for national service. He asked why he was not called up for the Navy, as he had been accepted by them, and was told "they don't accept anyone with a criminal record"! So started Johns army career.
All recruits do a number of weeks basic training. John was very much a "rough diamond". Dress him in a new suit and he would still look untidy. So John was in constant trouble, and always on a charge, during the basic training. He was, by then pretty disillusioned and very unhappy with the whole thing. Passing out day finished with a big parade. It was winter and the soldiers wore their great coats. These had a small slit low down at the back with one button holding it together. Before marching onto parade, the sergeant gave them one last inspection. Johns button was undone. The sergeant poked John up the backside with his swagger stick and said "get that button done up". John dropped his rifle and turned round and punched the sergeant. This would have led to a General Court Marshal, and John would have been found guilty and sentenced to two years in the glass house (Colchester). However, the commanding officer told John he had one alternative. He could volunteer for the graves commission. John asked what that was and was told it was something that needed doing in Burma but that John would get three weeks embarkation leave before he left, so John said OK.
John was shipped out to Burma to find out what his job was. In present day warfare, anyone killed has his location reported back to headquarters and a team are sent out to collect the body which is invariably returned to the country of origin, i.e. British bodies to Britain, American bodies to America. In the second world war transport was too precious and travel too long, so all military bodies were buried in military cemeteries in the country where they died. However, in a hot country it was necessary to bury the bodies quickly because of disease and wild animals. So when a soldier was killed, the location was reported back but the body was temporarily buried. Johns job, in the graves commission, was to locate the temporary grave, dig up the remains and transport them back to a central burial area. The remains could be from one day old (the war was still on) to two years or more. The worst ones were those a few weeks old which had reached putrefaction. John was given six Japanese prisoners of war to do the digging but, as soon as the smell started to rise out of the grave, they would jump out and refuse to dig further, even when threatened with shooting. So John would have to rest his Tommy gun against a tree and finish the job himself.
He did this horrendous work for about 18 months (YES, 18 MONTHS!) until one day he caught sun stroke and found himself, with no clothes on, swimming madly in the middle of the Irrawaddy river, except that he had never learnt to swim. Fortunately, his colleagues rescued him in a boat.

Henry was a war heroe. John was a forgotten heroe.

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