Part 3 (1/2)
On discharge from hospital I was sent to King's House in Durban for convalescence and was duly fitted out with hospital blues and a red tie.
I remember being there for Good Friday and for another couple of days and enjoyed the time touring the city; it was a beautiful place, this was the end of March 1943, their autumn, the right time of the year and the vegetation was lush I was just settling down to a short spell of doing nothing; I wasn't looking too smart, I used to have my hair cut every two weeks and it was now seven weeks long, additionally the pneumonia had left me with three boils on my face. My convalescence was short lived because I was ordered to report to a hospital, not Clairwood, to be examined to determine if I was fit enough to re-join draft RGDFA. An ambulance arrived and I occupied a stretcher on the upper of two berths, the man on the lower was going to the same hospital. Our ambulance bounced along over dirt roads, it was a very rough ride and after one huge b.u.mp my stretcher collapsed and I landed on the fellow below; he wasn't very pleased with me and I finished the journey sitting down, listening to his constant griping. After a cursory examination by the doctor I was p.r.o.nounced fit enough to re-join draft RDGFA. He must have known where we were going and he must have known that troops with lung problems were not supposed to be sent there, but there, that's the military. I suppose that after the war these three doctors, this one and the two on the Antenor, were let loose on the civilian population of Britain, I'm glad I wasn't one of their patients.
Most of our group had a good time in Durban and were very well treated by the South Africans, when we expressed our thanks they said, ”Oh, you should have been here before the Australians came, they nearly wrecked the place.”
Back on the docks we saw our next floating hotel, HMT Aronda; she was much more modern, lighter in build and with finer lines than the old Antenor. Once on board we got into our new routine. The s.h.i.+p had a permanent army officer, OC Troops who, I presume stayed with her on all her voyages. We also had another luxury on board, a real live bugler; his job was to sound off at various periods of the day to announce some activity or other.
As with the Antenor this s.h.i.+p was fitted out with mess tables and attached benches. Early on we had to report to stores and draw hammocks because the sleeping arrangements were similar as well. On the Antenor we had been issued with bottles of fortified lime juice (shades of Captain Cook) but now we were to be issued with bottles of carbonated drinks. We soon set forth, destination still unknown; we were all a.s.signed boat stations and each morning we a.s.sembled on deck waiting to be inspected by our betters, looking a little ridiculous in our ”Bombay bowlers” and our Bombay bloomers”. The inspection was quite a formal affair as an entourage consisting of the s.h.i.+p's captain, OC Troops and various others of decreasing rank, a lance-corporal as the caboose, traversed the s.h.i.+p. However leading this group and heralding its approach was the bugler; at each station he paused, stood smartly to attention, put the bugle to his lips and sounded four ”G's” then off he went to the next station to repeat his performance; he was a pain.
When the waters were calm and the nights were clear we sometimes lay on deck looking upwards to the heavens because in the southern hemisphere different star constellations were visible, the Southern Cross for one.
As the s.h.i.+p pitched and rolled ever so gently the tip of a mast would trace slow little circles in the near black sky; it was half an hour of peace. We knew that we were moving in a north-easterly direction and we had a general knowledge of the local geography but we couldn't determine whether we pa.s.sed to the west or the east of Madagascar. The first bit of excitement came when I perched on a box and, surrounded by a group of interested onlookers, had my locks shorn. I felt much lighter but my face still had its three boils, they were to stay with me a while longer. The Aronda was alone, not in convoy and I remember one morning well, I had gone up on deck early, sunrise comes suddenly at about 6am in those lat.i.tudes; there was the gentle throbbing of the engines but complete silence otherwise, the Indian Ocean was grey and more tranquil than I had ever seen water before , or since. All around the water was flat and mirror-like except at the stern where our wake, a thin white streak stretched out into the distance. I celebrated my 25th birthday in the middle of the Indian Ocean.
On board we had a public address system, installed presumably to impart words of wisdom like, ”splice the mainbrace” or ”Abandon s.h.i.+p” or something but in fact it was used to play records to keep up our morale.
Where the control room was situated I never did find out but whoever was responsible for the choice of records must have been a fan of Deanna Durbin; hour after hour the strains of One Fine Day came over the speakers, there were other records of course but even today when I hear One Fine Day I am transported back in time to the Indian Ocean. There are a few other incidents that stay in my mind from that period. One man put on a charge for some minor offence thought the punishment awarded was too excessive so he kicked the escort and fled; of course he couldn't get very far on a s.h.i.+p, a fact he should have thought of beforehand. We saw him running round the decks with three PT instructors in hot pursuit; he gave them a good run for their money but nevertheless he finished up in the s.h.i.+p's brig. As usual the military required guards to be posted during the night and in the interests of convenience and fairness each draft took turns to supply the men. For a change my services were not required on that voyage but one night it fell upon the Royal Army Service Corps to stand guard. Since he had to be up early in the morning to sound ”reveille” the bugler slept in the guard room to be awakened in good time. He also slept with his bugle, with the fancy cord around his neck. As I said before he was a pain and the RASC decided to do us a favour; while he was asleep the cord was cut, the bugle removed and dumped overboard. We knew something was amiss in the morning when no bugle call aroused us and we waited to see what would transpire. We a.s.sembled at our boat stations. By-and-by the bugler came into view, stopped at our station, stood to attention and ”Peep, peep, peep, peep.” he went. The military was not to be denied, they had given him a referee's whistle. That was the same occasion when the s.h.i.+p's liquor store was broached and some of the guards were the worse for wear. We never heard any more about this episode, perhaps some were punished, we were never told.
Attempts were made to keep us occupied, unofficially cards were played and money changed hands, usually from mine into someone else's. Housey was often played and at times shows were put on consisting of stand-up comedy, solo singing and sing-songs where we all joined in. One lad stood on the make-s.h.i.+ft stage and recited,
”Do you remember an inn, Miranda,
Do you remember an inn?
”And the shouts and the jeers
Of the young muleteers,
Do you remember an inn?”
He struggled manfully to the end, ignoring all the ribald remarks coming from some quarters and when he had finished he acknowledged the spa.r.s.e applause; definitely not the sort of poetry expected by the licentious soldiery.
Days came and went, I don't recall how many but the time came when the sea birds arrived on the scene and we knew that landfall was not too far distant. The brighter ones among us told us that we were nearing Bombay and for once they were right.
INDIA
As HMT Aronda approached Bombay we eagerly scanned the coastline and almost at once discerned that imposing arch The Gateway to India but there was not too much time to spend sightseeing as we had to prepare to disembark. The s.h.i.+p docked and a little later we were making our way down the gangplank. Partway down I could see a commotion on the quayside; three military policemen were holding down a p.r.o.ne figure; though his face was flat where it was being pressed against the quay I recognised him as being the prisoner from the s.h.i.+p's brig. He had attempted to escape custody once more but again he had failed; I think he didn't like the army very much. We fell into position by drafts and waited and waited; it was mid-day and getting very hot. We stood in formation for about an hour, eventually our guide arrived to lead us to our billets; he was Indian Army, somewhere around five feet tall and he set off at a blistering pace. We quick marched behind him and when I say quick I mean it, with his short legs he had a short stride and we longer-legged ones kept up with difficulty. After a mile or so we entered Colaba Camp, this was to be our home for a while.
Now started our introduction to things Indian. The teeming ma.s.ses and the number of people sleeping in the streets surprised me as did the apparent disregard for personal safety amongst the traffic. New words came into our vocabularies the origins of which sometimes go back to the many countries that British forces have garrisoned over the last three centuries. Some military personnel must obviously have become proficient in the local languages but for the most part the British soldier was and still is linguistically lazy, content to adopt and sometimes anglicise foreign words and phrases to suit the occasion.
Strangely enough using some English mixed with some foreign phrases and body language the soldiers usually made themselves understood by the locals who probably thought that all the words were English. At times it led to some interesting exchanges.
However at this stage we were introduced to mainly Indian words, charpoys for rope beds, chatties for unglazed urns, pani for water, jaldi for quick and many, many more. We met some of the regular army characters who had spent years in India and gleaned snippets of information from them. Were there any poisonous creatures around?
Well, yes, scorpions for one thing. What about snakes? There are several different sorts here. Very poisonous? Yes, especially the hoop snake. Hoop snakes? never heard of them. Oh, they are very fast but if they can't catch up with you by wriggling they put their tails in their mouths and bowl themselves along like hoops. Our legs were often pulled like this until we became in turn the seasoned leg-pullers of the new arrivals.
The camp CO used to ride around on a white horse and occasionally he would give us a pep talk; to those of us who were getting a bit too boisterous he said, ”Most of you before the war were law abiding citizens but once you've put on a uniform and moved away from home you think you've become licensed buccaneers. Behave yourselves.” There was a fair amount of spare time before we expected to move again and we spent a lot of it looking over this main port of The British Raj. The Gateway to India that we had earlier glimpsed as we steamed into dock was the first thing to see and we were duly impressed. Then there was the centre of Bombay, we wandered along Hornby Street to the Kodak shop where I bought a film for my vest-pocket Kodak. Unfortunately the camera had developed a pinhole in the bellows and most of my pictures were spoiled. A couple of evenings were spent at the cinemas, watching Hollywood films that were about two years old. We also visited a zoo (Victoria?) where strangely, amongst other creatures, we saw in captivity English sparrows Other unexpected sights included cows wandering unhindered through the streets and carts drawn by camels. In one of the main streets my attention was caught by the sight of a turbaned Indian who was sitting cross-legged putting on a show, pitting a cobra against a mongoose. I didn't feel like staying for the finale, I guess he had to separate the combatants or else go looking for a new snake.
Our stay in India was not very long, a matter of a couple of weeks or so but long enough to give us a feel for the country. Under the British Raj there didn't seem to be much evidence of the inter-religious hostility that would result in such a blood bath at Independence and part.i.tion in 1948. Political struggle there was and some anti-British sentiment but it didn't seem pervasive to us. Little booklets were issued to us that outlined the history and customs of India, (the term India was all-inclusive in those days, both Hindu and Moslem) and listed population densities together with a glossary of useful words and phrases. Other words and phrases not in the booklet we picked up from contact with the older and more experienced soldiers. At that time we also learned that the Indian Army was entirely separate from the British, with its own Viceroy commissioned officers whom we did not have to salute, and the ranks of Subahdar, Jemadar and Havildar were added to our vocabularies. During our short stay draft RDGFA suffered its first casualty, Cfn Love was whisked off to hospital and later succ.u.mbed to a brain tumour.
Our accommodation was in long huts that in memory appeared to be permanent; we found the charpoys quite comfortable and the bell-shaped mosquito nets that dangled from the ceiling gave us uninterrupted nights. Food was sufficient, plenty of rice in various guises and frequent curries that despite the warm weather seemed to cool one down. There was also the usual NAAFI store and fresh fruit could be purchased daily.