Early in 1950 the 1st Battalion South Wales Borderers mounted its first large scale operation against the shifta (bandits) of Eritrea. Banditry has been a way of life since time began in this rugged East African country sandwiched between the Red Sea, Ethiopia and the Sudan, but a few years after the end of the second world war, a political flavour was introduced to their national sport. It was Mussolini's dream to have an East African empire, but things turned sour on him in 1940 when British, Indian and South African forces defeated his army in Somaliland, Abyssinia and Eritrea.
When we arrived in Asmara nine years later, there were still plenty of Italian expatriates about. In fact the whole country, radiating from its beautiful capital city, gave the impression of a pleasant part of northern Italy. Our job was to look after the interests of these poor Italians and stop shifta from wiping them out, which they would have done given half a chance.
The area selected for our first anti-shifta operation was an expanse of semi desert country west of Keren. We travelled by road from Asmara through rugged mountain country where mighty outcrops of rock, densely covered in prickly pear cactus provided excellent observation posts for shifta who were waiting for an opportunity to snipe at vehicles. For this reason, we always travelled in convoy with everyone armed and alert.
We reached the edge of the plateau where, in March 1941, British and Indian troops under General Platt fought one of the toughest battles of the war. As we descended through the gorge we marvelled at the tenacity of our soldiers who levered themselves to victory with their finger nails. Marked on a rock in white paint for all to see were the words: HLI SCOTLAND FOR EVER (HLI means Highland Light Infantry). At the bottom of the gorge, the road ran through undulating country sparsely covered with thorn bush. Twenty miles or so further on we turned left and headed for a place on the map marked Arressa; this was the location of battalion headquarters. We arrived during the late afternoon and were able to erect our tents before darkness enveloped us.
The next morning, the commanding officer held his 'O' (orders) group. The operation had already started and I, as signals officer, felt a certain amount of satisfaction as wireless communications were working reasonably well and information was trickling in. When operational matters had been covered, the CO came to the 'command and signal' part of his orders. "I have decided to have my Tac HQ (tactical headquarters) in the police post on the top of the hill over there," he said. We followed the direction of his finger and saw a small white-washed hut sitting like a pimple on a hill a few hundred yards away. "Signals officer - I want a wireless and telephone to be set up. Any problems?" "No, sir," I replied, "I'll get that fixed right away." "Good," said the colonel as he rose from his camp chair and strode towards his jeep. He looked back over his shoulder and said: "There's just one more thing, pole the telephone cable." "Hang on, sir," I shouted. "We haven't brought any poles with us." The colonel stopped in his tracks, turned around slowly and said menacingly: "I'm not concerned whether or not you have brought poles with you, just get that cable poled." With that, he got into his car and drove off.
I was fortunate to have an efficient signals sergeant called 'Duke' Dyer. I went across to the signals tent and gave him the outline of the CO's orders. "That's the place over there," I said, pointing to the small hut on the hill. "Righto. sir, no problem," said the resourceful 'Duke'. "There's just one more thing, Sergeant Dyer," I said, "pole the cable." "We haven't brought any poles," he replied. I gave him a stern look and said: "I don't give a damn whether or not you've brought any poles, just get that cable off the ground." I turned on my heel and walked off. I give credit to Sergeant Dyer and the signallers for trying hard. They collected all the spare tent poles and every bit of wood they could find in the quartermaster's compound which would raise the cable off the ground, but it wasn't enough. After a short distance from the magneto (field) exchange, they ran out of 'poles' and the telephone line had to lie on the ground.
The following day at the CO's 'O' group, I had a feeling that things were not going well. When he got around to the 'command and signal' bit, he looked at me and said: "Didn't I tell you to pole the cable to my Tac HQ?" "Yes, sir," I whispered. "Then, why-have-you-not-done-it?" he said in that clipped way of his which signalled trouble. I stumbled with a lame excuse about not being able to find anything else to lift the line and received another broadside: "Absolute nonsense," bellowed the colonel. "The place is littered with poles. Go outside and I'll show you." Leaving the others inside the tent, the CO picked up a piece of wood which turned and coiled back on itself until it resembled a modern art version of a corkscrew. "What's wrong with this?" he said. "A few of these tied together will be ideal. The trouble with you, my boy, is that you don't use your head." Just to add substance to his words he picked up a few more bent sticks he found under a bush. "I want that cable poled by midday," he snapped.
I gathered 'Duke' Dyer and the signallers together and we set about scouring the barren landscape for anything made of wood. Nothing was rejected and we soon had a production line of signallers tying together an assortment of twisted shapes. We made slow progress getting the cable off the ground and every time we erected a 'pole' I looked at the small hut on the hill to see if it was getting any closer. At last, within five minutes of the deadline, we struggled up the remaining few yards to the CO's Tac HQ and drove in the last 'pole', which resembled three badly damaged bicycle wheels.
The colonel came out of the hut and surveyed the undulating cable stretching back to battalion headquarters. I wiped the sweat off my brow and gasped: "I never thought we would do it, sir." He looked at me with a smile on his face and said: "I'll let you into a secret, Bob. I didn't think you would either. Well done."
Sunday, 3 February 2008
STANDING PROUD
It's good to attend a wedding now and again. It makes you dig out your morning dress, check for moth holes and find if it's still in fashion. Your wife looks upon the celebration of nuptials as a good excuse to plunge her account at Harrod's or Harvey Nick's into deep trouble. It makes you do lots of things out of the normal routine and, although you may grumble at the cost of a present for the bride and groom - the former, a pimply faced horror when last you saw her, and the other - never before the wedding day, you get a glow when both greet you like a favourite aunt and uncle.
It was like that when Nesta, my wife, and I were invited to a wedding of the daughter of some old friends. The ceremony was to take place in Woking, which meant an overnight stay in a reasonably adjacent hotel. We found one in a picturesque village and resolved to return and spend more time there one day.
With a few hours in hand, we ambled slowly along the A319 in the direction of Woking. Suddenly, I let out a gasp and turned my head sideways, causing the car to cross the white line in the middle of the road. I was back on track within a second or two but Nesta said: "What was that about?" I did not give her a direct answer, but looked for somewhere to turn around. A few minutes later I was driving into a place which bore the sign: 'GORDON'S SCHOOL'. "What are we doing here?" she asked. I drew up alongside a life-size statue of a British Army officer wearing a 'fez' sitting cross-legged on a heavily caparisoned camel. "That's why," I said. "It's General Charles Gordon, Governor General of the Sudan. The last time I saw the statue was when I was with the South Wales Borderers in Khartoum in 1949."
An obliging house master came along and confirmed it was the same statue I had seen forty four years previously. He explained that three years after the Sudan had been given its independence, the statue was brought home and re-erected at Gordon's School on 2nd April 1959. We sat in the car for a while; Nesta occupied herself with The Daily Telegraph crossword while I mused about happy days long ago in Africa.
I was a 22 year old officer when I travelled with the 1st Battalion South Wales Borderers from Cyprus aboard the SS 'EASTERN PRINCE' through the Suez Canal and down the Red Sea to Port Sudan. Any romantic ideas I may have had about the desert were dispelled when I saw mud-hut hovels which comprised the township and ugly piles of (Welsh?) coal used to fuel locomotives of Sudan Railways. The heat, even at that time of the year (April), was sticky and oppressive. Further inland, in Khartoum, we would find it hotter but less humid.
The journey from Port Sudan to Khartoum took about eighteen hours with one night aboard the train. Desert met the eye for a full 360 degrees, broken only by the mighty River Nile and the metal track. It was a landscape such as I had never seen before.
Every window was crowded as we approached Khartoum. Desert gave way to cultivated land irrigated by centuries-old methods of drawing water from the river. Groves of date palms provided contrast in colour to sand and gravel while crowds of natives dressed in long white 'night-shirts' raced along the track beside us.
At last, we pulled into Khartoum railway station where we were greeted by a Guard of Honour and the Regimental Band of the Sudan Defence Force. That moment imprinted itself on my mind for all time: rigid ranks of immaculately clad black soldiers wearing scarlet flower-pot 'taboosh' hats, khaki-drill smocks, shorts and long black puttees above leather sandals. This was a template of the standard for which we should aim. The band, equipped with conventional instruments, played Arab music. It was a new sound to most of us and, although military in character, it had an exotic lilt and sensuous rhythm which stirred my blood. In the months ahead, I would spend time with these fine askaris on the borders of Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda. It was the beginning of my respect for Africa and Africans which has been a part of me from then to the present day.
A queue of Army trucks was waiting outside the station to take us to our new home in South Barracks. It was no more than a ten minute ride to the sprawling mass of stone buildings built to the same style as pre-war Indian barracks providing soldiers' accommodation, offices, messes, a parade ground, wide and well watered flower beds, tennis courts and a large swimming pool ringed by tall date palms. Company sergeant majors were soon bawling commands and letting soldiers know that if they expected a 'cushy billet' in Khartoum, they had another thought coming!
Ivor Jarman, the Quartermaster, who arrived three weeks ahead of the main body, had produced a plan of officers' accommodation and it was the first thing I saw when I entered the wide portico of the mess. My batman gave a whistle of astonishment when he saw the huge room with a high ceiling that his officer (a mere lieutenant) had been allotted.
That evening, a few of us took a taxi and drove down Kitchener Avenue to the Grand Hotel. We already felt we had entered a time warp, but we were transported even further into the 19th century when our taxi driver pointed towards one of General Kitchener's gun-boats, the 'MELIK', which he had used on his campaign of 1896-8, tethered to a tree alongside the Blue Nile. Further along the road we passed the Governor General's palace re-built on the site of an earlier palace occupied by a previous governor, General Charles Gordon, who was killed there in 1885.
The 'Grand' was, at that time, one of the great hotels of the world. It stood at the junction of the two Niles: the White Nile, with its source in Lake Victoria and the Blue Nile, which started its long journey to Egypt in the Ethiopian highlands. We stood on the bridge spanning the confluence and watched the two shades of water merge into one mighty torrent that flowed north for 1,500 miles towards the land of the Pharaohs and the Mediterranean.
We had a meal in the hotel and I sampled for the first time the national dish - 'ful sudani'. The main ingredient of this delightful platter is ground-nuts, but the delicate use of spices, which provide a subtle and mysterious flavour, make its reproduction in a cold climate almost impossible. A cool breeze blew in from the river and we watched from the veranda as the stern paddle-wheel steamer from Atbara tied up at the jetty.
Our voluble taxi driver was waiting to take us back to South Barracks and this time he drove along Gordon Avenue; another broad avenue running parallel to Kitchener Avenue and the waterfront. The battered old taxi had a flimsy framework that held some canvas over our heads, otherwise it was open to the elements. We were in high spirits but quite unprepared for the magnificent sight which lay before us. When we were half way down Gordon Avenue, the moon appeared through a gap in the clouds and illuminated a statue of a camel with its rider sitting cross legged on a heavily ornamented saddle.
The driver stopped alongside the plinth and gave us a history lesson: "This is General Charles Gordon," he said. "He became Governor of Equatoria (Southern Sudan) in 1873 and stopped the slave trade." He went on to explain that Gordon became the Governor General of the whole of the Sudan in the service of the Khedive of Egypt in 1877. He visited every part of his desert domain and was respected for his wise counsel and firm leadership. Despite his strong Christian beliefs, he was not averse to dealing harshly with those he found guilty of breaking the law. He often hanged offenders for serious crimes.
In 1880, Gordon's talent for sorting out problems which defeated politicians was recognised; he was sent to China where he single-handedly defused a situation that could have led to war. In 1881, he was posted to Mauritius and promoted to Major General. He then went to Jerusalem for a year before being recalled to the Sudan to supervise the evacuation of Egyptians from their expensive and ill-fated attempt to rule Sudan as a colony. To this end, he was appointed Egyptian Governor General of the Sudan but answerable to the British government as well.
Gordon returned to London in 1884 to warn the British government about the danger created by a mystical cleric of Islam known as El Mahdi. Prime Minister Gladstone had no intention of getting involved in another war in Africa and sent Gordon back to Khartoum with instructions to sort the problem out by himself. Later that year, the Mahdi spread his influence over huge areas of the Sudan even to the gates of Khartoum where Gordon was forced to prepare siege emplacements around the town. As an officer of the Royal Engineers with a professional knowledge of defence works and pyrotechnics, he produced many novel and effective measures to delay the inevitable entry of the Mahdi's warriors.
After ten months of ever increasing distress among the 34,000 soldiers, families and civilians of Khartoum, who resorted to eating every living thing they could find, the defences were breached and the Mahdi's forces entered the town.
General Gordon, by some accounts, had returned to his quarters in the palace. When he heard the sound of the enemy in the courtyard, he faced them in full dress on the outside staircase; he offered no resistance when they climbed the stairs and stabbed him to death. Gordon's head was cut off and delivered to the Mahdi in Omdurman, on the other side of the river. Two days later, the thunder of guns and sharp cracks of rifles were heard and two steamers came into view. They were carrying British troops who had travelled up the Nile to try and rescue Gordon. When it became obvious that Khartoum had fallen, they turned around and headed back down the river.
The British government was hard pressed to account for the abandonment of the nation's greatest hero; Queen Victoria was inconsolable and led the country in mourning. It was not until 11 years later in 1896 that a task force commanded by General Sir Herbert Kitchener (later Earl Kitchener of Khartoum) forced a passage up the Nile and re-established British presence in Khartoum. From then until 1956 the Sudan enjoyed an age of political stability and wealth from the export of its natural resources, in the main - cotton.
Even though the Sudan was known as an Anglo/Egyptian condominium, there had been little Egyptian influence there since 1884 and Governor Generals had always been British.
Since 1956, when independence was granted, the Sudan has withdrawn into its shell and a new dark age has settled upon its people. Various regimes, controlled from Khartoum, have created genocide and have brought misery to the negroid people of the south. Arabs of the north have been forced to accept the harsh rules of Islamic fundamentalism and the once prosperous economy has stagnated through mismanagement.
But back to Gordon's statue and the remarkable events that took place before it was erected in Khartoum in 1903.
It is the work of Mr Onslow Ford RA and is a replica of the original statue unveiled by the Prince of Wales (later - King Edward V11) in Chatham, the home of the Royal Engineers, on 19th May 1890. The 'Khartoum' statue was originally sited in St. Martin's Place, London where the statue of Nurse Edith Cavell, executed by the Germans during World War One, now stands. It was unveiled there in July 1902 by the Duke of Cambridge.
Lord Kitchener and Lord Glenesh (The Morning Post) thought this was the wrong place and campaigned successfully to have it transported to Khartoum. In October 1902 it was put aboard the SS 'CEDARDINE' and began its journey to Egypt. Within twenty four hours the 'CEDARDINE' was rammed by another ship in the Thames estuary, and sank. Gordon and his camel rested ignominiously in the mud forty feet below the surface until the following day when it was raised and placed aboard the SS 'LESBIAN' (Queen Victoria, now dead, would not have been amused!).
Once out of British waters, the journey to Alexandria was uneventful but when the statue began the next stage of its journey to Khartoum, on a smaller boat, it sank again. Finally, it arrived in Khartoum and was erected on a low plinth. Lord Kitchener objected and gave orders for a much higher stone plinth to be provided. He might well have been thinking about the time when his own statue would be erected a mere hundred yards away from that of General Gordon. This happened sooner than he could have imagined, following his death in 1916 when he was drowned aboard HMS 'HAMPSHIRE' after she hit a German mine off the Orkney Islands.
General Charles Gordon would have been proud to know that his statue has found a permanent home in Woking at the school which carries his name. It was founded by public subscription at the express wish of Queen Victoria in 1885, the year after his death. Since then, the school has had the reigning monarch as its patron. To this day, it retains its tradition of being organised on public school lines with a strong military influence. On ceremonial occasions, its pupils wear the unique Gordon uniform of blue tunic and trews for boys and blue tunic and kilt for girls. They make an impressive sight when they march behind their sixty strong band.
It was time to leave the school and drive a few miles further to Woking for the wedding. The bride looked beautiful, the groom was handsome and our old friends were much the same as when we last saw them. The champagne was ice cold and the food superb, but as we drove home my thoughts were of General Charles Gordon and my days as a young officer in Khartoum.
It was like that when Nesta, my wife, and I were invited to a wedding of the daughter of some old friends. The ceremony was to take place in Woking, which meant an overnight stay in a reasonably adjacent hotel. We found one in a picturesque village and resolved to return and spend more time there one day.
With a few hours in hand, we ambled slowly along the A319 in the direction of Woking. Suddenly, I let out a gasp and turned my head sideways, causing the car to cross the white line in the middle of the road. I was back on track within a second or two but Nesta said: "What was that about?" I did not give her a direct answer, but looked for somewhere to turn around. A few minutes later I was driving into a place which bore the sign: 'GORDON'S SCHOOL'. "What are we doing here?" she asked. I drew up alongside a life-size statue of a British Army officer wearing a 'fez' sitting cross-legged on a heavily caparisoned camel. "That's why," I said. "It's General Charles Gordon, Governor General of the Sudan. The last time I saw the statue was when I was with the South Wales Borderers in Khartoum in 1949."
An obliging house master came along and confirmed it was the same statue I had seen forty four years previously. He explained that three years after the Sudan had been given its independence, the statue was brought home and re-erected at Gordon's School on 2nd April 1959. We sat in the car for a while; Nesta occupied herself with The Daily Telegraph crossword while I mused about happy days long ago in Africa.
I was a 22 year old officer when I travelled with the 1st Battalion South Wales Borderers from Cyprus aboard the SS 'EASTERN PRINCE' through the Suez Canal and down the Red Sea to Port Sudan. Any romantic ideas I may have had about the desert were dispelled when I saw mud-hut hovels which comprised the township and ugly piles of (Welsh?) coal used to fuel locomotives of Sudan Railways. The heat, even at that time of the year (April), was sticky and oppressive. Further inland, in Khartoum, we would find it hotter but less humid.
The journey from Port Sudan to Khartoum took about eighteen hours with one night aboard the train. Desert met the eye for a full 360 degrees, broken only by the mighty River Nile and the metal track. It was a landscape such as I had never seen before.
Every window was crowded as we approached Khartoum. Desert gave way to cultivated land irrigated by centuries-old methods of drawing water from the river. Groves of date palms provided contrast in colour to sand and gravel while crowds of natives dressed in long white 'night-shirts' raced along the track beside us.
At last, we pulled into Khartoum railway station where we were greeted by a Guard of Honour and the Regimental Band of the Sudan Defence Force. That moment imprinted itself on my mind for all time: rigid ranks of immaculately clad black soldiers wearing scarlet flower-pot 'taboosh' hats, khaki-drill smocks, shorts and long black puttees above leather sandals. This was a template of the standard for which we should aim. The band, equipped with conventional instruments, played Arab music. It was a new sound to most of us and, although military in character, it had an exotic lilt and sensuous rhythm which stirred my blood. In the months ahead, I would spend time with these fine askaris on the borders of Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda. It was the beginning of my respect for Africa and Africans which has been a part of me from then to the present day.
A queue of Army trucks was waiting outside the station to take us to our new home in South Barracks. It was no more than a ten minute ride to the sprawling mass of stone buildings built to the same style as pre-war Indian barracks providing soldiers' accommodation, offices, messes, a parade ground, wide and well watered flower beds, tennis courts and a large swimming pool ringed by tall date palms. Company sergeant majors were soon bawling commands and letting soldiers know that if they expected a 'cushy billet' in Khartoum, they had another thought coming!
Ivor Jarman, the Quartermaster, who arrived three weeks ahead of the main body, had produced a plan of officers' accommodation and it was the first thing I saw when I entered the wide portico of the mess. My batman gave a whistle of astonishment when he saw the huge room with a high ceiling that his officer (a mere lieutenant) had been allotted.
That evening, a few of us took a taxi and drove down Kitchener Avenue to the Grand Hotel. We already felt we had entered a time warp, but we were transported even further into the 19th century when our taxi driver pointed towards one of General Kitchener's gun-boats, the 'MELIK', which he had used on his campaign of 1896-8, tethered to a tree alongside the Blue Nile. Further along the road we passed the Governor General's palace re-built on the site of an earlier palace occupied by a previous governor, General Charles Gordon, who was killed there in 1885.
The 'Grand' was, at that time, one of the great hotels of the world. It stood at the junction of the two Niles: the White Nile, with its source in Lake Victoria and the Blue Nile, which started its long journey to Egypt in the Ethiopian highlands. We stood on the bridge spanning the confluence and watched the two shades of water merge into one mighty torrent that flowed north for 1,500 miles towards the land of the Pharaohs and the Mediterranean.
We had a meal in the hotel and I sampled for the first time the national dish - 'ful sudani'. The main ingredient of this delightful platter is ground-nuts, but the delicate use of spices, which provide a subtle and mysterious flavour, make its reproduction in a cold climate almost impossible. A cool breeze blew in from the river and we watched from the veranda as the stern paddle-wheel steamer from Atbara tied up at the jetty.
Our voluble taxi driver was waiting to take us back to South Barracks and this time he drove along Gordon Avenue; another broad avenue running parallel to Kitchener Avenue and the waterfront. The battered old taxi had a flimsy framework that held some canvas over our heads, otherwise it was open to the elements. We were in high spirits but quite unprepared for the magnificent sight which lay before us. When we were half way down Gordon Avenue, the moon appeared through a gap in the clouds and illuminated a statue of a camel with its rider sitting cross legged on a heavily ornamented saddle.
The driver stopped alongside the plinth and gave us a history lesson: "This is General Charles Gordon," he said. "He became Governor of Equatoria (Southern Sudan) in 1873 and stopped the slave trade." He went on to explain that Gordon became the Governor General of the whole of the Sudan in the service of the Khedive of Egypt in 1877. He visited every part of his desert domain and was respected for his wise counsel and firm leadership. Despite his strong Christian beliefs, he was not averse to dealing harshly with those he found guilty of breaking the law. He often hanged offenders for serious crimes.
In 1880, Gordon's talent for sorting out problems which defeated politicians was recognised; he was sent to China where he single-handedly defused a situation that could have led to war. In 1881, he was posted to Mauritius and promoted to Major General. He then went to Jerusalem for a year before being recalled to the Sudan to supervise the evacuation of Egyptians from their expensive and ill-fated attempt to rule Sudan as a colony. To this end, he was appointed Egyptian Governor General of the Sudan but answerable to the British government as well.
Gordon returned to London in 1884 to warn the British government about the danger created by a mystical cleric of Islam known as El Mahdi. Prime Minister Gladstone had no intention of getting involved in another war in Africa and sent Gordon back to Khartoum with instructions to sort the problem out by himself. Later that year, the Mahdi spread his influence over huge areas of the Sudan even to the gates of Khartoum where Gordon was forced to prepare siege emplacements around the town. As an officer of the Royal Engineers with a professional knowledge of defence works and pyrotechnics, he produced many novel and effective measures to delay the inevitable entry of the Mahdi's warriors.
After ten months of ever increasing distress among the 34,000 soldiers, families and civilians of Khartoum, who resorted to eating every living thing they could find, the defences were breached and the Mahdi's forces entered the town.
General Gordon, by some accounts, had returned to his quarters in the palace. When he heard the sound of the enemy in the courtyard, he faced them in full dress on the outside staircase; he offered no resistance when they climbed the stairs and stabbed him to death. Gordon's head was cut off and delivered to the Mahdi in Omdurman, on the other side of the river. Two days later, the thunder of guns and sharp cracks of rifles were heard and two steamers came into view. They were carrying British troops who had travelled up the Nile to try and rescue Gordon. When it became obvious that Khartoum had fallen, they turned around and headed back down the river.
The British government was hard pressed to account for the abandonment of the nation's greatest hero; Queen Victoria was inconsolable and led the country in mourning. It was not until 11 years later in 1896 that a task force commanded by General Sir Herbert Kitchener (later Earl Kitchener of Khartoum) forced a passage up the Nile and re-established British presence in Khartoum. From then until 1956 the Sudan enjoyed an age of political stability and wealth from the export of its natural resources, in the main - cotton.
Even though the Sudan was known as an Anglo/Egyptian condominium, there had been little Egyptian influence there since 1884 and Governor Generals had always been British.
Since 1956, when independence was granted, the Sudan has withdrawn into its shell and a new dark age has settled upon its people. Various regimes, controlled from Khartoum, have created genocide and have brought misery to the negroid people of the south. Arabs of the north have been forced to accept the harsh rules of Islamic fundamentalism and the once prosperous economy has stagnated through mismanagement.
But back to Gordon's statue and the remarkable events that took place before it was erected in Khartoum in 1903.
It is the work of Mr Onslow Ford RA and is a replica of the original statue unveiled by the Prince of Wales (later - King Edward V11) in Chatham, the home of the Royal Engineers, on 19th May 1890. The 'Khartoum' statue was originally sited in St. Martin's Place, London where the statue of Nurse Edith Cavell, executed by the Germans during World War One, now stands. It was unveiled there in July 1902 by the Duke of Cambridge.
Lord Kitchener and Lord Glenesh (The Morning Post) thought this was the wrong place and campaigned successfully to have it transported to Khartoum. In October 1902 it was put aboard the SS 'CEDARDINE' and began its journey to Egypt. Within twenty four hours the 'CEDARDINE' was rammed by another ship in the Thames estuary, and sank. Gordon and his camel rested ignominiously in the mud forty feet below the surface until the following day when it was raised and placed aboard the SS 'LESBIAN' (Queen Victoria, now dead, would not have been amused!).
Once out of British waters, the journey to Alexandria was uneventful but when the statue began the next stage of its journey to Khartoum, on a smaller boat, it sank again. Finally, it arrived in Khartoum and was erected on a low plinth. Lord Kitchener objected and gave orders for a much higher stone plinth to be provided. He might well have been thinking about the time when his own statue would be erected a mere hundred yards away from that of General Gordon. This happened sooner than he could have imagined, following his death in 1916 when he was drowned aboard HMS 'HAMPSHIRE' after she hit a German mine off the Orkney Islands.
General Charles Gordon would have been proud to know that his statue has found a permanent home in Woking at the school which carries his name. It was founded by public subscription at the express wish of Queen Victoria in 1885, the year after his death. Since then, the school has had the reigning monarch as its patron. To this day, it retains its tradition of being organised on public school lines with a strong military influence. On ceremonial occasions, its pupils wear the unique Gordon uniform of blue tunic and trews for boys and blue tunic and kilt for girls. They make an impressive sight when they march behind their sixty strong band.
It was time to leave the school and drive a few miles further to Woking for the wedding. The bride looked beautiful, the groom was handsome and our old friends were much the same as when we last saw them. The champagne was ice cold and the food superb, but as we drove home my thoughts were of General Charles Gordon and my days as a young officer in Khartoum.
STRANGER IN PARADISE
Some say Pembrokeshire is the most beautiful county in Wales, but that does not mean it is the ideal location for an infantry battalion like the 1st Battalion Welch Regiment which took up residence in Llanion Barracks, Pembroke Dock in October 1954.
1/WELCH left UK in 1951 to become part of the United Nations force in Korea. They covered themselves in glory and earned yet another Battle Honour to carry on their colours. After a year of active service in the front line, the battalion was withdrawn and sent to Hong Kong for a two year tour of duty. Imagine then, seasoned warriors, and others who had joined the battalion in Hong Kong, used to the good life in the best overseas posting in the world, arriving on a wind-swept railway platform at Pembroke Dock on a cold October night. It certainly did nothing for retaining soldiers who had the option of extending their contract or returning to 'civvy street'.
If they thought Pembroke Dock railway station looked grim, they had another surprise when they arrived in Llanion Barracks. Perched on the top of a steep hill, the barracks was a splendid place for flying kites; the wind came at it from all directions. The barracks were built in the 1840's at a time when 'functional' rather than 'aesthetic' was the key word. Red brick can look quite nice when wisteria or virginia creeper cling to it, but if its only adornments are drain pipes and cast-iron staircases, it does not present a pleasant picture. Barrack rooms were long and rectangular, contained thirty men and had a coke stove for heating, half way down.. A locker and an iron bedstead which carried four blankets and two sheets folded and 'boxed' from before breakfast until after tea was the soldier's bed-space where he could recharge his batteries and, on Saturday mornings, lay out his kit for platoon commander's, company commander's or commanding officer's inspection. There was always someone who wanted to check the soles of boots (with the obligatory thirteen studs - polished), coils of spare laces and mess tins brightened with 'Bluebell'. That sort of time-wasting activity, with the odd route march thrown in for good measure was symptomatic of the times. The fact of the matter was, we had no role and very little to do. At times like that, people got under each other's feet and it made for poor morale. There was some light at the end of the tunnel though. We were told that in April 1955 (the following year) the four rifle companies of the battalion would be allocated to various training camps around the country. That meant that our soldiers would be responsible for the smooth running of camps where 'volunteer' soldiers of the Territorial Army would be doing their annual training. My company, of which I was second-in-command, was detailed to move to the Royal Armoured Corps Ranges and Training Area, Castlemartin; about ten miles away from Pembroke Dock.
I arose quite early on my first full day at Castlemartin Camp, had breakfast and then went to see the soldiers who would be forming up for muster parade. As I walked past camp headquarters, the Adjutant poked his head out of the window and said: "Hello, I'm Gerald, I don't think we've met. Come inside and meet the Commandant, he likes to see everyone on the first day."
Gerald was a stocky officer with thick eyebrows, heavy horn rimmed spectacles and a gruff voice. He wore highly polished ammunition boots under his barathea service dress trousers. It's funny how little things give a chap away. Army boots, the same as soldiers wear, instead of proper shoes from the regimental tailor would never have been tolerated in my regiment.
After we had looked each other over, Gerald opened the door to the commandant's office and introduced me. All I received was a curt nod of his head and a motion from his hand to sit down. My company commander, Major Dicky Randell, had been approached by the adjutant as well, so I took a chair next to him. Also present were a number of officers responsible for technical aspects of the gunnery range.
"Now listen here," began the Commandant, looking alternately at Dicky and me. "My name is Lieutenant Colonel Harold Witherspoon of the Royal Tank Regiment. My job is to make sure this place is run efficiently. I have no time for shirkers, dawdlers, nincompoops and drunkards. Do I make myself clear?" There was not much we could say to a question like that, so Dicky and I nodded and tried to look attentive.
"You will be here until the end of September," he went on, "and I expect you to set and maintain the highest standards of efficiency. Do you understand?" We nodded again. He continued to glower at us for a few more seconds, then switched his attention to another fellow who had a black beret on his lap, denoting he was a member of the Royal Tank Regiment. "Why weren't those empty cases I saw this morning sent back to ordnance?" The officer responsible for shell cases mumbled a feeble excuse which did nothing to placate the Commandant. "I'll not have it, do you hear?. Make sure you get those things back on time in future." The next one to get a broadside was the motor transport officer. "Why were two of your three tonners without their tool kits when I saw them at six o'clock this morning?" he spat. The MTO went through the 'goldfish' routine, and said nothing. "See to it in future," snapped the Colonel.
Everyone so far had received a rocket and I began to feel uneasy about this chap who would be my boss for the next six months. Up until then, Dicky Randell and I had not been told what our duties would be, other than supervising and looking after our soldiers.
Suddenly, I found myself looking at the end of the Commandant's finger as he thrust his arm in my direction. "Why were your boilers at fifty pounds pressure at 6.30 this morning?" he rasped. As I didn't know I had any boilers and, even if I did - could not possibly have known what pressure they should be registering, I thought it better to play for time. "Must be something wrong there, sir. I'll make sure they don't go above forty pounds in future," I mumbled. "No you won't you bloody idiot, you'll make sure they're up to sixty pounds at least," cried the Colonel.
I hoped that the storm would blow over, but more was to come. "Tell me, how you are working your sh***s?" he enquired. Once again, I had not the faintest idea what he was talking about. Nobody had told me that among the number of jobs I would be given was that of messing officer with responsibility for managing a large kitchen and dining hall. 'Sh***s' could mean all sorts of things, and I went through a mental selection process. SHEETS - SHAFTS - CHEFS - SHIFTS. "Did you say 'shifts', sir?" I replied, selecting the word that sounded most appropriate, but having no idea of the context. The effect of what I said to Colonel Harold Witherspoon was as if he had been stung by a hornet. "How dare you speak to me like that?" he thundered. "Any more of it and you'll be going back to your regiment with an adverse report." I murmured an apology and wondered what he thought I had said.
"What was all that about?" said Dicky, who got away without a scratch. "You seem to have upset him." "I've never seen him before," I replied, "and it looks as if I'm not going to see much more of him."
Before leaving camp headquarters, I asked the Adjutant what all the business of 'boilers' and 'shifts' was about. It was only then that I became aware of my duty concerning feeding the masses. "The Quartermaster does the job during the winter, he'll tell you everything you want to know," said the thoughtful Gerald.
The Quartermaster was a mine of information and I wondered why he could not continue doing the job during the summer, rather than hand it over to me - an unknown quantity.
A week went by without any trouble, and then I received a telephone call from the Adjutant. "The Commandant would like to see you, can you come across?" "Anything wrong?" I asked. "No, he just wants to have a chat, I think," was the reply. I tripped across the sports field and went into Gerald’s office. "The Colonel will see you now," he said, motioning me to enter. I marched in, saluted and waited for the Commandant to offer me a chair. Not a chance. "Why is your cookhouse in a filthy condition," he barked. I was struck dumb for a few seconds, and then said: "I'm sorry, sir, I didn't know you'd been there this morning." "I haven't been there," he replied. "I don't have to go there to know that the place is filthy." He leaned back in his chair and let me ponder on his words for a few moments before he continued: "Look out of the window and tell me what you can see on your cookhouse." I did as I was told, but nothing seemed to be wrong. As cookhouses go, it was a rather nice one. It did have some moss of the north facing roof, so I said: "I'll get someone on the roof to clear that moss, sir." "Not moss, you idiot - SEAGULLS," he bellowed.
I could have kicked myself for not thinking of 'seagulls', but there were seagulls everywhere in Castlemartin as it was in the middle of one of the largest bird sanctuaries in the country. I still could not see the connection between seagulls and a filthy cookhouse until the Colonel said: "Seagulls are scavengers and they love filth and dirt, that's why they're sitting on the roof. Now, get that place cleaned up and I'll be along at 11 o'clock to inspect it."
No scrum half ever crossed the sports field faster than me as I went back to the cookhouse to make sure that everything was clean and tidy. It was, of course, as I had an efficient catering staff who took pride in their work.
The Cook Sergeant heard about the rocket I had received and said: "Caught you on the old 'seagull' routine did he, sir?" When I nodded, he said: "That's one of his 'pets'. He's hot on seagulls but leave it to me." The Sergeant went into the dining room and saw one of the soldiers from my company who was employed as a dining room orderly. He and a few others like him were responsible for cleaning tables and hot plates and generally keeping the place clean.
Private Maldwyn Clutterbuck had not endeared himself to the Cook Sergeant because, even though he had a rich baritone voice, he knew only one song which he sang all day. "Stranger in Paradise' was worse than water torture practised by Chinese Triads and he had nearly driven everyone mad by his non-stop rendering of the tune.
"Right. You there, Private Clutterbuck. I've got somewhere better than Paradise for you. Follow me." The Cook Sergeant led Clutterbuck to the boiler house where there was a huge pile of coke in the yard. "Fill that bucket with coke and get up on that bank. When you see a seagull, let fly at it."
Maldwyn Clutterbuck was, without doubt, the most satisfied soldier in my company during that lovely summer of 1955. His daytime routine was one constant session of sun bathing until a seagull arrived, then he would fling a lump of coke at it. The cookhouse roof was kept clear of scavenging birds, the Commandant’s blood pressure was normal, catering staff were able to sing among themselves while Private Clutterbuck indulged himself with his favourite song.
The standard of service and cleanliness in the officers' mess was not good enough. This was mainly due to the inadequacy of the Mess Sergeant, who also came from my regiment. Colonel Witherspoon did not like him and, for once, I agreed with him. I was not surprised, therefore, when I heard he had been given the sack. His replacement arrived the same day and when I saw who it was, I knew we were in for more trouble.
Corporal 'Panther' Thomas had been the battalion sports storeman until he was promoted to the new job. He earned quite a reputation for himself, particularly in rugby circles, and had become a sort of talisman with his sponge bag at Army Rugby Cup finals where his stocky figure, propelled by legs pumping like pistons, could be seen running towards some unfortunate forward who had been kicked in the teeth. He won his nick-name in Korea where, according to legend, he had strangled a couple of Chinese soldiers who had unwittingly stumbled into his trench. The lighter side of his character was his ability to bring tears to the eyes of those who heard his rendering of the ballad, 'Eskimo Nell' and 'The Lord's Prayer'.
'Panther' set about the task of brightening the officers' mess ante-room as soon as he arrived. He brought with him a ghastly assortment of beer mats and cheap ash trays from the local brewery and he spread these awful objects around the mess until the place looked like some third rate restaurant. 'Panther' had rarely dressed in anything other than a track suit, so I did not recognise him in his 'blues' uniform when I went into the mess.
The Commandant came in soon after me, and Panther asked him what he would like to drink. "I'd like a gin and tonic, if you please, Sergeant Thomas," said the Colonel. Panther returned a few minutes later with a glass on a silver salver. "There you are, sir. I've put some ice and lemon in it; I hope it's to your liking." Colonel Witherspoon was a man of instant likes and dislikes and the beer mats and ash trays had already raised his blood pressure. He was about to tell Panther to get rid of them when the new Mess Sergeant said: "Excuse me, sir, did you beat a tenor or a side drum?" None of us knew anything about the Colonel's background, but it transpired he had joined the Army as a drummer boy when he was fifteen years of age. He progressed quickly through the ranks and during World War Two he received a decoration for gallant conduct when he was blown out of three separate tanks in one day. In getting out of one, he fell awkwardly and broke his leg which never mended properly. Panther, who had noticed the Colonel's limp, thought he recognised the slight drag of the left leg which is the common swagger of drummers. There was a long pause before Colonel Witherspoon replied; "Many years ago, I used to beat a side drum. How did you know?" Panther beamed and said: "I saw you coming down the road and I said to myself: 'once a drummer boy - always a drummer boy' " For the first time since I had known him, the Colonel was struck dumb; all he could do was glower at Panther as he cleared some glasses away.
After a remark like that Panther's days were numbered, but he accelerated his departure by falling out with the Mess Corporal. The Corporal was not a member of the Welch Regiment and therefore, according to Panther, not a proper soldier. He did not react quickly enough one day when he received an order, so Panther picked up a kitchen knife and stuck it through his neck. At his subsequent court-martial, he must have given a favourable impression to those who tried him because he was soon back on the rugby touch-line, wearing a lance corporal's stripe and carrying the 'first-fifteeen's' sponge bag.
Somehow, I managed to keep out of trouble for the rest of the time I was in Castlemartin and on the day I left I was loading my car when Gerald said: "The Colonel would like to have a word with you before you go." I thought to myself: 'This is where I came in', but Harold Witherspoon was gracious enough to thank me for all I had done while under his command. "I only wish I could have the same team next year, but I'll have to start with a new lot in six months time," he said.
I had a picture of my successor being called to account for boilers and seagulls, but that's the Army system and you soon learn how it works.
1/WELCH left UK in 1951 to become part of the United Nations force in Korea. They covered themselves in glory and earned yet another Battle Honour to carry on their colours. After a year of active service in the front line, the battalion was withdrawn and sent to Hong Kong for a two year tour of duty. Imagine then, seasoned warriors, and others who had joined the battalion in Hong Kong, used to the good life in the best overseas posting in the world, arriving on a wind-swept railway platform at Pembroke Dock on a cold October night. It certainly did nothing for retaining soldiers who had the option of extending their contract or returning to 'civvy street'.
If they thought Pembroke Dock railway station looked grim, they had another surprise when they arrived in Llanion Barracks. Perched on the top of a steep hill, the barracks was a splendid place for flying kites; the wind came at it from all directions. The barracks were built in the 1840's at a time when 'functional' rather than 'aesthetic' was the key word. Red brick can look quite nice when wisteria or virginia creeper cling to it, but if its only adornments are drain pipes and cast-iron staircases, it does not present a pleasant picture. Barrack rooms were long and rectangular, contained thirty men and had a coke stove for heating, half way down.. A locker and an iron bedstead which carried four blankets and two sheets folded and 'boxed' from before breakfast until after tea was the soldier's bed-space where he could recharge his batteries and, on Saturday mornings, lay out his kit for platoon commander's, company commander's or commanding officer's inspection. There was always someone who wanted to check the soles of boots (with the obligatory thirteen studs - polished), coils of spare laces and mess tins brightened with 'Bluebell'. That sort of time-wasting activity, with the odd route march thrown in for good measure was symptomatic of the times. The fact of the matter was, we had no role and very little to do. At times like that, people got under each other's feet and it made for poor morale. There was some light at the end of the tunnel though. We were told that in April 1955 (the following year) the four rifle companies of the battalion would be allocated to various training camps around the country. That meant that our soldiers would be responsible for the smooth running of camps where 'volunteer' soldiers of the Territorial Army would be doing their annual training. My company, of which I was second-in-command, was detailed to move to the Royal Armoured Corps Ranges and Training Area, Castlemartin; about ten miles away from Pembroke Dock.
I arose quite early on my first full day at Castlemartin Camp, had breakfast and then went to see the soldiers who would be forming up for muster parade. As I walked past camp headquarters, the Adjutant poked his head out of the window and said: "Hello, I'm Gerald, I don't think we've met. Come inside and meet the Commandant, he likes to see everyone on the first day."
Gerald was a stocky officer with thick eyebrows, heavy horn rimmed spectacles and a gruff voice. He wore highly polished ammunition boots under his barathea service dress trousers. It's funny how little things give a chap away. Army boots, the same as soldiers wear, instead of proper shoes from the regimental tailor would never have been tolerated in my regiment.
After we had looked each other over, Gerald opened the door to the commandant's office and introduced me. All I received was a curt nod of his head and a motion from his hand to sit down. My company commander, Major Dicky Randell, had been approached by the adjutant as well, so I took a chair next to him. Also present were a number of officers responsible for technical aspects of the gunnery range.
"Now listen here," began the Commandant, looking alternately at Dicky and me. "My name is Lieutenant Colonel Harold Witherspoon of the Royal Tank Regiment. My job is to make sure this place is run efficiently. I have no time for shirkers, dawdlers, nincompoops and drunkards. Do I make myself clear?" There was not much we could say to a question like that, so Dicky and I nodded and tried to look attentive.
"You will be here until the end of September," he went on, "and I expect you to set and maintain the highest standards of efficiency. Do you understand?" We nodded again. He continued to glower at us for a few more seconds, then switched his attention to another fellow who had a black beret on his lap, denoting he was a member of the Royal Tank Regiment. "Why weren't those empty cases I saw this morning sent back to ordnance?" The officer responsible for shell cases mumbled a feeble excuse which did nothing to placate the Commandant. "I'll not have it, do you hear?. Make sure you get those things back on time in future." The next one to get a broadside was the motor transport officer. "Why were two of your three tonners without their tool kits when I saw them at six o'clock this morning?" he spat. The MTO went through the 'goldfish' routine, and said nothing. "See to it in future," snapped the Colonel.
Everyone so far had received a rocket and I began to feel uneasy about this chap who would be my boss for the next six months. Up until then, Dicky Randell and I had not been told what our duties would be, other than supervising and looking after our soldiers.
Suddenly, I found myself looking at the end of the Commandant's finger as he thrust his arm in my direction. "Why were your boilers at fifty pounds pressure at 6.30 this morning?" he rasped. As I didn't know I had any boilers and, even if I did - could not possibly have known what pressure they should be registering, I thought it better to play for time. "Must be something wrong there, sir. I'll make sure they don't go above forty pounds in future," I mumbled. "No you won't you bloody idiot, you'll make sure they're up to sixty pounds at least," cried the Colonel.
I hoped that the storm would blow over, but more was to come. "Tell me, how you are working your sh***s?" he enquired. Once again, I had not the faintest idea what he was talking about. Nobody had told me that among the number of jobs I would be given was that of messing officer with responsibility for managing a large kitchen and dining hall. 'Sh***s' could mean all sorts of things, and I went through a mental selection process. SHEETS - SHAFTS - CHEFS - SHIFTS. "Did you say 'shifts', sir?" I replied, selecting the word that sounded most appropriate, but having no idea of the context. The effect of what I said to Colonel Harold Witherspoon was as if he had been stung by a hornet. "How dare you speak to me like that?" he thundered. "Any more of it and you'll be going back to your regiment with an adverse report." I murmured an apology and wondered what he thought I had said.
"What was all that about?" said Dicky, who got away without a scratch. "You seem to have upset him." "I've never seen him before," I replied, "and it looks as if I'm not going to see much more of him."
Before leaving camp headquarters, I asked the Adjutant what all the business of 'boilers' and 'shifts' was about. It was only then that I became aware of my duty concerning feeding the masses. "The Quartermaster does the job during the winter, he'll tell you everything you want to know," said the thoughtful Gerald.
The Quartermaster was a mine of information and I wondered why he could not continue doing the job during the summer, rather than hand it over to me - an unknown quantity.
A week went by without any trouble, and then I received a telephone call from the Adjutant. "The Commandant would like to see you, can you come across?" "Anything wrong?" I asked. "No, he just wants to have a chat, I think," was the reply. I tripped across the sports field and went into Gerald’s office. "The Colonel will see you now," he said, motioning me to enter. I marched in, saluted and waited for the Commandant to offer me a chair. Not a chance. "Why is your cookhouse in a filthy condition," he barked. I was struck dumb for a few seconds, and then said: "I'm sorry, sir, I didn't know you'd been there this morning." "I haven't been there," he replied. "I don't have to go there to know that the place is filthy." He leaned back in his chair and let me ponder on his words for a few moments before he continued: "Look out of the window and tell me what you can see on your cookhouse." I did as I was told, but nothing seemed to be wrong. As cookhouses go, it was a rather nice one. It did have some moss of the north facing roof, so I said: "I'll get someone on the roof to clear that moss, sir." "Not moss, you idiot - SEAGULLS," he bellowed.
I could have kicked myself for not thinking of 'seagulls', but there were seagulls everywhere in Castlemartin as it was in the middle of one of the largest bird sanctuaries in the country. I still could not see the connection between seagulls and a filthy cookhouse until the Colonel said: "Seagulls are scavengers and they love filth and dirt, that's why they're sitting on the roof. Now, get that place cleaned up and I'll be along at 11 o'clock to inspect it."
No scrum half ever crossed the sports field faster than me as I went back to the cookhouse to make sure that everything was clean and tidy. It was, of course, as I had an efficient catering staff who took pride in their work.
The Cook Sergeant heard about the rocket I had received and said: "Caught you on the old 'seagull' routine did he, sir?" When I nodded, he said: "That's one of his 'pets'. He's hot on seagulls but leave it to me." The Sergeant went into the dining room and saw one of the soldiers from my company who was employed as a dining room orderly. He and a few others like him were responsible for cleaning tables and hot plates and generally keeping the place clean.
Private Maldwyn Clutterbuck had not endeared himself to the Cook Sergeant because, even though he had a rich baritone voice, he knew only one song which he sang all day. "Stranger in Paradise' was worse than water torture practised by Chinese Triads and he had nearly driven everyone mad by his non-stop rendering of the tune.
"Right. You there, Private Clutterbuck. I've got somewhere better than Paradise for you. Follow me." The Cook Sergeant led Clutterbuck to the boiler house where there was a huge pile of coke in the yard. "Fill that bucket with coke and get up on that bank. When you see a seagull, let fly at it."
Maldwyn Clutterbuck was, without doubt, the most satisfied soldier in my company during that lovely summer of 1955. His daytime routine was one constant session of sun bathing until a seagull arrived, then he would fling a lump of coke at it. The cookhouse roof was kept clear of scavenging birds, the Commandant’s blood pressure was normal, catering staff were able to sing among themselves while Private Clutterbuck indulged himself with his favourite song.
The standard of service and cleanliness in the officers' mess was not good enough. This was mainly due to the inadequacy of the Mess Sergeant, who also came from my regiment. Colonel Witherspoon did not like him and, for once, I agreed with him. I was not surprised, therefore, when I heard he had been given the sack. His replacement arrived the same day and when I saw who it was, I knew we were in for more trouble.
Corporal 'Panther' Thomas had been the battalion sports storeman until he was promoted to the new job. He earned quite a reputation for himself, particularly in rugby circles, and had become a sort of talisman with his sponge bag at Army Rugby Cup finals where his stocky figure, propelled by legs pumping like pistons, could be seen running towards some unfortunate forward who had been kicked in the teeth. He won his nick-name in Korea where, according to legend, he had strangled a couple of Chinese soldiers who had unwittingly stumbled into his trench. The lighter side of his character was his ability to bring tears to the eyes of those who heard his rendering of the ballad, 'Eskimo Nell' and 'The Lord's Prayer'.
'Panther' set about the task of brightening the officers' mess ante-room as soon as he arrived. He brought with him a ghastly assortment of beer mats and cheap ash trays from the local brewery and he spread these awful objects around the mess until the place looked like some third rate restaurant. 'Panther' had rarely dressed in anything other than a track suit, so I did not recognise him in his 'blues' uniform when I went into the mess.
The Commandant came in soon after me, and Panther asked him what he would like to drink. "I'd like a gin and tonic, if you please, Sergeant Thomas," said the Colonel. Panther returned a few minutes later with a glass on a silver salver. "There you are, sir. I've put some ice and lemon in it; I hope it's to your liking." Colonel Witherspoon was a man of instant likes and dislikes and the beer mats and ash trays had already raised his blood pressure. He was about to tell Panther to get rid of them when the new Mess Sergeant said: "Excuse me, sir, did you beat a tenor or a side drum?" None of us knew anything about the Colonel's background, but it transpired he had joined the Army as a drummer boy when he was fifteen years of age. He progressed quickly through the ranks and during World War Two he received a decoration for gallant conduct when he was blown out of three separate tanks in one day. In getting out of one, he fell awkwardly and broke his leg which never mended properly. Panther, who had noticed the Colonel's limp, thought he recognised the slight drag of the left leg which is the common swagger of drummers. There was a long pause before Colonel Witherspoon replied; "Many years ago, I used to beat a side drum. How did you know?" Panther beamed and said: "I saw you coming down the road and I said to myself: 'once a drummer boy - always a drummer boy' " For the first time since I had known him, the Colonel was struck dumb; all he could do was glower at Panther as he cleared some glasses away.
After a remark like that Panther's days were numbered, but he accelerated his departure by falling out with the Mess Corporal. The Corporal was not a member of the Welch Regiment and therefore, according to Panther, not a proper soldier. He did not react quickly enough one day when he received an order, so Panther picked up a kitchen knife and stuck it through his neck. At his subsequent court-martial, he must have given a favourable impression to those who tried him because he was soon back on the rugby touch-line, wearing a lance corporal's stripe and carrying the 'first-fifteeen's' sponge bag.
Somehow, I managed to keep out of trouble for the rest of the time I was in Castlemartin and on the day I left I was loading my car when Gerald said: "The Colonel would like to have a word with you before you go." I thought to myself: 'This is where I came in', but Harold Witherspoon was gracious enough to thank me for all I had done while under his command. "I only wish I could have the same team next year, but I'll have to start with a new lot in six months time," he said.
I had a picture of my successor being called to account for boilers and seagulls, but that's the Army system and you soon learn how it works.
TERRA (IN) FIRMA
My last job in the Regular Army was Recruiting and Publicity Officer for the line infantry regiments of Wales (The Royal Welch Fusiliers and The Royal Regiment of Wales). I was based at The Prince Of Wales' Division Depot, Crickhowell, South Wales, had two teams of soldiers - one for each regiment, and a mobile display vehicle which travelled the length and breadth of Wales at all times of the year except mid-winter.
One of the places we visited was a pleasant little town near Swansea. Council officials were most helpful and allowed us to use the municipal park which comprised ornamental gardens, tennis courts, bowling green, cricket wicket and a rugby pitch. The mobile display wagon and the shooting range (in the back of a truck) were the first to arrive and it was not long before children were attracted to the park like wasps to a jam pot.
I was talking to some soldiers on the site when I became aware that the turf upon which I stood seemed to move when people passed by. I jumped a few inches off the ground and my return to earth set the soldiers wobbling like a set of near missed skittles.
It was then that Mr Ieuan (pronounced - Yiy-an) Thomas, the Chief Environmental Officer of the borough greeted me. "Hello Major Smith, everything alright then?" I assured him that things were in order and that we were looking forward to a good day. "There's only one problem," I said. "The ground seems to wobble. Was there ever a coal mine here and is it possible we could be standing on a covered over shaft?" I made another leap and the colour drained from Mr Thomas's face as he wobbled like a piece of jelly. He and his ancestors had lived in the valley for generations and after some thought he said: "Not to my knowledge have their been collieries. Potteries - yes, but no coal mines."
We were joined by the Borough Engineer - Mr Iorweth (pronounced - Yorrweth) Evans. He agreed about 'potteries' but said he could not pronounce about a coal mine as he and his ancestors had not lived in the valley as long as the family of Mr Thomas. "I could find out for sure when I get back to my office," he said. "We've got records going back for centuries." Ieuan would have been happy to let old pots lie, but borough engineers are an inquisitive breed and Iorweth walked across to the pavilion and brought back a long metal rod with a loop on the end. Standing on the steps of the display vehicle, he raised his arms above his head and drove the rod into the ground. No undue force was required or used to drive the eight foot rod through the turf as far as its loop. Iorweth withdrew the rod and we inspected particles of black stuff which clung to it. "Peat," said Ieuan, and then as an after-thought - "could be charcoal though." Iorweth picked up a few pieces and agreed with his colleague. It was my turn, so I inspected some of the black matter and noticed that it did not crumble like the rest. "Coal!" I said, "and it looks like good quality anthracite to me." The two borough officials gaped like a couple of goldfish, but then they closed ranks when they remembered the many occasions the ground had been used for fairs, carnivals and rugby matches. "You'll be alright, have no fear," they said in unison.
Despite their assurances, I did not feel they were entirely convinced. The display vehicles could have been moved to a safer area near the bowling green but wherever I jumped on the rugby pitch, the ground wobbled - besides, I was getting some funny looks as I leapt around the park like a demented frog. Taking the easy course, and assuring myself that if the ground was going to collapse it would surely have done so when the band in their fifty-seater coach passed by, I decided to carry on.
The Mayor of the borough, a charming elderly lady, was our chief guest at the show we put on that evening. The hour long performance included a display of foot and arms drill, gymnastics, mock battle and Beating Retreat by the Band and Drums. More than a hundred soldiers, plus the regimental goat, pounded the turf during the finale. I do not know if she had been told or even felt for herself the undulating movement of the ground. If she did, she said nothing and, as she had lived near the park all her life, she was most probably used to it.
She certainly did not appreciate the reason why I kept my camera at the ready during the performance. The Band and Drums. regimental mascot, Mayor, Councillors - and maybe me as well - disappearing through the hallowed turf of the town's rugby pitch may have given me the opportunity to take the picture of my life.
One of the places we visited was a pleasant little town near Swansea. Council officials were most helpful and allowed us to use the municipal park which comprised ornamental gardens, tennis courts, bowling green, cricket wicket and a rugby pitch. The mobile display wagon and the shooting range (in the back of a truck) were the first to arrive and it was not long before children were attracted to the park like wasps to a jam pot.
I was talking to some soldiers on the site when I became aware that the turf upon which I stood seemed to move when people passed by. I jumped a few inches off the ground and my return to earth set the soldiers wobbling like a set of near missed skittles.
It was then that Mr Ieuan (pronounced - Yiy-an) Thomas, the Chief Environmental Officer of the borough greeted me. "Hello Major Smith, everything alright then?" I assured him that things were in order and that we were looking forward to a good day. "There's only one problem," I said. "The ground seems to wobble. Was there ever a coal mine here and is it possible we could be standing on a covered over shaft?" I made another leap and the colour drained from Mr Thomas's face as he wobbled like a piece of jelly. He and his ancestors had lived in the valley for generations and after some thought he said: "Not to my knowledge have their been collieries. Potteries - yes, but no coal mines."
We were joined by the Borough Engineer - Mr Iorweth (pronounced - Yorrweth) Evans. He agreed about 'potteries' but said he could not pronounce about a coal mine as he and his ancestors had not lived in the valley as long as the family of Mr Thomas. "I could find out for sure when I get back to my office," he said. "We've got records going back for centuries." Ieuan would have been happy to let old pots lie, but borough engineers are an inquisitive breed and Iorweth walked across to the pavilion and brought back a long metal rod with a loop on the end. Standing on the steps of the display vehicle, he raised his arms above his head and drove the rod into the ground. No undue force was required or used to drive the eight foot rod through the turf as far as its loop. Iorweth withdrew the rod and we inspected particles of black stuff which clung to it. "Peat," said Ieuan, and then as an after-thought - "could be charcoal though." Iorweth picked up a few pieces and agreed with his colleague. It was my turn, so I inspected some of the black matter and noticed that it did not crumble like the rest. "Coal!" I said, "and it looks like good quality anthracite to me." The two borough officials gaped like a couple of goldfish, but then they closed ranks when they remembered the many occasions the ground had been used for fairs, carnivals and rugby matches. "You'll be alright, have no fear," they said in unison.
Despite their assurances, I did not feel they were entirely convinced. The display vehicles could have been moved to a safer area near the bowling green but wherever I jumped on the rugby pitch, the ground wobbled - besides, I was getting some funny looks as I leapt around the park like a demented frog. Taking the easy course, and assuring myself that if the ground was going to collapse it would surely have done so when the band in their fifty-seater coach passed by, I decided to carry on.
The Mayor of the borough, a charming elderly lady, was our chief guest at the show we put on that evening. The hour long performance included a display of foot and arms drill, gymnastics, mock battle and Beating Retreat by the Band and Drums. More than a hundred soldiers, plus the regimental goat, pounded the turf during the finale. I do not know if she had been told or even felt for herself the undulating movement of the ground. If she did, she said nothing and, as she had lived near the park all her life, she was most probably used to it.
She certainly did not appreciate the reason why I kept my camera at the ready during the performance. The Band and Drums. regimental mascot, Mayor, Councillors - and maybe me as well - disappearing through the hallowed turf of the town's rugby pitch may have given me the opportunity to take the picture of my life.
THE CASE OF THE RIGID BANANA
It is a little known fact that the fashion for 'flared' trousers ie. those that are wider at the bottom than they are at the knees, started in Borneo in the early 1960's. Our soldiers doing their training in Ipoh used to be the subject of ribaldry from soldiers of other regiments over their funny trousers, but by the mid 70's the style had become the 'in-thing' for well dressed men world-wide.
Soldiers from Sabah were, on the whole, a well behaved lot; it was therefore a shock to hear that one of them had been seen fighting with a Chinaman outside a bar. The Chinaman came off second best and very nearly lost his life through a knife wound within an inch of his heart. There were about half a dozen witnesses to the crime and each one said the act was committed by someone wearing 'flared' trousers. This vital piece of evidence coupled with the fact that a few other bell-bottomed trouser wearers were seen running away in the direction of the Army camp, led the police to think that a soldier of 2nd Battalion Malaysia Rangers was the culprit.
The British Commanding Officer of our battalion was none too pleased when he was acquainted with the facts, but he promised the local Chief of Police that he would investigate the matter. Accordingly, he told the Adjutant to order a scale 'A' parade for 2pm that day.
With everyone present, the CO mounted a dais and addressed the battalion. He spoke good Malay and he outlined the events of the previous evening. When he got to the vital piece about the fellow with 'flared' trousers being seen stabbing the Chinaman, he used the wrong word for 'knife'.
What he said was: "Dia pukul orang China dengan pisang." ('He struck the Chinaman with a banana'). The word he should have used is 'pisau' (knife). Not content with a single mistake, he reiterated the gory details a few times and, on each occasion, dwelt on how the 'banana' had narrowly missed the victim's heart.
There must have been three hundred Sabahan soldiers and Malay non-commissioned officers on parade and their faces remained expressionless. British officers, on the other hand, were convulsed with mirth. Nobody had the courage to tell the Commanding Officer about his mistake. The culprit was never found!
Soldiers from Sabah were, on the whole, a well behaved lot; it was therefore a shock to hear that one of them had been seen fighting with a Chinaman outside a bar. The Chinaman came off second best and very nearly lost his life through a knife wound within an inch of his heart. There were about half a dozen witnesses to the crime and each one said the act was committed by someone wearing 'flared' trousers. This vital piece of evidence coupled with the fact that a few other bell-bottomed trouser wearers were seen running away in the direction of the Army camp, led the police to think that a soldier of 2nd Battalion Malaysia Rangers was the culprit.
The British Commanding Officer of our battalion was none too pleased when he was acquainted with the facts, but he promised the local Chief of Police that he would investigate the matter. Accordingly, he told the Adjutant to order a scale 'A' parade for 2pm that day.
With everyone present, the CO mounted a dais and addressed the battalion. He spoke good Malay and he outlined the events of the previous evening. When he got to the vital piece about the fellow with 'flared' trousers being seen stabbing the Chinaman, he used the wrong word for 'knife'.
What he said was: "Dia pukul orang China dengan pisang." ('He struck the Chinaman with a banana'). The word he should have used is 'pisau' (knife). Not content with a single mistake, he reiterated the gory details a few times and, on each occasion, dwelt on how the 'banana' had narrowly missed the victim's heart.
There must have been three hundred Sabahan soldiers and Malay non-commissioned officers on parade and their faces remained expressionless. British officers, on the other hand, were convulsed with mirth. Nobody had the courage to tell the Commanding Officer about his mistake. The culprit was never found!
THE RELUCTANT ASKARI
With less than a week to go before we embarked on Hired Transport (HT) 'DILWARA' at Singapore for the return journey to Kenya in June 1953, one of our askaris went missing.
For an African to go AWOL in Malaya was like a swallow electing to stay behind in Britain when all the others were taking off for the southern hemisphere. He was seen in the nearby village of Ulu Tiram (adjacent to the Jungle Warfare School, Kota Tinggi where we were staging) but fled when we tried to catch him. With just one day to go, he was caught on a rubber estate and locked up in the guard room.
Askaris were concerned about what was happening in Kenya. Mau Mau was sweeping through the country like a forest fire and they knew that another war would have to be fought when they reached home. I asked my orderly, Kipleli, how he would like to live in Malaya, like so many other expatriates did. There was a look of terror in his eyes as he asked me if that was an option. When I assured him that it was only a matter for discussion, he thought for a few moments and replied: "Effendi, have you ever seen a mother chicken scratching the earth for things that her chicks can eat?" I nodded. "And when there is danger, what do the chicks do?" he continued. I pretended not to know. "They scamper under her wings where they know they'll be safe. You and all the other officers are the chickens, and I'm just a chick." That parable is typical of the way askaris related complicated issues to simple situations.
There was no doubt that the vision of ordinary askaris had been widened during their time in Malaya They learnt what communism was about and they learnt how to work with British, Malay, Fiji and Gurkha soldiers. They came to realise what fine athletes they were and were proud of the records they gained for track and field events. It was in the early '50s' that the athletic fraternity came to hear about the fantastic running skills of the Nandi and Kipsigis. Nowadays, it is commonplace to see the Kipsangs, Kiptanuis, Kiplangats and all the other 'Kips' streaking ahead of the opposition to return world record times - and it all started in Malaya.
But to return to the askari who wanted to stay in Malaya. He was kept handcuffed until he got aboard the ship and was then put in the ship's cells at the 'sharp' end of the boat. During the first day at sea, he made a nuisance of himself shouting and throwing food, which he refused to eat, at his jailers. But when we turned west after rounding the northernmost tip of Sumatra, we ran into heavy seas. The motion amidships, where I had my cabin, was uncomfortable enough until I became used to it, but in the bows the rise and fall was quite alarming. It was not long before the prisoner was whimpering for mercy. Eventually, he found his sea legs but then went on hunger strike.
After four days of taking water only, the Doctor told me he would have to be force-fed. I spoke to the Colonel, who by this time had had enough of the prisoner, and would have agreed to him walking the plank if the Doctor said so. But force feeding was agreed and the procedure was simpler than I expected.
A couple of burly regimental policemen quickly overpowered him, bound him in a straight-jacket and carried him off to the medical centre. He was strapped to a table while the Doctor produced a piece of wood like a horse's bit with a hole in the middle and tapes at both ends. He pressed it against the askari's tightly closed lips which opened when it became painful. The tapes were tied at the back of his head, and then we were ready for the next stage. This was the insertion of a rubber tube through the hole in the 'bit' which was fed down to his stomach. It was then a simple business to pour a jug of soup down the tube. It was all over in a minute and the prisoner, realising he wasn't going to win, submitted to the authority of the provost sergeant, and we had no more trouble from him.
For an African to go AWOL in Malaya was like a swallow electing to stay behind in Britain when all the others were taking off for the southern hemisphere. He was seen in the nearby village of Ulu Tiram (adjacent to the Jungle Warfare School, Kota Tinggi where we were staging) but fled when we tried to catch him. With just one day to go, he was caught on a rubber estate and locked up in the guard room.
Askaris were concerned about what was happening in Kenya. Mau Mau was sweeping through the country like a forest fire and they knew that another war would have to be fought when they reached home. I asked my orderly, Kipleli, how he would like to live in Malaya, like so many other expatriates did. There was a look of terror in his eyes as he asked me if that was an option. When I assured him that it was only a matter for discussion, he thought for a few moments and replied: "Effendi, have you ever seen a mother chicken scratching the earth for things that her chicks can eat?" I nodded. "And when there is danger, what do the chicks do?" he continued. I pretended not to know. "They scamper under her wings where they know they'll be safe. You and all the other officers are the chickens, and I'm just a chick." That parable is typical of the way askaris related complicated issues to simple situations.
There was no doubt that the vision of ordinary askaris had been widened during their time in Malaya They learnt what communism was about and they learnt how to work with British, Malay, Fiji and Gurkha soldiers. They came to realise what fine athletes they were and were proud of the records they gained for track and field events. It was in the early '50s' that the athletic fraternity came to hear about the fantastic running skills of the Nandi and Kipsigis. Nowadays, it is commonplace to see the Kipsangs, Kiptanuis, Kiplangats and all the other 'Kips' streaking ahead of the opposition to return world record times - and it all started in Malaya.
But to return to the askari who wanted to stay in Malaya. He was kept handcuffed until he got aboard the ship and was then put in the ship's cells at the 'sharp' end of the boat. During the first day at sea, he made a nuisance of himself shouting and throwing food, which he refused to eat, at his jailers. But when we turned west after rounding the northernmost tip of Sumatra, we ran into heavy seas. The motion amidships, where I had my cabin, was uncomfortable enough until I became used to it, but in the bows the rise and fall was quite alarming. It was not long before the prisoner was whimpering for mercy. Eventually, he found his sea legs but then went on hunger strike.
After four days of taking water only, the Doctor told me he would have to be force-fed. I spoke to the Colonel, who by this time had had enough of the prisoner, and would have agreed to him walking the plank if the Doctor said so. But force feeding was agreed and the procedure was simpler than I expected.
A couple of burly regimental policemen quickly overpowered him, bound him in a straight-jacket and carried him off to the medical centre. He was strapped to a table while the Doctor produced a piece of wood like a horse's bit with a hole in the middle and tapes at both ends. He pressed it against the askari's tightly closed lips which opened when it became painful. The tapes were tied at the back of his head, and then we were ready for the next stage. This was the insertion of a rubber tube through the hole in the 'bit' which was fed down to his stomach. It was then a simple business to pour a jug of soup down the tube. It was all over in a minute and the prisoner, realising he wasn't going to win, submitted to the authority of the provost sergeant, and we had no more trouble from him.
The Silver Screen
Tawau in the mid 60's was the centre of the pornographic film industry of Borneo. I cannot speak with personal experience, but I doubt if they were more sexually explicit than some of the programmes we see today on TV.
The market for these films was the staunchly Roman Catholic Republic of the Philippines. There was also a brisk traffic in 'PLAYBOY' magazines that came in by sea and were then re-exported in long, thin, pencil-shaped boats powered by four 40 horse power outboard motors. The boats travelled so fast that nothing in the Philippine Navy could catch them. They presented a difficult target but occasionally a boat would be hit by gunfire - there were never any survivors. Those who took part in this illicit trade considered the risks worth while; ten successful runs would provide crews with enough money to live comfortably for the rest of their lives.
Colour Sergeant Hamish McCleod of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders was the orderly sergeant of the day and was carrying out an evening inspection of 2/RANGER's camp in Tawau. McCleod was one of the first non-commissioned officers to be seconded to the Sabah battalion and had proved himself to be an excellent NCO; he set a high moral standard in his personal and professional life.
He was accompanied on his inspection by the Malay provost sergeant (regimental police) and was about to tell him to 'fall out' when an unusual sound made him freeze. He moved his head from side to side until he had a fix on one of the accommodation huts. Signaling the provost sergeant to follow, he tip-toed to the hut and smashed the door open with his boot. There was an exodus of bodies through every window frame and within a matter of seconds the room was empty except for one man. Corporal Lam Chop was standing stiffly to attention alongside a machine that was projecting a pornographic film. The only reason why he hadn't followed the others was because he owned the projector.
Colour Sergeant McCleod could not believe what he saw on the screen. His strict Presbyterian upbringing in Scotland had shielded him from such sights as human bodies writhing around each other like sand eels in a bucket. "Yur dirrty wee blackguard, I'll have yur courrt martialled for this," he exclaimed. He gave instructions to the provost sergeant to put the Corporal in the guard room while he himself switched off the machine and removed the film.
The routine for Commanding Officer's Orders (a military version of Magistrates' Court) is pretty much the same wherever the British Army has left its influence. Those who are about to answer charges of misconduct before their CO are paraded outside his office, usually at noon. To create atmosphere, there is much shouting of commands, stamping of feet and blowing of bugles.
My office was next door to the CO's and we shared a veranda where miscreants were paraded. I looked out of my door and saw Corporal Lam Chop having his uniform and general turnout inspected by the Regimental Sergeant Major. Knowing him to be a good NCO, I wondered what had gone wrong, so I waited for an opportunity to speak to the senior warrant officer.
The RSM told me about the discovery of Lam Chop's nocturnal side-line and I was dismayed to hear that he was being charged with 'conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline in that he did provide and exhibit pornographic films for the purpose of entertaining soldiers'.
We had experienced some racial problems between Malay soldiers serving in Tawau and our own soldiers - who were Sabahan. The old problem of 'flared' trousers had been the cause of a number of fights and our soldiers resented the patronising attitude of mainland Malays. The Brigade Commander - a Malay himself, made things worse by taking sides with his kinsfolk.
Looking at it in the bigger picture, I considered Lam Chop was doing a good job keeping soldiers happy and contented within the confines of the camp. The innocuous matter of showing pornographic films was, I considered, a small price to pay.
The British Commanding Officer of 2/RANGERs had recently returned to UK at the end of his tour of command and had been replaced by a Malay lieutenant colonel. The newcomer was an extremely competent officer who had been commissioned at Sandhurst; all the remaining British ranks were pleased to serve under him. I therefore went to find out what he proposed to do.
I was aghast when he told me he intended making an example of the NCO. I remonstrated with him, but it was no good; if the charge was proved Lam Chop would be reduced to the ranks and suffer a term of detention.
There seemed to be nothing else I could do to change his mind, but just as I was about to return to my office, the CO's phone rang. When he replaced the hand set he told me that the Brigadier wanted to see him; 'Orders' would have to wait.
Brigade Headquarters was only a few hundred yards away and it was not long before the CO returned. Even for a Malay, he looked flushed; he told me that the Brigadier had heard about Lam Chop being caught in the act and had reacted strongly when told that he was going to be disciplined. "You will do no such thing," he said. "You will return his projector and his film - we have booked him to give a show in the brigade officers' mess next Monday night."
The market for these films was the staunchly Roman Catholic Republic of the Philippines. There was also a brisk traffic in 'PLAYBOY' magazines that came in by sea and were then re-exported in long, thin, pencil-shaped boats powered by four 40 horse power outboard motors. The boats travelled so fast that nothing in the Philippine Navy could catch them. They presented a difficult target but occasionally a boat would be hit by gunfire - there were never any survivors. Those who took part in this illicit trade considered the risks worth while; ten successful runs would provide crews with enough money to live comfortably for the rest of their lives.
Colour Sergeant Hamish McCleod of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders was the orderly sergeant of the day and was carrying out an evening inspection of 2/RANGER's camp in Tawau. McCleod was one of the first non-commissioned officers to be seconded to the Sabah battalion and had proved himself to be an excellent NCO; he set a high moral standard in his personal and professional life.
He was accompanied on his inspection by the Malay provost sergeant (regimental police) and was about to tell him to 'fall out' when an unusual sound made him freeze. He moved his head from side to side until he had a fix on one of the accommodation huts. Signaling the provost sergeant to follow, he tip-toed to the hut and smashed the door open with his boot. There was an exodus of bodies through every window frame and within a matter of seconds the room was empty except for one man. Corporal Lam Chop was standing stiffly to attention alongside a machine that was projecting a pornographic film. The only reason why he hadn't followed the others was because he owned the projector.
Colour Sergeant McCleod could not believe what he saw on the screen. His strict Presbyterian upbringing in Scotland had shielded him from such sights as human bodies writhing around each other like sand eels in a bucket. "Yur dirrty wee blackguard, I'll have yur courrt martialled for this," he exclaimed. He gave instructions to the provost sergeant to put the Corporal in the guard room while he himself switched off the machine and removed the film.
The routine for Commanding Officer's Orders (a military version of Magistrates' Court) is pretty much the same wherever the British Army has left its influence. Those who are about to answer charges of misconduct before their CO are paraded outside his office, usually at noon. To create atmosphere, there is much shouting of commands, stamping of feet and blowing of bugles.
My office was next door to the CO's and we shared a veranda where miscreants were paraded. I looked out of my door and saw Corporal Lam Chop having his uniform and general turnout inspected by the Regimental Sergeant Major. Knowing him to be a good NCO, I wondered what had gone wrong, so I waited for an opportunity to speak to the senior warrant officer.
The RSM told me about the discovery of Lam Chop's nocturnal side-line and I was dismayed to hear that he was being charged with 'conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline in that he did provide and exhibit pornographic films for the purpose of entertaining soldiers'.
We had experienced some racial problems between Malay soldiers serving in Tawau and our own soldiers - who were Sabahan. The old problem of 'flared' trousers had been the cause of a number of fights and our soldiers resented the patronising attitude of mainland Malays. The Brigade Commander - a Malay himself, made things worse by taking sides with his kinsfolk.
Looking at it in the bigger picture, I considered Lam Chop was doing a good job keeping soldiers happy and contented within the confines of the camp. The innocuous matter of showing pornographic films was, I considered, a small price to pay.
The British Commanding Officer of 2/RANGERs had recently returned to UK at the end of his tour of command and had been replaced by a Malay lieutenant colonel. The newcomer was an extremely competent officer who had been commissioned at Sandhurst; all the remaining British ranks were pleased to serve under him. I therefore went to find out what he proposed to do.
I was aghast when he told me he intended making an example of the NCO. I remonstrated with him, but it was no good; if the charge was proved Lam Chop would be reduced to the ranks and suffer a term of detention.
There seemed to be nothing else I could do to change his mind, but just as I was about to return to my office, the CO's phone rang. When he replaced the hand set he told me that the Brigadier wanted to see him; 'Orders' would have to wait.
Brigade Headquarters was only a few hundred yards away and it was not long before the CO returned. Even for a Malay, he looked flushed; he told me that the Brigadier had heard about Lam Chop being caught in the act and had reacted strongly when told that he was going to be disciplined. "You will do no such thing," he said. "You will return his projector and his film - we have booked him to give a show in the brigade officers' mess next Monday night."
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