Part 5 –
Maggie, from this day forward…
Many of the
lads were courting seriously by now and one or two, such as Tom Hardy and
Dave Weighall, our chummy Brummy, had even set the date. Bob had met and was
casually seeing a friend of his sister’s, the nurse that he was eventually to
marry. I was still footloose and fancy free but unbeknownst to me, my days
were also numbered. My demise from an uncluttered existence came about as a
result of a contrived meeting that occurred one weekend that Bob and I had
arranged to spend together in Luton, Angela
his (then) casual date, being on shift that weekend. We had planned to take
in a dance at the George Hotel in Luton and were busily getting spruced up
when my younger brother Duncan’s
fiancée rocked up with a friend in tow. We were introduced and I had this
impression of a tallish, very pretty girl with long dark hair and fashionably
pouty lips. Bob and I then went upstairs to get changed into our lady-killer
clothes ready for an evening’s fun and frolics. We came back down the stairs
to find that the door was being held against us, and from the giggles on the
other side we concluded that one of the girls was responsible. Restraining
Bob from his enthusiastic offer to: "Shift her out of the bliddy
way", I led him into the back-bedroom, from where we climbed out and
gingerly made our way out over the outhouse roof. We negotiated this with
extreme care as neither of us fancied falling through and finding ourselves
deep in the plid! The drop from the end of the sloping roof was no more than
seven feet and never caused us any problem. We paused to knock on the
living-room window as we headed for the shared side alley between Mum’s place
and next door, this seemed to cause some alarm and despondency, we quickly
set off for our night on the town. On the Monday, back at camp, I got a
letter from Duncan’s
girl, Tina Stock, to say that she had brought Margaret down specifically to
meet me and that they were both very disappointed at how things had
eventuated. Would I be interested in writing to Margaret, as she had thought
I was "nice" and would like to hear from me and perhaps see me
again? I thought it over and decided that it would be something to do, so I
sat down and wrote the letter that was to change my life forever.
Maggie and me -
courting
It was a fortnight or so before we could meet again because fate with
its usual capriciousness, handed me a guard duty at the advent of the first
weekend available to go back for a look see. My Mother had meantime been let
in on the plot that had been arranged to set me up the first time, so that
when I arrived home it was to find that she and my stepfather had arranged
our first date for us! This was to be an evening out for all four of us at
the Leicester Arms Hotel, fine by me and we drove there in Bill’s car, with
Maggie and I sitting rather gingerly together in the back seat. The evening
was not a success I have to say. The ‘Leicester’
was the favourite watering hole of some of Bill’s workmates. He was a ganger
with British Rail at that time; these blokes were as rough as guts to say the
least and neither my mother nor Margaret were comfortable with the attention
that Bill’s ‘mates’ were lavishing upon them. One in particular, a Scotsman
of some sort, plonked himself at our table uninvited and was paying my mother
far too much heed for my peace of mind! Bill, showing off for the benefit of
the cronies, would not let me put my hand in my pocket for a round and this
caused the wee man to make some snide comment to me. He was handily placed
right next to me so I smiled at him, grabbed him around the neck with my
right hand, dug in fingers and thumb as hard as I could and smacked my
forehead hard into the side of his head. Having thus got his full and
undivided attention, I roared out in best parade ground voice, about two
millimetres from his lughole, the following words: "Listen you obnoxious
little git. If you are still in reach in thirty seconds I will smack your gob
so hard, you will have to shove your hand up your 'arris in order to clean
your teeth. Now piss off"! When I let go and stood up, he shot out of
the chair and legged it. My Mum’s face was a study, Bill sat there like a
stunned mullet and Maggie sat there wearing a slight smirk! The whole place
had gone quiet and everyone was looking in our direction but at least we were
no longer being bothered by dickheads. I was in uniform and I sometimes
wonder if people mistook the blue beret and the Air Techie’s wings for
something more arcane, as on several occasions I had merely to look sideways
at someone to get given some space? I thought that I had blown it with Maggie
perhaps, but no, she observed that Bill must be very thick if he hadn't
noticed what the loud-mouthed Scotsman had been trying to do in chatting up
my Mum in front of him. Eight weeks on and Maggie informed me that she had
spotted a very nice engagement ring; I said that I thought perhaps sixteen
might be a tad young for such an event but her mind was made up and she was
quite adamant. Maggie’s folks, Charlie and Vera Cosier were fine with it. The
announcement did not go down at all well with my Mother though, who until we
got engaged had seemed to approve of Maggie. This sudden change of heart was
to become an ongoing source of friction between Mum and I for some years.
Difficulties
The first few weeks of my romance with Maggie were not terribly auspicious
ones for all sorts of reasons. My Mother pulled a swiftie by informing Maggie
that I used to put time in at the S------ D--- Espresso bar just around the
corner and suggested that she should drop in there with me. As we walked home
from the cinema one Saturday night, I was horrified to see Maggie carry on
and enter the bar, and I had no choice but to follow. As we were served by my
former ‘woman friend’, the atmosphere was decidedly chilly and she gave
Maggie a real glare, being very quick on the uptake, Maggie later gave me a
roasting that would have sorted out your average coffee bean with no trouble!
I was very annoyed at Mums indiscretion, she was well aware that I had been
involved heavily!
The next stumbling block came about as a result of a 1,000 hr
flying trial to establish if the modifications to the Scout Helicopter
brought it to the standards required for mass purchase by the MOD for what
was to be an expanded Air Corps. We Ground Crew that were chosen to undertake
the servicing had to be on standby for intensive flying almost around the
clock, any faults had to be fixed asap and the chopper back in the air
soonest. This meant no weekend leave of course while the trial was on, eat,
sleep and above all WORK was the order of things. We did have a couple of
moments of light relief and sheer farce to lighten the load though. The
former was courtesy of Bob Brearton. There was a quite attractive wench that
worked in one of the offices peripheral to the hangar in which we were
housed, and she had a strange sort of walk. With her hips thrust forward and
a very pronounced wriggle she went through the hangar every day to purchase
fresh milk from the NAAFI truck at its stop prior to ours. She must have
practised this walk for hours in front of mirrors and was obviously of the
opinion that it was very sexy, it wouldn't have mattered anyway, she was
young, had nice figure, legs etc and we all stopped and perved her out as a
matter of course. On the day in question she appeared as usual, and then a
few paces behind her, Bob Brearton trotted into the hangar. To the delight of
we onlookers, he immediately did an absolutely perfect parody of her
distinctive walk. Problem was, she appeared to suddenly realise that she had
forgotten the milk money, she turned quickly 180 degrees and there were the
two of them, walking towards each other, both doing the same walk! Both of
them blushed a flaming crimson and Bob lacking the presence of mind to desist
and scoot, as they passed each other the howls of mirth reached a crescendo.
She never came that way again poor lass.
23rd September 1960 - Celebrating the
completion of the Scout Helicopter 1000-hours Intensive Flying Trial
Gerry PECK standing at
right-hand corner of table (3rd left of the blackboard)
Our new Brigadier provided the farce, as soon as he took over the
reins the old duffer insisted that he undertake a pilot’s course so that he
would be qualified at least on fixed wing aircraft. He was doing about as
well as could be expected for someone of his age and had managed to scrape
through most of the requirements, then came the night flying component of the
course. He and his instructor duly took off on their allocated circuits and
bumps, trouble was, when he came in to land, he plonked it down right on top of
the next Auster waiting in line for permission to take off! As luck would
have it, no nasty injuries occurred but the rather obscene sight of two
aircraft being towed away at first light next morning in an embrace that
suggested flagrante delicto caused some very loud and ironic cheers to
erupt from various points! As one looked at them, there was a temptation to
rush out and throw the contents of a fire bucket or two over them! There was
the usual quickly convened Board of Inquiry and the equally usual whitewash
liberally applied. That was the end of the old boy’s ambitions to fly though,
thank goodness, big sighs of relief all round I believe.
Legs Eleven
Maggie now had her sights set on a wedding that would take place
as soon as she turned eighteen, coincidentally some eighteen months after we
first met. To this end she started a serious ‘Glory box’ and began to order
such things as crockery, etc. from a friend who ran a Mail Order catalogue.
She insisted that the bulk of my wage be banked so that we would be able to
pay for our own wedding and a decent honeymoon, as there was Buckley’s chance
of my lot putting their hands in their pockets. Maggie’s folk were as poor as
church mice, as were most people living in council houses in that era. I was
a smoker in those days, as was Maggie, she insisted that we cut ourselves
down to one fag a day except at weekends, she controlled the purse strings,
as she still does to this day. My attitude at that time being that if she
blew it I was only out money, not freedom. Every day at camp I got a letter
from Maggie and in it, slightly flat but still serviceable, was my cigarette
ration of one ciggie! The lads could not believe that I was such a reformed
character, I had just enough money left each week to buy a tiddy 'oggy (Cornish
pasty) at morning NAAFI breaks. If the weather looked as though it was
going to be reasonable at weekends I would hitchhike to Luton,
otherwise it would be a train journey and less money to stow away. I daresay
that it was about sixty-five to thirty-five in favour of the thumb over all.
We would occasionally go out for a drink in a pub at weekends, but if we did,
we rationed ourselves to three "Poachers" each. More often than
not, we would visit either one of my numerous relatives or my very good
friends Ted and Beryl Allford, who were like surrogate parents to me. We were
out for a drink one night when we stumbled across my brother Duncan’s
fiancée, Tina Stock, hard in the embrace of a man old enough to be her
father. We were in the other bar from them but were able to see them through
the double counter arrangement that the pub had. Maggie later enquired from a
mutual friend as to the situation and how long and how far it had progressed.
Her findings were communicated to my brother in a letter I sent him, and a
few weeks later he was home on leave and confronted Tina with his knowledge.
Scotch one engagement!
My friend Ted bought himself his very first car, just after
passing his driving test. It was an old sit-up-and-beg Morris Ten and had
seen much better days, he told me to take the keys one weekend and take
Maggie out for a drive, which I did. We decided to call in at her place to
make some sandwiches for a bit of a picnic lunch, as we drove towards Farley
Hill Estate where Maggie lived with her folks, we had to negotiate a very
steep hill on Longcroft Road.
The engine in the old Morris was really clapped and it was quite obvious that
even second gear would not get us up the hill, so I did a truly magnificent
"block" change into first. Suddenly, all the cars and such
travelling downhill started flashing their lights and blowing their horns,
drivers waving and grinning like Cheshire
cats! I turned to say to Maggie that something appeared to have got them all
agog when I saw to my surprise that the front passenger seat had come off of
its mounting and Maggie was flat on her back. There, for all the world to see
and admire, were Maggie’s fine long legs waving seductively in the air and of
course tomorrow’s washing was being well displayed too! Her situation was not
bettered by the fact that we had a distance still to go uphill and I was not
game to stop on the slope. To her dismayed shouts of: "What shall I
do?" I responded with: "Just keep on winking, they seem to love
it".
A Whole New Ball Game
So here I was, with a sixteen-year-old fiancée who was about to
turn my whole life upside down in terms of my erstwhile freedom of choice,
and a Mother who had suddenly and unaccountably turned hostile. Bill Brown
had been on about me joining the local lodge of the Buffaloes, and thinking
that perhaps Mum and Margaret being together while Bill and I attended Lodge
meetings would help to settle Mum’s hostility to Maggie, I went along with
this. Mum simply stopped going! She had intermittently taken in lodgers over
the years and suddenly she began to do so again, these lads would bring their
girlfriends back and Mum would make a fuss over them, meantime studiously
ignoring Maggie. Not even the offer of a cup of tea for her, as a result most
of our time indoors was spent at her parents’ place, where I was made very
welcome. Things culminated in an explosion of anger one Sunday night as I
came back to prepare for my return journey to camp. I was in the habit of
making myself a sandwich to stay my stomach while going back on the train to
Wallop. On this occasion, nobody was home, all the food was missing from the
kitchen, and the door to the front room was locked from the street side so
that one had to come in through the front entry to gain access to the best
room. I always paid in my ration money whenever I came home on leave - the
very first thing I did - my brother did not bother! The pettiness of it all
really threw me and I blew a fuse, punching the door so hard that I knocked
out the side panel, thus allowing me to unlock it and access the food. I left
a note for my Mother giving her a piece of my mind and telling the pair of
them that the broken door was down to their ignorance and spite. Next weekend
I asked my aunt Doll if she would be able to put me up in her spare room at
weekends. She had a better idea, my Grandfather was ailing and she had to
make two trips a day to prepare meals and see to him. Would I be able to do
that at weekends to give her a break, I could sleep upstairs while Grandad
slept in the front room? I had been making my Grandad a grant of a guinea a
week from my pay since my days at 6th Armoured Workshop so this task would
not be onerous. On the odd weekend that I copped a duty, Maggie agreed to go
to see to him for his food and coal. She only worked a few streets away from
his home too and said that she would call in every evening to warm his
evening meal and see him right before he retired for the night, thus saving
my Aunt a second daily trip.
This arrangement worked really well until I was warned that a
posting to Aden
was on the cards. A quick visit to see the Adjutant, a follow-up by SSAFFA
and some other bod to ascertain that the whole thing was fair dinkum and that
was my posting cancelled, on compassionate grounds. The fact that I had been
making the grant was a big plus, coincidence rearing its head again. Some
months later a plane went down in the Radfan, the Pilot’s and Observer’s
tortured and badly mutilated bodies were found next to it; who knows if in
fact I would have been that poor sod of an observer had circumstances been
different?
The routine at my Grandfather’s worked out fine, I cooked for him
and shaved him every Sunday when I got back to Luton,
which was about nine weeks out of ten. On the odd weekends that I was on duty,
Maggie coped very well and my Aunt was grateful for getting some of her own
life back. My Grandfather had been a chimney sweep all of his working life
and was well thought of by all who lived in the Hightown area of Luton. I was always being stopped and asked how he was.
One Sunday morning, a fine day as I recall, I was stood on the front doorstep
waiting for my first glimpse of Maggie as she came out of the alleyway
through from Wenlock Street
into Boyle Street.
Across the road lived my Mother’s oldest friend, whose daughter Dawn was a
year or three younger than me. Dawn appeared at their front door and as she
came outside, spotted me, and came over for a chat. A few minutes into the
chat I spotted Maggie coming up the street, I could sense that something was
amiss from the way she was striding towards me. As she arrived at the house,
she swept without a word down the side passage adjacent to the front door and
I then heard the sounds of her progress through the house. Still without a
word, Maggie thrust past me, swung herself in front of me and faced Dawn with
her arms crossed and a scowl on her face! Poor Dawn, who was never in the
race as far as I and she were both concerned, took one look at Maggie and
stuttered that she would have to be going, then she scooted back across the
road. I was rather flattered by this obvious sign of proprietorial rights
being so clearly delineated, my explanation of the Gray family’s place in my
life was listened to but I still got scolded for encouraging "Other gels"
though. Maggie was a hard taskmaster!
On one of the train journeys back to Wallop, I met up with Frank
LeFevre at Waterloo.
We boarded the train and as was the norm, and pulled down the blinds in the
hope that other passengers would bypass our compartment so that we would then
have a seat each to stretch out on, for a kip. About ten minutes before the
train was due to pull out the door suddenly crashed open and this railway
bloke stood there yelling at us that we were not to pull the blinds down and
that he was fed up with bloody soldiers and their arrogance. We sat there
like stunned mullets! I was so startled that by the time I had marshalled my
annoyance he was gone. I pulled the blinds down again of course and then
stood directly in front of the sliding door, sure enough, after some three
minutes the door crashes open again and it's the Hitler clone. He nearly fell
over backwards when he found me right in his face. I said to him:
"Listen you jumped up little twerp, I paid for the use of any and all facilities
when I purchased a ticket to travel on this train. I am not a soldier to you,
I am a passenger and your function in life is to see to it that I get all the
creature comforts to which I am due. Now behave yourself or I will spank you
very hard". He then screamed that he would fetch an MP to sort me out. I
said to him: "Go for your life twerp, I'll complain to the Station
Master, guess which one of us will lose his job?" I then gave him my
best parade ground bellow with the words: "Now piss off"! as I
shoved him and slammed the sliding door across in front of him. No further
action required! On another such occasion, Frank and I had followed the same
routine with the blinds and were just settling down for a snooze when the
door came open and one of the WRACs from Wallop asked if she could come in
with us, we of course said OK. She told us that she had spotted us going into
the compartment and had been in one just two down from us. Her problem had
been that a couple of squaddies had followed her in and had started to get a
bit too familiar for comfort, we started off to sort them out but the WRAC, a
very attractive girl, pleaded with us not to do so. Frank was obviously very
taken with her, so as I was bespoke, I left him to do most of the chatting to
her as we whiled away the journey to Andover.
Getting Shirty
During the period of our courtship, Maggie and I spent our money
as well and as wisely as we knew how. Obviously we did not want to forego all
pleasure and entertainment, so on the odd occasion we undertook a coach trip
to one or the other of the popular seaside resorts. Always making sure that
Grandad would be OK for his lunch and so forth while we were out, usually
Aunt Doll would arrange to come down for an hour or so if we were away like
that. Clacton, Southend and Great Yarmouth
were the resorts that we visited in such fashion, because we normally saved
every cent we could, we really enjoyed all of these trips immensely. Maggie
had bought me a very colourful summer shirt and this worked wonders for us on
these trips, the "Spruikers" would spot that shirt and inveigle us
to have a couple of free goes on their stalls to encourage others to join in,
it seemed to work too. Maggie being an attractive and vivacious girl also
helped this format succeed I have no doubt at all! Five or six free goes on
various stalls or rides was fine by us and really eked out our scant supply
of money. One thing I feel I must say and that is that cusp of the fifties
and sixties were the best of times to be young and reasonably carefree. There
was a feeling of optimism everywhere and this was a great background
ambience, there was some great music about, the restrictions of rationing had
vanished and work was plentiful so that most people had some money to spend
on enjoyment and pleasure. On each of those trips, as we sat, sated and
replete in the coach on the return journey, I would be approached to take up
a collection for the driver, courtesy of the "magic" shirt as we
came to call it! As Luton was a mere thirty miles from London, we made one trip down there too, an
occasion that coincidence came to the fore on yet again. We were going to see
a film at the Odeon in Leicester
Square and I was showing Maggie such things as
the Windmill Theatre and Piccadilly Circus,
poor Maggie was so disappointed that there were no clowns! As we made our way
along Wardour Street I was suddenly hailed by name and up strode one of the
former Nashos from Wildenrath days, he had been a Photographic Interpreter
and had saved all his money while there in order to buy a superb set of
German photographic gear. He really looked the goods and told us that he had
a studio just around the corner, where he took photographs of models for
various "Glossies" and such. He tried to persuade us to forget our
plans for the evening and go back to his place, but I resisted his
blandishments and told him we were pushed for time as regards the cinema and
wished him all the best as we took our leave of him. To be perfectly frank,
the gleam in his eye as he regarded Maggie was a bit of a put-off for me, I
could see that he was now a man of the World and doubtless had a line of
patter that could turn a young girl’s head!
Open Day
Back at Wallop, it had been decided that the Air Corps Centre would
put on an Open Day as a means of gaining positive publicity for the Air Corps
and its soon to be undertaken expansion. Chopper Flight was given two stalls
to organise and for my sins one of them was laid in my lap. This was to be a
"Bowl for a Pig" competition and would consist of a
Hessian-surrounded patch of grass on the periphery of the hard standing upon
which a large appropriately coloured bullseye was to be painted. Right in the
very centre of which would be a tin that was inserted into the ground, This
had to be only just large enough to permit a biased bowling ball to drop into
it. Patrons would bowl from a line about fifty feet from the target. Scores
would be different for each of the coloured segments of the bullseye and the
highest score was reserved for entry of the ball into the tin. I had to do
all the artwork for advertising and side panels, plus provide a Spruiker
board and scoreboard. I have to say that as a former top pupil at Art, I made
a good fist of that. The CO was dead chuffed and when the great day arrived,
my five helpers and I arranged ourselves in shifts of three two-man teams and
off we went. Flight contingency funds had provided us with a lively young
porker from a local farm and this was a great attraction. We worked like Trojans
and took a huge amount of money, the pig eventually had to endure a play-off
between two tied scorers before it went off to meet whatever fate was in
store for it. In my time off I had top scored on the shooting range that had
been organised and I was looking forward to spending the ten quid first prize
on that. Unfortunately, as I was on last shift on the bowl for a Pig stall I
dipped out, some ratbag just outscoring me in the last half hour or so and as
I could not get away for one last try that was that! The whole day was an
absolute ripper though and everyone involved, which was of course all of us
on camp, felt that we had achieved what we had been detailed to do. That was
the message that came down from on high too!
Dogfights
Dogs were becoming something of a problem around the hangars area
at Wallop, many of the married personnel owned one and they seemed to be
allowed to wander at will all over the camp area but the real nuisances were
the mutts belonging to some of the Officer Pilot Instructors. Two in
particular were real standouts; one was a large Red Setter, a magnificent
russet animal with the ‘feathered’ legs of that breed. This was a singularly
arrogant hound possessed of the biggest bladder known to Veterinary Science -
it peed up everything in its path, wheels and chocks were drenched with
reckless abandon and, for variety, it would also leave an ambush of ordure
for the unwary to tread in. The other major contender for man’s worst friend
was a rather aggressive German shepherd. Attempts to dissuade this beast were
not met with total disdain, as was the way with the Red Setter, this animal
would bristle and menace the offender. One of the lads sorted out the Red
Setter by way of some accurate shooting with a grease gun filled with XG272
clag. As ‘Muttley’ cocked his leg, he was hit in the jewellery by a stream of
flying grease and took off like a potential Derby winne. Pausing after a hundred yards
or so to drag his rear end along the ground, and after a week or so of this
treatment he avoided our area for his depredations. Nobody was game to tackle
the Shepherd though but his demise wasn't long in coming. Tom Hardy and Dave
Weighall had both tied the knot by this time and had got themselves WD
hirings by way of married accommodation. Tom and his wife had got themselves
a Great Dane puppy, and some few weeks afterwards he brought it in to the
Flight to show it to us. It was huge, very friendly and as clumsy as a bull
in a china shop. As we stood in the hangar doorway making a fuss of it, it
spotted the Shepherd on its rounds, and as puppies will, it ambled across and
rolled over to display ‘juniority’. The Shepherd just attacked it straight
off! There was a series of pitiful yelps as the poor devil struggled to its
feet and the Shepherd then sort of placed its feet on the Great Dane’s
shoulder - next thing, the puppy had the Shepherd’s neck in its mouth and was
shaking it like a carpet! This time it was the Shepherd screaming out! The
Captain Instructor came out and spotted his dog being straightened out and
got very upset; we of course all stood up for Tom’s dog and explained that it
had not attacked but had been obliged to retaliate. Tom was meanwhile trying
to persuade the pup to let go of its new toy. The result of all this was that
there was an embargo on Ground Crew bringing their dogs to the Flight area.
Still OK for the Officers of course, however, now that we had seen the
Shepherd’s bluff called, a broadside or two with grease guns sorted him out
whenever he hove into view. The poor old Red Setter had another nasty
surprise coming his way too. Although he gave us a wide berth, he still
annoyed members of the fixed wing fraternity and one of them used a
screwdriver one morning to very good effect. The Setter would desecrate every
lamp standard between the Guardroom and the hangar areas as he made his way
through the camp. These lamp standards had an inspection plate set about a
foot or so above ground level and they were held in place by a top and bottom
screw. Spotting the dog on its way, matey whipped out his screwdriver,
loosened the bottom screw and removed the top one completely, thus allowing
the inspection plate to swing downwards and expose the wires and terminals
inside. We all stood watching as ‘Muttley’ came up and prepared to give it
his all; as he did so there was a sputtering sound, a mighty blue flash and
with a strangled yelp, the dog was flung back a couple of yards. He was
making a sort of keening noise as he struggled to get back on his feet and
once he did he took off at a speed that would have amazed a greyhound. He
could still be heard ki-yiking as he hit the main road outside the camp and
headed towards the Officers’ Mess. Had this have been at dusk instead of
early morning I swear his tackle would have been seen glowing a dull cherry
red. It is a fact that whenever we saw that dog again he always squatted down
to pee!
Joining The Greens
Since the time of the accident with the fire extinguishers my
right foot had never been quite right. After a full day on my feet it would
really ache, and a couple of visits to the MO did nothing to alleviate the
problem. Eventually I decided to see if my local Quack, who had ministered to
our family needs since our return from Australia in 1950, could come up
with a solution to this annoyance. The kindest thing that could be said of Dr
Seed was that he was an enthusiastic sadist, so I should have known better!
He checked it, mumbled and muttered a bit, then produced a roll of sticky
elastic bandage. Bidding me to remove my strides he then proceeded to swathe
my leg, from knee to toes, in layer upon layer of this evil stuff. I sat
there and fretted about this, because it occurred to me that with my hairy
legs, the removal was going to be a wholly different ball game to the putting
on! "Come and see me in a week or two's time" he instructed me with
a leer as I left the surgery, already feeling the rip and tear as the odd
hair succumbed to his handiwork. By ten o'clock that night I had to borrow a
pair of scissors from Maggie’s bag and start removing the bandages, my leg
felt (and was) very swollen and my toes were all puffed up and discoloured,
due to the tightness of the bandaging. With many "oohs!" and
"ouches!" I manoeuvred the small scissors down the length of leg
and foot, struggling all the way to cut through the multiple layers that I
was swathed in. Once this was accomplished, I had to start to rip the bandage
away from my leg; this could only be done a small section at a time to start
with. Maggie offered to rip it away for me but alarmed by her enthusiasm, I
declined her offer! I eventually had the bandage free from the front of my
leg so that there was only the full length of the back of the leg to go. This
I managed to free up in just two major yanks. Problem was that I now had one
hairy leg and one totally bald one. Discouraged by the inability of the
medical profession to sort my foot out, I decided to ignore the thing and
just carry on but by the end of any given day I was starting to limp a tad.
This state of affairs was to continue for over a year and was due to get
worse not better!
Meantime, I had become totally estranged from my Mother and
Stepfather. My routine at weekends was well organised by now but I was aware
that my Grandfather was deteriorating slowly but surely. I made sure that my
Aunts were made aware of this and prevailed upon one of them to let my Mother
know. Aunt Doll was still doing her trek to Granddad’s once a day during the
week so she was well aware of the situation, but was so bitter about none of
the other three doing anything, that she would not get in touch with them.
The three of them, Mabel, Winnie and my Mother, eventually made a point of
calling in, my Mother careful to do so during the week when I was at Wallop.
Familial duty thus fulfilled they all left me to carry on as usual, all that
I could do was to call on the doctor and request him to make a house call
next weekend. The Doctor was obviously an alcoholic and he never turned up,
after three attempts to get him to do so without success, I marched into his
Saturday surgery in uniform and when I got in to see him I put it to him
straight. "You have made no attempt to see my Grandfather despite my
continued pleas for you to do so. Unless you get up off your fat 'arris and
get around to his house this afternoon I will see that the Medical
Association is made aware of the condition in which you are to be found on a
daily basis. You are a disgrace to your calling and should be deeply ashamed
of the distress that your inebriation is causing your patients! Get there
today or if necessary I will drag you there kicking and squealing." He
was there at the house two hours later and was unable to look me in the eye,
his scripts for medication at least gave me the satisfaction of knowing that
I was doing all that I could.
As winter settled in my Grandfather slowly deteriorated and
sadly, in the January he finally succumbed. I applied for and was given a
week’s compassionate leave to settle his meagre estate and arrange a funeral.
This was a sad time; we had hoped that he would have been alive for our
planned wedding, which we had been expecting to arrange in May after Maggie’s
eighteenth birthday. Life however must go on, and as Grandad’s rented place
was no longer an option, I had to find some accommodation for my weekend
trips. Maggie’s folk put me up on a camp bed in their ‘box room’, taking care
of that pressing need. We had in the meantime approached the vicar of St
Matthew’s Parish
Church and he was happy
to marry us, we had but to finalise the date. Someone told us to get married
before May, as we would be eligible for some sort of tax relief. Another
quick chat with the vicar and he told us that the only date he had free was
the 17th March, St Paddywhacker’s Day to be sure! Maggie’s folk
were agreeable but were worried about the cost, so we assured them that our
savings would cover all that was needed, including drink and tucker for the
reception, as long as it was held at their home. This was fine by them so
that was it, Maggie was destined to be a seventeen-year-old Bride while her
Groom was a dirty old man of twenty-three. The news, when I broke it at camp,
was greeted with hoots and cries of: "Snap", as young Paddy had
just a few minutes earlier announced that he and his WRAC had set their wedding
for the self same day! Bob Brearton was now engaged to Angela, and likewise
Smudger, who had come across from Germany on leave and met Maggie,
was courting steady with a German lass called Thea, everyone seemed to be at
it all at once! Something in the water no doubt, or had the bromide perhaps
been curtailed?
Regimental Week
At Wallop a Regimental week was being organised, part of which
was to consist of a film show on first aid. A day on the ranges was also
organised but I was on Duty Crew so missed out on that. I never missed the
film though! Truly, whoever had done the make up and special effects for the
film was an absolute genius. I have never seen anything to equal the total
realism that came across to the audience, as they gazed in morbid fascination
at the ‘results’ of the simulated crash of a troop-carrying Dakota aircraft.
Broken bones protruding from limbs, blood, snot and gore in profusion
littered the scene of the crash as the ‘victims’ lurched about, laid there
feebly thrashing, or sprayed the area with arterial blood. After about ninety
seconds of this, I felt the first symptoms of a good old fashioned faint
coming on, I averted my eyes from the screen, stood up and made my way into
the foyer and thence to the bog at the foot of the short stairway to ground
level. Some minutes later I was in there swilling my face and feeling
slightly better when I heard the noise of the door into the cinema crashing
open, followed by the muffled thump of erratic footfalls, then a thump and
finally a sort of slithering noise. Feeling able to cope again and being
curious, I went out into the foyer and the mystery was solved. Some poor
bloke had left his dash a bit late and he had obviously lurched down the
stairs and turned left to enter the bogs whereat he had finally succumbed. He
had missed the door by about two feet as he fainted and he had fallen forward
to slither down the wall. He was coming round so I left him to it and went
outside for some fresh air. To my surprise there were about seventy bodies
sprawled about all over the grassed area outside the Gaf (Garrison Cinema),
all of them distinctly green about the gills, what a sorry un-martial mob we
were on that inauspicious occasion! I have to say that there was a steady
exodus from within as we all sat or lay on the grass, all ranks well
represented I hasten to add, there is a sort of democracy takes hold when you
are all the same general shade of green! [I remember it well, and was
similarly affected! (George MILLIE)]
One Or Two Hitches
As the date for the wedding drew nearer, things began to click
into place very nicely. We spotted an advertisement for a Hotel in Shanklin,
on the Isle of Wight, offering really good
rates for off-season occupancies of a week or more. The outlay for a week was
well within our budget for the honeymoon so we made a booking ‘fifthwith’,
which was one major requirement well catered for. Another vexing problem was
in respect of somewhere to live that was reasonably near to Wallop, ready for
when we were spliced. Here too we struck lucky, one of the lads on the Flight
had been renting a small two-room flatlet in Whitchurch and was informed that
a WD hiring would be available for him and his wife at the end of February.
He invited me to go along and meet the two old ladies who lived in this huge
old house, the ground floor of which they had turned into two flatlets. These
two venerable spinster sisters seemed pleased that someone would be ready to
take over the flat so soon after it was to be vacated and were happy to hold
it for me on a small deposit. I was told that a Squaddie called Craftsman
Champion and his wife had just moved into the other flatlet; the name meant
nothing to me at the time so I merely nodded politely at this information.
The two major criteria having thus been sorted out to our satisfaction, the
pathway to the church door was now uncluttered and a downhill run, and all
that remained was an interview with the vicar to sort out the hymns and such
that we wanted for the service. We selected "He who would valiant be"
this in view of its Bedfordshire connection by way of the author, and
"Onward Christian Soldiers", the latter because I was to be dressed
in No 1 Uniform on the big day and Maggie felt that this hymn would be most
appropriate. We also selected the 23rd Psalm, as this so well
portrays the real Christian credo. A rehearsal was the only thing to wait for
now and then it was just a week or three to go to the dreaded St Patrick’s
Day.
Back at camp, a course was going through its paces as usual and
the time for the trainee chopper pilots to do their mountain flying component
had arrived. I was selected as a member of the rear party, our function being
to remain at Wallop and continue with the more protracted servicing schedules
that one or two of our choppers were undergoing. While the bulk of the Flight
was away in the Brecon Beacons, the Flight had a scheduled soccer match to
play; this was a potential disaster, because all of our regular team were
away in Wales!
I was informed that I would be playing and asked what position I wished to be
put down for! Knowing that my foots condition would be aggravated by this, I
opted for left back - left back in the billets I optimistically suggested -
no joy though, I was told to front up for the match. This I duly did, in gear
drawn from the Centre Sports Store, the stuff was really tatty and the boots
had as much stud on the inside as they did on the outside from the feel of
them on one’s feet, I was not too chuffed with them at all. The match itself
went about as well as could be expected with a scratch side up against the
leading team in the league we were in. I think they all scored except for
their goalie, I have to say that they did not score from their right wing
though! Being short and deceptively sturdy, I was able to hustle anybody off
of the ball if they came down my side of the paddock; I was always able to
turn inside the attacker, left side or right, because of my low centre of
gravity. In one enthusiastic encounter with their right-winger we came in
together hip-to-hip, chasing down a loose ball, we struck and he sailed over
my hip, flat onto his back. The prat of a ref whistled me up and threatened
to send me off for using a judo throw! The other bloke got up and said:
"That's bullshit ref, it was a fair tackle." The ref, bless his
egalitarian heart, shouted: "I'm a 'kin Captain, not just a ref and if I
hear any more from you I'll send the pair of you off!" However, he did
seem to relent because after putting me in his little black book he allowed
me to stay on the field. Sending off a player from a team losing about nine
nil as we were at that point would have been overkill really! Just before
half-time we had a miracle happen, the ball fell at the feet of our hapless
centre forward and as had been the case from about the second minute of the
game, no players were in their half of the pitch. After a second’s
hesitation, our worthy hero began to sort of dribble the ball in the general
direction of the opposing team’s goal, being quite inept, he was rapidly
overhauled by the two backs who came charging at him from left and right. One
of them positioned himself for a shoulder contact and the other for a sliding
tackle, totally confused by the fact that he was suddenly the centre of
attention and alarmed by the ferocity of the inrushing players, our hero
simply stopped dead in his tracks. Right in front of him the two fullbacks
made contact with each other; the ‘meat’ wasn't in their sandwich! The end
result of this ferocious response to a possible movement of the ball towards
their goal was one broken ankle and one broken collarbone to their fullbacks.
Once play resumed they were down to nine men and as a result were only able
to score twice more in the match, making it thirteen to nil if my memory
doesn't fail me. My foot, in the meantime, was exceedingly sore and nothing,
once the game was over, not even a hot bath, would alleviate the soreness. A
visit to the quack saw me excused boots for a month, as the sole of my foot,
just aft of the toes, was grotesquely swollen and I could hardly bear my
weight on it. Further visits to the MO saw him issue the usual codeines and
have a thick sponge insole made for me to put inside my shoe. This was of
some help but there was no sign of the overall discomfort abating to any
appreciable degree. I was aware, once the initial swelling had subsided, that
I could clearly feel the bones under the ball of my foot and that the area
was very tender to the touch. Even to this day, that foot is not as it should
be and for many years it was to cause me some real problems.
The final week of my bachelorhood rolled around and as there were
two of us on the Flight getting spliced on St Paddy’s Day, we had a huge
Buck’s night on the Thursday night, by the cringe, but there were some
monumental hangovers on that Friday morning! Staff Kennett was good enough to
allow Paddy and I an early off on the Friday afternoon so that we could go
off and get ourselves organised with what we had to pack and take home with
us. A half dozen of the lads had indicated that they would turn to for both
weddings, this was possible because ours was due for 10.30 hrs and Paddy’s
was scheduled for 16.30 hrs and his was only forty-five minutes away by car,
near Watford I believe. Comes the morning of the great day and I had to get
ready and be out of the house at some ungodly hour so that Maggie could be
organised. I killed some time in a coffee bar and then, at about 09.45 hrs. I
started to make my way towards Hightown. As I walked up the hill from the
Town Centre I had to pass a pub alongside the exit from the railway
footbridge over Luton Station, the Bishop’s Mitre the pub was called! A
mighty cheer greeted me as I came abreast of the pub, whose doors could
hardly have opened a moment or two before my arrival, it was five of the
lads, as promised. They lined five whiskies up on the bar and told me they
had to be sunk before I left, I saw from the clock that I needed to make
tracks before too long, so I took my medicine as a good soldier should.
Squinting somewhat and with many jocular remarks aimed in my general
direction, the six of us then weaved our way along Hightown Road towards my appointment
with Destiny. Arriving at St Matthew’s I gazed blearily at assembled family
and friends, noting with some relief that Ted Allford, my best man, was on
station and had things well organised. After a round of greetings we went
inside the church and I had some short time to reflect on the changes about
to enter my life. Then came a sort of buzz through the congregation of
attendees and without more ado the organist started playing "Here comes
the bride". Ted and I stood up and moved into the aisle to await the
arrival of Charlie Cosier and Maggie. What a stunner she was! They say that
every woman looks her absolute best when she fronts up to the altar at her
own wedding. Be that as it may, Maggie looked truly gorgeous and just took my
breath away, a beautiful bride she was for sure! By now the whiskies had sort
of anaesthetised me and I stood there listening to and responding to the vicar
in a sort of comfortable glow, feeling no pain of any sort, not even from my
foot. The only thing that occurred to give away my pickled state was that
when the vicar went up to the high altar to give a benediction or whatever, I
went to follow him and Maggie had to pull me back into line with her. I
looked at Maggie, with her glowing face and shining eyes and reflected on
what a lucky bloke I was, a quick scratch with a pen in the Parish register
in front of two witnesses and we walked out into the church aisle as Mr and
Mrs Peck.
17th March –
Mr and Mrs Peck
Shanklin’s Pony
After the ceremony was over and the photos and congratulations
sorted out, we were driven back to the Cosier household where the reception
was to be held, as we had self catered, everything was all set up ready for
when we arrived back at the house. Thanks to Ted and Beryl Allford, we had a
beautiful three-tier wedding cake and we had seen to it that there was plenty
of food and drink for the guests. I slipped upstairs and got changed into
civvies ready for the journey to the Isle of Wight
for the honeymoon, Maggie doing so as soon as she could get away from all the
attention being lavished upon her. My Mother and Stepfather had turned to for
the wedding and likewise for the reception, there was no wedding gift
forthcoming from them though, I was simply pleased that they had turned up
and told Maggie to be philosophical about it. We left at around 13.00 hrs for
the train that would take us on the first stage of our journey through life
together. The lads from Wallop were leaving straight after us to make their
way to Paddy’s wedding; I was very appreciative of their effort in turning up
like that. One of them, Bob Shepherd, was a piper and he had hoped to have
his pipes at the wedding but his reed split and he could not perform - that's
life! We might as well have carried neon banners as to our status as
newlyweds; throughout the journey to the Isle of Wight it was nudge, nudge,
wink, wink at every stage! The hotel, when we arrived, turned out to be a
sort of Victorian edifice with aspidistras and such all over the foyer, the
young girl who attended to us and showed us to our room informed us that
another couple were booked in and would be arriving that same day. We met
them at tea and the girl was from Maggie’s old School, although she was a
year or so older than Maggie, so it was another turn-up for coincidences and
a pleasant surprise. We rounded off our first day as man and wife by going
out that evening to a rugby club function that the Hotelier had given us
complimentary tickets to; it was quite an experience! The four of us were sat
at a table when suddenly the MC for the evening announced that there was to
be a beer drinking contest, we grooms were on our feet in an instant but were
quickly reined in by our new CO’s and made to sit back down. A few moments
later I was glad that the girls had been so against the idea of us getting up
for the contest (Maggie said later that neither of them were comfortable
about being left alone at the table). The pints of ale that were to be
consumed were brought in and then poured into Victorian style chamber pots, I
can imagine what a pint of pale ale looked like sloshing around in the bottom
of those! The ten or so poor mugs that had rushed forward to be in the
guzzling competition looked anything but keen all of a sudden! Once the
signal was given the pisspots were raised and the sounds of slurping (and
gagging) could be plainly heard even over the ribald comments being bandied
about. That had to have been the slowest beer contest ever staged, the first
bloke to put down his pot was disqualified because he had spilt about half of
his ale down the front of his shirt and trousers. We had a very pleasant
evening at the function and everyone was friendliness itself to the four of
us, still plenty of leg pulling though as they all knew that we were
honeymooners! Back in our hotel room at the end of the evening as we got
ready to retire, we opened our case to locate our sleeping togs and the whole
thing was chocker block with confetti, packets of durex and bottles of
Aspirin! Charlie had let the lads loose on our gear during the reception, I
quickly checked my pyjamas and unpicked the stitches that had tacked the
bottoms together. Maggie’s peignoir had been spared fortunately. I was
later to learn that they had intended to tack a strip of fur to the hem of
that,(to keep her neck warm) but they had heard me announcing that we were
about to depart and had not had sufficient time to complete their mischief.
Maggie and me on the Isle of Wight
We had a
wonderful week there in Shanklin, the weather, for that time of year, was
just superb, really mild and no windy or rainy days at all. It was odd to see
the choppers from Wallop on the TV News dropping supplies to people in
Hampshire, just a few miles away as the crows flew, who had been snowed in!
It was a sort of unreal time, totally idyllic and so friendly an atmosphere,
we were sure that we had secured the best that money could have bought us. On
the Tuesday, we had arranged that the four of us would go horse riding up on
the downs. It was a lovely bright morning as we set off on the bus to the
riding school, a journey of some three miles from Shanklin, where a very
efficient young lady who asked if any of us had ridden before, met us. A
chorus of four negatives saw her snitch elevate slightly but she forbore from
any comment. She soon had four steeds lined up for us and she showed us how
to mount and then gave us a few moments’ instructions on how to get the
horses to go and stop. Once she was satisfied that we had grasped these
fundamentals we set off in single file along a winding country lane. I
noticed that my horse, which rejoiced in the name of ‘Jimmy’, had a tendency
to try and overtake Maggie’s horse, and I kept reining him in to prevent
this. A couple of hundred yards along the lane and we turned off onto a
bridle path, here there was only room for one horse at a time but that didn't
deter Jimmy, he was still trying to squeeze past and I was still having to
hold him back. Coming at last to a stile, on the other side of which was a
large paddock which had a sort of crest of high ground running the length of
it, we were ushered through one at a time by the riding instructress. As the
girl held the contraption open the rest of us trotted through, unfortunately
Murphy's Law kicked in and Maggie got her stirrup hooked on the latch bolt as
she went through. Poor lass was in a bit off a pickle as her horse did not
respond immediately she tugged on the reins, as a result her leg was pulled
out at a bit of an angle. I immediately brought Jimmy alongside and leaned
over to free her, as the stirrup was well on to the steel pin it was a two
handed job, to facilitate this, I placed Jimmy’s reins along the front of the
saddle and quickly freed Maggie. Just as I did so, Jimmy suddenly shot
forward, with my heart in my mouth I managed to grab the saddle fore and aft
and was hanging on for dear life as my horse stretched into a full gallop! I
could hear the girl screaming out something behind me, and it sounded urgent,
but all my attention was focused on retaining my seat, the reins meantime
were about halfway along the horse’s neck and sliding back and forth as he
went for it! The reason for the anxious yodels emanating from the
Instructress became all too apparent as good old Jimmy headed over the crest
and the dead ground the other side of it came into view. Jimmy was heading at
a gallop for the edge of a cliff that I later learnt overlooked a group of
ferociously sharp rocks called "The Needles". The edge was about
150 yards away as I spotted it and I did what any normal bloke would do in
such a situation, I bloody well panicked! The stupid horse was quite unaware
of where he was heading so I figured I had one shot in the locker. I let go
of the back of the saddle with my left hand threw myself forward and grabbed
at the reins. As soon as I felt them in my hands I leant back as hard as I
could and yanked the horses neck hard to the right, I do mean hard! The horse
made a sort of wheezing cough and did what almost amounted to a U-turn; I had
already leant in to his anticipated turn because that was the way that I
intended to leave the saddle if my one-off manoeuvre failed. Again using my
full strength I pulled the horse to a dead stop within a few yards. As I sat
there checking spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch, the Instructress
galloped up as white as a sheet. "Are you alright?" she twittered.
"I am" I responded, "Your bloody horse may need physio on his
neck though!" All through the rest of the ride, she kept assuring us
that Jimmy had never done anything like that before, I don't know about that,
all I know is that the horse had seemed ‘antsy’ from the moment we had set
out. Maggie was quite upset over what had happened and was very uptight about
ever going on horses again, although she has ridden camels since.
Two days before our honeymoon ended I remembered that one of our
former Nashos lived on the Isle of Wight and
when I looked up his name in the local telephone book, there it was. I rang
him and Dave ‘Rabbit’ Taylor
was delighted to know we were there and he arranged to pick us up that
evening in his car. He did so, taking us out for a drink in a pub that he
frequented, afterwards he said that before he took us back to the hotel he
would take us on a tour of the island. That he did! He set off and once we
were out of Shanklin, he turned off his headlights and drove us Lord only
knows where at what seemed like breakneck speed. Neither Maggie nor I were
too chuffed at that and I sharply reminded him that we wanted to get some
mileage out of our marriage certificate, he slowed down a tad but still kept
his headlights off. He always was a bit over the edge in anything he did and
I should have recalled that before accepting his offer of a drive across the
island. Both of us were relieved to get back to the hotel in one piece and
Maggie was a bit dubious at my choice of friends. The next day, after
checking the state of our finances. We set off to look at a Morris J type van
that we had seen advertised for forty-five quid, it seemed to be in
reasonable nick so we took the plunge and bought it, our very first vehicle
as a married couple and we have never been without one since. Driving across
Hampshire to Whitchurch, firstly on the Isle of Wight
ferry and then through the snow and slush still evident on the mainland was
quite an experience for us and the change in the ambient temperature was very
marked too. The honeymoon was over and we were soon to find out that things
had been stirred up for us prior to our arrival at our first little love
nest!
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