Danny wanders about for a bit.
FIRST, READ EDIT TO MY POST # 2668 TO savimosh01
At Chittagong, the record in my logbook breaks off briefly until June 5, when the rain must have slackened off sufficiently to allow a formation trip. My log drily notes "Electrical Failure", but no more. I can only assume that the EDP mod had been done on my a/c; indeed we'd have been idiots to go to war with the chance of having to wobble-pump home!
On the 8th, another strange one: "To Panda & return" - 40 min. Twenty minutes each way - say 40 miles. Where had we started from? (Pandaveswar is a good 180 miles from Chittagong). What did I go for? Don't know.
This will be my constant refrain for the the whole of the next five months, until the 15th October, when we would go and start operations again. P/O "Robbie" Robertson (my nav on my first three ops) has vanished. In the meantime I was flying with all and sundry till further notice.
July, all formation except the on the 3rd - "Air Firing" - just that. Where was the range? What did we fire at? Front guns or back or both? How did we get on? - not a solitary clue.
On the 27th, "Stew" (F/Sgt now) turns up from somewhere - no idea from where. We will stay together as a crew from now on.
August, lots more formation, a bit of fighter affiliation. On one day, I fly with a Battery Sgt-Major Callum (what was that all about?) The last two entries for the month (12th & 13th) are puzzles. "Air/Ground firing" - no wiser! Last one: "Bombing - 2x250 - formation".
Why would you waste 250 lb bombs on some sort of exercise, when 11 lb practice ones are available? Where was the range?
By now my readers (if they're still awake) are as sick of the question marks as I am. let's forget them. September, some good news, my commission has come through. George Davies (whose own had come a month before) welcomes me into the Mess. (Trip to Calcutta, buy new hat, have photo taken, find to my dismay that Calcutta full of troops, now have to return twenty salutes for every one I used to have to give - buzz soon wears off).
I was lumbered with the job of Squadron Entertainments Officer. This was a sinecure, as there were no entertainments other than the very rare visits from a travelling Services Entertainments Party, and none of these came anywhere near us in my time. As we had no power (and dry batteries were practically unobtainable), there was no domestic radio; our only resource was the wind-up gramophone (Grandma will explain).
You couldn't get the steel needles you had to use with them, but it had been found that a particularly hard thorn was almost as good. You could get packets of these at an extortionate price in the Calcutta bazaars; it was really not much hardship to go down to 'Cal' every so often, have a night in the Grand and come back with a big bag of these.
Although Concert Parties were rare, I must say that the 1970s TV comedy "It ain't half hot, Mum" was remarkably near the mark. Some of these shows were local amateur efforts, and cringe-makedly bad. But they were doing their level best, and meant well, so of course you had to polish your buttons and turn up to support and applaud, even if you did regard them as one of the Horrors of War.
There are huge blank periods in the log. 14 Aug/21 Sep, and 23 Sep/3 Oct. There would have been a lot of leave periods at this time. Mostly these would have been spent in Calcutta (as I intend to devote a whole Post later to Kipling's "City of Dreadful Night", I shall not elaborate now).
On one occasion we (Stew and I) went up to Darjeeling for a couple of weeks and revelled in the blessed coolness. Don't remember much about it, except that we got up at crack of dawn one morning to climb a hill from the top of which it was alleged you could see sunrise over Everest. (E. covered in cloud, of course, should've stayed in bed and bought postcard instead).
After you've waded through that lot, there are more interesting bits to come next time. On 15th October the Squadron flew Digri - Jessore - Khumbir(gram) (way up North in Assam) - we got the navigation right this time! - clocked 3 hrs, 30 min, about 500 miles plus pitstop. Now we're back in business again!
Cheerio,
Danny42C
Chocks away!
Last edited by Danny42C; 25th Jun 2012 at 22:26.
Reason: Correct error in 1st line: original 2670 to read 2668