Gaining An R.A.F Pilots Brevet In WW II

[Danny42C]

Danny's travels resumed, (or Small World Part I *)

(* Just hold that in memory, for Part II will be a long, long way down the line)

So I was marooned in Yelahanka from the end of October until after Christmas. I can't think of anything useful I did there in that time. Curiously, I don't remember finding any other "instructors" down there when I arrived, nor was there any trace of a VV "conversion school". I can only guess that I was the first (and only) unlucky one to have got my marching orders on the very day the policy was changed. And as the Station was already running a short conversion course on the Thunderbolts, it would be a simple matter to add on a VV Flight to that Unit.

Whatever the truth of the matter was, the fact was that I was a "supernumerary" there now, and the life of such an "odd bod" is often not a happy one - in short, you're a dogsbody, on whom is piled all the awkward and unpleasant jobs going. I therefore quickly made an opportunity to visit 225 Group in Bangalore (about 10 miles away). IIRC, they were housed in a requisitioned College of some sort, built in the form of a quadrangle. There I "unofficially" looked in on P.2 to see if they had anything going in my line.

I must have seen something of Bangalore ("The Garden City of the South"), but recall nothing of it, nor do I remember much about Yelahanka except that my basha was exactly in the overshoot line of the main runway; the night flying sessions were nail-biting affairs with the 'Bolts thundering right overhead every minute or so and the unsettling prospect of one coming straight through the basha if something went wrong.

My casual visit to Group paid off at the year end: I was posted to No. 1580 (Calibration) Flight at Cholaveram (Madras). This was the second Madras airfield, the main and much better known one being "St. Thomas's Mount", so called as it was not far from a hill on which popular legend has it that the Apostle Thomas (the "Doubting Thomas", the "Apostle of the Indies") was martyred in the 1st century AD. It was irreverently known as "Tommy's Mount" throughout the Services.

The rest of my time out there would be spent in South India, I would never see Calcutta or the Arakan or smell the scent of tea in the Assam hills again. But the Vengeance was not finished with me yet !

It was the middle of the cool season. Cholaveram was a pleasant place, and Calibration flying is not onerous. Radar was in its infancy in the East; the first experimental units needed "clockwork mice ". We flew on pre-arranged courses and heights, so that the radar operators could compare what they saw on their screens with what was really out there, and find the maximum range and height cover of their equipment. This involved a good deal of flying out over the Bay of Bengal, because at sea there are few "ground returns" to confuse radar operators. Any old aircraft will do the job, and the Vengeance was ideal, being big and slab sided, and so being a good radar reflector.

As well as flying, I collected the job of Mess Secretary. The Secretary was primarily a Treasurer, and this Mess needed a resourceful one. It hadn't been going long, and had not found its financial feet. Our situation was this: at the end of each month we had no food, no stock in the Bar and no money. But the Mess Bills were due, and I'd chase them up. As cash came in, we bought Bar stock, this turned into cash over the Bar, which we then used to buy extra messing items. A Mess draws basic rations, of course, but they are basic. Extra items make them more palatable, and you have to buy these. At the end of the month we'd drunk all the Bar stock, and eaten all the extra food bought with the takings. But the Mess Bills were due.........

In this way we chased solvency, never catching up, always robbing Peter (or at least making him wait) to pay Paul. I became quite good at this juggling - had to be with the PMC breathing down my neck. He'd have to carry the can if it all went wrong ! He was the Station Commander (of course everyone "lived-in" out there), a Wing Commander whose name, I am sorry to say, I cannot quite recall - Morton, Merton, Moreton, Moreland or something like that. Did we have an Accountant Officer? Must have had, I suppose. (is there some rule that an Accountant Officer can't be Mess Sec - for obvious reasons?) for I don't remember lugging cash to and fro from some Bank in Madras (but somebody must have had to do it).

We introduced the "Book-of-Ticket" system. This was very widely used in Messes in India. You have these books locally printed (and obviously serially numbered). The Mess sells them (for Rs 5 or Rs 10) over the Bar. They have tear-out tickets for Rs1, As 8 and As 4 (Rs 1=As 16). The tickets (torn from a book, loose tickets were not acceptable; it was instant dismissal for any Barman who did so), paid for drinks and casual meals. The idea was gold-plated every way you looked at it.

The Mess got its money up front. Service in the bar was far quicker; you did away with Bar books and possible disputes over Bar bills, cash-handling problems disappeared. As the loose tickets were no use to anyone, it was fraud-proof (or at least difficult). Best of all, casual visitors and postings-out left with part-used books in their pockets - this was clear profit to the Mess.

With this system in place and a 200% mark-up on the spirits which were the only alcoholic things drinkable, it did not take long for the Mess to go into profit; our troubles vanished, the PMC and I shared a sense of satisfaction in a job well done.

So far, so good.

Goodnight, chaps.

Danny42C.


What's well begun........