Communications Officer
The FANY who dealt with jungle, latrines and long gowns
“In 1944 with the war in Europe winding down I volunteered to go to India. There were about 14 of us on a troopship which had previously been the S.S.Strathmore. As we travelled in convoy it took us a month to get to Bombay [Mumbai].
“On arrival about 6 were told to travel by train to Ceylon [Sri Lanka] to join Mountbatten’s Supreme Allied Command South East Asia in Kandy. On arrival, I joined Force 136 which was the Far East Special Operations Executive (SOE) so we had our own camp, B6, located a few miles from Kandy. It was quite primitive being surrounded on three sides by jungle. We had no running water and latrines. We were housed in huts called “bashers” with straw roofs and at night you could hear rats running around.
“Our signals office was down by the gate and, of course, we worked in shifts. Our job was to take the messages from the field, have them decoded and passed on for action. We dined in the mess with officers from other sections and mostly we changed into a long gown. Before we embarked we had been told to take at least three evening dresses because it was still the Raj and sometimes we would be invited to other messes like the Royal Artillery or over to Mountbatten’s HQ in the horticulture gardens. I met Lord Louis a couple of times and being South East Asia Command Kandy positivity bussed with generals...Slim, Waverley and some Americans. So the contradiction was latrines and long gowns.
“After the Japanese surrendered I was posted to Meerut in India to do administrative work assisting our boys repatriation. I eventually returned to the UK in February 1946 by plane in a converted Stirling bomber. Took nine days....and that's another story!”
Read more about the history of the Corps here.