Description
Object description
British NCO served with 6th Bn Sherwood Foresters/40th Searchlight Regt, Royal Engineers in, 1938-1943; served with 144 Light Anti-Aircraft Regt, Royal Artillery in GB and North West Europe, 1943-1944; served with Royal Military Police in GB and North West Europe, 1944-1946; served with 149 Light Anti-Aircraft Regt, Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers in GB, 1948-1966; served with 73rd Engineer Regt in GB, 1969-1979
Content description
REEL 1 Recollections of background in Chesterfield, 1921-1939: family and social circumstances; education; sporting activities; work at furniture shop and as apprentice painter and decorator. Recollections of period with 1/6th Bn, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Regt/40th Searchlight Regt, Royal Engineers at Ashgate and Boythorpe Drill Halls, Chesterfield, 3/1938-8/1939: reasons for recruitment and interview; kitting out; change in unit title; move to Boythorpe Drill Hall; role of searchlight crew; method of operating sound locator; searchlight practice in 'dark room' with miniature aircraft and searchlight; drill; weapons training including Lewis gun, rifle, bayonet and hand grenades; relationship with officers and NCOs.
REEL 2 Continues: relationship with ORs; weekend camps including loading lorry, Lister generator, wireless, method of establishing searchlight site, training on aircraft, cooking and supplementing food rations; summer camp; question of promotion; practice mobilisation during Munich crisis, 9/1938; importance of maintaining equipment; lectures and question of approach of war; call up, 8/1939. Recollections of periods in Kingston upon Hull, Grimsby and Cleethorpes areas, 1939-1943: problems locating initial site at Headon; setting up searchlight and digging trenches; tent accommodation; anti-aircraft fire at German aircraft; use of duckboards and sandbags; training; food rations; first reaction to air raid sirens; training moves; introduction of 150cm searchlight and radar; use of searchlights as homing beacons for damaged aircraft.
REEL 3 Continues: use of searchlights as homing beacons for damaged aircraft and story of consequent attack by German seaplane; introduction of light signals and wireless codes for Allied aircraft; question of German air raids on Hull; independent operation from anti-aircraft guns; taking post on hearing siren; acting as searchlight operator; move to Grimsby area, ca 1941; reaction to promotion to lance corporal and corporal; searchlight site at Cleethorpes; searchlight barges on Humber River; decoy fires; minefield accident; daily routine and duties; hut accommodation; night guard duty; relationship with ORs and role as detachment commander; promotion to sergeant, 1941; relationship with civilians; collecting mushrooms; aircraft recognition training. Attending anti-aircraft cadre course at Ballykelly, Northern Ireland, 1943:training on 40mm Bofors gun; story of German aircraft brought down after pilot was dazzled by searchlights, 1939.
REEL 4 Continues: opinion of Bofors; training on Predictor. Recollections of period with 144 Light Anti-Aircraft Regt, Royal Artillery in GB, 1943-1944: firing camps and story of firing at drogue target towed by aircraft; role of safety officer; training on 20mm Bofors gun. Period acting as landing strip anti-aircraft defences in Arromanches sector, Normandy, France, ca 6/1944-8/1944: Channel crossing and landing at Arromanches; occupying trenches; story of shooting down two ME109s; German shellfire and personal morale; bartering with US troops to supplement food rations; compo rations; cooking arrangements; latrines; end of light AA role and break up of unit. Period at Royal Artillery Depot, Woolwich, 1944: watching for V1s; volunteering for military police. Period training with Royal Military Police, Richmond, 1944: traffic control; map reading; notebooks. Period at Birkenhead, 1944: training in docks and role guarding NAAFI stores; question of reputation of RMP.
REEL 5 Period at RMP Headquarters, Calais docks, ca 11/1944-5/1945: billets; duties on dock gates; role controlling and escorting soldiers on leave; restrictions on possessions taken on board ship by soldiers on leave; relationships with French police and civilians. Period at Training School at RMP Headquarters at Seneslager, Germany, 1945-1947: initial course and retention as instructor; motorcycle training; skills required as instructor; barrack accommodation; relationship with German civilians; question of signing on as regular; demobilisation. Post-war career: work at engineering works; effects of military service. Recollections of service with 149 Light Anti-Aircraft Regt, RA and Royal Engineers at Boythorpe Drill Hall, 1948-1966: recruitment activities; promotion to battery sergeant major; nature of training including annual and firing camps; opinion of 40mm Bofors gun; Bofors gun drill.
REEL 6 Continues: Bofors gun drill and method of dropping into action; use of Predictor; introduction of self propelled Bofors gun and faster firing version; recruitment; role of permanent staff instructors; importance of band; conversion into Royal Engineers unit, 1951; methods of minelaying and clearance; checking buildings for booby traps; demolition training and methods of handling of explosives, fuses and detonators; water purification training; latrines; constructing Bailey bridge for Bakewell agricultural show; trench digging.
REEL 7 Continues: improvised bridges; reactions to reduction in Territorial Army and disbandment of unit, ca 1966; voluntary unpaid service training as aid to civil power and maintaining drill hall, ca 1966-1969. Period as Regimental Quartermaster Sergeant with 73rd Engineer Regt based at Wigman Road Drill Halls, Nottingham, 1969-1979: loss of role as RSM at Boythorpe Road Drill Hall; role as RQMS; leaving on reaching upper age limit; photograph portraits taken of soldiers. Period as RSM with Derbyshire Cadet Force, 1979-1983. Period as magistrate, 1980-1991. Periods as chairman of Royal British Legion at Whittington and Chesterfield, ca 1982-2002: role as chairman; closure of Whittington RBL Branch; problems caused by increase in subscriptions and ageing membership; ownership of Haig House, Glumangate; welfare role.
REEL 8 Continues: organisation of poppy appeal; question of future of RBL and necessity of branch closures.