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Walthamstow Wanderer 6

By

Albert Augustus Crisp
November 1911 — June 2001

On arriving at the station, we were met by people, each holding a piece of paper. Each had the names of two lads that were going with them. There were just two Indians the rest were white and practically all Scotch, as we were to find out later. The coloureds had our names. But who could moan, certainly not me. I was more than satisfied, the way things were going. The period was from Thursday until Monday morning. It was good of our hosts to take anyone at all. You see they, man and wife, had both been doctors in England at big hospitals and according to them got the cold shoulder and went back to India. No tucking a mosquito net under you here, the net reached down to the floor and formed a room within a room. You could get out of bed and walk around and still be inside the net. They didn't have a swimming pool, but we were allowed to go to any of the others and use their pool! As stated the others were nearly all Scottish, they reckon that they emigrated more than us. They were all managers of tea plantations and our two doctors visited them, seeing to the pickers, whose main trouble was to do with their feet. Wouldn't vouch for the truth in it, but we were told they toileted where they were, and at times trod in it.

What I do know is it’s nothing like you see on the adverts and I didn't see any tidy gayly coloured clothes. All the whites did in their spare time was drink and play tennis. We went along to their club and saw a dartboard which was never used and had a couple of games, but as I've said they only played tennis, which was just at the back of the club, with a few chairs for spectators and others that were drunk. One of the days we were called for help. One of them, "whatsit as a newt", had run his car into a ditch. He couldn't get out and neither could the car. It was a Plymouth and I'd never heard of it. He spluttered out that it was a Yankee job. He hadn't done any damage to it.

All enjoyable and so back to camp. It was still in some confusion and I never was asked anything at all about Ramree. It was as though I'd never left Agartala. Back to the painting job and when they saw I was a dab hand with the brush I got a few other painting jobs, like touching up damaged paint on the fuselage etc. At last, my papers came through and being behind, I was told that I would be flown home and arrive for Xmas. A Liberator was mentioned and this depressed some a bit, as there was a rumour running around that they were ditching in the Mediterranean. Anyway the flying business was dropped and with it my thoughts of Xmas, as it was all the way round, in a luxury liner, not quite as luxurious as pre-war no doubt, but better than the "Mooltan" by a mile. The "Isle De France" was massive compared to the "Mooltan" and very clean.

Of course the "Isle De France" couldn't go through the Suez. After going by rail to Bombay, which took ages, I had waited on a station for eight hours. The natives, undoubtedly used to it, lit fires on the platform and made chapattis! So, on the boat at Bombay, out into the Arabian Sea, then the Indian Ocean and past Madagascar to land at Durban on the southernmost tip of South Africa. We could here strains of singing and as they got louder, we could see it was a woman dressed in white and using a megaphone. We recognised the song "There always be an England" and were told the woman was the Mayoress and would be there again when we left, as she sang every boat in and out of the harbour. We had one day ashore and got blacks, with a bear on a chair, begging. We had a ride in a rickshaw and I bought an "Olma" watch, which I still have. They had watches from 2/6 to £10, mine cost £5. On the boat again and sure enough there was the Mayoress, all dressed in white and impressive too, she seemed quite a figure of a woman. Anyway she kept on until she was gradually out of earshot.

So into the South Atlantic and the North Atlantic and finally into the "Roads" at Southampton. This was in January 1946. It was so rough, the weather was really bad, that we were told that smaller boats couldn't enter port and "had to ride it out". We landed all right, but out at sea in spite of our size, the sea came right over the top and we had to batten down. I managed to get to the side, now and again, and left a little to add to the depth of the Atlantic. Also some down the staircase, which a chap had nearly finished swabbing down.

Back in Blighty

On landing in January 1946, at the age of 35, we were sent to a place in Staffordshire and changed our blue for civvies. I had a grey pin-stripe, double breasted suit and a grey herring bone, single breasted overcoat and a grey trilby. Some didn't take hats. Oh and black shoes and socks. You could buy your R.A.F. greatcoat for a £1. Some did, some didn't, I didn't. I forget how much money I received, in the neighbourhood of £75 I think and so many days sort of paid leave. It was so cold, I sat by the oven with the door open for long spells and went past my leave before looking for work. I couldn't get used to the weather. It seemed the wrong part of the year to come home, especially when it was a hard winter. I went along to the "Xylonite" only to see the workers and thank them for the five shilling postal orders that they sent me, now and again. These gradually vanished until they sent me a letter saying that now so many were getting called up they couldn't keep it going being that it was collections from the employees, not from the firm. The boss asked me to come back but I didn't want it. Not only were the wages small but the work was boring. I had started there sooner than be out of work, because when the war started, my trade having practically vanished.

Actually, if I had been lazy it may have been to my advantage. Because later they had what they called, I think, class B release. In my trade I could have been released for bomb damage and other work. But at the labour exchange they had me down as a machine operator. When I said that I had been in the building trade practically all my life and only took this job a few weeks ago, the idiot didn't want to know. This all happened before class B was introduced. I found the job myself and they wanted to know what I did. If I had known that class B was to come about I wouldn't have settled so easily for being classed as a machine operator. At the time I wasn't too bothered though. At the factory they said that when my letters arrived they all gathered round to have a good laugh. I only wrote humorous ones to them. I had to earn my five shillings after all!

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