Farming, Fighting and Family

by Miranda McCormick

  The following afternoon, David and Mike Kershaw went to see the adjutant; the outcome of this visit proved to be significant in terms of David’s survival during the ensuing fighting:

  [The adjutant] told us one of us was to be posted to ‘F’ battery, the other to ‘C’, and asked if we had any preferences. I said I should like to go to ‘F’ as I liked the officers. At first Mike said he didn’t mind, and then decided that he too would prefer ‘F’. So the Adjutant tossed a coin and Mike lost. If the coin had fallen the other way I should almost certainly have been doing the job which poor Mike was doing when he was killed a few months later.

  Before this tragic event, however, David’s battery enjoyed a period which in his memoir he described as ‘a pleasant simple life which many a town-dweller would have envied’. He and his fellow officers were awoken in the early morning, their heads and pillows still wet with dew, by a ‘rat-tat-tat’ from a Bren gun. Having dressed in the semi-darkness they would drive or walk to rejoin their troops for PT, after which they would repair to their quarters for a wash and shave from a mug of water from a petrol can and a swim in the sea before breakfast in the officers’ mess. There then followed gun drill, vehicle inspections and such like, until midday, by which time work had to finish owing to the intense heat. David’s memoir includes the following vignette describing a typical early afternoon for his troop:

  After lunch everyone had a siesta; it was too hot to do anything else. There was little shade as the sun was almost directly overhead but I used to choose a spot half in the shade of the outside of the mess tent, and spent till tea-time either snoozing or reading. Anyone passing through the troop area at this time of day would scarcely believe there was anyone alive. The troops were dispersed over a very wide area for safety from the air. Everyone had found himself some neat little cave or hollow, or else had slung a ground sheet across two neighbouring rocks to form a little shelter, and everyone would be on his back in his little home. A passer might stumble on what he would take to be a derelict lorry. Long ago the sun had sucked all colour from its paint, its mudguards would be all battered and it would have no windscreen or lamps, the sort of ancient crock one sometimes sees in roadside dumps in England. But if he took the trouble to lift the bonnet he would be surprised to see a spotless engine with all the working parts carefully cleaned and greased …

  Later in the day David and his colleagues might have another swim or go over to one of the deserted Arab villages to gather fresh figs; at dusk they sometimes drove over to the cliffs to shoot rock pigeons returning to their roosts. David’s memoir records that during their month at Rakam Bay they never saw a single German plane. His most nerve-racking experience occurred when, as Orderly Officer, he had to drive over to collect the battery’s pay from the pay office at Bergush, on the other side of Matruh:

  On the return trip I ran into a sand storm. As I was feeling my way through the mine fields I suddenly became aware that pieces of paper were flying round my head and out of the window. The bundles of pound notes, which I had placed behind my seat, had somehow come loose. I jammed on the brakes and quickly trapped as many notes as I could with hands and feet. Then I walked back along the track and picked up a few more. I could see several fluttering away in the mine-fields. It was a sad sight but I could do nothing about it …

  David’s ‘happy days’ at Rakam Bay were soon to end. During the early summer, while the Allies had been occupied with Greece, the enemy had been importing considerable reinforcements, and a major military engagement was expected. Shortly before David and his battery left Rakam Bay their Commanding Officer, Jock Campbell, led them round the desert some 30 miles south to acquaint them with the defensive area to which they should move in case of emergencies. A few days later, there occurred what later became known as ‘the September Scare’; David and his troop were ordered to move to the defensive area as quickly as possible:

  Although we were officially at three hours notice to move, we were away in forty minutes. Night was falling as we set off. We wound our way through the sand-dunes onto the open ground, then up the escarpment and joined the Sidi Barani – Matruh road. The gun-towers* looked very small but very business-like as they pulled the guns up the escarpment in the fading light. As I watched them from my position at the rear of the column I felt the thrill of anticipated adventure …

  In the event the ‘scare’ turned out to be merely a German reconnaissance in strength. However David never returned to the camp at Rakam Bay, which was taken over by another RHA regiment. Instead he began a period of intense training in the desert, interspersed with a week’s leave in the comparative luxury of Cairo, which in letters home he claimed to be quite undeserved, since he had only been with the regiment some seven weeks. On his return, his regiment received a visit from the Commander-in-Chief, General Cunningham, who gave a little talk about how to deal with tanks:

  ‘Wait till you see the whites of their eyes’, he said, and suggested as one method of putting them out of action that we should all lie down round the guns pretending we were dead, and that then when the inquisitive Germans came along to take a look at us, we should all jump up and put a round through their tank at point-blank range …

  On 22 October a new commander, Major Terence O’Brien Butler, arrived to take charge of David’s battery. David’s first impressions of him were misleading in the extreme:

  He was a fat comfortable-looking young man, immaculately dressed in rather original clothes, who spoke with a slight Oxford drawl. He gave the impression of one who liked to live quietly and well, and I thought that with him in command of the battery we would lead an idle comfortable life. But his appearance belied him. He proved to be an athlete of unbounded energy, and not only worked harder than anyone I had yet met in the army, but also saw to it that everyone else did too. The day started at half past five with the dispersal from leaguer.* We would spend all day rushing over the desert, practising coming into and out of action and sometimes firing at imaginary enemy, and often I would find myself still at work with the major in his tent poring over battery accounts well after midnight. No one was allowed to be in the officers’ mess tent except for meals unless he was engaged in work of a military nature …

  Up until the beginning of hostilities in mid November David tried his best to write a weekly letter both to his parents and to Pamela, though as training intensified this became increasingly difficult. Whilst his later memoir concentrates primarily on his military experiences and tends to gloss over the discomforts and privations of life in the desert, David’s letters home convey a rather different picture. Owing to censorship he was unable to reveal much about his whereabouts or the military manoeuvres in which he was engaged, but instead he described his living conditions in some detail and, to his parents in particular, some of the ensuing health problems from which he was suffering, along with his general state of mind.

  On 22 September, a week or two after the 4th had left their temporary camp at Rakam Bay, David wrote to his parents:

  It is some time now since I was by the sea & I am very dirty. I washed my neck & feet in a pint of water today for the first time for about ten days …

  We wander about like ships in the desert & you never quite know where you are. I am always terrified of getting a whole lot of guns lost! It is very easy to go round in a circle & end up where you started, particularly on a dark night. In the desert small points assume huge proportions, & men will die to capture a thing which looks like a large molehill & is quite useless, just because there is nothing else to fight for …

  What a ridiculous war this is! I feel it can’t last much longer. What to do when it is over is the great question. I feel I should like to farm in S. Africa, but doubtless I shall never do it …

  In another letter to his parents written a month later, David wrote about the hazards of the desert wildlife:

  There is no trouble with fleas, ticks or mosquitoes, but flies have been perfectly awful. Fortunately the cold weather is gradua
lly killing them off & soon there won’t be any. The only other things are scorpions & snakes, of which the KRITE is the chief one to avoid. I have not come upon any yet – only one small snake which I killed, but you sometimes get beetles about 2 inches long in your valise at night & think they are scorpions in the dark!

  David had always been fastidious in matters of personal hygiene. The following extract from a letter to his parents written on 2 November illustrates just how difficult it had now become for him to keep up even the most basic standards. Having apologised for not writing as often as he would have liked, David continues:

  I honestly don’t seem to get the time. I have probably never been worked so hard before, but there is a war on, & one must do one’s bit. I even had to cut my fingernails by moonlight last week as there was no time during the day …

  It was unbearably hot today … Flies were just crawling all over my mouth and eyes & everywhere else. In addition I am having a spot of bother with desert sores & crabs of all things!! It is very upsetting! I had to do a surreptitious moonlight shave of the nether regions the other night in a half mug of cold dirty water …

  I have to travel as light as I can, so my wardrobe is very limited, & my only means of laundry … is when someone goes on leave, which happens about every two months. Pyjamas & sheets have to last 6 weeks to 2 months & shirts at least a fortnight, & last night I had just put on a clean one when someone spilt soup all down my back!

  Not a very cheerful letter I’m afraid, but my morale is really very good. Morale is the only word for the situation! I am alive & kicking – there have been a few excitements – & I am feeling fitter than usual, thanks to paraffin every night, plenty of bicarbonate & a fortnightly no 9.*

  David’s last letter to his parents from the desert was written on 15 November, shortly before the start of serious hostilities. It is a little more cheerful in tone than the previous one, and poignantly sends Christmas greetings, hoping that they would arrive in time:

  I am still very harassed & overworked. I was up touring around in the desert all night twice last week, but in spite of everything I am feeling a bit fitter today. My catarrh has become almost negligible; better than it has been for three years anyway. On the other hand my digestion seems to get gradually worse. The desert sores are healing I think, & I have got over the crabs. We are getting a spot more water & I occasionally get in a wash. We have just got some beer up too which is rather nice – the first we have had for many a moon, & a chap coming back from leave has brought a few oranges & grapefruit & some celery & butter. I can’t tell you how good they were!

  I wonder if this will get to you by Christmas. If so I will wish you a really happy Christmas, & lots of Good News about then. I hope you will manage a really good Christmas dinner somehow. I wish I could be with you. I expect we will celebrate in some way or other …

  David’s letters to Pamela from the desert replicate to a large extent those he wrote to his parents, but naturally the tone differs; there are frequent nostalgic references to their snatched time together, and constant gratitude for the letters that she wrote to him. On 5 October he wrote to her:

  I have just got back from leave & found a letter from you waiting for me. It was a very old one but a very nice one, June 24th to be exact; you had just heard about my moustache & were not too keen on the idea … It was such a nice letter that I am afraid you liked me more in June than you did in August! I think I will get all your letters in the end, and it doesn’t matter how long they take, they are lovely to get …

  I had a lovely leave … I spent the first few days in Cairo, where I swam & danced & went to ‘the Northwest Passage’ & one day galloped on a white arab across the sands from the Mena pyramids almost down to the other ones … It was wonderful to have a hot bath after nearly two months without & also a hot shave & some fresh food & to get all my clothes washed. Also I did a lot of shopping & bought my winter uniform (Bedford cord trousers & a golf jacket lined with camel hair stuff). I also sent you two lovely pairs of stockings for Christmas, which will probably not fit, if they arrive at all … I think I had better send you my love for Christmas now and be sure it gets to you on time. I still think you are quite the sweetest thing I know & very wonderful.

  The next letter was written on 27 October, and gives further details of desert life:

  This war is a very boring business & a very uncomfortable process, I have decided. As I write I am in our little mess ‘tramps dugout’ with the side of a lorry as one wall & just room for the three of us at a pinch. It is extremely hot & in a few minutes I shall have to go out & pay the troops in the sun. The wind is blowing much dust about & flies keep settling on my nose as I write. But we have been very lucky last week & had a few pats of butter brought by a friend from Cairo & also a cabbage & last night I even had a bottle of beer. My usual liquid refreshment is tea for lunch, breakfast & dinner, made with tinned milk & out of very salty dirty water & there is usually an eighth of an inch of sand in the bottom of one’s mug when one has finished. I am beginning to get very tired of it especially as it is flavoured with petrol fumes in the brewing …

  I have just finished my payout & have come back to find 3 letters from you waiting for me. Isn’t that wonderful! I have just read them all & feel much better, not that I was depressed, but I was just trying to give you an idea of what this extraordinary life is like.

  David’s next surviving letter, written on 7 November, expresses deep gratitude for several letters received from her and goes on to reminisce about his and Pamela’s time together and English life in general compared to his current circumstances:

  You were sunbathing in one [letter] on a day off … & you had been riding in Grovely* in another. Grovely is quite one of the most wonderful names I know. I often say it to myself. It really is too good to be true, but it is.

  You talked of lunch at the Cafe Royal & of strawberries & I had to stop reading as I was awfully hungry having had no lunch or tea & as I was waiting for supper …

  Life presents rather a dismal picture at present. I am very overworked & there is no beauty to be found in a desert sunrise when we always get up at 5.45. There is no change of scenery – just sand, & one never sees anyone who is not in the army, not even a black man occasionally. There are no papers, no wireless, no news, no water to wash in & sometimes no water to drink … I have been trying to work with flies crawling all over me & dust blowing all over everything & blowing my papers away, & if you scratch yourself it always gets poisonous & you get horrid sores. In short although I have only been 3 months in this part of the country I have had enough & feel like a spot of luxury once more. I am afraid I am too fond of the better things in life & I expect this is all very good for me, but I wish it was all over.

  David’s final letter to Pamela from the desert, written on 14 November, includes some rather touching homespun philosophy. By then he had received a letter from her describing her guilt earlier in the summer about the patient who had to have a foot amputated. At one point in his letter David replied:

  I don’t expect you will remember the incident about the telephoning & the man who had his leg off by the time you get this, but you mustn’t worry about that sort of thing. You are as bad as me. I always worry myself silly about all my responsibilities, & the mistakes I make & think I may make. I console myself by the thought that I didn’t ask for this war or for my job & I am doing my best & can’t do more & if I make mistakes, provided they aren’t through negligence or laziness, it is really just bad luck. Try doing the same – it is a great help, & if you ever don’t think you are doing your best, I can assure you you are – you certainly were on that occasion, & anyway a few minutes delay wouldn’t affect the situation, I don’t suppose …

  Try to figure out where space ends or think of the speed of light or the responsibilities of generals & admirals & the number of men who get killed by their mistakes & one realises that one’s own little worries aren’t worth any consideration at all.

  T
his well-meant advice arrived too late to influence Pamela’s decision to quit nursing for good. The incident to which David referred had continued to prey on her mind. On 23 August she wrote: ‘Feel dreadfully dreadfully depressed about that man again & can’t see the wood for the trees. Don’t know what to do.’ Finally, at her wit’s end, Pamela once again off-loaded her worries onto the long-suffering Gertrude Best: ‘Went to Matron about Cooper. Never said I told a lie or anything but just more or less explained. She was terribly nice about it. I hope I’ve done right. Felt much better. Oh dear.’

  Her immediate anxieties temporarily assuaged, Pamela switched her concerns to David and his well-being. On 31 August she wrote: ‘Today is really the anniversary of my meeting David. Isn’t it funny. I wonder just where he is tonight.’

  In early September Pamela’s diary refers to buying David’s Christmas present, some handkerchiefs which she subsequently embroidered in her spare moments; Pamela’s typical self-deprecation is again in evidence, even in this small labour of love: ‘Did David’s present which is very bad & awful stitches.’ Despite such perceived imperfections she was anxious to get her efforts in the post to David as soon as possible, for on 16 September she states: ‘Put up & sent David’s hankies, card & letter.’ These reached David just before the beginning of the November offensive, and his letter to Pamela of 14 November shows how gratefully they were eventually received, even if the present was somewhat impractical: