Boy Entrant; The Recollections of a Royal Air Force Brat

by Brian Carlin

  The webbing belt was standard British military issue; only its colour separated the services. The RAF version of the belt was blue-grey. It was made from a heavy woven material known as webbing, and had a fastener at the front comprising of two sturdy brass pieces that fitted together in a tongue and slot clasp arrangement. Two brass slides that were used to adjust the length of the belt, fitted snugly up to the clasp, and two buckles at the rear completed the brass-work. Probably the most attractive example of someone wearing this kind of webbing belt was Ursula Andress, when she first appears in the James Bond film “Doctor No.” However, hers was white, and it certainly looked a lot better on her than it did on me.

  A dapper little middle-aged civilian tailor moved along our side of the counter, taking measurements of our chests, waists and inside leg, as we continued to receive items from the clothing clerk. Each time he did this he would call out a size to the storeman, who would then issue the individual with two uniforms and a greatcoat in that size. One of the uniforms was to be used as our “Best Blue” and the other as our “Working Blue.” When it was my turn to be measured, he called out, “36 regular.” The storeman disappeared amongst the racks of clothing and then returned a short time later with a bundle of blue serge, which he dumped on the counter in front of me. I was then directed to go into a small curtained-off cubicle to try on both uniforms and the greatcoat for size. The uniforms were both a good fit, which the tailor confirmed with a few tugs and a check of the waistband, but the legs of the trousers needed to be shortened. Also, the greatcoat was loose around the waist and needed a slight alteration. The tailor gathered in the surplus material and marked it with tailor’s chalk. Then I took it off and filled out three labels with my rank, name and serial number, one of which I tied on to the greatcoat and the other two on to each pair of trousers before leaving them in a pile with other clothing that needed alterations, having been told that I could pick them up from the tailor’s shop in a few days.

  The uniforms were made from a hairy worsted material, which was standard RAF issue at the time. Both were identical. The jacket-like tunic was buttoned down the centre by a row of four brass buttons and came complete with a detachable belt, made from the same serge material, which was held fastened round the waist of the tunic by means of a brass buckle. The tunic included four pockets in all. Two of these were large side pockets positioned over each hip, while the other two were smaller breast pockets. All of the pocket openings were covered by a flap, which in the case of the side pockets just fell loosely over the pocket. But the breast pockets were different; they were held fastened by a small brass button that was otherwise identical in design to the larger tunic buttons. Each button was embossed with a representation of Her Majesty the Queen’s crown above an eagle in full flight. The regal bird was portrayed to be flying towards the viewer, but with its head turned towards the viewer’s right. The same eagle image, embroidered in pale blue silk, was also worn as a small badge, known as a “shoulder flash”, which was worn at the very top of the tunic sleeve on each arm. It was a curious feature of these embroidered eagles that their heads were turned to face rearwards.

  There is a service legend that answers the question of why the eagle’s head pointed rearwards. During the Battle of Britain many of the brave Spitfire and Hurricane pilots were NCOs—sergeants and flight sergeants—who wore this very same shoulder flash. The legend has it that the eagle’s head originally faced forward until one NCO pilot removed his, during those hectic September days, and switched them around to be on opposite shoulders, (there’s a “right shoulder” flash and a “left shoulder” flash). This, he said, was “because he needed to have a pair of eyes in his arse” when he was up there dog-fighting with Jerry. The idea quickly caught on, and eventually all NCO fighter pilots followed suit and wore them like this. As a tribute to their bravery, the RAF adopted the reversed eagles as the official shoulder flash for all “other ranks” airmen—including Boy Entrants. The RAF is a young service and doesn’t have too many traditions of its own, so we liked this particular one because it gave us the feeling that we’d inherited a tangible connection to the Battle of Britain heroes from the generation immediately preceding our own. The tunics and greatcoat were issued with these shoulder flashes already attached, which was at least one sewing task that we wouldn’t have to fumble our way through. But that wasn’t the case with the brass wheel badges that I’d first noticed at Cosford. We were issued with three of those; one for each tunic and one for the greatcoat.

  When everyone had been issued his full complement of kit, Sergeant Clarke told us to pay attention. Grabbing someone’s white canvas kit bag, he dumped the contents on the floor, and then proceeded to hold up each item as he called out its name. We were instructed to do likewise. When both he and Corporal Blandford were satisfied that each and every one of us had been issued with that particular item, he put it in the kit bag, and instructed us to do likewise.

  “Button stick! Hold up your button stick! Has everyone got a button stick?” He looked around in all directions as Corporal Blandford walked around and assisted those who were unable to tell their button stick from their elbow. The corporal then nodded his head towards Sergeant Clarke, who took this as a signal that everyone possessed this item of kit.

  “Okay,” the sergeant announced, “put it in your kitbag.”

  This was really a good thing, because we might have otherwise been unaware that something was missing. But, it was a two-edged sword because it also removed the option of being able to claim later that we hadn’t been issued with a particular item if it somehow went astray. Being short of an item of kit would get us into serious trouble, so now if anything went missing later on, it could only happen through carelessness on our part.

  When we’d finished making sure that all kit was present and correct, we were instructed to wear our big hats, the SDs, even though it had neither hat badge nor hatband. This was so that it wouldn’t be crushed out of shape in the kit bag during our march back to the billet.

  Before being dismissed on our return to G lines, Corporal Blandford instructed us on the order of dress for the next few days. “Pay attention!” He commanded. “Until you receive the items of clothing back from the tailor, you will wear your denims instead of working blue. That means you will wear your RAF issue shirt, collar and tie, beret and working boots.”

  “Those of you with tickets for collection of clothing from the tailor on Monday, Tuesday, etc., will be taken there to collect those items on the specific day. Thereafter, you will wear full working blue during working days and best blue on Sundays for Church Parade.” He paused briefly before asking, “Is that clear?”

  We all replied in a staccato response, “Yes corporal!”

  The terminology of “working blue” and “best blue” was new to us, but we understood it to mean that one uniform would be worn throughout the week and one would be kept in good condition, like the “Sunday suit” that was worn only for church and special occasions that most of us were familiar with in civilian life. It didn’t matter that, at this point, both uniforms were brand new and equally in good condition. It was simply a matter of choosing between the two.

  Denims referred to an olive-green coloured one-piece work overall made from sturdy denim material. We had all been issued with one set of these on a personal loan basis from the squadron.

  By this time, we were aware that we would be confined to camp during our first three weeks in ITS, so it wasn’t surprising that our weekend assignment was to get our uniform into a wearable condition, and also prepare for a kit inspection on Wednesday morning. This meant cleaning our brass accessories, which were covered in some kind of tough preservative coating, pressing any item of uniform that wasn’t with the tailor, ironing the wrinkles out of shirts then folding them in a special way, and polishing our boots. That may sound simple enough, but it wasn’t—we had to “bull” everything. In military slang, “bulling” means senseless cleaning for its own sake, like the mi
rror-like shine on the Guardroom floor, or the mirror-like shine that we were expected to put on our black leather boots. Now there was a challenge!

  The entire boot uppers consisted of knobbly black leather that refused to take on any semblance of a shine, yet the toecaps and the heels needed to be so mirror-like that a person, especially a corporal person, could actually see his own reflection in them.

  According to Corporal Kaveney—we needed to employ the old spit-and-polish routine, literally, to achieve the desired effect. “First, take a spoon,” he told us, “and use a match or a cigarette lighter to heat up the business end. Then put plenty of black boot polish on the toecap and the heel of the boot. Press down with the underside of the spoon and rub the polish into the leather in little circles.” He turned to leave, “Won’t take more than a couple of days, lads.” And then he was gone, his evil little smirk still lingering like the after image on a retina that has been exposed to a too-bright light.

  After many hours of rubbing, the pressure of the hot spoon on the leather smoothed out the little knobbly bumps, meanwhile the polish was absorbed into the leather. Then, when the toecaps and heel area were completely smooth, I put some spit on the area that I’d been rubbing and used a yellow duster wrapped around one or two fingers to rub the spit mixed with polish in little circles with my fingertips. Finally, the duster served as a polishing cloth to buff the leather until the toecaps and heels took on the smooth gleaming appearance of patent leather.

  Although we’d been issued with all necessary items of kit, we still needed to provide our own cleaning supplies. For instance, boot-polish, Brasso, and the blanco paste needed to clean our webbing. We had to buy these supplies from the NAAFI shop, as well as the front and back studs needed for attaching a collar to its shirt. In the meantime, our NCOs came around and gave each of us a chequered hatband to be worn around our SD and a painted metal disc to be worn behind the RAF hat badges on our berets. The check pattern on the ITS hatband was a double row of half-inch squares that alternated emerald green and black. The same pattern was repeated on the aluminium disc, but on a larger scale so that the disc was simply divided into quarters with alternating quadrants of green and black. The hatbands and discs weren’t actually issued as kit, but were on a personal loan basis, like our denims, for the duration of the time we’d spend in ITS.

  I continued getting my uniform ready to wear. This included sewing a wheel badge on the left arm of both tunics and the greatcoat. When examined up close, it became obvious that the wheel badge wasn’t really a “cartwheel”. Although the outer circle was a wheel of some sort, the “spokes” were in fact the representation of a four-bladed propeller within the wheel. The wheel badges were to be sewn directly onto the sleeve of our uniform minus the coloured discs that I’d seen both at Cosford and here at St. Athan; those would come later when we graduated to the Wings. Sewing buttons back onto my clothing was something I’d been taught to do early in life, so using the materials in the housewife wasn’t any problem for me. I opened it up and took out a small sewing needle, then broke off a length of black thread. As I threaded the needle, it brought back memories of my maternal grandmother, Hannah McElhone, who used to ask me to do this little job for her because she said I had “good eyes”. With the needle threaded, I positioned the first wheel badge about four inches below the eagle shoulder flash with the propeller oriented so that it looked like an “X”, as we had been instructed, and then sewed several loops of thread over two opposing propeller blades, close to the rim of the wheel. There was a full-length mirror at the end of the billet, so I tried the tunic on and checked to see if the wheel looked okay. It seemed to be at the correct location on my arm, and the propeller blades looked like an “X”. My eyes ceased to focus on the wheel badge and instead strayed to take in my whole reflection in the mirror. Somehow, it seemed that I wasn’t looking at myself, but at some other person who just vaguely resembled me. However, this other person was partially dressed in the uniform of the Royal Air Force. For a few fleeting moments, the vision seemed to signal a new life, a new person—and then the moment passed. I cleared my head of this daydream and got back to the task of sewing the wheel badges onto my other garments. After that, I slid the little button stick underneath each wheel badge and cleaned it with Brasso.

  All day Saturday we bulled our kit, trying to get the best possible shine on our buttons and badges, and performing near miracles in getting a mirror shine on our boots. Sometimes helping each other, sometimes offering or receiving advice. The spoon trick worked well for smoothing out the knobbles in the leather, but all the rubbing was hard work and my arms and fingers ached long before I’d finished. Finally, I took my turn at using the table at the end of the billet as an ironing board to press my tunics with a hot iron, putting a damp cloth over the area being ironed to prevent scorching. It was simple to cover the table with a blanket, and it served just as well as the provided tables in the ironing room miles away at the other end of the long corridor that interconnected the billets. And at some point, we all fitted the chequered hatbands around our SDs and put the coloured metal discs in place behind the cap badges on our berets.

  Everything needed to be tried on for fit and size, but it was a major struggle with the detachable collars because they were so stiff and uncomfortable. The front collar stud invariably stuck into the wearer’s throat at an angle, and after knotting the tie with the collar up, it was difficult to fold the collar over without getting it all crinkled up. Mercifully, the RAF phased out detachable collars several years later, and issued more modern shirts with collars that were permanently attached. But those of us who had to wear those uncomfortable detachable collars will forever remember the small circular semi-permanent red indentation on our throats, just below the Adam’s apple. It was always such an exquisite relief just to take that damned uncomfortable collar off.

  On Sunday, I took a break to go to Mass with Niall Adderley, who was also Catholic. We went in our civilian clothes because we both had items of our uniforms in the tailor’s shop. The RC (Roman Catholic) church was on the other side of the camp, in 1 Wing territory, but this posed no problem. The denizens of the Wings had enough to keep them busy on any Sunday morning; most of them were nominal members of the Church of England, and were therefore required to be on Church Parade. Other Protestants were also required to participate, but not Catholics since it was assumed, I think, that we would voluntarily attend church anyway without the coercion of the RAF hierarchy.

  Niall and I walked the mile or so from our billet to the church. He was from Dublin, the Drimnagh area to be precise, and was a very easy person to get along with. I was fascinated by his soft Dublin accent, which sounded so much more melodious to my ears than my own Ulster accent. Niall was endowed with a lot of wisdom for such a young person, coupled with a warmth and genuineness. Frequently, he was a steadying influence on my own brash impulsiveness and I certainly looked up to him. We stayed good friends throughout ITS, but got separated later when we went to the Wings and were housed in different billets.

  At the RC church, we were welcomed by several 1 Wing and 2 Wing Boy Entrants and given hymnbooks to use during the service. Apparently, this was neutral territory. Afterwards, we were offered refreshments in the common-room adjoining the small chapel where the Mass had been offered. The Priest, or Chaplain as he was referred to in the RAF, mingled with us and had a friendly word for all the newcomers. I was surprised by the fact that he wore a light coloured jacket, unlike the sombre black clothing worn by every priest that I’d ever seen in Ireland. He was also English, which didn’t seem right, but he came across as a compassionate human being. When Niall and I finally decided to leave he escorted us to the door, and said that he was looking forward to seeing us again later in the week, at Padre’s Hour. We didn’t quite know what that meant, but nodded and said yes as though we did.

  We had lunch after Mass, although it always seemed to be called dinner since it was the main meal of the day. Afterwards, Ging
e Brown came up with the idea of going to the huge indoor pool that we’d discovered just a few days before, and asked if anyone else was interested. I immediately jumped at the chance. Although I couldn’t swim, I certainly wanted to learn. Bertie Bassett and “Cokey” Cole both said they were coming too because they also wanted to learn how to swim. None of us possessed swimming trunks, but we did have the PE shorts that had just been issued to us, so we rolled them up in a white towel (Boy Entrant, for the use of) and headed for a dip.

  The pool was accessed through the large gym complex that we had seen a few days previously. Actually, there were two gyms. There was an outer gym with a concrete floor that was used for activities such as callisthenics, which would very soon become part of our training. The second inner gym had an immaculate hardwood floor that included an indoor running track. This was also where most of the gym equipment could be found. A blanket of warm humid air hit us as soon as we opened the door in a corner of the outer gym that led to the pool. The strong aroma of chlorine clung to my nostrils as we made our way alongside the pool to the changing room, taking in the immensity of the huge body of water as we walked through. It seemed enormously long and wide and the large room echoed hollowly to the splashes and voices of the people who were already having fun in the water. The doorway through which we had just entered was at the shallow end and facing us at the far end was a high diving board and a lower springboard. A number of swimmers were busily showing off their skills on the springboard so we stopped and gaped at them for a little while. Other people watched from an upper spectator gallery, applauding each time one of the divers made a clean entry into the water.