Boy Entrant; The Recollections of a Royal Air Force Brat

by Brian Carlin

  On the first and second days, I just fell in and out of a coma-like sleep, not knowing what time of day or night it was, not feeling hungry, but always thirsty when I woke up. In addition to loading me up with more blankets, the medics came around with their little cups of liquid amber and pills, insisting that I sit up and take them. After struggling to sit up and take the medicine, I would crash back onto my sweat-soaked pillow as yet another blanket was piled on top of the huge and ever-growing mound that my aching body was already supporting.

  On the third day, I was beginning to feel a little better and although my mouth tasted as though something had crawled in there and died, my state of consciousness seemed to be returning to something nearer normal. And I was hungry.

  It now became obvious that other patients, who were in the later stages of recovery, but still not well enough to be discharged, were acting as orderlies to help the overworked medics. One of their jobs was to bring around the meals to those of us still confined to bed. The food, it turned out, was being brought over from both 1 and 2 Wing cookhouses by lorry, which must have been a logistics nightmare in itself. Individual plates had been prepared and stacked on top of each other, separated by those little metal rings that are commonly used in the catering industry. Because of the sheer numbers of patients and the few lorries assigned to ferry the food from the messes, breakfast was more likely to turn up stone cold at around lunchtime. Lunch was similarly time-shifted, as was the evening meal. It wasn’t very appetising, but I was hungry and had little choice other than to eat it. Besides, I couldn’t taste anything anyway.

  Two days later, one of the medics pronounced that I was well enough to be up and about, so he told me to first go and take a bath and then get dressed. The recovering patient’s “uniform” was pyjamas worn under a working-blue tunic, with plimsolls as footwear. For the next two days, I helped out with such duties as distributing meals, sweeping out the billet and making up beds for the new patients, who arrived to fill them as soon as they were vacated. Those of us in the process of recovering discussed amongst ourselves the excellent opportunity this pandemic presented for the Russians to attack Britain, because if the situation at St. Athan was anything to go by, the entire RAF was probably laid low by Asian flu. All of the ground defence training that we’d undergone would have been little use in putting up any resistance, since most of the camp was near comatose during those late summer weeks of 1957. Cold-war Russia seemed so far away from our little part of the world in those days, that it never occurred to us that they too were probably under attack by the very same microbes that had brought Britain to its knees.

  After two days of dishing out food, rinsing dishes in the bath before stacking them in containers for their return trip to the mess and generally being at the beck and call of the medics, I was only too pleased when the duty M.O. (Medical Officer) pronounced me fit for discharge. Being able to wear my normal uniform again instead of pyjamas and plimsolls felt weird at first, probably because I had lost some weight into the bargain, but it felt good to be discharged from the temporary hospital and back in the normal world once more, even if I did still feel a little weak and shaky.

  That evening in the billet, I was surprised to discover that more than half of the beds had become unoccupied in the days that followed my own forced absence. Classes at workshops were sparsely populated by the few of us who had recovered and those who had yet to succumb. The few instructors still with us were marking time until class levels returned to somewhere near full strength. Just to keep us occupied until that day came around, we were tutored on topics that had been previously covered, which was actually a heaven-sent bonus for someone like me, since I was able to receive almost personal tutoring on my weaker subjects.

  The situation wasn’t without other bonuses as well. We received more personal attention at the boy entrants’ mess, not unlike the long weekends during which some of us had to remain at camp when the majority went home on 96-hour passes. It was easy to find a good seat in the Astra and there was scarcely a blue uniform to be seen on Barry Island, except for those few of us who took on the heroic task of ensuring that the teenage girls of Barry didn’t pine away out of sheer loneliness. All good things come to an end, however, although it was nice while it lasted. Within a few weeks everything had returned to normal. Regular instruction resumed at the workshops, mess queues regained their customary length and life everywhere just got back to being crowded again.

  * * *

  In October of 1957, the 32nd Entry commenced their ITS training. The routine had become old hat by now. Suddenly there were hundreds of pounding feet running up the concrete pathway to the mess at lunchtime, when the brand new sprogs were dismissed by the drill instructors. What it meant for old sweats like the 29th was that we either had to train them to be respectful of our Entry status or wait until the rush had died down. Most of the time, it was easier just to remain in the billet for half an hour or so and then take a casual saunter across to the mess. Invariably, when I did this, the queue had melted away, enabling me to go directly up to the servery and get lunch in good time, without having to compete with the press of humanity.

  * * *

  When the October trees had taken on the golden colours of autumn, it signalled that the balmy summer weekends spent flirting with the Rhondda Valley girls on Barry Island were behind me. Soon it would be greatcoat weather again and that magical summer, when I was 16 and knew everything there was to know about everything there was, would fade into the background to become nothing more than a dusty memory that might occasionally be taken out and aired once in a while as the years rolled by.

  The Rhondda Valley girls were a breed apart. They weren’t shy by any stretch of the imagination, as many a boy entrant was destined to find out, much to his utter amazement.

  The valley itself was a highly industrialised area just a few miles to the north of Barry, given over to coal mines and smokestack factories. Most of the teenage girls born and raised there went straight into factory jobs as soon as they had finished school at the age of 15. Apart from the few days off work at Christmas and Bank Holidays, their only escape from the everyday monotony of factory life was when all of the Valley coalmines and factories closed at the same time for the annual two-week summer holiday. One of the highlights of the girls’ lives during this period of unfettered freedom seemed to be a day trip to Barry Island on chartered coaches. And day-trip they did, arriving in wolf-like packs with an apparent single-minded determination to enjoy every second of their day out. They loved boy entrants! The sight of our uniforms, coupled with the fact that we were around the same age, seemed to attract them like magnets. If a group of them caught sight of us—and they always went around in large groups—they were immediately in hot pursuit, until they caught up with us. Not that we exactly ran too fast, mind you. It seemed that every Rhondda Valley girl’s ambition was to snatch one of our SD hats to be borne triumphantly back to the valley as some sort of hunting trophy. Thwarting this quest meant that we needed to be ever on our guard.

  But the girls had a sexual agenda as well! In the process of trying to distract us as they attempted to steal our hats, they weren’t always too ladylike and would often subject us to a group-grope. This, for us, was all part of the enjoyment—although we heard lurid tales that these same young ‘ladies’, egged on by older mentors, inflicted near-emasculation on any young, unsuspecting factory lad who might have made the tragic mistake of wandering into their all-female areas. The consequences were always sexual in nature, in ways that were very humiliating for the hapless young male victims.

  In spite of these stories, I always enjoyed encounters with the Rhondda Valley girls and loved their high spirits and devil-may-care attitudes. But alas, it was only for that one short summer.

  * * *

  An air of grim dreariness settled over St. Athan with the onset of November’s gloomy days; days that barely got light before dank darkness descended again. The Rhondda Valley girls had long since r
eturned to their terraced houses, surrounded by factory smokestacks and their black-faced coal-mining men-folk. As they worked in the factories, perhaps they thought back to pleasanter balmy summer days spent at Barry Island, idly flirting with lads in blue RAF uniforms—helicopter pilots, as they might have been led to believe, maybe the occasional one with a little bit of an Irish lilt in his voice. Meanwhile, the very same “helicopter pilots” were huddled inside the protection of their working greatcoats as they battled against biting, horizontal, wind-driven rain that opposed their march to workshops, in their ongoing pursuit of technical knowledge.

  November then gave way to December and thoughts of going home on Christmas leave loomed large in everyone’s mind. Not only that, but the spirit of Christmas had begun to make itself felt. For one thing, there was to be a Christmas concert in the Astra for the inmates—starring none other than the inmates themselves.

  When volunteers were called for, Richard Butterworth and I promptly decided to go into show business, notwithstanding the fact that we didn’t possess a single ounce of stage talent between us. But performing in the concert sounded like such a good skive that we just couldn’t resist it.

  A notice came around inviting volunteers to present themselves at the Drill Shed on a certain evening for concert auditions—no previous experience necessary! Well, if they were looking for people with no previous experience, they had certainly come to the right place, as far as Richard and I were concerned. We eagerly made our way to the Drill Shed on the appointed evening, bubbling over with excitement at this opportunity to be discovered as big stars. The large group that had already gathered by the time we got there were busy adding their names to a list, under the supervision of the officer in charge of the concert. Eventually the list came into our hands and we entered our names, squadron and flight number in the appropriate columns. We left the “Talent” column blank, although in retrospect we could have legitimately entered “enthusiasm”.

  When everyone had signed up, the officer looked over the list and gave us a little pep talk. Then he split the “artistes” into smaller groups according to their talents, holding separate discussions with each group before dismissing them. Approximately twenty untalented lads remained, including Richard and me. The officer walked slowly back to where we were all huddled, half expecting that he would dismiss us. But instead, he smilingly divided us into two smaller groups and directed each group to start coming up with ideas for a skit that we could develop and then perform in the concert.

  We scratched our heads for some ideas as the evening jankers parade started to form up, forcing us to move to a more remote area of the Drill Shed. Although the move was an inconvenience, it triggered a flash of inspiration in one of our number, who then came up with the brilliant idea for a dysfunctional janker-wallah parade skit. We all liked the idea and excitedly proposed it to the officer, who gave it his warm approval. What followed was a series of several evenings devoted to the development of ideas, scripts and repeated rehearsals for the ten-minute time-slot that we would be allotted on stage.

  It wasn’t difficult to pack the Astra when admission was free and so on the night of the concert, it was bursting at the seams. The “jankers-parade” team sat in reserved seats in the auditorium, able to enjoy most of the show until it was time to go backstage and prepare for our own presentation. It’s always amazing how much talent there is amongst ordinary people and the boy entrant population was no exception. We were entertained by singers, acrobats, amateur magicians, piano players, guitar players, comedy teams and more than one skiffle band that used washboards and tea-chests as basic musical instruments (this particular form of music having been made popular around that time by the likes of Lonnie Donegan). Then it was our turn!

  The curtain rose on our skit to reveal a straggly line of janker-wallahs in various states of disarray. One boy stood with a lit cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, another was heavily bandaged and on crutches, while yet another was dressed partially in uniform and partially in civilian attire. The Orderly Sergeant, as played by one of the group, was very timid and repeatedly requested the parade to come to attention, but none of the janker-wallahs paid him the slightest bit of notice as they busily interacted with each other. All of this was already getting laughs, but the appearance of the Orderly Officer brought the house down. In a stroke of casting genius, the concert officer had cast the smallest of our number, namely Richard, as the O.O. Rich really got into the role, as he marched confidently on stage and bawled at the parade to get fell in and stand to attention, achieving immediate compliance from the suddenly intimidated defaulters and gaining feigned admiration from the Orderly Sergeant.

  The defaulters’ inspection followed—this was the main thrust of the whole skit. Richard started at one end and picked on each member of the group for some problem or other, satirising the things that happen on real defaulters’ parade inspections. One individual was ordered to turn out the contents of his small pack, which in real life was supposed to contain several specific items, such as pyjamas, small kit (toiletries), boot brushes and button stick. But this particular small pack was wide of the mark. Instead of containing the correct items, the audience was treated to the sight of multiple ladies’ lacy undergarments tied together in a seemingly never-ending string that Richard laboriously dragged out from the interior of the bag. That got a big laugh. Our hero then asked another defaulter to hand over his canteen so that it could be checked to make sure that it was full of fresh drinking water. This was the favourite inspection item on a real defaulters’ parade and heaven help the poor sod whose canteen contained water that didn’t taste fresh, or if it wasn’t completely full. Butterworth uncorked the canteen and raised it to his lips and pretended to take a swig, then staggered around the stage after taking a hefty gulp of something that was obviously much stronger than water. He steadied himself and recovered his composure, but just when everyone thought he was going to make a big scene with the unfortunate janker-wallah, he took another swig and then another until the canteen had apparently been emptied. Then, he gave it back to its owner and told him, with a distinct slur in his voice, that it was the freshest water he had tasted in a long time.

  Sobering up remarkably quickly, he moved on to the next defaulter, a well-built lad who was at least six feet in height. Richard, all four feet of him, looked the tall lad up and down, supposedly inspecting his buttons. Then he leaned forward, bending over at right angles to his waist and appeared to inspect the tall lad’s boots. Meanwhile, Lofty, as he was known for obvious reasons, leaned forward from his waist and bent down over the top of Butterworth so that the upper parts of both their bodies were parallel to each other. He remained there during the whole time that Richard was bent over, returning to the upright position with split second timing as Richard also started to straighten up.

  Next Richard, apparently suspicious that something had just occurred which threatened his authority, came up very close to Lofty and assumed a confrontational stance. In response, Lofty pulled himself more erect and puffed out his chest in a silent yet assertive attempt to counter the pint-sized Orderly Officer’s attempt at dominating him. Not to be outdone, the O.O. re-exerted his authority by peering upwards in the direction of Lofty’s cap and announcing, “Boy Entrant, your hat badge is filthy,” although he very obviously couldn’t see the hat badge from his position. Then, with barely a pause, he turned to the Orderly Sergeant and barked, “Sergeant, take this man’s name and make sure he has cleaned his badge by the next parade. And tonight, have him do his fatigues at the mess!”

  As expected, this remark brought loud boos and catcalls from the audience because it was one of the worst fatigues that a janker-wallah could be given, usually involving the scraping of congealed food residue off cookhouse pots and pans.

  The inspection continued until all of those on parade had been dealt with, sometimes to the defaulter’s advantage and at other times to the Orderly Officer’s. Meanwhile, I had been waiting
in the wings for my cue. Alas, my great moment of fame was merely a brief walk-on part, but I tried to make the best of it. Unlike the defaulters, I was properly dressed in working uniform and, on making an entrance from stage right, I marched smartly across the stage to where Butterworth stood. He, meanwhile, had turned expectantly to face me. Of course my “keen” march across the stage brought loud boos from the audience, who all naturally identified with the underdog janker-wallahs. I came to a smart halt in front of Butterworth, giving a kind of little skip that drill instructors liked to perform when they came to a halt face-to-face with an officer. My arm came up in salute and quivered there for a few moments in exaggeration of another drill instructor favourite. Richard returned the salute. I then leaned forward and pretended to say something confidential into his ear, then straightened up and stood stiffly at attention.

  “Bring him on,” Richard loudly commanded.

  I turned towards the wings, from where I’d just emerged and beckoned. At this signal, four brawny boys staggered out from the wings carrying a bed on which a “defaulter” apparently lay sleeping in his full janker-wallah regalia of webbing and large pack. They carried the bed to one end of the parade line-up and placed it gently on the ground. Richard approached the person on the bed, then came to a stop and took a deep breath and yelled, “Defaulter, wake up!” The person in the bed reacted in a startled fashion, as though he had been suddenly and rudely awakened.

  “Why are you in bed, lad?” Richard inquired.

  “I’m on light duties, Sir,” was the boy’s reply, as he simultaneously held out a crumpled piece of paper that was supposedly a much coveted light-duties chit.