If I Don’t Write It Nobody Else Will. Eric Sykes

I could have claimed: Muslim, Trappist monk, Buddhist. My brain raced as if I was an inept politician trying desperately not to answer a simple question, but before I could blurt out an adequate response he’d marched towards the door and entered the chapel, whipping off his glengarry just in time.

      I realised I’d won the exchange. All I had to do now was to stand at ease and enjoy the warm summer breeze. I was looking the other way, so I didn’t notice the approach of the senior officer until he spoke.

      ‘What’s the problem, lad?’ he said in a quiet, fatherly voice.

      I sprang to attention and spluttered the first thing that came to mind. ‘I don’t believe in it, sir, not with the war and people being killed.’ Actually I’m sure these words bear not the slightest relation to what I actually said—it poured out in fluent gabble.

      He looked at me uncertainly, and then reasonably he said, ‘Why not give it one more try?’ and as he said it he gently propelled me into the chapel.

      It was embarrassing to say the least. All heads were turned towards the entrance as we came in. Then the senior officer, his arm still round my shoulder in case I made a break for it, led me to a place next to him on the front pew—‘Officers only’.

      As we sat, the padre came over to where I was sitting, and, laying his hands on the ledge in front of me, he began a lecture on why it was imperative that everyone should be Christian. After a few minutes he took his eyes from me and to the chapel in general he said, ‘Let us pray for all our wayward lambs.’ There was a shuffling as the congregation knelt and I did the same, blushing like an eastern sunset as my thoughts sped off at a right angle, as I noticed that, being in the officer’s pew, I had a hassock to kneel on and I am sure the erks were on bare boards, ha, ha.

      Perhaps that lunatic action of mine was responsible—but I shall never know. If my memory serves me right, I can’t recall any more church services at Gatton Park.

      One night I was on the midnight-to-eight watch, waiting for the welcome sound of the lorry bringing our relief from the camp. After the formalities of handing over were complete, we’d board the lorry, which would then take us back to camp for breakfast and, best of all, a few hours of blissful oblivion in our blankets. The night watch had been particularly draining, but the sun was strong and the birds were twittering ‘Good mornings’. What a pity to waste such a glorious summer asleep! On impulse I waved the lads off—there’d be plenty of time to sleep when we’re dead—and I started the long walk downhill to the town. Reigate was still unexplored, as far as I was concerned, but at least I knew where the WVS was (the Women’s Voluntary Service), a canteen run by bright-eyed, tweedy women with perpetual smiles who dished out tea and buns, rock cakes, sweets, and cigarettes to anyone in uniform who happened to drop by. These surrogate mothers giving up their free time for their highly valued war effort were a different world from the exhausted, shawled women of the Lancashire cotton towns. I banished the thought. They probably had a WVS in Oldham too, but somehow I doubted it.

      Contentedly I munched on a bun—it was a good idea of mine —and sipped my tea. It tasted much better drunk from pottery. Also it was a well-known fact that the tea we drank at the camp was liberally dosed with bromide in order to dampen our appreciation of the opposite sex. The things we believed…Sighing with content, I continued to munch. Who needs sleep? I was feeling warm and comfortable and in a strange way the incessant babble of conversation was receding, as if someone was turning down the volume. The next thing I knew was that I was jerked out of a state of well-being by a crashing snore, and it was only when I noticed other servicemen staring at me that I realised that the snore had been mine, ruefully answering my cocky assertion, ‘Who needs sleep?’

      I couldn’t stay in the WVS any longer. I put down my half-eaten bun and hurried into the fresh air. It was invigorating and once again I was wide awake and Reigate was my oyster. I took in my surroundings. Reigate itself was a flurry of activity during the day, with masses of servicemen—RAF, army, Poles, ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service), a veritable league of nations. The British drove sedate old three-ton Bedfords, which pulled up at traffic lights with an apologetic wince of brakes; and now there were Chevrolets pulling up at the lights, doing at least forty miles an hour, stopping dead when they pressed the foot pedal with a triumphant chooooo of the airbrakes, shattering all the gentility of this lovely old town—the Canadian Army had arrived, careering everywhere, giving the impression that there was no speed limit in Toronto and beyond. But the envy of all the young bloods were the Canadian despatch riders. Even these weren’t just men on motorbikes: they rode Harley Davidsons, the nearest thing to a horse on wheels.

      The realisation hit me that I was still only twenty yards or so from the WVS and I’d been standing on one spot for the last twenty minutes, gawping like a hayseed from the mountain country. Then a motor horn peeped and a Bedford pulled up by the kerb. I hadn’t even seen it arrive and had no idea why he was tooting. Could I have been asleep on my feet? He called out ‘Eric.’ Oh, blessed chariot! I dozed through the third gear of Reigate Hill and when we arrived back at camp I took off my boots, and that’s all I could manage before sleep overtook me.

      All the wireless operators were relieved of duties, two at a time, in order to take driving lessons. The cars were ordinary family saloons and the instructors all civilians, and for the next few weeks we shuddered and stuttered, veering erratically and at times bumping on to the pavement. Fortunately we were taught the rudiments of driving on the quieter roads surrounding Reigate. It was hairy, but I was quite pleased with myself, considering I’d only sat in the front of a vehicle once before. I was only ten at the time and that was when the lunatic who drove the bread van offered me a lift. He was obviously a racing fanatic, because he had me clutching on to my seat as he made his way up Oldham Road, crouching over the wheel, his foot flat on the accelerator, double declutching, making louder engine noises with his mouth than the motor itself; then, with spittle swinging from his lips, he stamped on the brake so suddenly that I slid down under the dashboard. ‘Don’t go away,’ he said as he plunged through the shop door with an armful of loaves, but I’d had enough and when he emerged I’d gone. I almost perspire now at the thought of that crazy half mile. On reflection we couldn’t have been doing more than thirty miles an hour, but that was unsafe for a bread van.

      Anyway, when we were considered proficient enough as drivers to be tested, we were trucked off to Croydon—busier than Reigate—to be examined by a senior civilian instructor. I passed my test, but I think only just, because as I stepped out of the car he said, ‘As a driver you’d make a good commando.’ I never discovered whether this was praise or sarcasm.

      A very interesting interlude, but that was only the first course; the main dish was driving a three-ton Bedford. We were chucked in at the deep end, at the wheel, in convoy and, if that wasn’t hazardous enough, at night. It wasn’t too bad once I could change gears without having to fiddle for the lever. The tricky part was keeping a distance of thirty yards between me and the tail light of the lorry in front. A lapse of concentration could be at the least embarrassing. The hooded headlights didn’t make matters easier; a half-inch strip of illumination doesn’t give a driver confidence. When I learned the reason for this crash course (unfortunate choice of words), that if, when we were in action, anything happened to the driver we would be able to take over, enabling the war to continue, this led to much conjecture at our camp at Gatton Park. We were now sure in our minds that we were a new innovation in the RAF, the first of its kind: an MSU or mobile signals unit. At least we knew now that we’d be mobile, but where would we be going?