Boy Entrant; The Recollections of a Royal Air Force Brat (51 page)

After that, there were only a few more questions and tasks to be tested on, before I was told that I had completed the Board and could return to the classroom. With a feeling of great relief, mixed with some confidence that I’d done okay, I collected my notebooks from the waiting area and headed back to rejoin my mates in the classroom. Mates? As soon as I walked through the door, they pounced on me.

“What were you asked?” They all wanted to know.

I described everything about the Board that I was able to recall, the recollections coming in fits and starts, as the act of remembering some of the key events triggered a recall of many other questions I’d been asked, or tasks that had been set by my examiner. This worked for all of us, because those who were still waiting to take the Board wanted to get a feeling of what to expect and I was anxious to know how well I’d done. Being able to remember many of the questions helped me to get some badly wanted feedback from the others as to whether or not I had correctly answered them. In the end, I got the impression that I’d done reasonably well, but it wasn’t a sure thing by any means.

* * *

There were two or three days to suffer through before we would learn how well or poorly we had performed in the Finals. In the meantime, most of us indulged in endless post-mortems, during which we sought to recall all of the questions that had been set on the Paper and asked during the Board and then try to determine whether or not we had provided the right answers. During these few days my spirits often soared with the realization that I’d answered a particular question correctly, but then crashed again when it seemed clear that I’d given wrong answers to others. And so, during those few days, my feelings swung erratically between the optimistic certainty that I’d passed and the gloomy pessimism of failure. Finally, word came that we were to report to the common room. As I entered with my fellow billet-members, the air of tense nervousness in the room was almost physical. There was none of the cheerful chatter and hubbub that usually characterized such get-togethers. Most faces looked strained and the few smiles that managed to appear briefly here and there were of the grim, tight-lipped variety. Attention was focused on Corporal Longfellow, who waited until he felt reasonably sure that everyone was present. Then his eyes ceased flicking around the room and he drew himself up to his full height.

“Okay, pay attention!” He said.

“Shushes” were uttered from various parts of the room, to silence those who, oblivious to the call to order, were engrossed in private, whispered conversations. But, for the most part, the statement was completely redundant since almost all eyes were already riveted on him.

“I’ve got the results of your Finals,” he said solemnly.

He then proceeded to loudly read down through the list of names, announcing the percentage of marks that the individual had gained for both parts of the final exam. We needed to achieve a minimum of 60% for each part of the Final and relegation loomed large in the future of anyone who didn’t make it past this milestone. In addition to the marks, Longfellow also announced the consequence of each result. For most it was LAC (Leading Aircraftsman) with automatic promotion to SAC (Senior Aircraftsman) within six months. A few, who had worked hard to gain exceptional marks, were rewarded with immediate promotion to SAC. Those who failed to meet the required percentage were either told that they were to be relegated to the 30th entry or, in the case of some who had already been relegated once, “cease training”. The latter was another way of saying that the RAF didn’t expect them to make it and they could either leave the service or transfer to another trade-group—one for which they might have a better aptitude.

As the results were being read out, the tense atmosphere in the room began to give way to one of whoops and loud gasps of relief mingled with a few groans, as pent-up feelings were released. At best, I was hoping to have squeaked through with a bare 60% on both parts of the exam and was overjoyed to hear that my marks for the Paper and the Board were both in the low seventies. Most of us had passed and those of us who did were now all busy pumping each other’s hands in congratulation. At long last, we could wholeheartedly prepare for the upcoming passing-out parade with a renewed sense of fervour and mounting excitement. The ordeal was nearly over.

* * *

Within a few days of the results having been made public, we were marched to the Clothing Stores to be measured for the new uniforms that we would wear after leaving boys’ service. The same little tailor who had originally measured us for our first uniforms when we were in ITS was still in attendance at the Clothing Store. To youngsters like us, the 15 or 16 life-changing months that we’d spent at St. Athan since we’d last seen him might have seemed like an eon, but to him it was probably nothing at all, since he had more than likely spent a major portion of his working life in the same occupation at that very same place. He was happy in his work, joking and chatting with us as we came to him one at a time, trying on our brand new “T63” Best Blue uniform and then the battledress-style Working Blue, both of which smelled of mothballs. All the while, we were admiring ourselves in the full-length mirror as he made small marks in the various places where the uniforms needed to be taken in or turned up. Like everyone else, I had received my new badges of rank from one of the Clothing Store clerks at the same time that they loaded me up with the new uniforms. They were still in my left hand when it was my turn to see the tailor, but he took four of them from me and stuffed two into a pocket in each of the new uniforms. These small two-by-three-inch rectangular pieces of blue felt cloth, on each of which was embroidered a two-bladed propeller in light blue silk, would be sewn onto the sleeves as part of the alteration process. I still had two more LAC badges remaining from the six that I’d been given, but I would have to sew these onto my greatcoat myself, after the passing-out parade.

* * *

As we of the rank and file were kept busy cramming as much knowledge as possible into our heads during the approach of the Finals, a gentlemanly tussle had been taking place at a slightly higher level. It was time for the permanent staff to select the 29th Entry’s Flight Sergeant Boy—the person on whom they would bestow the honour of Parade Commander for the graduation ceremony. Eric Critchley, our own 3 Squadron Sergeant Boy, was one of the four contenders, as was Eugene Gilkes, the 4 Squadron Sergeant Boy. No. 1 Wing provided its two hopefuls in the persons of Sergeant Boy Stannard and Sergeant Boy Foster.

Critchley was of medium build, contrasted with Gilkes who was much bigger and of better build than any of the other entry members. This was noticeable right from the beginning, when the Clothing Store had initially been unable to provide him with a uniform that would fit his large frame. For a few days, during our time in ITS, he was obliged to go around dressed in denims until a uniform could be specially ordered for him. Eugene was smart and excelled in his training as a Navigational Instrument Mechanic.

Becoming a Sergeant Boy was no easy task because, in addition to academic excellence, it also required a perpetually faultless turnout, which meant always appearing in a well-pressed uniform, gleaming buttons and shining boots. Not only that, but his disciplinary record had to be spotless. No one who had spent any time on jankers could aspire to be a Sergeant Boy. In short, Eugene Gilkes well and truly earned his stripes, as did the three other challengers for promotion to Flight Sergeant Boy.

Now it came down to the four of them in the “shout-off’ that would decide who would receive the coveted rank of Flight Sergeant Boy. Sergeant Boy Gilkes’s large frame and deep chest worked to his advantage and he won the day by out-shouting the other three candidates into submission. So, now that we had our Flight Sergeant Boy, the parade rehearsals began in earnest. In fact, that’s all that we had left to do, except for regular sessions of P.E. and of course the daily route marches—on the double.

As the first order of business, in preparation for the passing-out parade, we were issued with white webbing—a belt, bayonet frog and rifle sling, all of which had served in previous passing-out parades. We were also issued with a bayonet scabbard that fitted into the bayonet frog. The webbing items were all in need of white blanco and the scabbard badly needed one or two coats of black paint. Blancoing the webbing, polishing its brasses and painting the bayonet scabbard filled in some of the time between parade rehearsals. And, as if that wasn’t enough bull to be getting on with, there were always our parade boots to be spit-and-polished, buttons and badges on our best blue to be cleaned to a dazzling sparkle, and long periods in the ironing room spent adding razor-like sharpness to the creases on our best blue uniforms and greatcoats. Ordinarily, all of this bulling would have been a huge chore, but because it was for our very own passing-out parade, the work was a labour of love. I now began to understand that the reluctance of the previous entries to set their bull-boys to work on these menial tasks wasn’t so much the paranoia that I’d originally assumed, but was an extension of the passing-out parade ritual itself. I relished every moment spent endowing the webbing with a virginally white coating of blanco, took pride in the sharpness of the creases in my uniform and admired my distorted reflection in the mirror-like shine on the boots that I would wear for the parade.

CHAPTER 12

The Passing-Out Parade

W
e rehearsed for the passing-out parade every weekday during the course of the next few weeks, beginning from when we learned the results of our Finals. The gravel on the Square became intimately familiar, as we incessantly crunched around on it. For most of the rehearsals, we drew rifles and “pig-sticker” bayonets from the Armoury. The pig-stickers didn’t look too impressive, since they were little more than 6-inch long sharpened steel spikes, but they fulfilled a purpose by enabling us to practise rifle drill with fixed bayonets. If nothing else, this helped to endow us with the ability to avoid stabbing fellow entry-members, or ourselves, during the actual parade. But before drawing rifles from the Armoury for the first rehearsal, we were put through the “Sizing” drill.

Sizing was necessary because, much to the distress of drill instructors and those of like mind, individual humans aren’t all made the same height. And, if it were left to pure chance, the height profile of a formation of men would have a distinctly ragged appearance. Happily for the drill instructors, someone solved this irritating little problem by inventing a peculiar ritual known as Sizing. The sole object of Sizing is to transform the ragged appearance into a thing of beauty—at least in their eyes.

And so, on the first day of rehearsals, as we stood at attention in flights on the parade ground, our Squadron Commander, Sergeant Boy Eric Critchley, drew in a deep breath and commanded, “Squadron will size!”

Immediately our Flight Commander, Corporal Boy Spinks, executed a smart about turn and, now facing us, yelled an order that was echoed by the other flight commanders: “Flight, tallest on the right, shortest on the left, in single rank, size!”

The Sizing exercise took up several minutes, during which we initially broke ranks before taking our place in a single long line according our height. The single rank was then put through a series of intricate manoeuvres that ended up with a new three-rank formation, in which the very tallest of our members now occupied the end positions and the very shortest found themselves at the midway point. Those of us who were of varying degrees of intermediate height found ourselves graduated according to our stature. This was done in such a way that if an imaginary line touching the tops of our heads had been drawn from one end of the flight to the other, it would have traced a shallow concave curve. This was the sought-after result of the sizing drill and having achieved it, we were instructed to memorise our individual positions in the formation, relative to that of our immediate neighbours on both left and right. This was to be our permanent position in the flight, throughout all of the upcoming rehearsals and for the passing-out parade itself.