The Vindi Bridge

[Michael Bates]

Yes there may be 3 i belong to the central branch as i was at 5hvindi july-sept 66

[Denis O'Shea]

Hi Gordon my thoughts were the same but without being in the army I probably would not have got the opportunity to join the MN it was being in the Signals that led me down that path and seeing the ships transiting to canal. Rgds Den

[j.sabourn]

Denis , I assume you are talking about your national service re- army time. ? I Left school in 1952 one of my school chums exactly the same age and birthday as me. He Joined the post office as a telegram boy and was long enough there to get his motorbike. I assume then he signed up for National Service or May have joined the regular army at 18. However about 1962 which would have made him about 25 I bumped in to him and his German wife at a party in the UK. He talked all posh to what I remembered and asked him where he got the accent. He was a sergeant major in the Royal Corps of Signals and stationed in Germany with the BAOR . Now that I call rapid promotion as Fouro thinks 6 years is to short to rise from private to Colonel in wartime. I think promotion in the Russian army is very rapid these days , they should be paying more roubles as danger money especially to general officers or they will soon be drying up. I assume you got the signaling bug in the army ? Cheers JS

[Denis O'Shea]

#53. Yes John I was conscripted into the Royal Corp of Signals Jan 15th 1953 and went to Catterick camp which was the main signals camp for your first month of infantry training mainly square bashing ready for passing out parade, you then went to different camps for the trade you had been selected for, mine was Richmond for radio operating for four months then in my case shipped out to Egypt and so to Fayed bottom end of little Bitter lake. I left Egypt on the 10th JULY 1955 and demobbed on the 15th and returned to my previous employment which was steel erector having just finished my training before I was hijacked for my NS, after 2 years I went to radio college to study for my PMG and so began my MN career. Den PS. I only reached the rank of Corporal during my time which I obtained during my time in Egypt. Den

[j.sabourn]

Ships, tanks and humans that pass in the night, passed through the canal late 1953 for the first of many times bound from Australia to Purfleet on the Thames with sugar. Then down to South America with coal from Cardiff just before Xmas 53 . Assume when you say Richmond that is in Yorkshire and not Surrey. Cheers JS

[Denis O'Shea]

Yes John Yorkshire, just noticed I said Fayed at bottom of Bitter lakes should have been Kabret. Den