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George Spenceley relives his army training days in the 1950's and the many friends and memories he recalls
During army training at Oswestry we were subjected to a selection examination and somehow I was selected to be a radio operator. To this day I can't think why unless it was because I could ride a motorbike and had experience in driving a tractor.
For a couple of hours every day we radio operators would go out into the Welsh countryside and there we'd pass messages to each other over the air waves. This went on until such time as they decided that we had enough experience.
We were then taught the procedure for passing radio signals to the guns. This was to be our job in the future. A couple of weeks into my training I was ordered to report to the office and was then sent to the Queen Victoria Hospital for a chest X-ray.
I was told that I had some scarring on my lungs and the doctor asked if I'd had any sort of chest compliant in the past but I couldn't remember anything.
'Well according to your X-ray plates you've had pneumonia or rheumatic fever, it's very unlikely that you will be able carry on with your training'. I was shocked, no one had said that I'd had those illnesses in the past.
I was taken off all duties and was expecting to be kicked out of the army. That didn't last long for the report came through that all was well and I was OK.
The next day I was in the thick of it on cookhouse fatigues, washing pots and pans and hundreds of cutlery. I wasn't alone as other lads were there too. The day after that I was spud bashing, four or five sacks of potatoes had to be peeled by hand ready for the next day's meals.
The amusing thing was that although we all hated the monotonous job of peeling 'tatties' we agreed it was better than marching on the parade ground.
George Spenceley, 2002
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