I was amongst the select National Servicemen who went to Christmas Island in about June 1956, an advance party were there ahead of our rented Greek Troopship named the Charlton Star. We boarded the Troopship at Southampton and sailed to the Azores, the Panama, Hawaii and then to Christmas Island, it took  14 days.  In our group were many National Servicemen who had been deferred conscription because of civilian training, the guy who laid out the airfield was a trained land surveyor, and the guy that did the final grade with the BK grader was a National Service person.  When we arrived, the advance party who had raided the local Gilbertese store and bought up all the bright cotton cloth greeted us on the beach with colourful loin clothes and boots and puttees, like the film South Pacific. 

The 55 Field Squadron RE had been in Korea and had gone to Japan for R&R and were on their way home to UK when the boat was turned around in the Indian Ocean and they were sent to Christmas Island, they were surely a pissed off group of soldiers.  The Americans had just evacuated S.P.A.L. at the end of the Island  (South Pacific Airlines). They had been paid two million by the UK Govt.  They were using flying boats to go San Francisco to Tahiti with Christmas Island being the stop over and refuel.  We grabbed the Evinrude outboard and built an 8-foot dinghy with plywood from a stolen prefab building, which we used in the Lagoon.  S.P.A.L. was later used as an R&R place for exhausted personnel.

I am surprised that no one has shown up from this original time span.  We had loads of RE, Air force and Civvies.  I have a flag that they sold us as a souvenir and an Operation Grapple booklet.

I am quite disgusted with the operation of the Veterans Association; they have no database so that we can link up with Old Soldiers.

When my time was just about up, in July 1957, they paraded us all and asked for volunteers to stay on as they were going to extend the exercise, they said that they were now prepared to pay an Overseas Allowance, someone asked if it would be backdated and the answer was no, not one person volunteered.

We were pretty well shat on at Christmas Island, no money, National Service men were lowly paid (I got an additional sixpence a day on being promoted to L/Cpl, a bar of chocolate) and most of the regulars were either married or else drank it away.  We had no personal cameras on the island, my buddy had one later in the exercise and he could only print 2"x2" black and whites.  I have several of these and I will get copies for you later, my wife complained that all we photographed was Plant Equipment.  At the time the song "Would you like to spend Christmas on Christmas Island" came out and we had "Record Roundup" beamed to us but we had no radios whatsoever, all a farce.  When I flew home via Fiji, Australia, Singapore, Calcutta, Karachi, Bagdad and Brindisi and then Stanstead on a service called Skyways, I had only 10 pounds to my name, what a wasted opportunity. It took 10 days.

Amongst the personnel were Major Bean C/O, Captain Roberts who I believe is alive and well in Tunbridge Wells, Lt. Neis and a WO11 named Seymour, a lovely man who we nicknamed Davey Crockett, a Sgt Carey. A Cpl. Birchell, a Cpl. Tony Seagy ( from Malta), and a Cpl. Holiday, all were full timers, I had a great friend, a  L/Cpl Neal Sutcliffe who I would dearly like to make contact with and a Sapper named Duggy who signed on for National Service but wanted to transfer to the Engineers so he signed on for three years and finished with 21 years so he could get some leave. His mother was the wife of the General Manager of Blaw Knox.

The land Crabs which were tied to pieces of string were made pets.  Coconuts were painted and attached with UK addresses and sent First Class Mail to relatives.  The Navy introduced Bed Bugs so I was told to collect DDT and mix it with AVGAS that was loaded onto the Auster spotter plane and sprayed over the Island, we had no idea how  dangerous this stuff was so we opened our arms as it flew over and we were coated with white spray, a bit like Calamine Lotion.

As I/C Troop and Equipment allocation, I was able to send people to work early so as to miss parade, a Sapper Williams drove a truck mounted Lorraine crane and turned it over into a ditch, I was charged with “knowing that he did not have a driving license”,  I told the S/S Seymour that Part two orders early on said that no tests would be performed and that people who could drive could do so,  I was marched in and the charge was changed to “knowing that he was not competent” to which I responded that the Troop Lt Neiss was aware of this happening so the charge was dismissed, what a load of shits.

The cement came in 40 gallon drums and one day the higher ups decided that we would attempt to build a cement soil road, we mixed the cement with the Lagoon Mud, the Gilbertese labourers used Palm Frond ends to flick the cement around, and then we rolled it up and down with the graders and used the Wobbly Wheel Rollers and water spray to consolidate it, the Lt. Col. was thrilled.  However at about 3.00pm it Monsooned and the whole road was under water, nobody had warned the Troops in the field so the drove through the water.  Next day we had concrete all over the place.

We had loads of Tenants Lager in the shape of the old Zebro black lead cans which was causing sickness so they decided to bury it all, our Engineer lads dug a huge pit and buried it but not until they had got royally drunk and finished up in the Hospital.

One of the cooks decided that they could break into the beer storage tent and only his feet were sticking out, the Provo were onto this and all his mates had made off.  The Provo were grabbing his legs and pulling him out and he thought that it was his comrades, he shouted, "Stop it you silly sods".

At the end of the first two drops, the Island went quiet and most of the troops were sent home, I was kept back and became I/C of Airfield maintenance, a long and boring six months.   A good story, we had eight Tar Boilers lined up at the Airfield, so one day I decided to fire one up, well it rained and the water caused the tar to bubble and it boiled over catching the rubber tired wheel which tipped and in the end all eight were well alight, the RAF fire crew arrived and what a balls up that was.

My wife and I were in Hawaii twelve years ago and we thought of flying on to Christmas Island but the flight left on a Tuesday and stayed for eight days so we turned it down, maybe for the good of memories,  we were lucky I think that the nearest explosion was on Johnson Island so we were not exposed to radiation.

I have a cousins husband in Vancouver, named Reg Hayler who told me of later drops off the Island.

Its all a long time ago.

Any friends are welcome to contact me in Vancouver Canada, we come over to UK nearly every year.

Goodnight  tomjeanpierce@telus.net   or tomjeanpierce@aol.com