Dearest Jane... (3 page)

Let’s go back now and meet the young, bachelor Roger as a soldier abroad – latterly as a prisoner of war. From the late 1930s, my father’s letters home to his own parents and others illuminate this key period of his story.

In July 1937, Roger was a twenty-seven year-old officer in the Coldstream Guards, embarking on his first overseas assignment.

He set sail in ‘a small white vessel’ of the British India Line. In his earliest existing letter home, he describes the ship passing smoothly through the Bay of Biscay, a beautiful dawn as they sailed into Gibraltar and how, in Malta, he was captivated by the island and its people. His final destination was Alexandria in Egypt.

His battalion had been dispatched to the Middle East on a peace mission to curb and contain the civil unrest and terrorism, rife in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine. At the core of the conflict was the resentment and anger of resident Arabs at the waves of Jewish immigrants arriving as they fled persecution in Europe.

Roger was English by birth and in taste and habit. Committed to the life of a professional soldier – a career initiated by his father who regarded him as a somewhat shambolic character who could only benefit from military discipline – Roger did not have the instincts or outlook of an adventurer. He responded with great pleasure to the charms of civilized watering holes in Europe, but ultimately he was at his happiest and most at ease in his own country. I will not say ‘at home’ as that was a place of only intermittent enjoyment for him, controlled as it was by a mother for whom warmth meant something generated from a heater.

His letters home from this period introduce us to some of the qualities that Roger later distilled into his epistles to his children. Restless and bored in the company of anyone who took themselves too seriously, he yawns at the tedium he is subject to: the Royal Egyptian Yacht club, dreary guests at formal social occasions, pompous and inefficient Army officers, aggressive nationalists, political fanatics . . . dictators. All could be laughed at – along with himself – sometimes lightly, at other times with a sharp twist of the lemon.

Roger’s easy capacity for friendship was always coupled with a need for regular retreat into solitude. Company was all well and good, but he relished quiet periods in which to read, reflect and enjoy his own thoughts. Sometimes, though, it is not the solace of solitude but loneliness which percolates through those letters. There is no mention of a girlfriend, significant or otherwise. Maybe he just chose not to permit any girls to dance across the pages of letters to his parents.

Roger was not constrained by the stiff upper lip of his generation. He was not inhibited in expressing his feelings about unpleasant, uncomfortable or fearful experiences; and the period he served in Egypt and Palestine provided its share of them. Finding himself in a region of terrorist attacks, bombs, shoot-outs, assassinations and road ambushes, there was more than a chance that Roger might not have survived to tell these tales. Addressing the downside of things, sympathetically, mischievously or caustically, added further spice to his letters to his mother, father and other relations.

The weather here is perfect – very hot and sunny with a pleasant sea breeze and not too cool at night either. I have left off my vests and never wear a waistcoat before dusk.

The chief trouble is the mass attack by flies and bugs; every Wednesday is a day set apart for de-bugging every conceivable article of furniture and apparel and even so they continue to thrive.

At present Alexandria is rather like Le Touquet in mid-winter – all the amusing places closed till the spring – but the locals are very hospitable and entertain a good deal. Never have I seen people drink more; apparently the climate is suitable for soaking and you can certainly put down a packet here without any ill-effect.

Would you like some Jaffa oranges? Do let me know and I’ll send you some after the Christmas rush. I’ve sent off some Turkish Delight but God knows if it will ever get there, they’re so hopelessly inefficient here.

Social and recreational life in Alexandria occupied the time whilst awaiting orders, as Roger told his father, Pop, in a number of letters:

We’ve been pretty tense and anxious lately but on the whole life is quite enjoyable. I sail most afternoons in the harbour, being a very nautical and seamanlike member of the Royal Egyptian Yacht Club – extremely smart and exclusive (I don’t think). We usually go out in a boat which holds four or five people (it’s called a ‘Fairy’ I believe) and cruise round the harbour watching the boats come in and out and meeting the Imperial Airways Seaplanes. It’s usually rather rough outside the harbour so I find I enjoy myself more if I exercise a certain discretion and refrain from committing myself to the mercy of the waves and my own very limited nautical abilities. There are races in the harbour three days a week and although I sometimes take an extremely minor part as portion of the crew in these events, I find them rather a strain owing to the intense seriousness with which they are taken by the local yachtsmen.

My social outings have been severely limited – I’m afraid I’m not a popular success with the local ‘gens chics’. However, I toiled off to a very stiff lunch party the other day (invitation card 6” × 4”) and paid for my temerity by undergoing a three-hour ordeal sandwiched between two of the dreariest bores I’ve ever met. One of them would lean across to talk to me and perspired most liberally on to my plate. I nearly covered my food with my handkerchief whenever I thought he was going to address me.

Best love,

Roger

I went up to Cairo this week to do some work there; it’s far worse than here, very much hotter and terribly dry and dusty. The Nile has reached a record height and people are beginning to get nervous of a flood. This is really an extraordinary country: even at the main bookstall at Cairo Central Station it is quite impossible to buy anything but literature of a highly pornographic description!

Best love,

Roger

I’m just off to motor down to Moascar (military garrison) about two hundred and twenty miles away in the desert. I’m not taking the Vauxhall as I know it would never make it on the ghastly roads out here, and it is far too valuable to me for running about town. I leave at midday in an Austin 7 (military) and drive from the Canal road to the Pyramids (about 120 miles) and I’ll spend the night out there in the open. The next day, I leave the road and drive cross country over the desert, my only guide being a compass whose accuracy has been more than questionable since a cow stood on it at Sandhurst! I expect the last 100 miles will have to be done at about 10 mph and I shall be lucky if I don’t stick in the soft sand. The country is hideous the whole way except for occasional bursts of wild flowers.

I went for a picnic with some pretty tiresome girls at Aboukir Bay, a most lovely place for bathing and sailing, and prawns the size of small lobsters. I very rapidly tired of the party and spent the day with some native fishermen who were far more amusing and rather better mannered. I think I shall have to hire a very small boat next summer and just cruise quietly about in it.

Best love,

Roger

An awful dinner party last week – 34 people and I sat next to a fabulously wealthy and exceedingly vulgar old bitch who was in the back row of the chorus of a Greek cabaret before marrying the richest man in Egypt. I told her a lot of shocking lies and asked her to come on a cruise on my 100-ton yacht to the Aegean Islands; she has accepted and is I think looking forward to it.

Best love,

Roger

There is not much to do in the evenings here – but there are good places where you can eat yourself silly on excellent food for about half a crown; the cinemas are indifferent and all the films are cut and they adhere to the odious French habit of having a long interval in the middle of the big film. Thank God for Penguin Books!’

Best love,

Roger

Then Roger found himself caught up in a modern Battle of Jericho. There were plenty of military challenges in the area. When my father later described his days in Palestine to me, it was clear that over and above the conflict, he personally liked both Jews and Arabs for their different qualities, not least in the Arabs’ readiness to always laugh at a joke
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Dear Pop,

I have just returned from a short trip to Jericho where we were dispatched to restore order and re-establish the police who have been turned out by the rebels over the last three months.

We had another of those bloody night drives – a convoy a mile long, leaving billets at 2.45 a.m. and getting to Jericho at 9 a.m. I thoroughly enjoyed it: You go down a twisting, precipitous road with the hills rising sharply up on either side. The whole 25 miles can have changed very little since biblical times and the only signs of modern civilisation were the ashes of burnt out Jew lorries, driven up without escort from the Dead Sea Potash Company and meeting with the inevitable fate on what must be the world’s best road for ambushes.

Bethany is a charming place, without any of the unfortunate traces of tourist-catching vulgarity that mars so many places in Jerusalem.

After 20 miles or so downhill, we reached the Dead Sea, with Jericho in the distance. It’s a very small town, appalling hot and stuffy in summer and full of mosquitoes – with plenty of trees and surrounded by banana groves. The inhabitants are mainly of Sudanese extraction but periodically the place gets overrun by the gangs who come down from the hills and raise hell.

We met with very little opposition but a few natives were shot trying to break the cordon. British HQ was established at the Jordan Hotel, kept by a club-footed Greek whose trade has been ruined by lack of tourists and non-paying gangsters. I enjoyed my stay there as I had my first night in a bed since we left Alexandria. The bugs were rather more annoying than usual and all had to swallow quinine every day to avoid malaria.

One afternoon there, an old Arab rode into our HQ on his donkey and asked if we could spare him some iodine for a couple of scratches. On examination, we found six bullet holes right through him, all stinking and gangrenous; apparently the poor old boy had been shot up about two days before by an aeroplane which also polished off about fifty of his goats.

God knows how long we shall be out here – I should imagine about another six months. I don’t mind living in mild discomfort but its rather boring, never getting out of uniform, having no books to read, and never seeing anyone at all except soldiers.

The more I see of the Palestine Police, the more I realise how incredibly idle and indisciplined they are. They cause us endless trouble by letting all their rifles get stolen, spreading secret information and getting pissed and shooting up harmless people.

The more I see of the Army on semi-active service, the more hopelessly inefficient they seem to be: thank God there wasn’t a war! Some of the British regiments out here are absolute jokes, like the Ws who have lost five trucks, several Lewis guns, shot up their own patrols and run like Hell whenever they meet an armed gang of more than one. Then there are the KO who are nothing more than an armed gang themselves and the RS who are absolute savages. The Buffs and Black Watch, though, are both first class as are the 11th Hussars.

Best love,

Roger

‘Thank God there wasn’t a war’! Oh my dearest father, don’t hold your breath
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This letter to his sister Joan indulges in one or two more gentle pleasures beyond the debris and squalor of poverty and strife in Palestine
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I rather enjoyed Jerusalem, firstly because it was mildly exciting, secondly because the Old City is a most intriguing place, partly fascinating and beautiful, partly squalid and repellent. Some of the Arab hovels I went into were deep in excreta, with human beings, goats, donkeys and chickens all squatting silently and miserably in the same room; once or twice I’ve had to light my pipe to avoid being sick. On the other hand, some of the convents and hospices are beautifully clean and very attractive indeed and run by the most delightful people. I lived in a very high building on the edge of the city wall and at five o’clock in the morning, with the sun rising beyond it, it was a very beautiful sight, especially as there was complete quiet owing to the curfew. Most of the city has altered but little since Our Lord’s time; Pontius Pilate’s house can still be seen.

I am at billets in Ramleh at present and would be very comfortable if the electric light hadn’t been cut off and if either the bath or the lavatory worked. There is a lovely view across the plain to the hills which seem to change colour every hour of the day.

I caught a big chameleon here and kept it for a day or two. They are very tame and settle down in no time. I let this one go when I went off to Jaffa for four days work.

It’s rather dull when one’s not working here as you can’t leave camp at all or you are likely to get kidnapped or shot.

The following letters bring up all kinds of intriguing points: the state of my father’s wardrobe, terrorist attacks, British officers misbehaving . . . the deteriorating world situation
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Life continues its uneventful round out here: I haven’t been outside the city traffic checks for nine weeks and my work doesn’t seem to get any less. We’re all waiting anxiously for the Government policy to be outlined and that may give us some idea of the duration of our visit here. As we were originally prepared for a two-month visit, I only brought very few clothes here and I am attending social functions among the Jerusalem elite in grey flannel trousers with a patched seat and a coat that was donned with pride for the first occasion in my Sandhurst days.

Forty Arabs were blown up just down the road last week by Jews who had placed a bomb in the Arab market, skilfully concealed in a basket of carrots. One unfortunate gentleman was squatting on the basket when the bomb blew up and was completely disintegrated except for his legs which were paraded up and down the street all that day by his female relatives, accompanied by piercing and incessant lamentations. The same night, an infernal machine, which would have almost destroyed Jerusalem, was discovered on a roof by a British policeman who luckily heard the machine ticking. Most of the Arab assassinations are now done by boys under fourteen who are handed the weapon and shown the quarry by a terrorist.