Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

My experience of the Signals with Uncle was at the end of the 50s and very early 60s. I'm intrigued by some of the descriptions above about his lab = mead, pets refuge, etc, which I have no recollection of at all; I really only encountered him (and Chlorine) through the Signals. I also have no recollection about passing Morse tests. For my own part, I joined the Signals not out of technical interest or ability, but because the mainstream CCF was so boring – all that parade-ground drill, quite stupid – whereas there was a delightfully anarchist feel to the Signals. My strongest memories are of Signals camps – once in heath country in (I think) Hampshire rather than the South Downs, where our job was to provide communications for the main body of CCF. We had fun laying miles of telephone cable, which meant very small teams moving out over the landscape in very autonomous ways – and I first got horrendous sunburn on my arms, for which we had nothing to treat them with, and then wore my army boots out completely, so that the soles literally split into two halves, with nails coming up under my feet! The other camp was much odder – Uncle invited me, on my own, to go camping at the end of the summer holidays. I remember my family being very worried whether to agree or not, but did let me go, and CFK and I tramped around somewhere in Sussex and ate pigs' trotters. He never made the slightest inappropriate move; I think that 'undisciplined' exterior hid a very highly disciplined interior man. And as for nicknames, mine, for reasons never explained or understood, was Coypu!

keibat wrote: Sat Jul 11, 2020 4:37 pm My strongest memories are of Signals camps – once in heath country in (I think) Hampshire rather than the South Downs, where our job was to provide communications for the main body of CCF.

And as for nicknames, mine, for reasons never explained or understood, was Coypu!

I would imagine that you were at either Bordon or Longmoor Military Camps on the A3 near Liphook and Liss. They are now closed but provided 4000+ acres of training grounds including vast areas of heathland. They were, in fact, the ideal place to play soldiers and were used by the Royal Navy to provide Individual Pre-deployment Training to matelots going off to serve ashore in those major maritime powers of Iraq and Afghanistan earlier in the century. I have to say it was enormous fun: I was given a vehicle, a driver, a section comprising mainly medics, plus hundreds of rounds of blank ammunition and a slack handful of smoke grenades, and sent off with a map to drive around dealing with whatever incident they decided to throw at us. I would imagine it was exactly like a CCF camp; indeed it seems just the sort of thing my daughter does with her CCF. As for the weather - it was July and boiling hot one day and absolutely bucketing the next; I've never been so wet and had to use my spare teabag, the only dry thing I had as it lived in a sealed compartment on top of my issue thermos, to try and dry my glasses. Still, allowed us to spend the evening in the camp bar rather than conducting the scheduled night exercise!

As for being named Coypu - not from Norfolk perhaps?

Not from Norfolk - a Yorkshireman from the flat parts of the East Riding. I have no idea at all why he called me Coypu!

loringa wrote: Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:02 am As for the weather - it was July and boiling hot one day and absolutely bucketing the next; I've never been so wet and had to use my spare teabag, the only dry thing I had as it lived in a sealed compartment on top of my issue thermos, to try and dry my glasses. Still, allowed us to spend the evening in the camp bar rather than conducting the scheduled night exercise!

As for being named Coypu - not from Norfolk perhaps?

At least you missed the "Arduous Training" camps which were cold (well, icy) and w e t ! How I got inveigled into that I don't know but it was excellent training for when I left CH and my leader in Norway was seconded from "Hereford College". Standard pack was 120 to 130lbs and the introductory march was 10 hours straight off! Hot - 124*F and 98% humidity atthe met station to 24*F and gale force winds 4 hours later.

Coypu? Everyone got a name except for one not so strong Col A boy (not me) whose name suited him.

Foureyes wrote: Fri May 15, 2020 5:17 am "He also had expressive nicknames for almost all the boys whom he knew. These included Blossom, Henscold, Berkshire, Liz, Fuffinch, Percival, Gubbins, Weasel and Cow (for his senior sergeant, whom he greatly respected)."

One name I recall was 'Death' which apparently was due to the boy's jet black hair and very pale face. Most of his names for boys were both amusing and apt, but I thought that one a trifle cruel.

He also had weird names for his dogs. Two I recall were 'Chlorine' - which presumably related to the gas, but why I never knew - and 'Hebben' whose origins were totally obscure (to me, at any rate).

David

Yes, I, for my sins, am Henscold. To this day I use it as a Username/Pseudonym.