Mussolini_ His Part in My Downfall - Spike Milligan [14]
“They’re letting me out tomorrow,” says Jamie.
“You going back to your unit?”
“No, I’m going before a medical board, they’re going to downgrade me.”
“You lucky sod.”
“Aye, I don’t think I’d like any more fighting, I should have stayed at home.”
So ended Jamie Notam’s dream of high adventure. I wonder what happened to him.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1943
I’m up and about, I’m OK, I’m cured, I’m normal again, I feel fine, I’m ready to be killed again, he’s fit, send him back, etc. etc. Yes. The Scots doctor on his rounds.
“So you’re leaving us, Mirrigen.”
“Yes, sir.”
“How do you feel?”
“Very ill, sir, very, very, very ill.”
He smiles. “Well, Mirrigen, all good things come to an end.”
Was I the good thing? Help!! Two new patients arrive, and are dumped in the bed each side. Both are coughing like consumptives, what luck, if I hang around I might get it. Shall I kiss one? I wonder where the Battery are and what they are doing, going Bang! I suppose. There is a barber among the patients, Rifleman Houseman.
“Anyone want a haircut?”
There is no reply.
“Free,” he adds, and is knocked down in the rush. I let him loose on my head, when he showed me the result in the mirror, I nearly fainted.
“Howzat?” he said.
“Out,” I replied.
My head looked like someone had set it on fire.
“It was all for free,” explained Rifleman Houseman.
BRILLIANT RECOVERY FROM SANDFLY FEVER BY HUMBLE L/BOMBARDIER
So the headlines should have run, all I got was a Lance-Corporal suffering from incurable stupidity, who said, “Bombardier Millington?”
“That’s almost me,” I said.
“You are to be discharged tomorrow.”
“I understand that my name is now Millington and I am to be discharged as fit.”
“Yes, RTU*.”
≡ Return to Unit.
RTU? That had me, so I sang it to a Novello tune ‘RTU again whenever spring breaks through.’ (Groans).
He blinked and made me sign a piece of paper that in as many words said, “We have tried to kill this man but failed.”
“You will be ready by 0830 hours and take the unexpired portion of your day’s rations.”
Unexpired rations? The mind boggled. I started a series of farewells and looked deeply into the eyes of all the nurses with a look that said quite positively, “You’re lucky I never screwed you,” and they looked back with a smile that said, “When you’ve been promoted to Captain, knock three times.”
OCTOBER 1, 1943
It’s a mixed day, a souffle of sun and cloud. Outside the 76th General a 3-tonner truck is waiting like a wagon at the Knacker’s Yard. A short squat driver with a squint in his left eye ‘finds’ and calls our names out from a bit of tacky paper. “Lance-Bombardier Mirrigan?”
“Yes, that’s me,” I said. “Lance-Bombardier Mirrigan.”
He calls out the names of several more soldiers of the King, who at the sight of them would abidicate. I enquire where we are being taken.
“Corps Reinforcement Camp.” He pronounced the word ‘Corpse’. An Omen.
We all climb over the back of the tailboard, there’s no roof, only the supporting struts. So started a journey of much boredom. Come, let us start.
I look at the vacant stares of my travelling companions, all infantry men, they have my sympathy. We drove for half an hour, during which they never said a word.
“Like a fag,” I said to one.
“Ta,” he says.
That’s half his vocabulary gone, I thought. He was Irish. The roads are tired and dusty, tanks have ground away the surface, after half an hour we pass through Battapaglia.
“We’re going South!” I said.
Still no sign of animation from my companions. The buildings we pass are all much like I originally described, the colours usually white, pale blue, deep blue, sometimes a light pink, clusters of shops, small one-man affairs, all looking pretty run down and shabby. There are goods for sale but none luxury. There’s bread, vegetables, seasonal fruit, apples, walnuts, grapes, figs; ‘Casa de Scarpa’ show a poor variety of shoes, looking very pre-1939, what was I talking about? I was a pre-1920 model myself.
What was I doing in this war? it’s