Rommel_ Gunner Who__ A Confrontation in - Spike Milligan [1]
Whatever happened to Poetry?
Algeria
The ground was like rocks. The nights were rent with gunners groaning, swearing, twisting, turning and revolving in their tents.
Temperatures fluctuated. You went to sleep on a warm evening, by dawn it dropped to freezing. We had to break our tents with hammers to get out. Dawn widdles caused frost bitten appendages, the screams! “Help, I’m dying of indecent exposure!” We solved the problem. I stuffed my Gas cape with paper and made a mattress. Gunner Forest wrapped old Daily Mirrors round his body, “I always wanted to be in the News,” he said, and fainted. Others dug holes to accommodate hips and shoulders.
At night we wore every bit of clothing we had, then we rolled ourselves into four blankets. “We look nine months gone,” said Edgington. “Any advance on nine,” I cried.
Confined to Camp
It is night, Gunner Simpson is darning something which is four fifths hole and one fifth sock, “ I wonder when they’ll let us into Algiers.”
“You gettin’ randy then?” says Gunner White, “because, we’ve all had our last shag for a long time.”
“Are there French birds in Algiers?”
“Yer. They’re red ‘ot. Cert Crumpet.”
“You shagged one then?”
We slept warmly, but had overlooked the need to commune with nature, it took frantic searching through layers of clothing to locate one’s willy, some never did and had to sleep with a damp leg. Gunner Maunders solved the problem! He slid a four foot length of bicycle inner tube over his willy, secured it round his waist with string, he just had to stand and let go. Jealous, Gunner White sabotaged it. As Maunders slept, fiend White tied knots in the bottom of the tube.
“No, but my dad told me abaht ‘em in the first world woer.”
“They’re not the same ones?”
One by one the soldiers would fall asleep. I lay awake, thinking, dreaming young man’s dreams, jazz music would go through my head, I could see myself as Bunny Berrigan playing chorus after brilliant chorus in front of a big band surrounded by admiring dancers. Suddenly, without warning, ‘Strainer’ Jones lets off with a thunderous postern blast, he had us all out of the tent in ten seconds flat.
One freezing dawn we were awakened by a Lockheed Lightning repeatedly roaring over our camp. “Go and ask that bastard if he’s going by road,” says Edgington. I got outside just as the plane made another drive. I shouted “Hope you crash you noisy bastard,” the plane raced seaward, hit the water and exploded. I was stunned. The gunners emptied from their tents to watch the flames burning on the sea. “Poor Sod,” said a Gunner, and he was right. Reveille was sounding. “Listen,” said Edgington cupping an ear, “they’re playing our tune.”
My day, by Gunner Milligan
Dear Diary, oh what a morning it’s been.
06:30
REVEILLE: we were annoyed.
07:30
BREAKFAST: Oh yum yum.
09:00
1st PARADE: Good morning darling!
09:15
DAILY TASK: Who me?
13:00
LUNCH: More boiled shit. Oh yum yum.
14:15
2nd PARADE: Haven’t we met before?
14:30
TASKS: I’ve got back-ache Sarge.
16:45
FALL OUT: Crash.
18:00
GUARD MOUNTING: Quick. Under the bed!
A word about the food. Crap. Hard biscuits, Soya Links, Bully Beef, jam, tea, every day, for all meals. The first weeks were spent route marching. The Army works like this. If a man dies when you hang him, keep hanging him until he gets used to it. Marches were made tolerable by Major Chater Jack↓ insisting we sing.
≡ Our Battery Commander.
A message would pass down the column: “Gunners Milligan, Edgington, White and Devine forward!” We’d gain the head of the column and to the tune of Vive la Compagnie, we’d sing:
SOLO:
The might of the nation was wielded by one
OMNES:
Vive la Joe Stalin!
SOLO:
He isn’t half knockin’ the shit from the Hun!
OMNES:
Vive la Joe Stalin…etc.
We were young, we were enjoying the new adventure, ninety-nine per cent of the lads had never been abroad, and this was a bonus in their lives even though it took a war to give it. Chalky White invented a new sound, on the first beat of the march you crashed your foot down, for the next