MY FATHER VICTOR DOUGLAS RAY PART 2: THE WAR YEARS, 1939-45...

 My Father In World War II… 

My father’s service would be one which saw no overseas action at all, bar a period of time in Northern Ireland, when he was based at Ballykinlar. 

His army number was 5111777, easy to remember I guess but he also remembered the numbers of several of his close mates in the 9th Battalion, Royal Warwickshires. Rather odd, really...

DAD'S ATTESTATION FORM.
NOTE HIS HEIGHT OF 5 FEET 3 & A HALF INCHES AND WEIGHT OF 135 POUNDS.
HE WOULD REMAIN AROUND THE 140 POUNDS MARK FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE.
HIS PRE-WAR OCCUPATION WAS LISTED AS A FITTER'S MATE, NO DOUBT WORKING ON TRAM ROOFS.

One of his first duties delighted him, for he was posted on guard duty at Villa Park’s Trinity Road grandstand, beneath which arms had apparently been stored. He got to kick a ball about on the pitch when off duty too, which really pleased him. Training near Berkhamstead, where mum visited him was very much dad’s thing and during a posting to Deal in Kent he recalled hearing and seeing shells exploding across the channel.

DAD KEPT HIS TUNIC BUTTONS... 

HIS BUTTON STICK (STAMPED WITH THE LAST THREE DIGITS OF HIS ARMY NUMBER...) FOR CLEANING HIS TUNIC BUTTONS WITHOUT GETTING POLISH ON THE ACTUAL UNIFORM.
BY SLIDING THE STICK OVER THE BUTTONS THEY STOOD PROUD OF THE TUNIC AND WERE THUS EASY TO CLEAN...

AWAITING CONFIRMATION FROM THE ROYAL WARWICKSHIRE REGIMENT AS TO THE MEANING OF THIS PATCH WORN BY MY FATHER...

In Northern Ireland his clerical abilities and quickness with numbers came into full use and he moved on from Private to Corporal and then in October 1945, to Sergeant. He was in control of the issuing of both transport and fuel. His clerking skills certainly came to the fore. He was also for a time, I believe, a batman to an officer. He always loved the idea of being trusted by the 'upper class’ and generally believed that they could do no wrong. 

LETTER FROM AN OFFICER WHO ALSO WROTE A TESTIMONIAL FOR DAD, WHICH APPEARS BELOW IN THIS POST...

DAD'S FAVOURITE FOUNTAIN PEN...

ASTRIDE A MOTOR BIKE...

He learned to drive at that time, albeit heavy army trucks but he kept up his licence after the war until twenty years later in 1965 when he was able to afford a car, a blue Mini. He hadn’t driven at all in the intervening two decades, meaning a hairy first drive with me as a passenger, from the Austin factory in Longbridge, right through Birmingham’s city centre and out east to Shard End… Now that was a scary trip.  

DAD'S WARTIME DRIVING PERMIT...

One of his duties as a Corporal was to awaken the men in their barracks and two incidents arose from this task which would shape his diet and also provide a brace of remarkable anecdotes.

AS A CORPORAL IN A BERET.
THE BADGE ON THE BERET IS PICTURED BELOW...

THIS ARMY WHISTLE BELONGED TO MY FATHER...

Firstly, one frosty Irish morning, he passed the kitchen en route to the barrack rooms and he acknowledged the cook’s wave as he went by. The next room along was a storeroom in which oats (used for porridge making) were kept but on that morning a window was slightly ajar, so my father leaned across to close it from the outside. Movement from within however took his eye and he peered through the open window to see rats cavorting in and defecating on the cereal… 

Dad lost his temper, something I remember only too well, slammed the window shut and stormed into the kitchen, where he grabbed at and confronted the cook against a wall, demanding: 

“Did you know there are rats shitting on the oats in the room next door? We have to eat that…”

The retort was simplistic, if harrowing: “Yes Corporal, but once it’s cooked, no-one would know…” 

Dad told the cook he would report this to an officer but when he attempted to complain, he was told that that was the way of things. He was subsequently sent away to get on with his duties…

My father never again ate porridge…

The second story took place one morning when he entered a barrack room. He carried a stick with him which he used to strike the metal foot-end of each bed as he roused the troops. As he pushed into the room and was poised to strike, his eyes were drawn to the first sleeping soldier near the door who lay on his back, woollen fatigue hat pulled down to his eyebrows and the bedclothes pulled up to his chin. 

However, there across the soldier’s mouth lay a rat, asleep and feeling the benefit of the warm air expiring from the guy’s breathing nose and lips. Dad smashed his stick down on the metal rail of the bed and the rat scurried away. Dad yelled at the yawning soldier: 

“You had a rat lying on your mouth!” 

The reply was magnificent: 

“Well, Corporal, it’s gotta keep warm sum’ow, ain’t it?”

Dad hated rats for the remainder of his life…

However, some years later, in Birmingham City centre, dad met that very same soldier and they greeted one another and chatted about the past. Dad asked what the chap was doing for a job at that time and the reply was quite remarkable: 

“I work for the Council, as a rat catcher…” 

ALF GRIMMETT WAS MY DAD'S MATE FROM WARD END & ALF HAD MADE THIS PLAQUE FOR THE END OF HIS BARRACK ROOM BED.
WHEN ALF WAS POSTED, MY DAD UNSCREWED THE NAMEPLATE AND KEPT IT AS A SOUVENIR. 

A LETTER TO DAD FROM ALF GRIMMETT...

Dad told me that he had met an Irish girl during his time at Ballykinlar and that he really liked her… I know no further details...

BALLYKINLAR, MAY 1945.
DAD IS SECOND FROM LEFT, FRONT ROW...

HQ COMPANY NCOs, JUNE 1944, DEAL, KENT...
DAD IS 4TH FROM THE LEFT, BACK ROW.

THE FULL COMPANY, BUT I HAVE NO FURTHER DETAILS.
DAD IS SEATED ON THE GROUND, 5TH FROM THE LEFT.

Dad played for his Company’s soccer team and apparently there were seven professional players in the eleven. Dad had only played football on Sundays in Birmingham but he was determined, small and tigerish in the tackle, which earned him a typical nickname of the time: ‘Tiger’. He was a valuable ball-winner as the defensive ‘right-half’.

I USED TO SHOW DAD'S 'ARSENAL' SHIRT WHEN DOING WW2 ROLE=PLAY SESSIONS FOR SCHOOLKIDS AT BIRMINGHAM MUSEUM...

The team managed to acquire, through the contacts of one of the other players, some surplus Arsenal shirts, no numbers but serviceable and I still have dad’s… I think his team only lost once, maybe twice, during the whole war but dad recalled a cup final before which one of his team-mates, a defender with Birmingham City, instructed dad to forget passing, shooting, positional play and his own players’ actions, so that he could stick close, very close to Leslie Compton of Arsenal (he represented England twice, aged 38, the oldest ever debutant for the national team but although he played cricket for Middlesex, he never made the England cricket team). Compton’s brother was the famous Denis Compton, who also played football for Arsenal (although not England) but he famously represented England at cricket. 

1945, BALLYKINLAR.
DAD IS SEATED, FAR LEFT, WITH A MOUSTACHE...

Dad was horrified that he had to simply stick to Compton like a leach and just boot the ball away from him if possible. Apparently, the Birmingham player in dad’s team careered purposely into Compton during the opening five minutes and left him writhing on the ground, hurt and angry and thus with my dad shadowing him for 90 minutes, Compton failed to ignite his team and my dad’s team won the game. He said it was the worst he had ever played in a match…  

ABOVE & BELOW: THE FOOTBALL MEDAL (MADE IN ALDERSHOT) WON BY DAD'S TEAM...

1942.
DAD IS STANDING, 2ND FROM THE LEFT...

TWO OF DAD'S SHIN PADS WHICH HAVE LENGTHS OF CANE INSIDE.
NOT GREAT IF A BOOT BROKE A CANE, I GUESS.
I WAS MADE TO WEAR THESE WHEN I WAS 7 OR 8, UNTIL MUM BOUGHT ME SOME MORE MODERN ONES.
THEY WERE RED, STILL WITH CANES INSIDE BUT WITH A LAYER OF SPONGE AGAINST THE SHINS...

His army team actually represented Irish League club Coleraine in wartime matches, something my father was always proud of.

I guess the war coming to an end was tough for dad because he loved the army life, with sports on tap, food, washing and accommodation provided and with plenty of leisure time to spend with other soldiers.

However, he had married my mum in 1943 and she was the daughter of a professional soldier, who had moved about a bit in his career after marrying my grandmother. My mum knew that her own mum hadn’t liked the life of an army wife much and she certainly didn’t fancy it herself, which was something that my dad perhaps held against her following the war.

DAD & BEST MAN LESLIE MCSTOCKER ARRIVING AT THE CHURCH FOR MY PARENTS' WEDDING.
DAD'S MUM IS BEHIND HIM...

27TH MARCH 1943, ST MARGARET'S CHURCH, WARD END, BIRMINGHAM...

Dad thus had to settle down and find work, becoming a window cleaner, although I have no idea when he started, or where his round was but I guess he worked in the Ward End area, where he was living with mum at his mother-in-law’s house in Bamville Road. Many years later, he cleaned windows in Hodge Hill on his ‘official’ Thursday off from his insurance job, so it was likely that his ‘round’ had originally been somewhere near the Fox & Goose pub and in Hodge Hill… 

THE TESTIMONIAL WRITTEN FOR MY DAD BY CAPT. AUCKLAND OF THE 9TH BATTALION...

He was incensed that the Labour Government had promised ex-soldiers homes to live in after the war but of course he didn’t receive one and swore that he would never vote for ‘Lying Labour’ again. He didn’t. And he was a Tory voter for the remainder of his life, despite living for most of it in a council property in Shard End, Birmingham…  

DAD'S MEDICAL CLASSIFICATION & LIST OF PROTECTIVE INOCULATIONS.

DAD'S NEXT OF KIN PAGE & THEIR ADDRESSES...

IT APPEARS THAT DAD WAS PROMOTED TO LANCE CORPORAL IN JUNE 1940, TO CORPORAL IN JULY 1942 AND FINALLY TO SERGEANT ON 10TH OCTOBER 1945...
HIS LEAVE DATES ARE LISTED ON THE OTHER PAGE.

THE RELEASE LEAVE CERTIFICATE...
SPLENDID WORDS WRITTEN ABOUT MY FATHER IN MORETON MORRELL, WARWICKSHIRE...

RECORD OF SERVICE, 15TH MAY 1939 UNTIL MY MUM'S 26TH BIRTHDAY, 9TH MAY 1946...

SERVICE BOOK INSERT...

DAD'S TRAINING...
NOTE THE QUALIFIED DRIVER TRAINING AND THE GAS CHAMBER EXPERIENCES, AS WELL AS THE AWARDING OF A DEFENCE MEDAL...

END OF THE WAR AND DAD'S TRANSFER TO THE ARMY RESERVE...

DAD'S ORIGINAL FATIGUES HAT...

OUTSIDE THE OLD MANOR, BERKHAMSTED...

1941 ON LEAVE AND LOOKING REMARKABLY LIKE A PEAKY BLINDER...

THE MEDAL: SOMETHING TO KEEP, I GUESS...

MY FATHER, VICTOR DOUGLAS RAY: PART 1, THE YOUNGER DAYS, 1920-1939...

 My Father: Victor Douglas Ray…

Part 1: The Younger Days, 1920-1939 

NOT OVERLY EXCITED ABOUT HORSE RIDING...

Born on 4th June 1920, my father had older brothers, Bill and Les, an older sister who died in her teens and two younger sisters Connie and Sheila. He was saddled with the middle name of Douglas for some reason, making the initials of his forenames VD, which was rather unfortunate… In later years, his signature included quite a swirl over all but ‘Ray’, so that the V and D were almost illegible…

5 YEARS OLD BUT THE PHOTOGRAPHER FAILED TO GET HIM TO SAY 'CHEESE'... 

I believe that he was a bit of a tell-tale on his younger sisters, which they resented all their lives, for he would inform on them if they wore lipstick whilst out, even though they would desperately wash it off before reaching home.

SHEILA, CONNIE & MY FATHER, 1927...

As a child he made a few pennies for pocket money by collecting pop bottles after meetings at Bromford Racecourse, which were returned to a local shop for remuneration. He and his friends would also find lost golf balls in the grounds of the Penfold golf ball factory across the road from his house in Bromford Lane, where Connie actually worked.

HE LOOKS RATHER WORRIED AT THE BACK...

He attended Leigh Road School, which he usually ran to, involving rushing down the short distance in Bromford Lane to Drews Lane, along the length of that to Washwood Heath Road and then right into Leigh Road, completing a mile and a quarter jog each day, each way… Of course, in a Wolseley office in Drews Lane my mum was working, so their relationship began in their mid to late teens, I guess, for dad had a job on virtually the same site, in the Midland Carriage Works.… 

MIDLAND CARRIAGE WORKS/WOLSELEY...

Dad learned to swim in the canal near Bromford Bridge when he was a boy, which must have been a grimy stretch of water, for it hustled past a variety of factories on its way into Birmingham’s city centre. I guess I should be grateful that he took me on a few early Sunday mornings to Saltley Baths instead, where I learned the breaststroke… 

NORTON BATHS, GEORGE ARTHUR ROAD, SALTLEY...

He excelled at soccer, cricket, drawing, woodwork and arithmetic at school, it seems, for his ball-eye co-ordination was good and he kept up his running but he learned his mental maths through fear from a loathsome teacher at Leigh Road School. 

When he and his classmates heard their form teacher approaching along the corridor, silence fell, for the chap would begin to formulate a short ‘sum’, dictating it from outside the room and continuing as he strolled into it: 

‘8 + 12 – 9 + 7 – 6 = ?’  

Hands would fly up, others remained down but the teacher would pick on any child for an answer, punishing an incorrect retort, or hesitant response with his rapping cane. Attention gained, fear created, the teacher began his day, which had no room for ‘learning difficulties’ or ‘inclusion’. The deaf attended Deaf School, the blind attended Blind School, the badly behaved attended Approved School and the mentally insecure were shoved into asylums…

MY DAD'S SURVIVING SCHOOL REPORTS:

He was in Leigh Road’s school cricket team as a secondary pupil and he reckoned that he was a good bowler but from what he told me, he was rather a ‘favourite’ of the teacher pictured on the image below. He liked batting and in later life he enjoyed keeping wicket for the Britannic area team which played occasional matches. Clearly he thought he was better at it than I was…   

DAD WITH A BAT, MIDDLE ROW, FAR RIGHT...

He used to cycle to the other side of Hodge Hill Common with his friends too, when it was merely open countryside, then have a picnic somewhere near the River Cole and cycle home late in the day. The lads sometimes erected a tent there and remained overnight for a longer adventure. That area, oddly, became Shard End Estate, where he would live for the majority of his insular life. 

ABOVE & BELOW: A CYCLING TRIP TO WOOTTON WAWEN...

He and his peers would also cycle to Stratford-upon-Avon, struggling up the hills near Henley-in-Arden to get there and he loved the camaraderie of those times with his mates. Dad and his chums once went camping to Barry Island in Wales in the mid-1930s, I believe for a week-end and he apparently tasted curry for the first time in Cardiff, where immigrants had begun to settle at that time. The trip must have been his first time at the seaside. 

ABOVE & BELOW: CAMPING AT BARRY ISLAND...

RATHER POSED, FATHER, I MUST SAY...

He had so enjoyed the camaraderie of the lads from Ward End and he had belonged to a Territorial Army unit in his teens, which practised out of premises off Brookvale Road, close to Moor Lane, a stone’s throw from Villa Park and I guess that because of his liking of peer camaraderie and going camping with his mates, the very idea of army life hastened his joining up with the Royal Warwickshire Regiment for the duration of World War II.

He had been working at the Midland Carriage Works, as mentioned above, making parts for tram roofs, after leaving school at 14 years of age. He reckoned that it was the best job he ever had… 

However, his teen years ended with a world war breaking out and of course, like so many others, he moved into a world of uncertainty and strife.

He loved it…