CITIZEN INTO SOLDIER

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 85, 7 February 1941, Page 9

CITIZEN INTO SOLDIER

(1) First Days In Camp

day. "How do you like it?" he said; or perhaps, since it was right after mess, he asked if I were full. Of course I said "No!" There had been some disorganisation in the commissariat department, and the cooks, trained to peel potatoes, with an occasional spell on onions, had not risen to the occasion. Later, they were replaced, and meals improved. We were grateful to officers who seemed to care abou: our stomachs almost as much as we ourselves did. Well, my friend managed to get from stew to Tom Wintringham, and we sympathised with each other about spending our first days doing monotonous hours of foot drill and rifle drill. What we wanted was training at making flame-throwers out of beer bottles and grenades out of jam jars. And what we received was period after period of turning left, right, and about; standing at ease and at attention, falling in and falling out, sloping arms and ordering arms. I MET an acquaintance here to-

I have a fancy we needed it. As an army of any sort we were no great shakes. But it is very necessary to grumble. A private soldier really cannot exist without a moan or two. They are more than an outlet for his feelings. They are an expression of the unconquerable desire of the least of us to remain men and not numbers. It was hard, indeed, to be marched, left-righted, even into mess — to sit shoulder hard against shoulder — to clamour for a share or go without-to eat bread tested by many other fingers for its quality-to drink tea ladled from the dixie by many mugs of varying cleanliness-to see the dust from the mess tent floor gritty on your plates and filming even the surface of the soup. It was worse to find yourself a slave to brass and drill from Reveille to Lights Out-to have no time to read, write, think, or converse intelligently -to be cut off entirely from the world on the other side of the Main Gate Guard-to be living in only one section of the hexagon six men make of a Bell tentto want your mirror when it was at the bottom of your kit bag, and to hide your personal secrets when they floated miraculously to the top. We Learn Wisdom All these things are hard. Our submission to them, and to many others, must be bought by the wisdom which you who read this will apply to the use of whatever results we achieve. Of course we make the best of it. We are like children, laughing at simple things, afraid a little of the schoolmaster, resentful of control or childishly anxious to impress. There are laughs at night in the tent. I am relieved that in mine they come from good humour and some small wit. In others, even if they come from the common New Zealand mixture of bombast and talk that is 50 or 75 per cent. sex, sanitation, or blasphemy — they still come. I should think the only really unhappy men in camp to-day were the delinquent

caught fence-hopping and myself, who let the Major pass without turning out the guard at the main gate. However, my. disgust with life was short-lived. Five minutes later I saw a crowned shoulder through a motor-car windshield at 20 yards, presented arms in time, and called out the guard-which failed to respond in time, leaving me with a satisfactory sense that the derision was all to my credit. Possibly I was wrong when I said we were the only two unhappy. Many of us feel deeply about this complete reorientation of our living. Many of us are sensible enough to put it down to what made Hitler, and leave it at that. All of us hope in some degree that we may have a hand in altering the conditions which made this mess you read about in the papers they print in what we have already come to regard as the outside world. But for others this somewhat optimistic contemplation of things to come

scarcely. mitigates what must be sheer misery. There are managers of big firms taking their turn with the rest of us in places that would amaze Chic Sale. At P.T. they must bend their knees with younger men whose joints are looser. Their space in the tent is no larger. And the area of their brass is just as great. However, as far as I can see them they are going through with it. For others, there are different regrets — girls, picture-shows, "hops" in that order, One Justifiable Complaint The one really justifiable complaint is brass. P I should like to count all the separate pieces, but I am too lazy. It is 7.30 p.m. In 45 minutes I go once again on guard duty. At 7 a.m. I stood on picket duty for an hour, then bolted breakfast and paraded at 8.30 a.m. Drilled till mid-day and then paraded for guard duty. It is two hours on and two off. In the two off

we must go over all our brass, clean the dust off our rifles, brush our boots, and take turns at leaving one by one for the latrines about 500 yards away. A day of ordinary parades leaves no more free time, and sometimes less. In the two hours we are off duty it is brass -brass-brass-bloody brass. If it’s not brass it is personal hygiene, and if it’s not that it’s letter writing, and if it’s not that it’s sleeping. It is impossible to get more than seven hours a night. To get more something must be neglected. And it’s all because of this brass. Who said there was a shortage of metal? There’s none-we have it all here in camp. The only shortage is in tempers. At the moment mine has gone far enough to inspire me to count buttons and brass on web gear. Hitler must wait for 15 minutes. The Colonel has just gone out and we hope he stays until the Book of Words says we do not have to turn out for him.