91�ȱ�

Unsung Heroes

It had hung there for years with hardly a glance but for the occasional dusting: the college photograph of men demobbed from the armed forces after World War Two. Presented with the academic staff they constituted almost the entire student body in the year 1947 — 48 at Handsworth Theological College, University of Birmingham. The students in the photograph were all prospective ordinands for ministry in the Methodist Church. My husband is there in the back row.

I asked about the men in the photograph, “Some must have had stories to tell?”
He looked along the front row, “Brian Bond”, he said in passing, “Soon to leave for Bengal after this was taken … and that’s Alan Barber between him and Eric Blennerhassett, ‘Ali’ as we knew him, Ali Baba … what else with a name like that.” Ali had been an MTB skipper in the Royal Navy. Working his way along the front row he stopped again, “Now then, what was his name … a Welshman … Emrys … that’s it, Emrys Evans — beautiful tenor voice, used to sing ‘Like a Golden Dream’.” A spitfire pilot during the war, Emrys had a bad crash. It was sometimes a student duty to ring morning bell and rouse the college from sleep by knocking loudly on every student door. I had only one full year there with Emrys but never once knocked at his door. I had to know why — and was told that his closest friends in college lifted him from his bed in deep sleep every morning to lean him, like a wooden plank and just as stiff, against the bedroom wall. Only then and very slowly, after 15-20 minutes, did he come to.”

He looked at the picture again … “That chap behind Emrys — that’s Willy Rushton. He was demobbed from the Army and always carried a cushion with him. That too caught the imagination and I got to know a bit about Army latrines and toilet blocks. It was normal procedure, where numbers required, to build ‘Multiple Seaters’, but with single flow and outlet. Regular cleansing and sanitising was therefore essential and achieved, according to situation, by many means. There were even times when petrol was poured along the length of flow and then ignited — the greatest care taken that no one was in at the time, of course. Not care enough, however, one day when Willy was in. He may be in heaven by now, but I’ll bet he’s still carrying his cushion.”

“I remember him,” he went on, “there’s Jack Arland, marvellous entertainer and member of the Magic Circle … and with quick recognition … “ here’s Deryk Howarth (‘Officer’s Mess I’ll have you know’) and Bill Podmore, Ewart Wilson, Jimmy Douglas- Hunt (College ‘Doctor’), Harold Ward — there’s no end to them all … and Frank Bramhall here — still the Sergeant Major in voice, manner and appearance.”

What about your Naval service?” I asked.
“That was very soon after the war ended,” he said again, “I was with the Mediterranean Fleet on destroyers and was on a ‘boarding’ Party of three as the engineer during the world wide Jewish rush to enter the ‘Promised Land’ in 1946 — 47. Ships of all shapes and sizes were arriving off the Palestine Coast heavily overladen with men, women and children and sometimes listing so badly they might never make port. Tying up alongside was sometimes the only way to prevent capsizing. It was a terrible job and we had to control this stage of the vast flow by getting aboard and taking over bridge, engine room and decks. The ‘bridge’ had a revolver; the Matelot had nothing. I had a length of lead piping”

“Why did you and other students at Handsworth candidate for the Ministry of the Church when you had all seen such bleakness and destruction of human life?” I asked him.

He gave it some thought. “Were we chasing dreams? Looking for ‘pie in the sky’? — Or, perhaps we had glimpsed the vision of a better way of life — and had to tell it.”

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.