'A Grandfather's Tale: Memoirs being mainly concerned with service in the Indian Army and the Indian Political Service in India and the Persian Gulf from 1932-1947' [‎43r] (85/118)

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arid saici quire Collection of papers folded in half and stitched together to form a gathering of folios. sincerely, ,r And how is dear Queen Victoria'?'* a c- , , ,
dead for forty-four years I was a , ^oria. As she had been
check and replied thlt as’fL as I s, 1 k6pt ^ Self in
spirits. The old Qu^en Ld in facf b 3PPy ^ ln the best of
were many such as my old acquaintance, who regJderhefar^ortal^ iT*
ZSZ ITrl forty ^ “ ^ 4 !“’ ^ so
with J aL^s 1 ^tSr^^^I^f:rVSlS: ^the^ fo S Sec?rt y
fiist c^ aVer ’ 22,500 t0nS ’ ° n the 8th July 19it5 - There were‘five hundred
firs, class passengers on board, both civil and military, and about five
ousand Bntisn troops. We, as a family, were extremely lucky to be allotted
because ^the^ttef^ ° laSS Stater0 °'" with its" own batgro!
because of tne latter we were most popular with our friends, wi' had a oorthole
opening on to the deck, where the British troops came up in batches from their
cramped quarters below, to take the air, and if we had L leave the children
on their own, we were never short of volunteers to keen a friendly eye on them
When we sailed from Bombay the blackout was still in force, but three days
a er it was lifted, and despite the overcrowding we much enjoyed the voyage
home. Guy Pettigrew, Hugh’s elder brother, and his family were on boarc^ fnd
we saw a lot of them. Their two children, Jill and Simon, were much the same
ge as ours, a nd Guy was a Political, a year senior to me though two and a half
years older. I had heard of him from Hugh but never met him before but we all
became great friends and have remained so ever since.
We reached Liverpool on the day that the General Election results were
announced, and I shall never forget the cheers with which the British troops
greeted the news of the Labour landslide Victory. Quite why this was so, I
round it hard to understand but I suppose that any delays in their getting
nome, after years in the East, were blamed on the Government, and though this
was a Coalition, they thought of it as the fault of Churchill and the
Conservatives. However, it was a good tempered occasion and all ranks were
overjoyed to be home at last.
We eventually got ourselves and our belongings sorted out and on to
the train South, and, as always on coming back to England, I was struck by
the amazing greenness of the countryside, particularly on this occasion after
my year in the Mekran desert. After arriving in London there was a long wait
for a taxi and when I did get one the driver sat firmly in his seat and made
not the slightest effort to help me cope with our ^formidable amount of luggage.
Porters were non-existent. However, in the end we made it to Fenchurch Street
and on the very last leg of our long journey, caught a train to Westcliff-on-
Sea. Luckily, that stage took under the hour but even so Elizabeth, aged
nearly three, who had never travelled before in a non-corridor train without
the usual facilities, was hopping up and down like a yoyo before we arrived.
When we reached my mother’s house all the family, except for my younger
brother Patrick then serving in Austria, were there, and Jane was confronted
for the first time with her mother-in-law, my two sisters and my elder brother
Derek, home on leave from the R.A.F. and his wife Dorothy. Practically the