RAPC, MAIDA CAMP, FAYID

As Remembered By Dave Granville Davies

We joined th S.S. Charlton Star at Southampton docks late in March. There were 18 in our draft and it snowed as we sailed. As usual the Bay of Biscay was a caldron of mountainous waves – frightening to us sailing for the first time. At Gibraltar the ships crew told us they had been on stand-by for two nights expecting the old ship to break up – we were in no doubt of the possibility, seasick as most of us were. Meadows, a lad from Liverpool, never missed a meal though and seemed to be munching or sucking something the whole voyage.

We disembarked at Port Said and were escorted in convoy by the Scots Guards looking very business-like. A de-railed locomotive 2 miles into our journey was the first signs of terrorism. Part of the convoy turned off for Moascar and TEK, then drops at RAF Fayid and Abyad. We left the now depleted vehicles outside our new camp in Fayid. Maida Camp was the Regimental Pay office Middle East, the Command Pay Office and officers accounts section. There were a thousand men in the camp at that time and a shortage of beds and tents. We had to wait for the usual 140 men to mount guard so that we could use their beds. The beds were the old type detention ones, 8 or 9 inches off the floor with detachable iron legs, thin steel slats for springs, a well worn thin mattress, no pillows or sheets, just two blankets.

Next morning we were evicted when the guard dismounted. This went on for the next few nights until a draft left for demob. The native labour were forced to stop working for the British so we were given all kinds of jobs. The first 2 weeks we dug latrine pits 8-10ft deep. During this time we witnessed our second terrorist act. A Staff Sergeant from our camp was found on the side of the railway behind the cinema with a smashed skull and 17 stabs wounds. The following day his union jack draped coffin was loaded onto an open 15cwt truck for the short journey to the cemetery on the Bitter Lakes road.

We were still the odd bods about the camp and given other jobs – one joined the regimental police, another to work on the mule cart, a few to the cookhouse and, with Meadows and two others, I was ordered to the officers mess as waiters. This was too good to last – no inspections, no guard duty, swimming most afternoons, but most important we eat the same food as the officers. After three weeks Meadows was shocked to learn he was listed to be posted to Nairobi in Kenya. I can still see him the day he left in full kit. All he could say was "All that lovely grub”.

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