Photo: Flying the Flags

Today is Flag Day in Canada, commemorating the replacement of the Red Ensign with a uniquely Canadian symbol, but I didn't want to go the obvious route and just post a picture of a flag and nothing else - that's pedestrian and has been done. Instead, I'll offer a snap of Burrard Pacific Breeze, one of the three SeaBus passenger ferries that link Vancouver and North Vancouver - public transit vehicles with radar. The flags of Canada and British Columbia catch the wind on the mast pretty well.

If only it was also a stat holiday. Then people might actually care.

I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In case this is not legally possible, I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

State Your Name, State

Ever since the 1970s, the picture of political fault lines in Canada has been rather simple - the borders of Quebec. It's the only province that's actually attempted to separate from Canada, and future histories often include an independent Quebec and multiple Canadian provinces joining the United States as a result. It seems to me that it's commonly American authors that project this - as if Quebec is the glue that holds Canada together. As a Canadian, I can say that's not so. Personally I would prefer to see Quebec remain an integral part of Canada, but an independent Quebec would not lead to Canada's collapse. I tend to agree with Will Ferguson's ideas on this in Why I Hate Canadians - that "separation would bring the regions of Canada closer together, like a trauma survivors' support group."

But it's an interesting thing to speculate about, nonetheless - the hows and whys and whethers of Canada coming apart at the seams, and what's left when the dust clears. It's something that's been rattling around in my brain ever since I moved out west. While I consider the idea of Ontario seceding from Canada faintly ridiculous - I'd find it far more believable for provinces to secede piecemeal until Ontario is the last one standing, to get away from Ontario if nothing else - I'm not the first one to consider the possibility of the western provinces going their own way. Hell, there have been political parties dedicated to the concept.

The only question I have is this - what the hell would you call the result?

It's an important question - they'd have to replace the marker at the Blaine/Surrey crossing, you know. It says "Canada" on the other side.

Quebec has it easy - they wouldn't have needed any time to pick out a name upon gaining independence; just "Republique du Quebec" would have worked out perfectly. Indeed, if individual provinces separate, there's no real need to select a new country name. The problem arises in the event of multiple provinces separating and making a go of it themselves as a new unified state, when there's no unified term that already describes them.

Take British Columbia. On its own, it might not have the best shot at independent statehood... but if things have got so bad in Ottawa that BC is voting to lower the Maple Leaf, Alberta is likely several steps ahead. It's not a massive leap to suggest that in this hypothetical future, Alberta and British Columbia choose to go it alone together - thus introducing the issue of a unified name. So far as I am aware, at least, there's no existing geographical or political term that describes BC and Alberta alone.

The Transhuman Space setting did this as part of its background, breaking up Canada into its constituent parts. The union of Alberta and British Columbia was called... the Union of Alberta and British Columbia. This is what you get when there's no existing terms to apply - uninspired names. Plus, what the hell would a citizen of that country call themselves? An Albertan and British Columbian? An ABCer? A Unionist? It would be so much easier if Washington and Oregon could be brought in - then the resulting state could use Cascadia, simple and clear, but the US government would likely have words about that particular arrangement.

So what else is there? Something like Pacifica, which does not really sound like a state name that could be taken seriously - and besides, it doesn't describe the Alberta half of the new state at all. Perhaps the Republic of the Rocky Mountains would work better - there's shared geography right there - but again, what do you call its citizens? Rocks? Rockies? Mountaineers?

It might be easier, in the end, to echo the naming conventions of the Civil War, where no one stopped being American just because of national borders. "Canada" is a geographical expression as much as it is a nation - a western state could easily call itself something like, say, the Allied Provinces of Canada.

Personally, I hope this is something I never have to worry about. But it's interesting to consider.

Photo: Bridging the Sunset

The Alex Fraser Bridge, spanning the Fraser River between Annacis Island and the mainland in Delta, has shown up in a few previous photos here, mostly because I like its architecture and it's generally a striking presence on the New Westminster riverfront horizon. Some time ago I was down there near to sunset, and managed to get this picture while the western sky seemed to be on fire.

I consider myself fortunate that I stumbled onto this one - that the clouds were in such a spot that they framed the sunset, but didn't overwhelm it. Twenty minutes later, it was all gone but the bridge.

I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In case this is not legally possible, I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

Quaff Review #10: Summer Honey Seasonal Ale

It's winter in New Westminster, and the weather forecast is dominated by rain. The nights are cold, the days are grey, and this thing that the tales of our ancestors call "sky" is seeming more and more to be just a myth that keeps the Lower Mainland trudging forward in the hope of better days. It is, therefore, the perfect time for me to reflect on my last bottle of Summer Honey Seasonal Ale, from the Big Sky Brewing Company of Missoula, Montana.

I picked up a six-pack of bottles from an Albertson's grocery store in Billings while heading west to Vancouver - coming just in under the wire, since as a seasonal brew, it's only available from April to September - and I drank them only carefully. After all, from what I've seen of the BCL's offerings, it's not like I'll be able to replace them any time soon.


The bottle advertises it as "ale brewed with honey & spices" - the Big Sky website doesn't expand much on this, calling it only a "unique, balanced blend of spices" with Montana honey. While I don't taste the honey too much myself, it's still a smooth-tasting beer with no negative aftertaste. The taste itself defied easy description when I tried to pin it down; for me there was a sensation of wheat with vague berry hints, with a few minor flavors lurking around the fringes, making it just busy enough to be interesting. It doesn't have much of a smell to it, which is good news - after my experience with Earthquake High Gravity Lager a few months back, I think I like my beers better when the alcohol content isn't obvious from a sniff.

It's a nice, clear amber, and with 5.0% alc./vol. for a 355 mL bottle, it has the smooth, relaxing looseness that makes for an ideal Saturday afternoon porch beer. How unfortunate that I don't have a porch, and that they're calling for rain all day.

I almost wish I had negative things to say about Summer Honey Seasonal Ale - but I don't. There's nothing groundbreaking about it, nothing that particularly draws my attention, nothing that makes me focus in on it one way or another; it's just there, in the background, fulfilling its role with quiet competence. That's the sort of thing I can respect about a good beer.

Though I wonder if it's sold anywhere closer to Vancouver than Montana.

ANDREW'S RATING: 4/5

Previous Quaff Reviews

• #9: Earthquake High Gravity Lager
  
• #8: Route des épices
  
• #7: Sparks Plus
  
• #6: Hurricane High Gravity Lager
  
• #5: L'Indépendante
  
• #4: Antigravity Light Ale
  
• #3: Nektar
  
• #2: Innis & Gunn Original
  
• #1: Abbey Belgian Spiced Ale

Photo: Coast Guard of Canada Place

I don't know if she's still there today, but for Wednesday and Thursday at least, the western cruise ship berth at Canada Place in downtown Vancouver was host to an uncommon visitor: USCGC Hamilton, lead ship of the Hamilton class of high-endurance cutters operated by the United States Coast Guard. According to an article in the Juneau Empire, Hamilton is making a series of port visits while returning to her home port of San Diego, California after finishing a deployment in the Bering Sea.

When I first ran into her, before I could find any identifying marks, the Canadian flags that flew from Hamilton's mast made me think it was part of the Canadian Coast Guard. Nothing could be further from the truth. Canadian Coast Guard ships aren't even armed. Contrast this to Hamilton, which actually has a Phalanx CIWS mounted at her stern - meaning that its designers thought there was a legitimate chance that U.S. Coast Guard ships would find themselves in a position where they needed to be able to shoot down high-speed anti-ship missiles.

I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In case this is not legally possible, I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

Who Supports the Sports?

I've never been that into sports. Sure, I collected baseball cards as a kid and cheered on the Jays' World Series wins in 1992 and 1993, but it was less out of a deep, abiding interest and more because I was a socially awkward ten-year-old, and an interest in baseball is right on the contract for being a ten-year-old boy. It's not something I follow at all anymore - hell, it was only within the last month that I discovered the Minnesota North Stars moved to Dallas eighteen years ago. Though I will admit that I was sorely tempted to brave the crowds at Wrigley Field the first time I was in Chicago. It's not something that's important to me, but I recognize its broad and long-standing appeal in the population at large. Sports speak to something primal: they've been with us from the beginning.

Modern-day organized sports, on the other hand, is something else entirely.

Yesterday the Globe and Mail ran an article from John Allemang asking a simple question: "if arts and culture are publicly funded, why not sports arenas?" I know enough about sports to know that this is a third rail, and it's a complicated issue besides. It stems from recent noises that have emanated from Ottawa recently, suggesting that the federal government may assist in the financing of a new hockey arena in Quebec City - part of their cunning plan to lure the Nordiques back home from Colorado. Government involvement in cultural affairs is not new; there are many such venues that get some government support, from arthouses to science fiction magazines.

As sports do occupy a major place in modern culture, it's easily arguable that sports facilities should only be entitled to a share of that same funding. I can see that point... but for me, there's only one fly in the ointment.

How many sports venues are currently owned by for-profit corporations, explicitly as profit-making endeavors?

Chase Field, a publicly-owned sports venue in Phoenix, Arizona

As a member of the Torontonian diaspora, the example of SkyDome still stings. Back in the late 1980s, what was then one of the most technologically advanced stadiums in North America - just look at that dome! - cost $570 million to build, with the cost split between the governments of Metro Toronto, Ontario, and Canada, as well as twenty-eight Canadian corporations - corporations that, incidentally, paid $5 million in 1980s dollars for stadium exclusivity, and so you could be sure you wouldn't get any Pepsi products at the dome. The big problem is that there were extensive cost overruns, enough so that the Dome wasn't making enough money to pay them off - so, ultimately, its debts were paid off by the provincial government in 1994, from provincial revenues, and sold into private ownership for the bargain basement price of $151 million. When Rogers bought it in 2004, it paid the princely sum of $25 million.

Ontario's tax dollars at work.

Given that experience... there are limited circumstances where I'd be okay with tax revenue going to support a sports venue. If it's done in conjunction with private partners, and it's the for-profit private partners that are on the hook in case of cost overruns - as was the case with Chase Field in Phoenix - and if a share of the revenues go back into the public purse, I could conceivably be for it.

What I'm not for is the subsidization of profit-seeking corporations with tax dollars. Taxes should be used for delivering public services - water supply, electricity, space exploration (at least until private corporations find a profit motive out there), infrastructure, public transit, and so on - and even then, we have to remember to keep our priorities in order. Look at the example of Arlington, Texas - at 380,000 people it is the forty-ninth largest city in the United States, and it does not have a public transit system. Why? Perhaps part of it has to do with the fact that the requisite share of Arlington's sales tax revenue, which appears to be one of the only real options for funding mass transit in Texas, is instead going towards paying off the debt for building Rangers Ballpark in Arlington and Cowboys Stadium.

Governments shouldn't be the ones left holding the bags for these places unless they're the only ones that get the money when times are good.

Photo: Crow in Flight

It's in the realm of the split-second that the photograph is truly effective - preserving an instant that goes by so fast, the eye isn't capable of really seeing it, not as anything more than a blur. Not like landscape photography at all. I've been trying my hand at collecting shots like that when I have the opportunity, and when my anemic camera reflexes permit.

I captured this yesterday down at Granville Square - the crow in question had been chilling on the light standard an instant before.

I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In case this is not legally possible, I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

Short SF Review #17: Attached to the Land

Attached to the Land, by Donald J. Bingle
Appeared in Future Americas, 2008

Who would have thought a city boy like him would wind up here, the patriarch of a clan of ranchers, with land of his own? It was improbable. Of course, the whole thing had been improbable.

If you know where to look, it's not hard to discern a fairly consistent anti-urban pattern within the science fiction genre, one that's lasted through the ages. Granted, it's far from universal - look no further than the ecumenopolitan settings of Trantor or Coruscant for that - but it's there, harkening back to the same call of the wide open spaces that have entranced and enchanted us for millennia. In stories that follow that pattern, it's in the countryside - or, just as frequently, the suburbs - that one finds all the great things in life, the best places one can be, while the cities are wicked, rotten things creaking and groaning from the sins of millions, dirty and full of despair.

Sure, I'll admit I found the rural Montana sky comfortable and inspiring... because when I took this picture, I was standing next to a gas pump that was filling up a van that had been running on fumes for ten miles.

"Attached to the Land," one of sixteen stories collected in the 2008 anthology Future Americas, helps to carry this meme onward into the twenty-first century, for good or ill. The story is set in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and Wyoming at some unspecified point, but which from clues within the text seems to be at least the middle of the twenty-first century. Our protagonist is Travis Greene, an elderly rancher with a fine plot of land and a growing family - and this is the source of his final problem.

Because there's been another politics messup, and the United States has shattered... or, more appropriately, walked away from itself. The primary background event of the story, the one that underpins the whole of the plot, is a remarkably peaceful - and frankly completely implausible - mass secession of a huge swath of the West, Alaska, and every Canadian province and territory west of Manitoba (which I'll get to later). They organize themselves as the Western Range and Mountains; a name which leaves absolutely no doubt to the orientation of this new federation. Some of the former US states are specifically mentioned as joining so they won't get stuck as the "last conservatives" in "an increasingly urban and liberal United States." There's no Second Civil War because the President and the entire line of succession are Westerners - presumably California, Oregon, Washington, Texas, and Oklahoma are not considered "western" by this definition - and the President "just lets the states go."

Considering that only thirteen years ago a President was impeached because he couldn't keep his pants on, I find the idea that a Congress dominated by non-seceding states would let this pass is ridiculous. In fact, let me insert a pertinent quote from the Turkey City Lexicon.

You Can’t Fire Me, I Quit

An attempt to defuse the reader’s incredulity with a pre-emptive strike — as if by anticipating the reader’s objections, the author had somehow answered them. “I would never have believed it, if I hadn’t seen it myself!” “It was one of those amazing coincidences that can only take place in real life!” “It’s a one-in-a-million chance, but it’s so crazy it just might work!” Surprisingly common, especially in SF. (Attr. John Kessel)

Still, it's what we're given in the narrative and it's what we have to live with. A description of how life goes on in the Range, as it's more commonly known, occupies most of the story. In fact, as I write this I realize that this description in fact seems to displace the story itself. There's barely any conflict in this story. By the time we meet Travis Greene, he has already made up his mind as to what he's going to do. Sure, one of his sons does try to talk him around - and that's the only point in this story that isn't the protagonist lost in his own memories.

They're pretty much all he has, because the Western Range and Mountains ensures that there's a tight connection between its people and its land. See, every citizen of the Range must be a landowner - formerly federal land that was doled out in a lottery immediately after secession - and if for whatever reason you end up not owning land, you're kicked out - "into the crowded cesspool of the United States of America to starve and riot with the rest of the impoverished masses." You also have to have enough land to make sure that your children will be able to hold on to some themselves - and therein lies Greene's problem. His solution is, honestly, no surprise.

Now that I think about it, considering that the author appears to reside in Illinois, I have to wonder if "Attached to the Land" isn't meant as a sendup and parody of the anti-urban impulse. Personally, my biggest problems come from that it's hitched itself to reality - I just can't plausibly see events progressing from "here" to "there." For one, the utter lack of a Civil War - the story specificially states "there was no grass roots secession movement," but I highly doubt that tens of millions of Americans would be willing to go along with suddenly not being Americans anymore just because their state governments want to control their own mineral rights.

The other thing that really annoys me about this story is something that's carried through a number of the other stories in Future Americas - the casual assumption that non-Americans want nothing more than to be Americans, or in this case Rangers. Western Canada is included in the Range because "the whole Quebec thing had proved Canada would never stand in the way of any secession." For one, that's a flagrant misunderstanding of the Clarity Act... and for two, I personally find it insulting. Canadians aren't just Americans-in-waiting, nor are we champing at the bit to fly someone else's flag. The prospect of Canadian provinces lining up to join the United States is about as likely as Americans lining up to secede from the United States.

ANDREW'S RATING: 2/5. It's well-written, structurally speaking; I just can't stand it.

Previous Short SF Reviews:

• #16: "The Great Gizmo Machine!" (Pierce Rand and John Forte)
  
• #15: "Alien Psychologist" (Erik Fennel)
  
• #14: "The Frontliners" (Verge Foray)
  
• #13: "Second Chance" (Walter Kubilius and Fletcher Pratt)
  
• #12: "Hades" (Charles F. Ksanda)
  
• #11: "Revolt of the Ants" (Milton Kaletsky)
  
• #10: "Blessed Are the Meekbots" (Daniel F. Galouye)
  
• #9: "To Make a New Neanderthal" (W. Macfarlane)
  
• #8: "Funnel Hawk" (Tom Ligon)
  
• #7: Testing... One, Two, Three, Four" (Steve Chapman)
  
• #6: "Bite" (Lawrence A. Perkins)
  
• #5: "No Shoulder to Cry On" (Hank Davis)
  
• #4: "Crazy Oil" (Brenda Pearce)
  
• #3: "The Saturn Game" (Poul Anderson)
  
• #2: "Job Inaction" (Timothy Zahn)
  
• #1: "Roachstompers" (S.M. Stirling)

Photo: Community Vehicular Reclamation Project

Toronto's Kensington Market is one of those places that's difficult to pin down if you've never been. When describing it to Vancouverites I've settled upon "roughly, a combination of Granville Island and Main Street," but that doesn't really get the feeling across. The eclectic businesses, the busy sidewalks, the one-way streets and the Pedestrian Sundays - perhaps this is similar to what Kits was like forty years ago, but now I can't think of anything.

Back in mid-September, a week or so before I left Toronto, I captured what appears to be one of the fixtures of the market; some kind of car that's been wholly reclaimed as a patch of nature. Perhaps if more cars looked like this, our cities and our world wouldn't be in quite so sticky a situation today.

I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In case this is not legally possible, I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

A Historical Perspective: Riding the Holy Rails

Back in 1936, seventy-five years ago, my grandfather Les Parkinson was a soldier of the 22nd (Cheshire) Regiment in the British Army, serving in what was then the British Mandate for Palestine - mainly to serve as a warning to Benito Mussolini not to try any funny stuff near Britain's African possessions, as at the time the Second Italo-Abyssinian War was raging. The British military presence was likewise used for security purposes in Palestine, which was then experiencing a general strike and an Arab nationalist uprising that would continue until 1939.

I previously posted a brief extract of his memoirs dealing with this time back in 2009, accompanying a period photo. This is another, larger fragment that I'm glad to be able to share with whoever wants to read it. As for myself, when I read it it was a bit surprising to learn that the tactic of house demolition as a punitive measure against insurgents wasn't a policy that the Israeli Defence Forces came up with - rather one that they seem to have picked up from the British.

*****

After I got rid of my boils, I returned to duty and got my first train escort. It was a goods train group to Haifa. This proved to be an event from which I learned a lot. As I was senior soldier, I was in charge of the escort, so I chose to ride on the footplate. I picked the train up at Lydda and learned that we were going through to Haifa. The trip would last two days, so I drew rations for all four of us for the two days. The food was all tinned except the bread. We had tins of "machonicies" stew. This was two tins in one. The top tin contained the stew, and the bottom contained the rice. Then there was dry tea, tinned milk, margarine and the usual bully beef and tins of beans.

The engine crew consisted of a Jewish driver and an Arab fireman. To me that spelt trouble, but the driver told me that they had been together for years so all was good between them. The engine driver I found to be a great fellow. He told me that the Arabs had sold their land to the Jews for they cold not make it productive, and after seeing what the Jews had managed to do with the land, the Arabs wanted it back. But in general, both parties got on well together. It was the militants that caused the trouble. This I thought was true, for in towns and villages one could see Arabs and Jews living next door to each other in perfect harmony.

The engine driver told us that the strikers got a lot of money from other Arab countries, but part of it came from wrecking the trains and stealing and selling the goods. He told us that when they were going to wreck a train they would take a section of the track out where it was on a bridge or an embankment. They would then go to meet the train on level ground, open fire with their guns and shoot at the train. This was to get the driver scared and make the train go faster to get away from the shooting. When the train arrived at the point where the rail had been removed, it would topple over and roll down the embankment, then it would get looted by the rest of the gang, which was waiting at the site. A lot of this could be stopped now that there were soldiers on each train, for by learning to drive the train in times of need, the soldier could stop the train and with his guns could drive off the raiders. So I learnt to drive the engine.

The driver told us that at each goods station down the line, they would stop and do all the shunting that was needed. The fireman did the driving whilst the driver reported in and rested in the station building by having a nap.

The first place we stopped at was called Tulkarem. It appeared to be in the middle of nowhere, but there were villages around in the hills and nearby was a town called Nablus, which was a stronghold of the strikers. We managed to get over the trip without any bother. I was happy with it for I learned a lot, so much so that I was able to pass the information on to others, much to their delight. Little did I realize that my tuition would pay dividends shortly, on the return trip.

Tulkarem, Palestine - 1936

The Golden Arrow was the crack passenger train that ran to Jerusalem every Monday from Haifa. It was always well-guarded, for there were always at least three escorts going back to Lydda from the end of the week's escorts. I was to return to my base by the Golden Arrow. My escort was fully seasoned, as were the other two who were returning to Lydda. However, the escorts from the Haifa group were on their first job and had an NCO in charge. I knew this chap, so I told him of my learning from the engine driver and he had me ride on the engine and gave me one of his men to teach. He had a Lewis gun. He and the other men patrolled the train, having two at a time in the guards' van.

It had been made very plain to us that martial law had not been declared, and so the military were there to assist the Palestine Police in maintaining law and order, and that all incidents had to be reported to them for their action. It was common knowledge that the Arab gangs came from the Nablus area, and this was hilly country and near to Tulkarem, so one had to be very alert when in the area.

Before leaving Tulkarem, we stopped for about an hour, this enabled the passengers who wished to leave the train and stretch their legs to do so, as well as get a drink of "cold" water, for there was none on the train. It was here that I took pity on a young couple with a baby for I gave them my water bottle to have a drink, and in return the man took my photo and mailed it to me. During the stop the escorts patrolled around the train. I told the NCO that for the next few miles, we had to be ready for anything and not to relax one bit.

Sure enough, it happened. After we left the area, someone started shooting at the train. I made the fireman lay down on the coal bunker and made the engineer stop the train. He didn't want to - he wanted to go faster to clear the area - but my rifle pushed in his back, and the click of the bolt putting a bullet in the spout, convinced him to stop the train. Then a bit of a gun fight started, but as soon as the raiders heard the machine guns going they gave up and fled. We found a wounded man when we searched the area. Further down the line we found that the usual length of rail had been taken out to make the train crash, but this time it didn't work, thanks to my teacher, the first engine driver I met.

Not long afterwards the police arrived, for one of their patrols had heard the shooting and they took over. One of them recognized the wounded man. He lived in Nablus. The police were a cruel lot. They picked the Arab rebel up and dropped him on the ground, him with a bullet wound in his thigh and a burst of machine gun in his shoulder, but he wouldn't talk at all. By this time the sun was up and it was very hot. The Arab kept crying out "moya moya." He was asking for water, so the police gave him some. They poured it out so that it splashed on his face, but none for drinking. While this was going on, we were waiting for the repair crew to arrive and repair the track.

Eventually the police came with the Arab's wife and they restarted their efforts to make him talk, but he didn't. In fact he died without recognizing his wife. Usually in cases like this, any information the police got they acted upon. Any building, whether it be a house or a shop, that belonged to a known striker or in which ammunition or explosives were found was blown up by the Royal Engineers on the instructions of the Palestine Police. So off the police went and had the Arab's house blown up. We were able to continue our journey when the track had been repaired, and arrived back at camp safe and sound and very much wiser.

Most of the preparation for wrecking trains was done at night time, when they knew they wouldn't be spotted. To combat this, it was decided to provide mobile patrols of the main routes from Lydda, Haifa, Jerusalem and Jaffa. This action was brought in because a train on the Jaffa run was wrecked and one of the escorts on the engine was killed. This chap, named John Quirk, was blown up when the engine's boiler blew up, and poor Johnny Quirk was scalded to death. This train was the first to be blown up by the new system that was now in use. The Arabs used to plant a bomb below the rail joints with the detonator pin sticking up above the rails. The length of track was loosened, but left in position to avoid visual detection. As the train wheels went over the bomb, the pin was depressed and the bomb detonated.

To combat this, a flat bed was placed in front of the engine, and this detonated the bomb and did little or no damage to the engine. In addition to this, the Royal Engineers came up with the ideal patrol vehicle. They got hold of a few trucks, joined them together back to back and fixed railway bogey wheels to them. The gasoline engines provided the driving power and the truck wheels propelled the vehicle. There was an engine facing each way so that it was able to go either way without using a reverse gear. Mounted on each vehicle was an ack-ack mounted Lewis gun. Eight men manned the queer-looking vehicle, but it was effective. The one we had was used every night, all night, mostly on the run to Jerusalem. When on patrol, we often saw an Arab camp so we would stop and search them, and always we found nothing but were always invited to eat with them.

Next morning, on the return trip, the camp would be gone and so would a length of railway line, or we would find a planted bomb. They were very crude, for by removing the detonating pin the bomb was rendered harmless. We used this type of patrol vehicle until a new type was built and put into service. The Engineers built a thing that looked like a house on a flat bed. It was made of concrete and was pulled by an engine that was manned by men of the Engineers. We also had a couple of plate layers with us so that effective repairs could be carried out immediately. This train was christened "the Hillman's Pride."

By now there was a good routine in the camp, and one rotated around so that we all got a chance at all the various jobs, good or bad. One day, I found myself on the stand-by. This was a number of men who stood by in case of emergencies. When a train was wrecked, a squad of men were sent out to guard the train and its contents. One afternoon, a train on the Jaffa run was wrecked. Now this route to Jaffa was not a very popular route, for it was dangerous as it mostly ran through heavily wooded areas and orange groves. One could hide an army in them. The trouble was that you didn't know who was shooting at you. The only way to tell was by the sounds of the shots. The Jewish people had modern guns, better than those of the Arabs. Their guns and ammunition dated back to the First World War. They had found huge caches of guns and ammo that the Turks had buried during the war. This, plus the fact that the Jews did not fire on goods trains, helped to determine who was shooting at you.

Our group was ordered to get ready to go out to the train wreck. As it was a goods train, extra men were needed, and to my surprise my brother Ron was put on the patrol. The NCO in charge was an old Indian soldier, Corporal Adams. He had spent many years in India and was not a greenhorn, that was a comfort.

When we first arrived at our camp at Sarafand, the site of the PP's polo pitch, we found a vehicle park full of new trucks painted in desert camouflage. This accounted for the rush in the UK to get drivers trained. These trucks could carry eight men and their equipment, so now we were putting the trucks to good use.

The train wreck to which we had been assigned to guard was on the Jaffa line and past the first set of orange groves. It was about ten miles away from Lydda. When we got there we found the wrecked train being looted by Arabs from the local village, but they soon went away. The train itself was a goods train and carried general cargo, such as gramophones, records, radios, millions of Camel cigarettes, booze, and anything else that could be bought from a store.

We set up our "shop" and started to guard the wreck. Naturally, those on patrol made the rounds of the wrecked box cars and we all had a good time. Corporal Adams let us have what we wanted - except the booze, that was a no no - and I really enjoyed my first smoke of American cigarettes, and the food that was there supplemented our rations.

When darkness came our relief didn't arrive, so we had to settle down for a night's guard in the open. We had a bit of a fire going to keep us warm, for it got very cold at night. Corporal Adams gave us a lecture on what he expected of us. Being an old "Ponkey Wallah" who had served many years in India, and out there they had many skirmishes with the natives, especially on the northwest frontier, so we listened intently to the voice of experience.

He told us that the Arab strikes would come during the dark hours and that they would fire random shots from all sides to try to see just how we were deployed. He said that it was reasonable to assume that they would come from the side of the wreck that faced open fields and not through the orange groves behind us, for they would probably be patrolled by the Jews who owned it.

We had two Lewis guns, which he placed at the front and rear of the train so that each had a 180-degree field of fire. The rest of the men patrolled in pairs on each side of the trains. All this talk took place while we ate our supper. As we were in pairs, one could sleep while the other kept watch and they then changed over, but one had to be awake and on watch at all times and nobody could fire his weapon until told to. He warned us that the most dangerous times were at dusk and dawn.

We had nearly finished our meal when one of the sentries reported seeing what he thought was a person crossing a field and going into a hedge ditch. With that, the fire was doused with water and we all scurried off to our new set positions. What time it was we had no idea, but it had to be around ten or eleven. Anyway, our Ron and I had the Lewis gun at the front of the train and we lay there listening, not daring to speak for fear of giving away our positions.

Then the shooting started, sporadic rifle fire just as was predicted earlier, first from one place and then another. Finally, on instruction, guns fired to where the muzzle flashes could be seen. Then all was quiet for a while. The lance corporal came and told us that when they next fired a very light would be shot by Corporal Adams. This was to light the area so we could see who was where and when we could see the target, we were to open up with our Lewis gun.

Well, up went the very light just like a firework, and lit the corner of the field where we thought the Arabs were, and we opened up with our gun. We put a good burst into the target. Then the gun stopped firing on its own, so we went through the routine to get the gun firing, but it wouldn't go so we had to work by touch to get it going.

The drum was a round thing like a deep plate that held the bullets, and as it rotated around it placed a bullet in the firing position. Two pawls stopped the panier from rotating either way, and we found that one of the springs had broken. It was the one that stopped the reverse movement, so we swapped the springs around so that the gun could be used in an emergency.

Ron and I just lay there with our rifles at the ready for the rest of the night whilst the others did the same, but they managed to keep whoever was out there at bay, for we were sure that they would not try to get by us, for we had the machine gun that they didn't like to face. They had no way of knowing that our gun was not working properly. They tried again and the other gun came into use, and that seemed to settle the attackers down. So after a couple of hours, all went quiet. Perhaps they were tired and wanted to go home to bed. Just one person seemed to have been left behind, for he fired the occasional shot just to let us know they were out there somewhere.

Eventually, dawn broke. This is when one's imagination runs riot. Somebody spotted what they thought was a person climbing a tree near to where we had made camp, so the order was given to open fire with the Lewis gun, which we did, and put a good burst into the object. At that range we couldn't miss, but the thing still stayed there, so the lance corporal walked over. When he got to it he burst out laughing, for the man climbing the tree was his overcoat swinging from a branch. It had been there all night, and it looked as though a crowd of moths had eaten it for it was full of holes.

A good search of the area provided us with good evidence of our attackers, for we found blood spots and marks of someone being dragged and a few empty shell cases. These, the police determined, were of Turkish origin from the First World War. During the search we managed to acquire a few cartons of cigarettes and a few other objects of worth. When our relief came, they told us that they had had a rough night and day too, and that the company sergeant major was searching every patrol that returned to camp, so we had to ditch our loot along the roadside. No doubt the Arabs who found it were grateful for our small gifts.

Past Perspectives:

• On the Manchester Beat
  
• A Yellow Warning
  
• The Liverpool Blitz
  
• The Manchester Blitz