Jack Calder - Return to England

Transcript

And when we met the Americans, they said, "Well" After we'd convinced them who we were, they said "There's a tent over there, get over there and get yourself deloused", because we were covered in lice. Hadn't lost him since North Africa, right. "Go into the next tent and get yourself some clothing, go into the next tent and get yourself a feed. Go into the next tent and get yourself a bed. Whatever you do, be back here tomorrow morning at 8:00." "What's going to happen at 8:00 tomorrow morning?" "Never mind, just do what we tell you." So we done that.

The following morning we went... We were put in vehicles and sent out... And taken out to an aerodrome. When we got to the aerodrome, they separated all the countries. Australians were putting one area, New Zealanders somewhere else. Taffy, my old mate, he was put in another area and so on. The Australians were put in a converted flying fortress.

They'd taken the bomb bays out and put in boards and they put 50 of us in there. And we were taken over to England. And this was about 9:00 in the morning, by 4:00 that afternoon we were in England and by 5:00 we were at the Australian base down in Southeast... In Eastbourne, we were at Eastbourne. All they'd done the first night at Eastbourne was show us where we had to stay and, "We'll see you in the morning."