The Army camp that banished the ‘bad’ troops

FOR Albert Long it meant the exotic taste of tinned tomatoes. For a bevy of local lasses, the gift of nylons and chocolates… perhaps in exchange for a little something later on.

For the boys in blue, it was five weeks of isolation, humiliation and no pay as they were methodically expunged of an embarrassing anti-social condition.

And for thousands of others it was the visit of two monarchs: the undisputed King of England, George VI and the undisputed King of Quips, Bob Hope.

Today, it is hard to believe the place existed at all. Hardly a trace remains. It is just farmland now: that and a heavy goods driving test centre.

If it wasn’t for a dedicated group of local historians, who erected a bronze plaque at the site once occupied by The Chiseldon Camp, then its memory would have simply drifted into local folklore.

For almost half-a-century a swathe of countryside adjoining Chiseldon was home to what was arguably the Borough of Swindon’s most important development outside of the Great Western Railway Works.

Lancers, hussars, rifle corps, cookery corps, bicycle battalions, an assortment of be-kilted “jocks” including the famed Black Watch, German prisoners-of-war, wounded American GIs, wounded soldiers from the Beaches of Normandy, displaced families from Poland and Hungary… an estimated 200,000 people lived or were based at Chiseldon Camp during its 48 years.

And it all began exactly 100 years ago this month.

The Great War was only a month old when railway tracks materialised on farmland requisitioned from the Calley Estate, swiftly followed by the arrival of 100 chippies and a similar number of labourers (paid a premium of seven pence an hour.) The first barracks were up in weeks – 72 50ft long huts initially, followed by what – at its height – was a transit town of 15,000 people, ten times that of 1,500 population Chiseldon.

Furniture company Gilbert’s – still trading from the same Old Town premises today – supplied hundreds of lockers and beds. Boss John Gilbert received a letter from War Secretary Lord “your country needs you” Kitchener recognising his efforts “for king and country.”

As Chiseldon historian David Bailey points out in The Story of Chiseldon Camp – Part One 1914-1922, the advent of 5,000 people in close proximity to a village presented problems.

Imagine 500 men pouring off a train at Chiseldon… only to find there were no loos! Also bursting were the mail bags at beleaguered Chiseldon Post Office which was forced to call for reinforcements.

Local landlords, however, struck gold. At least until the inevitable clampdown following the inevitable drunken shenanigans. It was not uncommon for soldiers to be found sleeping it off in gardens and under hedges.

A couple of intemperate Welsh Fusiliers, heading back from Swindon through Hodson Woods, got into a brawl, resulting in one cutting the other’s throat. The culprit was so blitzed he thought he was “dealing with a German”. Much to the outrage of Swindon Licensed Victuallers, who claimed it was a “vicious attack” on their trade, the sale of alcohol to troops was severely curtailed.

Some less than virtuous locals, however, were also having a time of it, plundering tents and store-rooms while the army boys were engaged in mock battles, digging trenches and chucking bombs around on Liddington Hill.

Gangs of local men and children regularly raided the camp, on one occasion stealing “12 loaves of bread, a segment of cheese, unopened tins of sardines and preserved meat and a large piece of uncooked bacon.”

Equipment, too, was pilfered – often by the ton – including blankets, cloths and “almost anything that could be moved.”

Citizens of the long-established village, however, got on pretty well with those in the newly-established camp.

Albert Long, who was seven in 1914, vividly recalled falling in behind a company of Royal Welsh Fusiliers as they marched from Chiseldon station to the newly emerging camp of huts and tents.

“We kids used to go around the tents and the soldiers would give us loaves of bread and other things from their rations. I remember this particularly as it was the first time that I ever tasted tinned tomatoes.

“Nothing was motorised in those days so the rations were brought up to men by wagons drawn by mules.

“The mud at the gateway was up to the knees of the mules and the axles of the wagons.”

Of the dozens of units comprising tens of thousands of men based at Chiseldon before heading for the battlefields of Flanders, Gallipoli, the Somme et al – including several cyclist corps – there appears to have been an especial fondness for “the jocks”.

Bailey writes: “Their Scots accents, somewhat exotic dress and the novelty of their presence in very large numbers caused them to be remembered for a very long time… and caused many a young girl’s heart to flutter.”

Chiseldon also hosted a “bad boy’s camp” – a barbed wire-fenced VD hospital-cum-prison whose blue uniformed patients-cum-inmates usually served five weeks without pay, which was how long it took to treat the disease in pre-penicillin times.

Village kids were warned by their parents to keep away from anyone in blue, should they encounter them. As a young girl, Muriel Howard saw a gang of them heading towards The Elm Tree, having just broken out.

“The men, who were Australian, were rounded up and taken back. I was ever so frightened as I didn’t understand what illness they had.”

Old habits, though, die hard and some patients, having been given a clean bill of health, headed straight for the brothels of Newport Street and Morley Street in Swindon.

Given the horrors of trench warfare that lay ahead, who could really blame them?

On Fridays, however, Swindon came to them… the 6.45pm from Old Town station ferried a group of good time Wiltshire gals seeking fun, liquor, cigarettes and romance.

It was affectionately known – at least, by the boys – as “the meat train”.

 

  • WHEN the Great War finally rumbled to a conclusion Chiseldon Camp became a low-key military training centre with the vast majority of its structures (300 huts, messes, dining halls, office blocks, stables etc) disposed of… only to be replaced two decades later.

     

    Rising phoenix-like for World War Two it hosted American as well as British troops, eventually coming under full control of the US Army.

    Bob Hope, among others, arrived to perk up the GIs and amuse the locals. On seeing village youngsters bunched in front of the stage during his show he quipped: “Oh no, Crosby’s backyard.”

    The locals hadn’t a clue what he was on about but the Yanks were in fits.

    Afterwards it was explained to the Chiseldon contingent that it was a reference to his comedic compadre Bing Crosby who had numerous offspring whereas Hope had none.

    Come D-Day, Chiseldon became the first port of call for wounded Americans cut down on Utah and Omaha Beaches.

    Flown by Dakota to a string of airbases around Swindon they were then conveyed to a US military hospital at Chiseldon, cleaned-up and despatched to where they could best be treated.

    It was, according to Chiseldon historian/author David Bailey, a slick operation with troops wounded on the battlefield in the morning being treated at Chiseldon in the evening. Some 32,000 GIs received care there during the first six months alone.

     

  • When George VI inspected troops at Chiseldon Camp in March, 1940 he was greeted by a “rag-tag army” of local youngsters who formed a guard of honour.

     

    They were dressed, as best they could, in military regalia – toy guns, hand-me-down caps and any other paraphernalia they could beg, borrow or steal.

    Imagine their euphoria when the monarch smartly responded with “a most formal military salute.”

    After its closure in 1962 Chiseldon Camp was dismantled and slowly vanished from the eyes and minds of villagers.

    In the 1990s, however, the Chiseldon Local History Group undertook a research project to unearth all known material on the camp before it was lost altogether.

    As a result it published two books, The Story of Chiseldon Camp Part One – 1914-1922 (1998), and Part Two – 1922-1962 (2005).

    With cash from the first volume, the group in November 1999 erected a bronze plaque on a sarsen stone they had contrived to excavate stating: “About this place stood Chiseldon Camp 1914-1962.

    “This stone is dedicated to all the men and women of all nations who passed this way during those years, many of them brought here by the major conflicts of the 20th Century.”