SETTLING IN

It was February and our recruit platoon was sent to Kilworth to fire our range practices. This would be firing live ammunition with the weapons that we were training with.

I was 21 years old and had been travelling since I was 17. Some of the recruits were the same age as myself and had seen a bit of life, many were younger and a few were older, including 4 old soldiers, Congo/ Cyprus veterans who had left the army; couldn’t settle back into civvy street (or couldn’t get a job) and had rejoined.

The idea of getting out of barracks and going to the countryside for a week appealed to everybody, especially some of the city lads who thought that they were going on a holiday.

The sight of Kilworth from the back of a smelly Bedford truck soon changed their minds. A bleak countryside designed by God for creating soldiers. It was a bleak winter’s day with a cold wind howling down from the hills and a freezing rain falling in sheets. The sight of the black wooden huts cheered everybody up a little. They looked like something out of a war film and the platoon felt like real soldiers. The huts were surprisingly comfortable.

I’ll never forget the first night sitting around a pot-bellied stove that glowed red. Someone had liberated 2 sliced pans along with a pot of Bo Beep strawberry jam from the cookhouse, along with a small slab of army butter, hard as a rock, which we melted down over the stove and put on our toast with a wobbler (Brush Shaving Army Issue) like we had seen the cooks do when preparing sandwiches for large numbers going to the range, etc - it’s amazing the things you see when you are on fatigues in the cook house -1 could write a book. No sirloin steak ever tasted better, it tasted like manna to hungry young soldiers and young soldiers were always hungry.

The next morning we had our first experience of the wash house. It was like a giant freezer, with icicles hanging from the taps. Most were inexperienced shavers and the combination of shivers and coldness left many looking like they came back from the war by the time we got to breakfast and our green, white and gold egg.

For many, the first day on the ranges was a strange experience. Some of us had fired weapons before, but the majority had fired nothing stronger than a catapult and they were firing Belgium 7.62 FN semi automatic rifles (a more effective weapon than the British SLR) and the 7.62 MAG General Purpose Machine Gun, capable of spitting out death at the rate of 600 to 1,000 rounds a minute (in sustained (heavy) fire roll). The NCOs were excellent coaches and having zeroed the weapons at the 100 yard firing point, we settled into the shoot with some very good shots emerging.

The platoon split into two, taking turns in the butts and had a great craic pushing up and down targets on the command of the corporal. At lunch, the egg and cheese sandwiches were quickly devoured as whatever it was about the Kilworth air, it always made us ravenous!

At the end of the day’s shooting we had the best shot and he would get an award on our passing out day. Nearly everyone passed (got the qualifying score Table 4). We all enjoyed the last practice 'The Galloping Major’ especially, where you put your bayonet on your rifle and adopting different firing positions, advancing from the 300 firing point, firing at the targets as they appeared right up to the 100 firing point. This seemed more like the real thing.

Following this practice, we were graded as marksmen (some of us would later receive a small badge to wear on our tunic) 1st and 2nd class shots and those who just qualified. The marksmen and first class shots would later train with their unit shooting team, spending many hours on the range perfecting their art.

That night after a delicious meal of piping hot army stew and bread and butter, followed by stewed apple and custard, we retired for the night, dog tired but happy, happy with the shoot and looking forward to firing Table 18 on the MAG machine gun on No 4 range the following day.