Christmas’s Past – Christmas 1957 by Ian Giles

(From Ian…..) Here’s a story taken from within a story, my RAF National Service 1956 -58.

Christmas’s Past – Christmas 1957

This is a story about a journey, but before I start, I think it would be appropriate here for me to describe the social culture and driving conditions of those days.  Never did it cross my mind that people would not stop to give me lift or help me on my way if they could.  The figure of a serviceman in uniform standing at the road side was a familiar sight and had been since the days of WWII.  Day or night made little or no difference; people would be only too pleased to help you on your way without thought of thanks or reward.   Most drivers, be they private car, heavy goods local or long distance would willingly give you a lift if only for a few miles or indeed, many miles dependent on their journey, people would converse freely which all added to the journey’s interest.  It is a few such journeys I would like to share here.

I suppose to anyone under the age of 60 it is almost impossible to imagine the modern world without motorways, journeys that took all day to get from say Newcastle to London, or London to Plymouth were the norm in those days, I can remember taking 12 hours to cover the distances from Birmingham to Torbay by road during the summertime as you had to negotiate every town and village en rout. Queues on the Exeter by-pass for example would stretch for miles.  It was a similar story by rail, journey times today are a fraction of years ago.  Anyway let’s get started.

Christmas Past

Christmas 1957 stands out in my memory; it was time for me to go home to Kingswear for my Christmas leave, this would be my second and last Christmas in the RAF for I had only a further six months to serve. Hitch hiking was my preferred means of travel as it usually provided interest and variety,  It was Mike Elllis who imbued me with enthusiasm for hitch hiking, for he used to regale us with many a fine tale.  It was mainly the people one met that provided the interest. You had no idea what transport or who you would meet or even how long your journey would take.  Rain or shine, winter or summer I found being on the open road a deeply satisfying experience, I suppose it was the feeling of complete freedom, I wonder if a tramp  on the road experiences such a freedom?  I could fill several pages with memories of interesting journeys made; I will confine myself here to one or two.

It was an absolute pea soup of a foggy day when I started out at midday on the Friday before Christmas 1957; I was going home to Kingswear on leave from RAF Stafford where I was serving my two years National Service.  I’d made my way out of Stafford hitch hiking along the A449, en route for Kidderminster, Worcester and the A38 for Bristol and the West of England.  The journey distance from Stafford to Kingswear was approximately 230 miles.   After eight hours on the road I had barely covered thirty miles, which found me at my first town of Kidderminster.  For the first time I felt I was being defeated by the conditions, a serious rethink was taking place as to how I should proceed from here.  There was nothing for it but to abandon my plan and try and get to the nearest railway station, which was Kidderminster itself.

Under the eerie swirling light of a street lamp I waited for the sound of an oncoming vehicle, I could not see a thing beyond the swirling yellow wreath of the street lamp; eventually the fog deadened silence was broken by the sound of a vehicle approaching.  Appearing out of nowhere a Morris Minor convertible broke through the curtain of light and drew up rather irritably, as if annoyed at the necessity at having to stop.

The driver leant across the passenger seat, wound down the window and asked where was I bound?  I repeated the plans that were still fresh in my mind and that I wanted to get to the nearest railway station.  Still leaning over the passenger seat he started to wind the window up indicating he could not help me, his rapid movements suggesting speed was of the essence, I thought I caught the word ‘Exeter’ through the fast closing window.  Did I hear right? I quickly yelled I was going to Devon, the door opened and I was invited to join him.

He set off at what I thought was a lunatic speed, the fog had not let up one bit, in fact I think it had got worse as it was now pitch dark.  I strained my eyes, trying to see through the windscreen, but all I could see was the reflection of the car’s headlights in the fog. To me it seemed impossible the driver could see where we were going; I sat back, closed my eyes and resigned myself to whatever fate had in store.  Mile after mile this man drove like a man on a mission, he was a young chap not much older than I.  As the miles clicked away my apprehension of this man’s driving changed to admiration, how he was managing to drive with such assuredness in these truly awful conditions defied logic.  Towns came and went, we must have passed through Bristol but I could not recognise anywhere; conditions remained unchanged and we sped on for mile after mile.

At times I glanced at the speedometer, which I swear was registering eighty miles an hour.  I have had many years to remember this journey and still ask myself if I really did see that needle hover over the eighty mark.  I suppose the logical answer must be it could not have been possible, I must have imagined it in my near state of panic, either way, he dropped me off at the Exeter Bypass at exactly two o’clock in the morning.  I reckoned we had covered one hundred and eighty miles non-stop in just six hours, which in those conditions was incredible. (motorways were not even on the drawing board)  I thanked him profusely, what more could I say. I slammed the door and waved, by which time he had disappeared into the fog, which had not abated one jot.  Throughout the long journey he had talked quite freely about himself, but for the life of me I cannot remember a single thing he told me, doubtless my selective memory process choosing more pressing details of the journey. What a pity!

On Exeter Bypass, I again stood alone in the freezing night air in the silence of the swirling fog.  In a matter of minutes, a police car of all things drew alongside with two policemen on board; within seconds I was on my way to Paignton.  When they dropped me off they told me that later, they were going to Brixham and if they saw me along the way, they would give me a lift to Kingswear, which I thought was decent of them.  However, that was the last I saw of them, because by then I was walking the railway line at Churston, it was my intention to walk the line to Kingswear, even if there was a tunnel to go through!

My footsteps sounded hollow on the wet sleepers, up ahead somewhere, was the tunnel.  Presently, a yawning black hole loomed out of the fog, this was it; as it happened I had foreseen the possibility of such an occasion and had taken the precaution of packing a torch, I congratulated myself on my preparedness.  It was absolutely pitch black inside the tunnel, the only sound being the steady drip, of water dropping down from the blackness above, it would have been treacherous without the aid of the torch.  At about the half way mark a grey circular hole appeared in my vision, at first I was puzzled but then quickly realised it was the tunnel exit; the tunnel was built on a curve and as I rounded the bend, the exit revealed itself.  I was all the time apprehensive that a train might come either up or down the single line, I tried to convince myself that this was not possible because the trains had stopped running into Kingswear hours ago, there was however the possibility that with the fog extending all over the country, and it being Christmas, a late train might come down the line.

As I emerged out of the end of the tunnel I was aware something was different, it took some time for me to figure out what it was, then it dawned on me, the fog had lifted, for bright moonlight was penetrating the thick mist.  I was now on the last lap, thirty minutes later I was wearily climbing the hill past the village church, it was as quiet as the graves just over the stone wall, suddenly the silence was shattered as the church clock sonorously clanged out four times, signalling to the sleeping unhearing villagers it was four am. Shaken out of my drowsiness I checked my watch, I had been on the road over sixteen hours and I realised it was Christmas.  I had an overwhelming urge to yell at the top of my voice, “Happy Christmas everybody”  …….. But I never did of course.

End