Diary of Major Geoffrey John Webb 24 March - 28 December 1941
When war broke out in August 1939 Dad, Geoffrey John Webb, then 18 years old, returned to school to find everyone preoccupied with OTC. He and several of his contemporaries, encouraged by staff, volunteered for army service and within days went to Cardiff University to be attested, given the King’s shilling, and told to go home and await call-up.
When called up, as an officer cadet, Dad was sent to a battalion of the Royal Scots and travelled by ship to Bombay and on to the Cadet College Bangalore where he trained with Indian troops for the Middle East. After Pearl Harbour the troops were reassigned to the Far East and headed for Burma Among the papers Dad left when he died was a diary.
Enclosed in a trunk sent to Calcutta c/o Cox and Kings together with a service dress to remain in storage until 1947, the diary, hand-written in pen and ink records events in nine months of Geoffrey’s life following his enlistment in the Indian Army and travelling to Bombay in the meat ship Highland Chieftain in December 1940. He arrived in Bombay about 15-20 March 1941.
Until 1995, 50th anniversary of the end of World War II, Dad took no part in parades and had not even claimed his medals. That 50th anniversary reminded him, “We are forgetting, we must not forget,” and jolted him into action. He vowed never to forget the horrors of war and the young lives sacrificed. So from them, he wore the medals, as one who survived those horrors, in tribute to those who did not come back.
Dad wrote:
"Having transferred from the British Army to the British empire Indian Army in 1940, my service was with the 2½ million volunteers, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, who bore the main brunt of the defence of India and Burma. As one of the “Forgotten 14th Army”, words of Gurkha Brig. Colonel John Master in his “Road to Mandalay” come back to me.
No one seeing the black, white and brown, all lying in their indistinguishable blood can fail to cry, “What is man that he can give so much for war, so little for peace!”
As we older ones, survey the young people today, so smart, so well-trained, let us thank those who lead them in ways of service. Let us work for their future and for all the children of the world to be free from hunger, avoidable sickness, young death and so, sharing the God given resources of our world. Live in peace."
The diary starts on Monday 24 March 1941.
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