Casevac
In 1956 we were collecting patients from all parts of the world and from the Navy and Army, as well as our own sick RAF personnel. No one would carry out surgical operations in tropical climates if it was possible to ship patients home swiftly for treatment in better conditions in the UK. It was a big and well oiled operation.
My turn to fly abroad and collect patients came every seventh week. I flew to Cyprus, Gibraltar, the Middle East and the Far East on several occasions, but most of all to Germany. It was a well guarded secret that tuberculosis was rampant among troops in the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) after the Second World War. This was a huge army so, even in the mid-1950s, we had no difficulty in filling two planes a week with TB patients and returning them to RAF Wroughton.
It all felt very informal and friendly. On the first morning I was told by the person in charge to go to the NAAFI and buy a pint of milk and a loaf of bread and bring it across the tarmac to our plane. There were no Customs or Immigration people at a military airport. We landed near Cologne where there was an airstrip close to a medical facility. Our counterparts, who were stationed there, had been drinking sterilised milk with a beer bottle top and eating German rye bread, so this weekly gift was always appreciated. There were two flights a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays - a lot of people had TB.
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