1943 ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT DIARY OF ONE BRITISH GUNNER'S MISERABLE 6 MONTHS IN DIEGO SUAREZ MADAGASCAR

On offer is the manuscript diary of one British WWII soldier's unwelcome service as a Gunner for His Majesty's Army in the East Africa Command. Handwritten by Gunner C.J. Wallace O.F.C. [Ordnance Factory] 1612928 while serving in Diego Suarez, Madagascar.

The diary begins in January, 1943, four days before Wallace of the 152 E.A.H.A.A. Battery [152 East Africa Heavy Anti Aircraft Battery] embarked by ship for Madagascar in Jan, 1943. Wallace writes a full 104 pages over the next six months and concludes his diary when it is full on June 30th.

Wallace served as part of heavy artillery crew whose job was to defend against enemy aircraft or shipping. During the period of the diary, the 125 E.A.H.A.A. Battery saw little action, save for a couple of times enemy aircraft flew over Diego Suarez and at one point there was concern over a ship sighted offshore but this proves not to be an enemy craft. The only "action" he saw involves local people very sadly becoming accidentally wounded during a training exercise.

Wallace's entries give a realistic sense of the relentless, joyless, powerless, day-to-day experience of many conscripts. He is bored, homesick and miserable. He and his comrades are often ill with diarrhoea or malaria. There is a constant low level grumbling: weather, filth, squalor of the local town, privations of the accommodation, poor food, failure to receive timely pay, poor transport infrastructure, behaviour of the officers and locals, and his deep longing to go home to his wife, Joan.

Of interest is his endless irritation with the constant, pointless emphasis on petty regulation and "spit and polish." He writes of this often. An excerpt:

"We had to change our beds today, for three planks of wood, everybody must have the same, even if you were nice and comfortable before. Just like our battery. I suspect it's all Godfrey's doings, even if you have your own camp bed, when the day comes for inspection, you have to hide it and show three planks with kit on."

The only high points in Wallace's lived experience are the regular games of football, listening to the wireless when it works and a two week leave period at the tiny town of Joffreville in a converted sawmill established to enable soldiers to request and recuperate. In June of 1943, Wallace writes that a brothel was opened in Diego Suarez for the officers. He writes that it was, "licensed by army medical authorities... [with sex workers who were] white and almost white girls." Wallace reports on rumours he hears (which disgust him) about another potential brothel opening where the sex workers would be women from another African country. 

The brothel entry is another layer of frustration Wallace shares, giving credence to what could be the overall thesis of his diary: his suggestion that the regimental motto should be "Semper in Excreta."

Historical Context

Prior to 1942, Madagascar was a French colony and Churchill feared that Vichy France would allow the Japanese to use the island as a base for operations in the Indian Ocean. This fear led to a British and Allied offensive in the spring of 1942 which successfully led to the invasion of the island. The 152 E.A.H.A.A. Battery [152 East Africa Heavy Anti Aircraft Battery] was part of the East Africa Brigade based at the most important harbour, Diego Suarez, on the northern tip of the island. They were part of the all-important defenses of Britain's strengthening hold of the area.

Condition

The diary is a small notebook with 104 pages. It is 100% complete with all pages completely filled to the brim. The paper covers are detached from the single staple which holds the notebook together. Tucked in the diary is a fascinating selection of ephemera including an abandoned draft of a letter from the author to his wife in south London, plus a couple of simple, rhyming poems in which the writer expresses his cynicism about the army life. Overall Good.