Walter James Brindle
Private
A Company - 1st Battalion - Gordon Highlanders
Violence in Cyrpus
Coarse rocky peaks dotted with pine trees and cloaked in a swath of underbrush created a series of natural defenses which proved a great hiding place for insurgents. Navigating the many knolls and footpaths of this mountain range known as the Trodos was no easy feat and ensured Walter Brindle of the Gordon Highlanders became efficient at hiking during patrols (1). Recently arrived to A Company in the fall of 1956, he was one of several new replacements, landing in one of the few remaining jewels of the once grand British Empire, Cyprus (2). Yet there was little familiar about this place to the Glasgow native, patrolling the ancient Byzantine streets of houses with clay-tile, the scenery far more reminiscent of Greece than of a Commonwealth nation (1). Perhaps it was for this reason the local Greek speaking populace was sympathetic to the EOKA terrorists, who the 1st Battalion sought to root out of the mountain communities from their base in the town of Platres (1).
Patrols in the vast forests and upon remote mountain roads often proved a violent affair, with hostiles suddenly firing upon A Company and just as quickly disappearing into the wild when the Gordons gave chase (1). Despite being armed typically only with shotguns and dynamite, the EOKA proved a great menace, killing or wounding several in the company that fall with well placed bombs and gunfire (1). For Walter it was a true lesson in counterinsurgency, his posting in the nation being filled with a swath of search & destroy missions, the young Scotsmen always on guard for suspicious activity or movement in the brush. By the arrival of snow that December, it was time for the now weary battalion to depart, having captured insurgent munitions and engaged the enemy, effectively keeping the EOKA from seizing power and obtaining the organization's goal of joining authoritarian Greece (1). The safe departure of the highlanders through the snow clogged mountain roads would unfortunately not mark the last British deployment to the island, tensions between the ethnic Greeks and Turks necessitating future missions (1).
Dover to Hanover
Training, parades, and sporting competitions provided a much more typical peacetime army experience for the veteran highlander as the battalion settled for a period in Dover, England (1). Such a life was very much pleasant comparative to Cyprus, providing those serving their two year national service requirement such as Walter with a taste of more typical military life. The youthful Scotsman proudly among those to greet Queen Elizabeth in the Gordon Honor Guard following her return from the Netherlands in 1958 (3). The luxuries of this quiet posting eventually ending the following year with the 1st Battalion being deployed to the German village of Celle in Hanover (1).
Once settled into their new barracks in the formerly hostile nation of Germany, the 1st Battalion began a refit to become an entirely mobile unit, Walter transferring to the Motor Transport Company (1,4). Almost immediately they were engaged in a variety of events including skiing and combat exercises alongside friendly NATO forces, providing quite an experience for the young Scotsmen (4). Such a posting also allowed for opportunities to learn from those veterans of World War Two and Korea, including the rather infamous Captain Durbin, who helped lead an exercise well in Sennelager (4). Walter would himself gain a bit of notoriety for the sheer quantity of food he was able to prepare for his fellow Gordons well on exercise (4). It was much appreciated by the other lads who were consistently famished during their stay in Germany due to a struggling procurement service (4). Though frustrating to the men, it was all part of the growing pains of a more modern British Army, Walter being among the last to have served in pacifying a remanent of the crumbling Empire.
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Sources:
(1) Sinclair-Stevenson, Christopher. The Life of Regiment - The History of the Gordon Highlanders. VI, Leo Cooper Ltd, 1974.
(2) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 4, 1956.
(3) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 5, 1958.
(4) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 5, 1959.
(1) Sinclair-Stevenson, Christopher. The Life of Regiment - The History of the Gordon Highlanders. VI, Leo Cooper Ltd, 1974.
(2) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 4, 1956.
(3) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 5, 1958.
(4) The Tiger & Sphinx. The Regimental Journal of the Gordon Highlanders, Vol. 5, 1959.