CTC Middle East

There's not a whole lot written online about the Combined Training Centre in the Middle East, which was based at Kabrit/Kabret/Kibrit between the two Bitter Lakes that comprise part of the Suez Canal.

The best source is, unsurprisingly, the Combined Operations website. I've cobbled some details together for my COPP Survey website. Most of the other references that I've found online are passing mentions in veteran accounts, though there are also some IWM photos tagged Kabrit.

I've had Attack from the Sea, a 1949 book written by Rear-Admiral Edward Maund, sat on my bookshelf for some time but have just dipped into it for the first time. He was appointed Director of Combined Operations (DCO) in spring 1941.

His book includes a fairly extensive description of the CTC 'as he found it' following his appointment. Given the lack of info available elsewhere, I thought people might appreciate having it online to access for reference, and so that other people can add info as they find it.

Maund's description is on pages 169–170 of his book.

The business of the DCO, ME, had been going through a rather trying time. In the main this was due to the fact that equipment was so short that no one could visualise any landing operations being undertaken from the Middle East. The efforts and thoughts of GHQ were concerned with one problem: how to keep Rommel out of Egypt. […]

The Combined Training Centre at Kabret on the Bitter Lakes, some 35 miles up the canal from Suez, was an almost pitiable sight.

Kabret is one of the canal company’s signal stations and controls the movement of ships in the Bitter Lakes. Its neatly built bungalow and signal station stand on a tiny peninsula which juts out to divide the Great from the Little Bitter Lake. The buildings stand up some 50 feet above sea-level and are backed by a plantation of small fir trees which almost cover the peninsula.

The pier below the signal station runs out towards the dredged channel for ships with concrete blocks marking the limits of deep water. Ships having to ‘garre up’, as they call it, to allow another ship to pass berth against the edge of the channel and use the bollards on the concrete blocks for their wires and hawsers. […]

On the land side of this peninsula the Combined Training Centre had been set up. It consisted of a houseboat as offices and a large Nissen shed as a lecture room. The particular stores required for a landing were stored in the immediate vicinity.

The camp for officers attending courses came next up the road that led to the Suez–Ismailia highway, then the camps for the naval crews of landing craft and beyond them again, out on the dusty desert and clear of the Kabret aerodrome, the camps for the brigades under training.

In the bay south of the Kabret point lay the few flotillas of landing craft and some tank landing craft, while immediately on the lake side of the CTC houseboat there was a slipway with shipwright’s shop, one landing point for a tank landing craft, and a home-made landing craft pier where troops could embark for landing practices.

In the winter it was pretty cold and in the summer devilish hot, but always healthy despite the dust storms that blotted out even nearby objects for days on end when the wind blew.

The CTC staff of half a dozen officers would hardly have considered Kabret a training establishment on Ritz lines, though the naval commander on the staff had scrounged an additional houseboat out of the Suez Canal Company in which he lived a more normal ship existence, to the pleasure not only of himself, but of many visitors as well.​

I've had a stab at mapping out Maund's description.

First, a Google Maps link to the peninsula with the signal station

Then a rough attempt to map out some of it based on Maund's description – some areas more definite than others! Especially uncertain is the location of the houseboats and the slipways. With the slipways, I suspect I've been drawn too far away to an area where there are two slipways these days – although I guess it's not impossible that the current ones were built on top of earlier ones. The areas for the officers attending training and the naval men are very approximate!



It's possible to plot some of that onto the painting that's been uploaded to the Combined Operations website. The view seems to be looking more or less directly north from the southern end of the naval camp?



Then looking at the wider area, I combined two maps from the University of Texas online collections. A number of army references to the CTC seem to say along the lines of "we went to Geneifa". I wonder whether the area they camped in was closer to that town than to the rest of the CTC, or took up the whole area at different times.



If anyone else has anything about this CTC, or HMS Saunders, the naval element, I'd love to hear!

(I've tagged this "India" too as my understanding is some elements that served in SEAC went to this CTC for training.)

 

I forgot to tag this SAS and Special Air Service, so am doing so now by adding thi reply. The Folbot Section/Special Boat Section of Layforce was also in this area in early 1941.

 

Cracking stuff Rob; a mighty effort on your part and very very much appreciated.

Kind regards, always,

Jim.

 

And Rob, a poor addition to your efforts but included as this is from whom men of a certain persuasion (L Detachment ) obtained most of their camp (and of course, this is contemporary with the time) during an early initiative test.

With thanks and courtesy to (since 1941 )

https://28maoribattalion.org.nz/photo/kabrit-training-centre-egypt



Kind regards, and light fingers, always,

Jim.

 

Hi! this is excellent stuff! Currently writing a book on the Middle East Commandos so this will come in very useful indeed if that is ok. I had a few questions if I may..

Can I confirm if this site was also related to the Middle East Depot Commando Training and Holding Unit established in Dec 40 and opened 25 Jan 41? Commanded by Major D.W. Melville.

Do you have any relevant dates of training etc carried out and the types?

Many thanks. Sean

 

Let me know if you want me to do dig out some stuff from the Germans, and I have some notes on FLIPPER as well.

All the best

Andreas

 

Andreas - Yes, if you have any things that you think will be of help I would be grateful. Thanks. Sean