What would you have volunteered for?

Discussion in 'The Lounge Bar' started by Clint_NZ, Feb 8, 2012.

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  1. Clint_NZ

    Clint_NZ Member

    Sorry if this question has been asked before but new to the forum.

    Imagine it is 1939 (For Commonwealth members and/or German members of the forum) or even 1941 (For any American/Russian/Japanese members) and you have decided to enlist; what branch of the services and what role within that service would you have volunteered for?
     
  2. Kbak

    Kbak Senior Member

    I would choose the RA Gun crew or the RAF pilot which ever would take me.
     
  3. John Lawson

    John Lawson Arte et Marte

    Hi Clint NZ

    My father said to me, when I joined the army, 'make a friend of a cook and a storeman and you'll want for nothing'.

    So maybe I'd be one of these, in any unit, remember 'any **** can rough it'.

    (Bearing in mind I have already volunteered 22 years of my life away)

    Regards, John
     
  4. Tanja van Zon-Anderson

    Tanja van Zon-Anderson Senior Member

    Hi Clint NZ,

    I am to young for that period. But when I was 16 years old I volunteerd for the Dutch Airforce trying to become a pilot. I was a girl, too young and wearing glasses. So I could not.

    If I had to choose now I would volunteer for the cavalerie (horses). That is because I love horses. At this moment I own one that was origenaly bred for army work and she is impressive.

    To be honest. My choice are bases on romantic idea's. I have no clue at all how live was at that time.

    Greetings
    Tanja
     
  5. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    I'd have volunteered for a Reserved Occupation so then I wouldn't be called up.
    A job in the local Railway Works would have done that.
    ;)
     
  6. Drew5233

    Drew5233 #FuturePilot 1940 Obsessive

    Which ever I thought would have the least amount of casualties.
     
  7. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    Given my actual ancestry, I probably would have been interned.
     
  8. 26delta

    26delta Senior Member

    Hi Clint NZ,

    I am to young for that period. But when I was 16 years old I volunteerd for the Dutch Airforce trying to become a pilot. I was a girl, too young and wearing glasses. So I could not.

    If I had to choose now I would volunteer for the cavalerie (horses). That is because I love horses. At this moment I own one that was origenaly bred for army work and she is impressive.

    To be honest. My choice are bases on romantic idea's. I have no clue at all how live was at that time.

    Greetings
    Tanja

    Surprisingly enough, the cavalry had a major role in supply operations (carrying munitions, etc.) because the horses could go where trucks could not.
     
  9. 26delta

    26delta Senior Member

    I was one of those who volunteered during Vietnam. To my surprise, I find my military career paralleled that of a great-uncle who served in WW1. We both started in the Chemical Corps, but were transferred to supply. After Vietnam, I continued as a reservist in naval avionics and signal intelligence. My great-uncle transferred from supply to the Engineer Corps, building radar stations.
     
  10. Bradlad

    Bradlad Senior Member

    I am not sure, I would deff have volunteered for the RAF, and even though with hindsight I know what happened, I think I would have gone for a flight role, gunner or the like.
     
  11. Jon Horley

    Jon Horley Member

    If I'd been a young woman at the time, I'd have volunteered for whatever was most likely to take me. Although with asthma, that might not have been too much! Probably would've liked to have been a London civil service ambulance driver, like my mother was for a year, until having to give it up due to pregnancy (with me). She told me that the civil ambulances really weren't proper ambulances at all - they were like small lorries with more or less deep shelves inside to plonk the stretchers on, and scoot away.

    The work was hazardous and often heart-rending, given the sights they saw, but one of her more light-hearted recollections was following a particularly nasty bombardment round World's End (London). A lot of buildings had been flattened and when they arrived, survivors were sitting or stumbling around, covered in ghostly gray cement dust. Out of this strange scene wandered an old East Ender in just his underpants, gray from head to foot. My mother asked if he was all right and he replied, "Yeah, I'm awright, ducks. But blimey! I went to the karzi, pulled the chain, an' the 'ole bleedin' 'ouse fell down!"
     
  12. Stormbird

    Stormbird Restless

    In 1940 I would have volunteered for anything that would had helped setting my country free from the Nazis.
     
  13. mimike

    mimike Junior Member

    Since I had experience in the printing field when I was drafted I started my military career in the Map Making field and (after 11 years) switched to Military Intel. (as an Analysis); these same paths were open in 1939 so I don’t see why I would change something that worked. This would have made me a Topographic Engineer in WWII and an Intelligence Analysis during the Korean War.
     
  14. sparky34

    sparky34 Senior Member

    the one thing for sure , it would not of been the infantry ..
     
  15. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Since I had experience in the printing field when I was drafted I started my military career in the Map Making field and (after 11 years) switched to Military Intel. (as an Analysis); these same paths were open in 1939 so I don’t see why I would change something that worked. This would have made me a Topographic Engineer in WWII and an Intelligence Analysis during the Korean War.

    If it was 1939, you likely would have been travelling north, with many of your countrymen, to join the Canadian armed forces.

    RCAF for me!
     
  16. Mike L

    Mike L Very Senior Member

    Jon, loved this:

    Out of this strange scene wandered an old East Ender in just his underpants, gray from head to foot. My mother asked if he was all right and he replied, "Yeah, I'm awright, ducks. But blimey! I went to the karzi, pulled the chain, an' the 'ole bleedin' 'ouse fell down!"

    A mate of mine spent 22 years in the Army, until a few years ago, with Engineers and later Intel. Deployed on 'tri-service' bases, Germany, NI, Iraq and Afghan. He reckons if he had his time again he would go for RN.
    As for me probably RN with my family connections as the question is set in 1939. Later on perhaps RAF or even later on Airborne (paras) or Commandos but I probably wouldn't have made the grade (thankfully).
     
  17. Assam

    Assam Senior Member

    I would expect that I would have had interwar service by 1939, but in the event I did join up & in the UK, I would have gone for my grandfathers old mob 17th Lancers or cousins old mob North Staffordshires.

    ATB

    Simon
     
  18. wowtank

    wowtank Very Senior Member

    TBH I would have been very scared and Joint the RAF to stropped being called up to the PBI and because I was an Air Cadet.
     
  19. kiwigeordie

    kiwigeordie Senior Member

    My mother asked if he was all right and he replied, "Yeah, I'm awright, ducks. But blimey! I went to the karzi, pulled the chain, an' the 'ole bleedin' 'ouse fell down!"[/QUOTE]

    Oddly enough Jon, exactly the same thing happened to me last week:D
    Seriously though, somewhat like mimike, I was a cartographer in the RAF but my real ambition was to be aircrew and that's what I'd try for. I was also rather taken with Air Sea Rescue.
    Pete
     
  20. Combover

    Combover Guest

    Like most infantrymen of ww2 I've actually met, I'd have volunteered for the navy...and then promptly been sent to the army.
     

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