Wireless of the Week - week 44

[Bruce Parker (RIP)]

Apart from the instruction manuals for various radio sets, it required a great deal of information and training to efficiently operate complex and vital communication systems. British and Commonwealth armies produced a series of training pamphlets, commonly referred to as ‘pams’ to facilitate this training.

During the Great War and before, the Imperial War Office produced manuals covering signalling topics and these were very often re-published by private firms that sold them back to individual soldiers, complete with advertising at the front and back. As technology progressed between the wars, different editions of numbered pams covering everything from field phones to signal tactics in were produced.

These training pams were usually 5-1/2” by 8-1/2” booklets with buff coloured covers containing pages with instructions and usually pictures or sketches describing the material being presented. It is typical and indicative of the relationship between the British and Canadian Armies that the War Office would publish a pam, and the exact same pam would be re-printed by His Majesty’s Stationary Office in Canada a month or two later.

The following are examples of training pams used by British and Canadian forces in the Second World War. The first is “Signalling 1915” covering morse, semaphore, station work, dispatch riding, telephone cables and map reading. It was hopelessly outdated at the start of WW2 but such was the preparation of Canada for war in 1939 that this type of leftover pam was often all that was available.

The next is ‘Signal Training (All Arms) Pamphlet No.7 RT Procedure’ that contains three parts. It instructs signallers on basic voice procedure such as initiating a radio call with “Hullo”, ending with “over” when a response was expected, “out” when your communication was complete and “I say again” when repeating (but never saying “repeat” because that’s what the artillery used for firing the same salvo again and hence it wasn’t a good idea to confuse the two). It is interesting to note that stations at the tactical level were not given identifying call signs as they are today. Instead, the ‘link’ between stations was given a ‘link-sign’ and headquarters would call an out station by beginning “Hullo one”, if ‘one’ was the name of the link-sign, and the out station calling headquarters would also begin by saying “Hullo one”. The pam also covered fundamentals like spelling out words using the phonetic alphabet (AK, BEER, CHARLIE, DON, EDWARD, FREDDIE…until 1942 when the Americans joined the war and from then on ABLE, BAKER, CHARLIE, DOG, EASY, FOX…), pronunciation of numbers (ZERO, WUN, TOO, THUH-REE…with a slight rolling of the “R”…, FO-WER, FI-YIV, SIX, SEV-EN, ATE and NINER) and code names for positions like SUNRAY and SUNRAY MINOR for a commander and his second in command and PRONTO for a signals officer.

Third is ‘Signal Training Pamphlets (All Arms) No.4 Wireless Signalling’ which was a basic introduction on how radios and line equipment worked and ‘No.5 Signal Procedure’ which covered the need for common procedures to ensure clear, quick and efficient transmission of messages whether by lamps, flags, line or wireless. It spoke to the difference between quick, unrecorded VE messages based on understood letter codes for operations in progress and ‘Written Messages’ that were recorded and logged in signals stations.

As a great deal of signalling was over lines connecting phones, remote units and switchboards, ‘Signal Training Volume IV’ covered the construction and maintenance of lines. Note that line communication was not advancing quite so quickly as radio communication as this manual was originally dated 1927 and re-printed in much the same form by Canada in 1941. Maintenance of equipment was also covered in pams, an example being care of lead acid batteries in this 1943 one titled “How Are Your Batteries?”

Finally, training on the operation of a signals office (how to schedule staff, how to log messages, etc.) and even how to conduct signal training was covered in these 1942 pams ‘Signal Training (All Arms) No.8 Signal Office Working’ and ‘No.9 Training’. I find it satisfying that the section on how to select signallers for training says those selected should possess the following characteristics: i. Good education, ii. Intelligence, keenness and initiative, iii. Good character and iv. Good handwriting, eyesight and hearing.

I find these pams provide a unique insight into WW2 signalling and the life and times of signallers during that period.