Recorded memoir of Wayne Walker (MC 371/882/54)
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Recorded memoir of Wayne Walker

1


MC 371/882/54


1 audio cassette (Sony UCX-560)

nd [c 1985]


448th Bomb Group


Wayne Walker


Address at start of recording has been redacted (0mn 16s to 0mn 20s).

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Description
[0:00-05:00] Remarks on his family, childhood in Kansas and pre-war work as a radio mechanic. Describes his training: induction, Fort Logan, Colorado, 8 February 1943; basic, St Petersburg, Florida and radio mechanic school, Hammer Field [California]. Describes journey to England on ship, 'British Orient.' Comments on British lifestyle and housing, rationing and friendliness of English people. Anecdote about sharing his Thanksgiving Day rations with an English family. Mentions places he visited around Newcastle-under-Lyme [Staffordshire] and journey from ?Doddington Park, mentioning prisoner of war camp there, to Seething, Norfolk. Comments on Seething base and describes service at a British searchlight battery near Hemsby, Norfolk. [05:00-10:00] Comments on British servicemen and mentions German fighters strafing the station at Hemsby. Describes meeting local families, a land army girl and his friendship with an RAF corporal from Winterton radar station, Norfolk. Describes his return to the United States and discharge from service, October 1945. Anecdotes about censorship of his letters during the war and letting his parents know where he was by sending them an aspirin bottle with Norwich on the label from a chemist's shop. Remarks on his return to Norfolk for a reunion, 1983, how Norwich and Seething had changed since the war and his plans to return for another reunion, 1987. Recorded on side A only.