On to North Africa

On to North Africa Mr. Chisholm: Well we were advised that we were going somewhere and they provided us with tropical helmets and khaki shorts and all the rest of the tropical gear and we took a ship out of Greenwich, Scotland and a huge convoy and we went down, we got halfway down the African Coast, we were going to go down and around the Cape of Good Hope and up to Cairo through the Suez Canal, let’s see now for, and then we got, after we got halfway down there, there was apparently a panic over in Egypt. They needed more pilots. So our ship was diverted from the convoy into Freetown and they took us on a coastal boat down to Takoradi on the Gold Coast and then they flew us right across Africa over to Khartoum and then up to Cairo. It took us about three days to go across there. Pan American Airways, the Americans had set up Pan American Airways shuttle service across Africa to rush people up to the front. Things were getting, getting pretty bad up in Egypt and of course once we got there, the usual screw up. We sat there for three months because our airplanes got sunk. Interviewer: So you were in, where were you when you were waiting? Mr. Chisholm: Right in Cairo. Interviewer: You were in Cairo then for three months for aircraft... Mr. Chisholm: Wonderful place to spend a holiday in the middle of the War. Interviewer: Well tell me a little bit about Cairo. What was it like? Mr. Chisholm: A great combination of ancient practices and modernity in that on the streets you’d see a Cadillac go by and then the next thing that would go by would be a donkey cart with a bunch of junk on the back. It was, it was a real mixture of the old and the new. It was quite an interesting place to be.