Cultureshock

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Video transcript

There must be thousands of tales that have been written and filmed about World war 2 , but I would like to tell you about a personal one of mine.   It's the tale of my husband’s mandolin, it was a banjo mandolin, and from being a small boy he taught himself after a few lessons from his dad. And you know, wherever he went it went with him, well nearly everywhere, at school concerts, parties, on our picnics and even when we went cycling in the cycle cub where incidentally was where we met.   However, to get to my real story. When war was declared he was 19 years old and he was drafted into the RAF and we decided a little later to grab at life while we could and got married on one of his 14 days pass.   Well, it just seemed natural  his mandolin went with him in the RAF and was soon playing for the boys when ever he had the time , and when ever the ENSA came to the camp he would play in the interval. Soon he was drafted over seas and was in the North African invasion, he was with a squadron that flew the small planes, Austers I believe  was their name, that was used to spot enemy positions etc, so he was quite near the front line a lot.   Some time after he took very ill and had to be left behind in the army hospital. He was there a while and in the meantime the squadron moved on and some how his mandolin was left behind and lost.   When he was better he was posted to another similar squadron and the boys heard he could play, so they passed the hat around and got enough to get him another. Goodness only knows how they managed that. And soon he was entertaining the boys again.  

He travelled some miles, was in the Sicilian  invasion then the Italian one and after a tiring heavy time they were given a 48 hour pass and seeing Rome was taken, they were able to go there , and while he and some friends were sitting by the famous Roman Fountain, he heard his name being called, " Lofty! Lofty", he heard and there running toward him was his old friends of his other squadron. " Wow" they said "never dreamed we would see you again, we hoped and hoped and here you are, and we have something that belongs to you". "What is it?" My husband said. “Oh no. Come back to our billets and we will give you it”. When arriving at the billets and the boys gave him... yes it was his mandolin, he just couldn't control his joy at finding his old friend, the mandolin again. “Well?" his friend said. "What do you think about that? It has been in the invasions, buried in mud, lost in the dunes, lost again and then we found it again. So you better hang on tight to it from now on." Of course he did all the rest of the war, right up north Italy, meeting new friends and playing his mandolin and incidentally another little tale.

While playing in a little village square, called Sappada, a man came up and said to my husband how much he enjoyed his playing and then invited him to his home, where he met a good few of the mans friends, who were all musicians. As it turned out, this man was a professor of music and most his friends were all players of different instruments. They hoped one day my husband would return and visit but somehow we never did. However, my husband was able to hang on to his mandolin for we still have it , battered case and all the memories it holds.