Unidentified (specialist wireless?) RAF units - WWII - North Africa

[Happyhaddock]

Ross,

many thanks for that, clearly you are very familiar with making sense of RAF service records.

I'm going to take a little time to digest what you have written but would you mind me coming back to you should I have further questions?

I'm wondering if it is possible from the units mentioned in north Africa to infer a little more about where my grandfather went and what he did.

Would my assumption that he served as part of a small wireless observation unit reporting enemy movements back to HQ fit with the entries on his service record?

Also this may seem an odd question, but my grandfather was always a lover of nature and wildlife but he had a life long atypical hatred of camels; something which can only have come form intense personal experience. The only photographs we have of him in recognisably British RAF uniform may date from before the war. Those photos of his we can be sure of being from wartime show what were presumably his colleagues/friends in tropical uniform, along with additional tourist type snaps of Egypt. However those images that actually include my grandfather show him either in swimming trunks at the beach or in Bedouin style desert robes.

Does it in anyway seem plausible to you that my grandfather's service record supports the notion that he might have spent time roaming the desert dressed as Arab, possibly working with camels?

[Happyhaddock]

Operation Husky, the liberation of Sicily, commenced on 10 July 1943. 328 Wing was based at Protville II from June to October 1943. Reformed in early June 1943, 328 Wing squadrons operated torpedo-carrying Beaufighters, Martin Marauders, Baltimores, Wellingtons, US Spitfires and Aircobras. Protville, was located approximately 18 km north of Oued Lill; 25 km north-northwest of Tunis. As there were two airfields at this base, 1.5 miles apart, hence the reference to Protville II.

Thanks for this, does this hint a connection to southern Italy?

two photo's in my grandfather's limited wartime snaps stand out as not looking North African

[rafcommands]

More likely the snaps are off duty activites rather than clandestine ops.

Looking at Trade Training and Specialist Courses I suggest that his daily activity was normal Operations signals traffic between higher HQ and subordinate Wing HQ along with the multitude of general admin signals between Wing HQ and units in the field at remote aerodromes.

This will include Cypher traffic but his job would have been to send/receive/admin file record encoded signals without seeing the original or decrypted signals.

The Air Ministry was quite good at knowing where units were located so the service records do not shown the activities or dates of movement between locations (and contitents!). This was reported to Air Ministry and higher formations by means of the Operations Record Books (ORBs) which would have been part of the signals traffic he sent/received monthly.

These ORBs survive in the National Archives Kew and are open to inspection there.

eg
https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2362874

https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C7160464

Ross

[Spikey68]

two photo's in my grandfather's limited wartime snaps stand out as not looking North African

Monopoli is a town in southern Italy, near Bari.

[Happyhaddock]

Monopoli is a town in southern Italy, near Bari.

Thanks I was aware of this, but my language skills are such that I didn't want to jump to conclusions and assume the name Monopoli must be referring to that town. I didn't know if it might simply be a word that meant something like "library" or "museum" or some other generic civic building.

Cheers