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11 Independent Field Squadron Royal Engineers - The Shooting Team
11 Independent Field Squadron Royal Engineers was reformed in 1948 in Austria and in 1954 moved to Malaya to a base camp at Butterworth in the province of Wellesley the camp was made out of attap huts left over from the Japanese army's occupation of Malaya a decade earlier. Not a great welcome to their new posting.
Nominated as the Field Squadron of 28th Commonwealth Infantry Brigade with its Headquarters at Taiping, the Squadron operated mainly in Perak and Kedah and it spent a lot of its time in the Kinta Valley area initially, later moving further to the north as the Communist Terrorists (CT's) were pushed north.
The Squadron operated for long periods in the jungle, building jungle forts and new roads to open up areas of jungle for the security forces. Also, when based at Sungai Siput airstrip in 1958, they operated in the Kinta Valley, setting up "no go" areas. This was part of Special Branch's Operation Ginger which made it harder for the CT's to get down into the valley to collect food etc. The work required was to clear scrub from the area and put up signs to warn people to keep away as they could be shot. The Operation was very successful.
Our donor Richard recalls that it was a very happy Squadron and the moral was always very high. Most of the team were single men between 18 to 22 years old, and they still meet to this day (2009) at reunions organised by himself. In the 2009 reunion 82 men attended and with their wives, the party numbered 139 (and that is after 50 years!).
The photographs show:
On the left, 11 Squadron shooting team receiving their winners cups from the Sultan of Perak, Sultan Sir Yusuf Izzuddin Rathiullah Ghafarullahulahu Shah, KCMG, OBE, in 1958, and
On the right, the shooting team at Ipoh 1958. In the front row, left to right are:
To read more about Richard Clarke, click here.
To read more about Operation Ginger, click here.
To read more about Jungle Forts and Airstrips, click here.
To read more about Sultan Yusuf, click here.