The History Of The Corps - A Troubled Journey

The History Of The Corps - A Troubled Journey

Maj Gen VK Singh

It may come as surprise to most Signallers that a comprehensive regimental history of the Corps of Signals has still not been written.  Of course, there is a book that covers the history of the Indian Signal Corps, which existed till 14th August 1947, but it covers only the period up to the outbreak of World War II in 1939.  The history of the Indian Signal Corps from 1939 to 1947, and of its successor, the Corps of Signals, is yet to be written.  During the last fifty or sixty years, there have been several attempts to write the history of the Corps, but very few bore fruit.  The troubled journey of the history of the Corps is a story in itself, known to few among us.

Maj Gen RFH Nalder, who was the SO-in-C in India shortly before Independence, wrote a book entitled 'The Royal Corps of Signals – A History of Its Antecedents and Development (CIRCA 1800-1955).' Published in 1958, the book covers the activities of the Indian Signal Corps very briefly.  In India, a book entitled 'History of The Corps of Signals –Volume I–Early Times to Outbreak of Second World War (1939)' was published by the Corps of Signals Committee in 1975.  Based on the draft written by Brigadier Tery Barreto, this was the first time a comprehensive history of the Corps was published. Another ten years were to elapse before another ‘abridged’ history of Corps, written by Col VA Subramanyam, was published by the Corps Committee in 1986.  This covered the entire period, from the earliest times to the date of writing, and thus  overlapped the period upto 1939 that had already been covered by the earlier book.  The coverage  of World War II was cursory, as was the treatment of operations after Independence.  Most of the present generation of officers have read or heard only about Subramanyan’s book, and believe it to be the regimental history of the Corps, which it is not.

The preface to Volume I of the book published in 1975 indicates that Volume II, when published, would cover the period of World War II up to the partition of the Corps in 1947, while Volume III would cover the post–independence history of the Corps. (According to Brigadier Tery Barreto, who wrote the draft, the title should have been 'History of The Indian Signal Corps and Its Antecedents'–it   was changed without his knowledge–since it was the Indian Signal Corps that existed before  Independence, and not the Corps of Signals.  Also Volume III was originally planned to contain only appendices).  A lot of work has been put in by various Corps historians and monographers in collecting material for Volume II during World War II and afterwards, but unfortunately, the book could not be published.  It is only recently that the Corps Committee has decided to make amends and publish Volumes II and III.  Once this is done, we will, God willing, have an authoritative regimental history of the Corps.

The earliest known attempt towards compilation of the history was in                 May 1923, when Major AW Pulverman, Commandant Signal Training Centre & Depot, addressed a letter to all commanding officers to forward material for compilation of a Digest of Service, in accordance with the King's Regulations. At about the same time, Major F Church, the Records Officer, wrote to several individual officers with a similar request. In 1934, Major CEJ Reynolds from the STC submitted to the SO-in-C a voluminous document entitled Notes For Historical Record Of Signals In India & The Indian Signal Corps. This covered the period up to 1933, and nobody seems to have made any addition to it after this date. In 1935, Major GLG Pollard attempted to obtain historical material, primarily for the souvenir for the 1936 Reunion. During the same year, Major WA Scott from the Signals Directorate began collecting material for a short history of the Corps after 1918. There appear to have been no further attempts in this direction till the outbreak of World War II in 1939.

During and after the War, efforts to compile the history gained momentum. This was primarily due to the designation of an officer as the 'Corps Monographer.' (Till very recently, I was not even aware that an appointment like this ever existed). The first one I came across was Lt Col EC Thomson, Royal Signals, who was posted as GSO 1 ( Signals  3) in Army Headquarters from 1940 to 43. He wrote an excellent account of the War, entitled The First Four Years, that covers the period from 1939 to 1943. The monograph covers almost every aspect of the Corps during the period, including personnel, organization, training, equipment, ciphers, development of communications, expansion and Indianisation and so on. In 1944, Major RN Batra was detailed to compile the Signals portion of the War Department history of World War II.

In 1947, the establishment for writing a monograph on Signals in World War II was formally sanctioned, and Major EG Lomas was appointed. He wrote a historical monograph entitled Signals And Intercommunication, which is a review of the activities of units of Royal and Indian Signals during World War II, though the history of Signals from the earliest times has been covered in brief. This was evidently prepared for the Historical Section of General Headquarters (India) by Signals Directorate, to enable a history of the Corps to be written at a later date. Only the first two chapters dealing with the early history of the Corps and the position up to 1939 were written. Of the remaining three chapters that were to cover events during the war, the post-war period and the lessons learnt, Lomas could only make brief notes, and these were perhaps not completed. This may be the reason why the Historical Section never came round to writing the official history of the Corps of Signals during World War II. Incidentally, the Combined Inter Services Historical Section (India and Pakistan) that was created after Independence produced the official history of the Indian Armed Forces in World War II in 17 volumes. Each arm and service has been covered, with Signals being the lone exception.

The next document was produced by Lt Col M Cohen, who held the appointment of Corps Monographer from 4 Dec 1953 to 4 Dec 1954. This covers a period of about a hundred years, and is in fact a brief history of the Corps from the earliest times. A large portion of it is based on Thomson's report prepared a decade earlier. In his note to the DD Sigs dated 4 Dec 1954, signed as GSO 1 (Mono), Cohen has made some very interesting comments and recommendations. Some extracts are given below : -

"For the future, may I suggest that any person writing a further history of the Corps of Signals should be allowed at least 18 months. That there be another officer, JCO or a senior NCO to assist in the research."

"If a history of World War is required in the immediate future, it is useful to allow the officer at least two months in the UK for most of the Commanding Officers during the war are there. Besides, it is known a lot of official information not held here is in the UK."

The appointment of Corps Monographer expired in December 1954, and was  never revived. This was also time when the Royal Signals officers, including the SO-in-C, Brigadier CHI Akehurst, returned to England. However, the task of writing or updating the Corps history continued, mainly due to the interest taken by the DD Sigs, Colonel Tery Barreto, who volunteered to compile the history of the Indian Signal Corps  up to 1947. He had started collecting material on his own in 1951 when he was doing the Staff Course and continued working on the project during his subsequent tenures as CO 20 Infantry Divisional Signal Regiment (1952–53); DD Sigs (1953–56); CSO Southern Command (1956–60); CSO Western Command (1960–63) and Commandant School of Signals (1963–65).

The 10th CCM held in March 1957 formally assigned to Brigadier Tery Barreto the responsibility of completing the Corps History on which he had been working on his own till then. From 1958 to 1965, Tery submitted an annual report to the CCM on the progress of the history, as the Chairman of the Corps History Committee. He corresponded with several hundred serving and retired signallers and their widows, both in India and abroad. He also interacted with Maj Gen Nalder who has acknowledged his contribution in his book on the history of the Royal Signals. He had letterheads printed with the title 'Chairman, Corps History Committee', and used this in his correspondence.

In June 1964, Tery submitted the draft of Volume I to Lt Gen AC Iyappa who had relinquished the appointment of SO-in-C but was still the Chairman of the Corps Committee. Shortly afterwards, Tery decided to proceed on premature retirement and put in his papers. Before he left, he handed over all the material he had laboriously collected and meticulously catalogued over almost               15 years. In fact, by the time he retired in 1965, Tery had not only completed the draft of Volume I, but also collected a fair amount of material for Volumes II and III. Then why did it take ten years to publish Volume I ? And why were the subsequent volumes never published ? That is an interesting story.

Two years after Tery's retirement, the Corps Committee decided to publish Volumes I and II. The 17th CCM held in 1967 gave the responsibility to Lt Col GY Sowani. Four years were to elapse before he visited Jabalpur in 1971, and submitted a report after examining the records held there. After he expressed his inability to complete the task, various writers were contacted; including Lt Col CL Proudfoot, Colonel Pyara Lal and Colonel V Anantahraman. Finally Colonel Pyara Lal agreed to edit the draft of Volume I that had been prepared by Tery, and worked on it with the help of a professional editor from a leading national daily. Meanwhile, Major KS Kapur took on the assignment of writing Volume II, and all available material from Mhow and Jabalpur was carted to Delhi and handed over to him. However, he later gave up the task due to ill health, and in 1972, the job landed in the lap of the ISTT, Brigadier KD Bhargava, who expressed his reluctance to take on the assignment. The 24th CCM held in 1973 overruled the objections and decided that the ISTT would be responsible for writing both Volumes II and III. The available material was again carted to Jabalpur and handed over to the ISTT. Lt Col JC Dhamija was given the task to compile the Corps history and he began working on the project in 1973.

The History Of The Corps Of Signals–Volume I–Early Times To Outbreak Of Second World War (1939) Volume I, based on Tery's draft, was finally published in 1975 by the Corps of Signals Committee. Apart from changing the title, the author's note written by Tery was replaced by an unsigned preface. The Corps Committee published the book but there was no foreword by the Colonel Commandant or the SO-in-C. It gave no credit to the author, unlike the Royal Signals history, which gives full credit to General Nalder. As can be imagined, Tery Barreto was not exactly happy with the manner in which the book was published. Having worked on it with single-minded devotion for almost a decade, one can understand his feelings at being ignored on the occasion of the culmination of his labours. However, his love for the Corps remains untarnished even today–he has readily agreed to collaborate with the writing of Volume II, which is now underway.           This is a sterling example of esprit de corps and generosity that has few parallels.

Returning to the story of Volumes II and III, Brigadier Surjit Singh, the ISTT, became Chairman of the Corps History Committee in 1976. Realising that there had been no progress in the matter, he decided to approach Tery Barreto and request him to assist in compilation of the Volumes II and III. Considering the way he had been treated in the past, Tery's reluctance was understandable. However, he agreed to take on the job, provided certain conditions were guaranteed. Unfortunately, these were not met, and the proposal was dropped. The proposal seems to have been buried for several years, before it was revived almost a decade later, when Colonel VA Subramanyam was assigned the task of producing a history of the Corps. All the material was again carted from Mhow and Jabalpur to Delhi, and a cell comprising several officers and secretarial staff was established to assist in the project. Inexplicably, instead of writing Volume II, covering the period 1939 to 1947, it was decided to compile the history of the Corps from the very beginning. Though ample material was available for a comprehensive chronicle, it was decided to publish only a condensed and abridged version. It appears that the author was not given a free hand and there were restrictions in terms of the size of the book as well the deadline for completing the project.

More than twenty-five years have elapsed since Volume I was published. We have still not been able to bring out Volume II and III. Several units that took part in World War II went to Pakistan, and their war diaries are no longer available. Almost every officer who served during that period is dead, with a few exceptions. As a result, it will be almost impossible to get personal accounts, which are the essence of a regimental history, and which a technical monograph can never replace. A half-century has been wasted because of half-hearted attempts and the decline of institutions such as Corps Monographer and the Corps History Cell, which were created for the purpose of updating the Corps History. A Corps Directive exists, making the Corps History Cell a part of the Traditions and Publications Sub Committee based at Mhow. As long as he was in service, Tery Barreto looked after the Corps History Cell almost single-handedly. Ever since his retirement                 in 1965, this has been virtually defunct.

            The Corps Committee has recently decided to complete the long overdue publication of Parts II and III of the Corps History. A team headed by the author, based at Delhi, is now engaged in writing Volume II of the History of the Corps of Signals–or the Indian Signal Corps, to be precise–covering the period 1939  to 1947. This will be followed by  Volume III, which will cover the post-independence history of the Corps. As mentioned earlier, Brigadier Tery Barreto has agreed to lend a hand, in spite of his age–he is eighty-two–and failing eyesight. He has already loaned personal copies of several books and bound copies of The Signalman, and willingly gives his advice whenever it is solicited. All the existing archival material has recently been moved to Delhi to facilitate production of Volume II. This is a good time to revive the Corps History Cell, which could build up on the cell at Delhi. In fact, one of the officers from the team can be appointed the Corps Monographer, so that the momentum already gained is not lost. Perhaps the present and future generation of Signallers will take greater interest in preserving the heritage and history of the Corps than their predecessors.

(Published in the Signalman,  2001)