This is an entry in a year-long project to post-blog the demobilisation experience for British servicemen at the end of the Second World War. See here for an introduction to the project and here for a brief overview of the demobilisation process.
According to the Daily Mail, the commanding officer of the RAF recruit training center at Rattlesden in Suffolk yesterday telegraphed the Air Ministry to report on a self-styled 'underground movement' which has been organised by airmen unhappy about "foul oppression and despotic tyranny." This is the first incident in which men stationed in the UK appear to have been copying the tactics of the RAF strikers in the Far East. A typewritten newsheet circulated at the base, written by the 'Rattlesden underground movement,' complains of "restrictions, unecessary supervision, petty regulations, and a host of parades" making life "intolerable." Between 2-3,000 air force recruits are currently based at Rattlesden.
End of month accounting: on June 30, 1945, there were 4,653,000 men and 437,200 women in His Majesty's armed and auxiliary forces.
During January, 1946, 381,100 men and 28,635 women were released under the Class A scheme; 25,843 men and 583 women were released under the Class B scheme; with 422,135 men and 30,869 women being released in total (including miscellaneous discharges on compassionate and medical grounds).
Overall, since the start of demobilisation, 1,764,242 men and 197,103 women have been discharged from HM Forces.
Data from Fighting With Figures: A Statistical Digest of the Second World War (HMSO, 1995).
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