The Phantom Piper
Stirling Castle 1938

I joined the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in 1938. The training Depot was Stirling Castle. Stirling Scotland.
The day would begin for most by being awakened to the wail of bagpipes. Those who’s brains were still being controlled by Morpheus and or the effects of the Johnny Walker they had imbibed the previous evening to cries of ‘Slainte’ and ‘doon the hatch’ were finally roused by the harsh tones of the bugle blowing reveille.

“ Get out of bed,
“Get out of bed,
“Get out of bed now”

“All you lazy bones get up now”
 
One day one of the lads on encountering the bugle player in the N.A.F.F.I. asked him, “Can’t you play another tune on that bloody thing or are you just hoping to blow it out straight . The outcome of the N.A.F.F.I. verbal fracas was, the next morning we got long reveille.

“Charlie Charlie, you’ve got one chance at it,
Charlie Charlie out of that pit.
Charlie Charlie there’s no second chance at it,
Jump out now Charlie or your in the shit.

“He slumbers”
 “I slumber”
“Oh don’t we all?”
“ Charlie slumbers peacfully”
“and can’t hear the call”
“Charlie Charlie get out of bed,”
“Don’t just lie there pretending your dead”.

Charlie Chorus .

When long reveille began some blokes would put a pillow over their heads hoping to get five minutes more in bed.
Saying like, “Next chance ah git ah’m gon’  tae tie a f-n’ knot in that bugle”.
Another ventured, “why not just shove it up his arse” Then a Geordie bloke ventured, “wua ger enough in wua ears wen wua wakken wi’ oot addin shit tae et”

Anyone who ignored the bugle call by desperately holding on to the girl in his dream or trying to ease the cramp in his stomach where it came to a point would be rudely awakened by the Orderly Sgt on his rounds in the morning

At dawn a piper would walk along the parapet on the side of the castle that faced the site of the Battle of Bannockburn playing, “Up in the morning early” or  “Johnny Cope.”

A good piper never mixed his drinks because waking everyone in the morning to, “Up Johnny Cope in the morning early” would lose him any good conduct stripes he may have earned.

I had stood on this parapet many times in 1938 and gazed out into the distant hills and pondered the fate of many a man who had risked all for what he believed in. Some mornings the town of Stirling and all the surrounding countryside would be hidden, blanketed under a sea of mist so thick the only thing to be seen in the far distance would be very tall trees on hill tops.

The only entrance to Stirling Castle is via the drawbridge. When I was stationed there I noticed the chains that raised it had been removed. Anyone on the drawbridge should look to their right and notice about a hundred yards away there is a cluster of iron railings surrounding a raised plot of ground. A memorial to many, there stands the block upon which many a head had rested before parting company with its body for ever.

I always found the people of Stirling very friendly and on one occasion was amused when passing a house to hear the lady of the house shout to one of her offspring who was playing on the pavement outside the house, “There’s a Sodjer, dinnae be cheeky tae the Sodjer mind”

I winked at the wee lad as I passed and he screwed up his face trying desperately to wink back but only managed to blink both of his eyes together.

One night I awoke to the sound of pipes and soon others were awake too.
“It’s one o’clock in the bloody mornin’ ” growled a voice from the corner of the room.
“that’s not reveille he’s playing, that a lament” said another voice in the darkness.
“ he’ll lament the morrer when I gi’ ‘im a thick ear” said another.
Gradually the pipe music faded away and the eerie silence that remained unbroken as we drifted back to sleep.

The next day we learned that the C.O. wanted to know who the guilty Piper was but got no satisfaction as each Piper denied playing any pipes at midnight or thereabouts. I was also puzzled and we discussed the fact of, “ you cannot alter the volume on bagpipes, so how had the music faded when the only way off the ramparts apart from the stairs is two or three hundred feet straight down. One suggestion was it was the Phantom Piper.