RAMSAY GARAGE
USED BY THE MILITARY
DURING WW2

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The Transportation Section of the Headquarters Commandant group of the 5th Air Force Service Command were located in Ramsay Garage in Brisbane in October 1943. Lt. K.V. Stirling was in charge of this section at that time.

Harvey E. Chambers of Buford, GA, told me on 3 March 2008 that Ramsay Garage was located on North Quay on the river front in downtown Brisbane. Harvey was one of the original personnel when they formed the 5th Air Force Service Command transportation unit at that garage.

Harvey told me that Ramsay Garage was a former horse stable and still had the old stall in it. We had to tear out all the old stalls to make it into a usable area as a motor pool and garage workshop.

They converted the old hay storage area above the work area into a barracks and that's where Harvey and his buddies lived for almost 20 months.

Harvey still has the booklet that contains a photo of the members of the transportation section which was made on North Quay just across the street from the garage.

Gordon Mallitt of Bethania contacted me on 3 January 2008 and told me that for some months during the latter part of the war he was with a unit doing repairs and maintenance on motor vehicles and on searchlight equipment at a garage building on Coronation Drive, Milton, not far from Park Road. They had an old bloke in the unit, and Gordon thinks his name was Ramsay. He was said to own the building, which is why he was there. Gordon believes the same man owned the "Black Cat" casket agency opposite the Treasury Building, in the city and he used to go in and check on the business every week or so. The building on Coronation Drive was a typical garage, petrol station, type of place, with a large backyard and a dwelling upstairs where Gordon and his mates used to live. Gordon believes this may have been "Ramsays Garage." Gordon told me that next door to the garage there was a factory producing "Mossom" mossie coils. The business was staffed, as Gordon well remembers, by some pretty young ladies. Gordon also commented that he was there at the end of the war - and he met some of the girls in Adelaide Street later that night.

 

Can anyone tell help me with more info about Ramsay Garage?

A photograph would be great!

 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I'd like to thank Harvey E. Chambers and Gordon Mallitt for their assistance with this web page.

 

Can anyone help me with more information?

 

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This page first produced 18 December 2001

This page last updated 25 January 2020