Bunker Man

Yesterday, when I was out for a walk with my girlfriend - we walked past a man digging a hole in a field with a tractor. On the way back, we had to stand aside so the tractor man (apparently having finished digging his hole for the day) could drive his tractor past us on the narrow lane. However, when the tractor reached us, the door swung open and he started to talk to us, or rather my girlfriend. I don't think he fancied me much. Anyway, he started telling us how he worked for contractors who had dug bunkers for the Ministry of Defence in Scotland. He had worked on bunkers in the Western Isles, he said, that were for equipment used for 'keeping an eye on the Russians' he said. Then he told us that he had helped build a bunker or Gruinard Island.

I know Gruinard Island as the 'Anthrax Island'. Many years ago, when I was a boy, I stayed at a campsite on a beach that looked out to Gruinard Island. We could see the 'MOD - Keep Off' signs and wondered at the horror that would ensue if someone went over and came back infected with the deadly disease...

We forgot to ask Bunker Man what he was digging a hole for - in a field near our house.