1st Queen’s arrived at Allahabad from Quetta in the last week of October 1936. It was the second time the Regiment had been stationed there, the 2nd Queen’s having been there from 1924 to 1926. Quetta had been a traumatic experience and all the great majority of the battalion had seen of India so far was the Sind Desert during the long train journey from Karachi and the stony wastes of Baluchistan. Consequently the endless vistas of wheat, cotton fields, trees and tropical vegetation of the plains, a product of the irrigation schemes culminating in the Sukkur barrage completed in 1932, which had harnessed the Indus and its tributaries, made a welcome change.
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2nd Queen’s, who were stationed at Allahabad in 1926, had the excitement of seeing the arrival of Sir Alan Cobham both on his outward and homeward journeys by air to Australia. He landed on each occasion on the River Jumna under the walls of the Fort and spent the night as the guest of the Commanding Officer. D Company provided a guard for the aircraft and young Domoney, who had won an essay competition as his prize, was taken for a trip by Cobham before he resumed his journey. By 1936 Allahabad possessed a busy airport and the 1st Battalion frequently entertained RAF flights passing through to and from the Far East, although seaplanes still used the Jumna. In 1937 the Sergeants Mess entertained a party of French aviators who landed en route to Indo-China.
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[Source: http://www.queensroyalsurreys.org.uk]
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