A 95-YEAR-OLD war veteran will make a solitary pilgrimage to Tanzania in November to pay tribute to the men who died fighting on the African continent.

Captain David Nichol is the last surviving member of 6th Battalion, King’s African Rifles (KAR), who fought in Somaliland and Ethiopia against the Italians in World War Two.

It is almost a forgotten conflict but more than 4,000 Allied soldiers died during the East African campaign which lasted from 1940 to the end of 1942 when the Vichy French were finally driven out of Madagascar.

“We were a crack battalion,”

he said. “We went to Somaliland first. It took about one month. The Italians were no good. Ethiopia took a bit longer – about three months.

“We then went to Madagascar because the Vichy French were refuelling Japanese submarines in the Indian Ocean and were sinking British shipping so we had to take the whole island.

“It was 1,000 miles from north to south and it took about six months. It would have been six weeks if they hadn’t blown up all of the road blocks. They destroyed all of the bridges and put trees in the road. It was a slow advance.”

After completing the African campaign his battalion went to Burma to fight the Japanese.

A fluent speaker of Swahili, Capt Nichol spent his post-war years in Tanganyika working for the Colonial Office until it gained its independence in 1961 and became Tanzania.

Because of his links to the country, Capt Nichol, who is also president of Salisbury’s Burma Star Association, travels back to Africa almost every year visiting around eight war memorials paying tribute to the Allied soldiers who fought against the Axis.

When he travels back to the country some dams and roads he built as a district commissioner still serve the country.

“I had a glorious time in Tanganyika,”

he said. “I used to go on safari on Monday, come back on Friday and do the office work over the weekend. I hated the office work.

“Tanzania is a lovely country, very peaceful, friendly and big hugs. They even give me a guard of honour when I lay the wreaths with the British High Commissioner and Tanzanian army officers. It is all very jolly stuff really.”