the initial structure for british bomb disposal parties in 1939 was composed of

Back in 1939, when the whole bomb disposal thing was just getting started, it wasn't nearly as organized as you'd think. The initial setup for those british disposal parties was basically just a small team consisting of one officer and usually five other ranks. They were often pulled from the Royal Engineers, since they were the ones expected to know their way around explosives.

It was honestly a pretty rough start for them. They didn't have all the fancy gear you see in movies nowadays; it was mostly just nerves and basic tools. They were tasked with dealing with unexploded ordnance that was dropping all over the place, and honestly, most of those guys were learning as they went along because there wasn't a real manual for it yet. Pretty wild to think about how they had to figure that stuff out on the fly.