 He was attached to the Royal Artillery at the heavy battery in Murray Town Barracks in Freetown.In January 1939, Cole convinced a group of his fellow Sierra Leonean soldiers to join him in sending a letter of protest to their British commanding officer, complaining that their pay was not enough to meet expenses.Cole and his fellow soldiers also demanded to be treated in the same way as British soldiers of the same rank and most of all they demanded boot and other forms of footwear.