Forgotten Voices of D-Day Read online

  Major Peter Martin

  2nd Battalion, Cheshire Regiment

  All the officers had to assemble one day in a cinema and General Graham, who Monty used to refer to as ‘A gallant old warhorse’ and was a delightful person, stood up and addressed us. He said Monty had been in grave doubt as to whether the 50th or the 51st Highland Division should be one of the initial assault divisions in the invasion of Europe and, in the end, Monty had tossed for it and he, General Graham, was delighted to say that Fifty Div had won and would therefore have the very great honour of leading the invasion of Europe. Whereupon there was a colossal boo from all around the cinema. I felt really quite sorry for General Graham but I think the division felt it had done its stuff by now and that it was time somebody else took a turn. We couldn’t really see why we should be the spearhead when there were so many divisions in the United Kingdom who had not seen a shot fired so far. However, we consoled ourselves with the thought that good old Fifty Div, veterans of the Sicily landings, were of course the obvious ones to select if you wanted to guarantee a successful landing.

  Private Richard Atkinson

  9th Battalion, Durham Light Infantry

  There was a lot of moaning went on. ‘Not fair. Not again. How about somebody else having a go?’ Things like that. But the usual soldiers’ moan and we knew we had to get on with it. There’s nothing we could do.

  Sergeant John Clegg

  Centaur tank crew, 1st Royal Marine Armoured Support Regiment

  The British Fifty Div had been brought back and most of them hadn’t been given any leave. The thing that you could see on the side of their lorries as they went down the road was: ‘No Leave, No Second Front.’ I don’t know whether they did eventually get any leave or not but that was their slogan. One couldn’t blame them, really. I mean, they’d done their job in Italy and North Africa. To think that the Second Front was looming and they were going to be involved in that without leave, at least. One can imagine, you know, telephoning your wife or sending a card saying, ‘I’m in England but I’m not going to be able to see you.’ So of course it wasn’t fair. But life has never been fair.

  Sergeant Joe Stevens

  33rd Field Regiment, Royal Artillery

  Montgomery visited us at Hawick and prior to his coming we were all paraded. The surveyors put out white lines of tape, we all stood on the tape, the divisional commander came on to the parade ground as though he was Monty and went down the whole line of senior officers shaking hands. The next day we were taken out again, we were all lined up on the tapes, and before Monty arrived the tapes were all taken away.

  Then Montgomery came on to the parade in a jeep and stood on the bonnet and he said, ‘Gather round me, men.’ He didn’t shake hands with anybody and we all pushed forward and knocked the brigadiers and the brass hats all out of the way. He said, ‘Look upon me like a boxing promoter. And if I were to tell you that you were going into a fight and it was going to be a walkover, I would ill-advise you. But we’re going to Europe, everybody knows we’re going to Europe; the Germans know we’re going to Europe but they don’t know when and where and this will be the deciding factor. I wish you all luck.’ And then he left the parade. He looked as though he were talking to me. He was talking to everybody, I know, but he looked as though he were talking to me.

  Corporal Reginald Spittles

  Cromwell tank commander, 2nd Northamptonshire Yeomanry

  We had to go and see Monty to give us a pep talk. We was at Rudston village and they lorried us over to this area. He finished off by saying that we would be going on to Germany. ‘It will be just like cricket,’ he said. ‘We’re going to knock them for six.’ And a little voice behind me said, ‘I hope the buggers know this.’

  Private Richard Atkinson

  9th Battalion, Durham Light Infantry

  He’d give you a few fags and spoke to two or three people but he was a general who’d come amongst you, which I’d never seen. They were usually distant figures. He was able to bring everything down to our level and I think we appreciated it, actually. Another thing he did, he wouldn’t make a move unless he had everything he thought was necessary: guns, trucks, everything. And that gave you a little bit of comfort. There was no haphazard, halfcocked business. You knew you had a fighting chance, let’s put it that way.

  Brigadier Sir Alexander Stanier

  Commanding Officer, 231st Infantry Brigade

  He was marvellous at contacting the troops and I think that’s what a commander must do, because if you don’t get the men to stand and fight you won’t win the battle, however brilliant the plan is.

  General Sir Bernard Montgomery, commander of all Allied ground forces for the invasion, inspecting and speaking to troops in the spring of 1944.

  Corporal Andrew Jones

  1st/5th Battalion, Queen’s Royal Regiment

  He liked his training. I think with all the training and what happened afterwards we owe him a great debt. He didn’t send us into battles in which he knew there was going to be a great lot of casualties. I don’t think he wanted to see things that had happened to him in World War One.

  Captain Julius Neave

  Sherman tank commander, 13th/18th Hussars

  He had a sort of maddening attitude from my point of view in that he knew perfectly well that the loyalty of the officers was absolutely unquestioned but he had to curry favour with the troops in some way or the other which he did by making, as far as he could, the officers look foolish. I found that a very irritating trait. This was demonstrated on this occasion when he did arrive extremely late and found the whole of the garrison of Fort George, which was very considerable, drawn up in serried ranks. He announced in a loud voice that it wasn’t what he wanted at all and everyone was to break ranks and gather round his jeep and he would stand on the top. And I knew perfectly well that if we’d been a rabble waiting for him to arrive there would have been the most frightful criticism: ‘What is this rabble hanging around and waiting?’ In the same way, he would, quite uncharacteristically for a very ascetic man, hand out and throw cigarettes and things out of his car at the troops in a way which I found really rather ostentatiously objectionable. But one forgave him because he was so successful. I think success was the measure. The troops wouldn’t have liked him if they’d been unsuccessful.

  Driver Roy Hamlyn

  282 Company, Royal Army Service Corps, attached to 3rd Canadian Division

  The 3rd Canadian Division was lined up on three sides of this enormous great field, drawn up on three sides, and then beheld some of the great generals of the time, Canadians especially, and then King George VI came along. I was quite shocked to see him because he looked a very sick man. Obviously he had been made to look a little bit better than what he really was, with make-up or whatever it is they use, but he was evidently a very sick man. He didn’t look left or right but just went through the motions of passing through us.

  Major George Chambers

  8th Battalion, Durham Light Infantry

  We had another inspection. We didn’t know who it was, we had no idea, we weren’t told, and we were drawn up in these squares awaiting the inspection. The usual thing, of course: you got into the square about half-past eight in the morning and at about half-past ten the general or whoever was coming would arrive so you were standing there, doing nothing, getting bored stiff. And what should come but one great big car with one man inside. No outriders; not like the way Monty had come with his posse of outriders, etc. And out of this car stepped Eisenhower, who then did a Monty – called everyone around – and proceeded to address the troops. At this stage the troops were bored stiff and had had all this so many times before. But, you know, at the end of this speech that Ike gave, the troops burst into spontaneous applause, which was tremendous praise of the man. His personality had got across to the troops. They were a bored and bolshie lot at that particular time.

  Company Sergeant Major William Brown

  8th Battalion, Durham Light Infantry<
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  He was great. The finest general that ever was, General Ike. There was no bullshit at all about him, you know. But he was immaculate. You’d have thought he was cut out of chocolate.

  OPERATION TIGER: THE SLAPTON SANDS DISASTER

  Telegraphist Derek Wellman

  HMS Onslow (Royal Navy destroyer)

  There were various major exercises before the invasion proper. There were three in all, I think. Operation Tiger was one of them and it hasn’t received much publicity although it was one of the most disastrous of the war.

  HM Queen Elizabeth during the Royal Inspection of the 6th Airborne Division, spring 1944.

  Standing beside Brigadier James Hill, HRH Princess Elizabeth watches a demonstration parachute jump during the Royal Inspection of the 6th Airborne Division, spring 1944.

  We were meant to cover the area where the rehearsal was taking place, which was at Slapton Sands in Devon, though the area covered was mostly in Lyme Bay which stretched from Portland Bill all the way into Plymouth Command, and we were looking for E-boats. The VHF DF [Direction-Finding] operation had moved from U-boat frequencies to E-boat frequencies, but we didn’t have much success with them. By and large E-Boats did far less communicating by wireless. Occasionally they communicated by radio but only for a few seconds and we weren’t in quite the same business of getting bearings and so on of E-boats because they moved very rapidly. We had encountered quite a few of them even before this particular action and tried to keep them at bay.

  The disaster occurred because of the two close escorts provided by the Royal Navy: one of them collided with an LST leaving harbour and it was ordered to go back to Devonport for repair and a substitute wasn’t provided. In my view that’s fairly conclusive as to why the E-boats, who came across the Channel round about the Plymouth area, were able to follow along the coast and get to the stern of this convoy of LSTs without being spotted or driven off. And of course they played havoc, sank two LSTs and set a third on fire and so on.

  Peter Nevill

  Beaufighter night-fighter pilot, RAF

  The 27 April 1944 was my twentieth birthday and this happened at 2.15 the next morning, so I took off on my birthday and this happened the next morning. When I went out on my patrol I saw a lot of landing craft heading towards Lyme Bay. They were on their way into the bay from various places along the coast for this exercise. This exercise was to practise landing tanks and lorries and stores, so these landing craft were all loaded up with these things and the idea was that they would offload them at Slapton Sands in South Devon.

  I’d already been told to keep clear because there was an exercise on. Well, we went as far as Start Point and realised that all hell was being let loose in Lyme Bay. There was a ship on fire; there were tracer shells flying in all directions. And I got on to control, ‘Hey, there’s something wrong happening here. They need help.’ They said, ‘Keep away, it’s an exercise.’ I said, ‘My God, if it’s an exercise, it’s an exercise that’s really gone wrong,’ but I was told to keep away. So what we did instead, we went to the entrance of the bay and looked in to see what was happening, and we realised that there were E-boats in amongst the landing craft.

  Ordinary Seaman John Capon

  HMS Obedient (Royal Navy destroyer)

  On 28 April we was out in the Channel, clearing up. We’d just come on morning watch, we’d come on at midnight, just an ordinary patrol, and I was looking over the side of the pom-pom deck, leaning against the rails, and I saw two orange balls of flame. I says to Wiggy Bennett, and these are the exact words, ‘’Ere, Wig. Some poor bastard’s copped it over there.’ And then all of a sudden the sound came back, ‘Boom! Boom!’ Then we saw tracer. He said,

  ‘Oh, it’s an exercise. They’re doing it on Lyme Bay.’

  Before the morning came we were put at action stations. And then Irwin, he phoned up Dover and told them about it and they said to us, ‘Hold your stations’. Irwin wanted to go in to help, he wanted to go in and do what he could, but they said, ‘Hold your stations’. And it was just breaking dawn and I looked around and you couldn’t see anywhere without a body, without a Yankee turned upside down, dead. There was hundreds and hundreds of bodies.

  And all of a sudden comes a chug-chug-chug and up come these seven E-boats. They came up our port side, opened up with their small machine guns, a couple hit our side, and then they came round our bow and down our starboard side, firing their machine guns all the time. We got a couple off but we couldn’t lay the guns because we were that close, but once they started getting away we opened fire with the pom-poms. One of them we did catch, we literally carved the bridge off that with the pom-pom, but it was still going, it still joined the others, and away they went.

  That was Slapton Sands and that was the most bodies I have ever, ever seen. As far as the eye could see there was bodies. We did pick up one alive. They laid him on the wardroom table and he just popped off of hypothermia. They stripped him off, covered him up with a blanket and that, but he died, poor sod. I can see him now. Good-looking kid. They were only kids. But then again, we were all kids, weren’t we?

  Able Seaman James Henry Morgan

  HMS Onslow (Royal Navy destroyer)

  There was a low mist on the water, a two-foot mist, and what they did, they asked for volunteers to go and pick survivors up. So we went, me and this Harris, in the cutter, a stoker and three seamen, and we brought eight back and then we brought seven back the second time. We were pulling them out, these Yanks. Then they laid the dead bodies out on the galley flats and in front of witnesses they cleared their pockets out of their cash and their identification and all that lot. Even those that were alive we took their money and all that lot off them and we dried it for them, dried all the money for them, and when we brought them back into Portland they took all the dead off. The survivors that could walk marched off.

  Telegraphist Derek Wellman

  HMS Onslow (Royal Navy destroyer)

  We had a number of coffins come on board. They were placed in the coffins and taken off. But the event that stuck in my mind was that the Officer Commanding cleared lower deck, which meant that he had everybody who wasn’t on watch round him, and came up with the most extraordinary statement. He said, ‘You’re not to speak of this event, of what’s transpired tonight, not just for the rest of the war but for the rest of your natural lives.’ Which struck me as very odd – the use of words more commonly used by judges than anybody else – and I imagined he was reading from some directive that he had. As might be expected, we respected this confidence. Because, obviously, it would have a devastating effect on American morale to know that over 750 of their men, mostly young people of my own age, nineteen, twenty, who had never known anything about warfare, in fact had only recently landed in Britain, had died simultaneously.

  Peter Nevill

  Beaufighter night-fighter pilot, RAF

  We followed two E-boats, which we hoped would be the ones we’d seen before. They went into Cherbourg harbour and we followed in and gave them some rockets. I’m not sure whether we hit them or not. Then we had to get out, quick. The Germans suddenly woke up and all the guns in Cherbourg seemed to be firing at us. We went like hell out of it. Nothing followed us, it seemed, and we got back to base. We had been damaged: we lost a flap on the wing.

  We reported and went and had our breakfast and then went to bed. Round about 10.30 in the morning we were woken to go and see the officer in charge. He said he’d reported what had happened and we were told that in no way were we ever to talk about anything that had happened because the Americans wanted to keep it quiet.

  Later, whilst I was in hospital, my navigator came to see me and said that they’d taken away my logbook and his logbook. They must have shredded them. That’s a terrible thing to do, to take a bloke’s logbook away. I mean, they could have taken a couple of pages out, but they destroyed the whole thing.

  Countdown

  If there ever were a word, it was ‘armada’. I don’t kno
w what the

  Spanish Armada was like; it must’ve been a fearful sight.

  By the middle of May 1944, units in Britain earmarked for the invasion had moved into camps close to airfields and ports. At one minute to midnight on the evening of 25 May, every camp was simultaneously sealed: barbed wire went up, guards patrolled the perimeter, nobody was allowed in or out. During the next few days each unit was briefed on its D-Day tasks. Then, with the date of the invasion set for 5 June, thousands of men and vehicles bound for the seaborne assault began to leave the camps for the south coast ports. Many units were already embarked and at sea when news came through that the operation was postponed: conditions in the Channel were too rough. Twenty-four hours later, Eisenhower ordered the invasion to proceed on 6 June. The waiting was over.