大象传媒

鈥淟et Battle Commence!鈥�

Part 1
Early on the morning of May the 11th we moved off into Belgium. We were waved straight through the customs, everyone seemed very pleased to see us and we were cheered all the way to Brussels. The people had turned out 鈥榚n mass鈥� in the City and gave us a terrific welcome, unfortunately we could not stop to enjoy all the good things that we were offered freely but had to keep going for our meeting with Jerry. Once we had sorted him out we would return to Brussels and claim our reward! Looking back it鈥檚 marvellous how innocent of the real facts of life we were. We had swallowed all the media talk about plywood tanks hook, line and sinker, we honestly thought that it would only be a matter of days before we sorted out the Jerries. Our only worry was that it might be finished before we got there. I had a Colt 45 and six rounds of ammunition, they were Dum Dum bullets, soft nosed bullets which were banned by the Geneva Convention. If the Jerries had taken me prisoner with them in my possession, they would have shot me out of hand. In fact I had already made up my mind to throw them away if there was any possibility of such an event.

We went straight through Brussels, through Louvain and eventually arrived in a small village west of the river Dyle. We prepared a number of bridges for demolition in the unlikely event of jerry pushing us back and settled down for a day or two whilst we waited for the enemy to give in. The Guards were in front of us and they were more than a match for any Germans.

On the second day, I was told to go to a town south west of Brussels and collect a fifteen Cwt truck. I took a driver with me and off we went. We duly collected the truck and I drove it back to the unit. On the way back to Brussels we picked up a couple of Nurses who were trying to get back to the 鈥楬opitale St Piere鈥�. In a small village we spotted a police check on all vehicles, there were military and Belgium police, we dropped the girls off before the check point, we then went through the check point and had a cup of coffee at a caf茅 whilst we waited for them to catch up with us. After they had also had a cup of coffee we carried on to Brussels and dropped them off in the City.

Incidentally, the Belgian police were taking anybody out who did not have the correct papers or a satisfactory explanation of their presence and were being quite rough with some of their 鈥榲ictims鈥�. We were told by Belgian civilians, that if the police caught any Germans, they were likely to shoot them out of hand. Anybody who looked like a 5th columnist was also likely to get a bullet there and then.

After we dropped the Nurses we carried on to our unit. About a couple of miles before our billet, we were stopped by a British sentry wearing a gas mask who informed us that there was a gas alert, neither of us had our own gas mask with us so we had to try and hold our breath for the last few miles, until we arrived at the billet were we found out that the alert was over. It had been a false alarm, however, the villagers on seeing the 鈥楾ommies鈥� wearing gas masks, all got the wind up and decided to evacuate the village. In only a couple of hours the place was deserted, apart from our unit of R.E.鈥檚.

As the civilians were leaving a Belgian farmer approached me, it appeared that he had a problem, his Shire horse mare was due to foal at any time and he could not take her with him, he asked would I look after her and help her if she should start to foal, well of course I assured him that he had nothing to worry about and off he went. I kept looking at the mare, keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that she would keep her legs crossed, which luckily she did, and fortunately for both of us nothing happened. The farmer returned early the next day to collect his mare and was very, very grateful to me for standing in as midwife, I told him that to the British Army, a simple thing like a mare foaling was all in a days work, the pair of them walked off very happy.

That night we all moved into the Belgian homes and slept on real beds, some of us were sleeping in a child鈥檚 room and being a bit of a comedian, I stripped of and struggled into a child鈥檚 nightgown. Unfortunately, as I was standing there in walked the Orderly Officer, apparently there was some light showing at the window, I had to stand to attention in my nightwear whilst he blasted me up hill and down dale about the lack of blackout. Much later on I was having a chat with the officer, I asked him how he had kept his face straight, he replied 鈥� with great difficulty鈥�, and that when he got back to the officers mess, the other officers had all had a good laugh too!

Next morning when we got up we found the village street full of cows wandering around waiting to be milked, I spent most of the day milking cows, I found a few drivers who could milk and we were busy most of the morning, at first we milked the cows into buckets, some of the milk we kept for our own use, the rest we fed to the calves that were roaming about the streets, eventually we ended up milking the cows straight onto the floor. Some of the lads were sent around the village looking for telephones which they then had to break as the lines were still alive and could be used by enemy agents to inform Jerry of our strength and position. They also had to dispose of any carrier pigeons for the same reason.

In the village we discovered a warehouse full of beer, the owner was busy packing a lorry with goods and chattels ready to evacuate the village. He told us we could have as much beer as we liked as he didn鈥檛 want it to be left for the Jerry鈥檚, the only condition he made was that we would drink the beer on the premises and not take the bottles away as there was a deposit on every bottle! We did manage to stuff a few bottles in our battledress blouses for the lads back in the billets. When the family had departed we had a mooch about the warehouse and I 鈥渓iberated鈥� a case of a dozen bottles of something with a very exotic label which I carried back to the billet where Jack, who could speak French, informed me that I had indeed got twelve bottles of best quality 鈥淥live Oil鈥�. The names the lads gave me are unprintable, I wasn鈥檛 very popular.

There wasn鈥檛 a lot of warlike activity, the R.A. asked us to blow down some greenhouses that were obstructing their line of vision. After two or three days in the village we were told that we were going to blow the bridges and pull back, 鈥渢o straighten the line鈥� was the reason that we were given, it seemed a bit odd to us as Jerry wasn鈥檛 driving us back, anyhow, back we went and prepared more bridges for demolition if need be. Blow me if we didn鈥檛 get orders to pull back again, more line straightening. Myself and a Sapper Cpl were left behind in order to blow up a house by the road side and block the road to any Jerry transport. When the last of the infantry fell back the officer in charge would tell us that they were all clear and we would then blow up the house, we were to expect them around nine o鈥檆lock, at first there were lots of troops passing our position, then the traffic got less and less until the flow dried up completely. There we sat, waiting for the officer. All was quite and peaceful, a bright moonlight night. Suddenly there was the sound of footsteps coming down the street, we both held our breath, then, just behind us, the sound of heavy breathing, we both whipped round, prepared to do or die and there was a very young calf looking for a feed. All we could do was give it a friendly pat and tell it not to do that to us again, as it was a Belgian calf and we spoke in English I don鈥檛 suppose it understood us, anyhow, it wandered off and we were once more alone, waiting for the German army to show up.

About one o鈥檆lock in the morning we thought that we would walk down the road towards the enemy, past the house that we were going to blow, to a road bridge that was to be blown by another party of R.E.鈥檚. When we got there we found that the bridge was gone and so were the R.E鈥檚, without telling us that they were going. We did a very smart about turn, blew up the house, collected our gear, got on the motorbike and away we went. About a mile up the road we found that the party who were to have waited for us to tell us them we were the last of the British and then they would crater the road, had already done so and we were stuck on the wrong side of the hole! At this stage we began to get a bit worried, a big hole in front of us and the German army behind us and just to cheer us up, it started to rain!

This was the moment when my pre-war hobby of motorcycle scrambling paid off, we took to the fields and eventually found a way around the crater and back onto the road. I was exhausted but the thought of what was behind us kept me going but the sixteen stone passenger with the heavy detonator swinging about was more than just a bit of a distraction. We went through Brussels in the early hours of the morning, the rain still pouring down and not a single person in sight to cheer us on our way. Eventually we found our unit in a field where we managed to scrounge a cup of tea. When we reported back to the officer and told him how we had been left in the lurch by the infantry officer not giving us the OK to blow the house, our officer then gave us a rollicking for not bringing back the wire we had used to blow the house!

On another occasion I was sent to a pick up point to meet a RASC lorry with a load of explosives for our section, whilst I waited on the corner, along came an officer from another unit on a similar mission, he was smoking Players cigarette and I was smoking a big fat Havana cigar, I would willingly have traded a box of twenty five cigars for a packet of players, but I didn鈥檛 have the nerve to approach him, he probably thought that I was a bit of a snob, but in fact I felt a bit sick!

When I eventually returned to my unit I was hoping to get my head down and have a bit of a 鈥渒ip鈥�, no such luck. 鈥淧ack up, were pulling back鈥�. Nobody told us why, so back we went, this time we stopped at a series of lock gates connected by bridges near a large lagoon which had been prepared for demolition. While the Sappers were working we drivers went into a Caf茅 for a drink. The owner was packing up his car but he served us with a beer each, then refused to accept our money as it was no longer legal currency. We managed to find enough 鈥済ood money鈥� to pay him and got our beer. Half an hour later he had left and we were able to serve ourselves drinks on the house! We took out some drinks to the Sappers too.

Whilst we were waiting for the lads to finish their work I was approached by a lady who asked if I would put her dog down as she was leaving and could not take her dog with her and did not want it to fall into the hands of the Germans. It was a beautiful Chow. I said that I couldn鈥檛 kill it but that I would ask the Sgt to do it for her. I took the dog down to the lock and explained to the Sgt what I had let him in for. He took the dog to one of the bridges that we were going to blow, the idea being that he would leave the body on the bridge and then it would go up with the bridge, thus saving the digging of a grave. The Sgt stood on the bridge with the dog on his right side, facing the enemy, he put his revolver to the dogs head and turned his head to the left. Just as he pulled the trigger, the dog turned his head and the bullet whistled by it鈥檚 left ear. At the sound of the bang, the dog wriggled free and took off at around a hundred miles an hour and was last seen heading towards the Germans in a cloud of dust.

A demolition party was left on the site and believe it or not, once more we moved back, straightening the line! We pulled off the road into a field near a crossroad, on the other side of the road was a small cottage and in the field next to it hundreds of refugees were resting and feeding, when along came some Stukas who dive bombed the field full of civilians along with the small cottage. They ignored our army trucks and just went for the civilians. We helped the farmer to search through the rubble of his cottage and eventually found the body of his baby daughter, about two or three years of age. That was the moment when the war ceased to be a big game and turned very nasty.

Refugees were beginning to cause a lot of difficulty to troop movement, they seemed to be moving in all directions which meant that on some roads traffic came to a standstill and all the time the Stukas were bombing them with out mercy. Food was also a big problem for the refugees, I went into a wood on the outskirts of Brussels to collect explosives, on the way in I passed a dead horse on the roadside, when I came back about an hour later, someone had cut a large joint out of it鈥檚 buttock.

One evening the news arrived that the Infantry were a bit thin on our front and that we had to take over a section of the front line for the night or until relieved by the Infantry. As I only had a revolver and was not much of a threat to the enemy it was decided that I would remain behind on guard with the vehicles. Away they all went and left me, all on my own in the dark, in a wood which got very spooky as the night wore on. Then, in the early hour, I heard the sound of a body of men coming through the woods towards me, I held my breath, thinking to myself, you would have been better off in the trenches, at least you would have had a bit of company, when one of the men tripped over something and his language was most definitely British! They were a company of Guards, doing the usual thing, 鈥榝alling back to straighten the line鈥�. One of the lads asked me if I had anything to drink and it just so happened that on of my lorries I had a barrel of beer, which had been liberated to stop it falling into the hands of the Germans! We had a bit of a booze up until the officer threatened to shoot the lot of them it they didn鈥檛 move, and away they went. If any ex Guards remembers having a drink of beer in a woods late at night on the way back to the coast, I鈥檓 the bloke that gave it too them. Incidentally, when the lads got back in the morning they said that they had had a very quite night and that Jerry had not bothered them at all.

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