大象传媒

I was with the 94th Field Regt. RA who went to Normandy just after D-Day and made our way through France, Belgium and Hollan where we took part in the battle of Arnhem. After two weeks at Elat we moved south to the German border near the Reichsfeld Forest where we still had a lot of firing to do.

One afternoon the order came for all No.1 to report to the command post, so being in charge of No4 gun I went off expecting another big fireplan to be arranged, but, surprise, surprise, it was news of 48 hour leave in Brussels for one man per section to include one Sgt. from the four of us. So it was a case of drawing lots. I was most surprised when I won and my lads said I must have fiddled it, so to keep the peace I said I would do duty all night.

When the morning 'stand to' was over I made my way to to the rear of the position where the cookhouse truck was waiting with breakfast for all the lads. Well, breakfast consisted of 'porridge' (that was hard biscuit crushed and boiled in water to look like porridge). My turn came and the cook was pouring mine into my dixie, I remember seeing it slip out onto the ground as everything went black. When I woke up I was lying on the ground with my feet almost in a huge fire! I tried to get up but couldn't so crawled away still not knowing what had happened.

Apparently a shell landed on the truck and the whole thing was blown to pieces. Two men were killed nine were wounded and two later died in hospital. When I eventually reached the First Aid Post, I found I had been hit eight times, one rather nasty piece crushed my ankle and took away part of my boot and a large lump of flesh, three more in the fleshy part of my legs and four tiny pieces which were left to work out on their own.

Four of us were taken by ambulance to Nijmegan Hospital which was operated by British and German staff. I was put in a ward which was already full, but I had a stretcher between two beds where we were almost touching each other. My condition was not life threatening so no treatment was given that day. During the night the enemy opened fire with long-range guns and shelled the ward I was in. The roof came in and we were covered in rubble. The chap next to me was killed, but they pulled me out with a few more bruises!

We set off in ambulances again back to Eindhoven where we were looked after by Nuns. They were very good to us and did what they could but there was no medical care.
This was the start of my long journey home.

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