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This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Kat Pearson a volunteer from CSV Action Desk on behalf of Mr Barry Cox and has been added to the site with her permission. Mr Cox fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

Not being of the war mongering type, it has taken nearly two years, and then only by the cajoling of my family, to sit and watch 鈥淪aving Private Ryan.鈥� Quite a moving film it turned out to be, and very different from the Gunga Din, Errol Flynn type movies that I expected and that we experienced shortly after World War 2. However, the Errol Flynn films, where everyone dies laughing their heads off for some reason (I think to show their pearly whites off) were produced to portray how good the life of a typical army private was. It didn鈥檛 hurt when you got hit with a great lump of shrapnel between your ears, it was great, the beautiful nurse held your hand until it suddenly dawned on you that in real life it wasn鈥檛 funny after all and you were crying out for your Mom- as they did. It took me back a few years, in a nostalgic way, after seeing the film because I remember the build up to that huge invasion that was to be codenamed D-Day.

Alveley, as with so many small villages throughout the United Kingdom was to be called upon to take part in a massive build up of military hardware which was to be required for the eventual invasion that the film 鈥淪aving Private Ryan鈥� was to portray so vividly.

The first sight of the 鈥淯nited States Army鈥� insignia (A large white star in a circle) on the lines of vehicles, jeeps, canvassed covered lorries and so many other track and wheeled vehicles that started to fill the fields was awe inspiring to the likes of me at the age I was in 1944/5 The scenes the film portrayed sent me down the well-worn lanes of nostalgia that I seem to travel more as I get older. The Yanks arrived in long columns of trucks that turned off the Bridgnorth/ Kidderminister Road as if going to the 鈥淢ill Restaurant.鈥� They continued up Astley Bank right to the top of the lane. Over the following weeks, hundreds of fighting machines were lined up filling the huge areas of land, and as I recall, a canvas camp to house the personnel. The building I remember along the that area or any substance, was a long shed (with a story of its own- for years after the war it was I believe squatted by a family who eventually after many years scratching a living as small holders, bought the land and built a house there. He was an American coming over with the invasion force, who met and married a local girl and settled here.) There was no other building up there to stand any test of time, so it was known that as an army camp it would only have a short duration there and as soon as they got the signal it would be up pegs and go.

With the American trucks came the American personnel to drive and service them. Men who in due course had time off, and needed somewhere to relax. One of the places they headed for on days off was the 鈥淔enn Green Lido.鈥� On these days they would gather in their groups and loll around the pool. Local dialects were soon mingling with the long American drawl that John Wayne always did well.

So to the title 鈥淪aving Private Ryan, Alveley, and my first Portable Radio.鈥� The G.I.s or Yanks as we called them, who arrived on the scene, soon found the idyllic spot of the 鈥淔enn Green Lido,鈥� the ideal place to meet young ladies and the very well manicured lawns that surrounded the sparkling pool soon filled with off duty G.I.s and girls lounging aroung listening to music (I would like to say Major Glenn Miller with the band of the American Air Force of course, it was so long ago I don鈥檛 know who it would be, but you can bet it would be a big swing band like Millers.) I have rambled on to get to the point of my story, this being the radio they heard their music on. It was the first little portable radio I have ever seen or heard and how 鈥淗ollywood鈥� it seemed. Handsome G.I.s, lovely girls, a sparkling pool to splash and play in, the friendly 鈥渃an鈥檛 catch me鈥� chases, where the girls saw to it they were indeed caught and kissed, then the drying each other down, listening to music on that (which I would have died for) portable radio.

Of course the weeks passed quickly and as the landings that were about to take place in Normandy approached, the vehicles which had gathered in the Alveley area started to make their way to the southern staging areas ready for the invasion. Driving these vehicles were the 19 and 20 year old lads, the Ryans, the Smarts, the Kesslers, or what ever name you would like to give them, taking in the last lung full of Shropshire country air and waving to us and the last view of the thatched round houses and the beautiful pool they had gamed in as they had waited for that fated day, D-Day. So there you go, little old Alveley played a small part in its success, Fenn Green helped to lighten the few weeks before the invasion for the G.I.s, maybe one of them could have been a "Private Ryan" who knows? I wonder about that little radio, you know- did he take it with him when he hit the beach? Was he reminded of that little bit of heaven he'd shared with us when he listened to it later? Did it survive those initial weeks after D-Day, or was it blown to pieces like so many of those young lads in the first hours of battle.

What happened to the girls they left behind? Were any of the unions that were made strong enough to survive those years apart? Did any of them meet again and splash in that lovely pool together?

On my desk I have a model of an American Sherman Tank. I have never thought about it until now, but do you know, I'm sure I've seen a few hundred lined up somewhere. Amd that little portable radio they brought to the pool, I've got two or three in the house now but do you know, there is only one that stays in my memory; That's the one I heard when I was 9 or 10 those many years ago when the Yanks were here, a long way from home. Lets hope they did make it back home OK and that little radio played into the peace.

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