大象传媒

As mentioned in my profile I and other "baby-boomers" had childhoods overshadowed by tales of World War 2. As so many of our parents' generation had been in the forces and would occasionally talk of their experiences, this was hardly surprising. I would like to recall some of the people I knew in my childhood and teenage years in the 1950s and 1960s, retelling the things they would remember, or what was said about them by others in passing. Some, of course, are no longer with us and this is my way of commemorating perhaps the most unselfish and self-sacrificing generation that Britain has ever produced.

There were "John" who worked as a shop assistant in the local greengrocers at Mill Hill Green Man. He was a soft-spoken pleasant man who was always nice to children and adults alike yet evidently in frail physical and mental health, with staring blue eyes in a skull-like face; it was whispered that he had been tortured by the Japanese and sent halfway round the bend.

Once or twice my mother Peggy talked about her first cousin Bert Pardington whose ship had been torpedoed under him at Crete. He was in the sea for many hours before being rescued and the exposure and exhaustion he endured subsequently affected his heart. Bert was invalided out of the Navy, I believe, and sadly he died of heart failure soon after the end of the war and thus the Pardingtons in the male line ended.

My father Bob's friend Frank Geraerts, who lived across the road from us and whose three children I grew up with, was in the London Scottish Regiment; ironically he had a Westphalian-German father although his mother was English. Frank was sent to Normandy during the D-Day landings and accidently got shot in the thigh during the battle of the Falaise Gap, by one of his own platoon! That was the sum of Frank's war, he was cas-evacuated back to England to recover; which was very fortunate as all the rest of his platoon were killed in Normandy. Ever since Frank's leg has always been weak as a result of that gunshot wound.

Frank Geraerts' cousin Ben Geraerts was captured in Singapore by the Japanese and later sent to work on the infamous "Railway of Death" in Siam, now Thailand. Ben experienced terrible brutality and starvation and witnessed many deaths, including his best friend who died in his arms. Ben was a devout Catholic, as were all his family, and his faith must have carried him through the ordeal and he promised himself that if he survived, he would find his friend's widow (who was believed to be in the Land Army)and tell her what had happened. On liberation Ben who was 6'4" weighed only about 5 stone. On returning to England he traced Maisie, his friend's widow to tell her the whole story and to cut a long story short, they married and had two daughters.

John Cleary, Frank's brother-in-law was a wireless operator in the 14th (Forgotten) Army in Burma and was in the jungle for most of that dreadful campaign, contracting blackwater fever and cerebral malaria simultaneously, nearly dying but eventually recovered. The cerebral malaria seriously affected his nervous system, leaving him with the shakiest hands I have ever seen in my life. He could only have half a cup of tea, otherwise he would spill it all over the place. Yet John was the most irrepressible optimist and was always full of laughter, joking about his failings non-stop. Everyone seemed to like him and animals liked him too (especially my own cat, Pixie) - the best sign of all.

My father Bob had a first cousin with whom he grew up with in Leagrave called Richard Norris (whom I have mentioned previously in "A Sergeant's Yale - Part 3"). Richard was in the Royal Air Force and had been a Spitfire pilot in Burma. When Bob and Richard ran into each other Richard was by then a transport pilot on the VIP run, carrying personnel and essential supplies (especially drink) over India and the Far East. Richard was based in Delhi as was Bob, so whenever they could they would meet up somewhere and spend as much time as possible together.

Another of Bob's friends, Ken Robb, was one of the unfortunates left behind at Dunkirk and was a German P. O. W for five years. I recall when Ken had had a few whiskies, the stories would emerge. At one time he was put to work on a farm in Poland which was owned by a German woman. The woman obviously fancied Ken who rejected her advances and she took spiteful revenge on him by reporting him to the Gestapo on a false charge of stealing food. Another time he was forced to work in a German Army hospital as an orderly and one night he had to assist in the operating theatre at the emergency amputation of a German's soldier's leg. The severed leg was handed to Ken and he was brusquely told to get rid of it. He took the leg in shaking hands, went outside the theatre and was promptly sick in the corridor. Once he had recovered himself and disposed of the leg he was ordered to sit with the injured soldier who was in a very bad state and kept groaning, "I'm dying, Tommy!" and Ken kept replying, "No, you'll be all right, Jerry", although it was obvious he was on the way out. Fortunately Ken had a devoted girl friend in England called Georgie who was a nurse - who waited for him all through the five years he was in captivity. No "Dear John" letters for him. They were married as soon as he returned at the end of the war.

My husband Steve is a semi-professional guitarist and during the 1980s he played in a country four piece band and became friendly with Maurice the drummer, an affable character whose surname unfortunately neither of us can remember. However one day Maurice told us how his parents were on their wartime honeymoon when a telegram arrived at their lodgings, recalling the sailor bridegroom to sea as his ship was due to sail. He left his bride behind and hurried back to the home port on the first available train - to find that his battleship had already set sail, leaving him behind. It was such a lucky escape - the vessel was HMS Hood and she had left on her last voyage, to be sunk by the "Bismark" in the Atlantic. If Maurice's father had arrived back in time, it is very likely he would have gone down with his ship - and Maurice would never have existed!

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