大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Vishwanath Bhargava of the Chineham Learning Centre on behalf of Audrey Hall and has been added to the site with her permission. The author understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

Driver J Couzens
No. 1878895
118 Road Construction Co.
Royal Engineers

Stationed in Blain Brittany

I found myself all alone on the boat and saw hundreds of men in the water struggling I saw one lifeboat which was packed to capacity and heard the occupants singing roll out the barrel the time came now when I was forced into the water I looked at my watch for the last time and it showed 4.18 pm I entered the water with my trouser shirt and identity disc but I found after a while that my trousers were a handicap for swimming so I discarded them after a struggle and much freer to swim unfortunately I was doing alright until a piece of wreckage bumped into my ribs nearly putting out of action I kept on going I was in pain but I had to go on as I could see my wife in my vision saying come on Jack and so I carried on and I saw some of my old company struggling and calling for help in the water but I could not help most my company were West Riding Yorkshire men and grand pals too.

There was plenty of wreckage floating around and I did not hear and machine guns blazing but it was terribly oily. I kept going for over an hour when I was picked up two sailors in a small tubs and than I had to climb the ladder to get on the Havelock which I managed after a painful journey. When I boarded the Havelock a sailor swabbed me to get the oil off me and gave me a pair of white duck trousers to put on and then found my way to a ward room where they gave me a iced drink there were a quite a lot of high ups there and I went to sleep for a short time I found one of the high ups taking a census and my name and number was taken. We then proceeded to Plymouth and on our way there several of the survivors passed out and even buried eventually we arrived at Plymouth and I was rather in pain and taken to Plymouth Naval hospital and given treatment while there I saw terrible cases of burning and the poor men were screaming with pain. I was then transferred to a small hospital in Sutton in Surrey for a week convalescence after which I felt fit and then I was posted to Chatham my depot and a couple of days there I got sick leave and during my sick leave my wife received a notification from the War Office of my casualty which I still hold. After a couple of weeks at Chatham I volunteered for a bomb disposal company that was just forming and was posted to Southampton where we were kept busy digging out unexploded bomb.

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