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Harry Reeves came to the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Birmingham Public Space at the Mailbox to tell his story to a volunteer. He also talked about his experiences at Dunkirk (see 'Don't Rock the Boat'). He accepts the terms and conditions of the website.

In September 1944 we went back to France. Went from Portsmouth and landed on the Mulberry harbours in Arromanches, and went on to Caen. By now I was a sergeant so I sat in the front of the lorry. Travelled to Holland and Nijmegen bridge. It was our job to illuminate the bridge in case of an attack.

After a time we moved to northern Holland. It was now early 1945. We were given the job of illuminating the ground in front of our advancing troops, mostly Canadians. We were sitting targets, I was very worried. We became very good at charging the carbons in the lights because of fear of being shelled, we lost quite a few men wounded and killed.

I was sent to Antwerp at one time to guard the port. This time was a bit hairy. Myself and another sergeant and 30 blokes had to guard at Krefeld, an ammunition dump. There was ammunition from every country under the sun. Each day German POWs had to sort out the shells — a dangerous job. We deployed the 30 men around the site. We had one guard at each gate. One night in the summer of ’45 I was on duty and suddenly there was an almighty explosion that went on and on. I thought the dump had gone off. I’d done 6 years and thought my number was up! I ran down the drive to find out what had happened. An officer approached to find out. We never round the reason why it all went up. One of our guards was killed — he’d been right through the war. We never found a trace of him. We did find our deed boxes — they were metal.

One odd incident — Brigadier Morley was in charge of our site. He used to carry out snap inspections. One of our lads had gone for a cup of tea. The ‘Brig’ put the man on a charge and told me off. His name was ‘Blondie’ Reece. He was sent to detention centre for 9 months. I met him after the war at a Villa match. In 1946 as I came out of the ground I spotted him at the match.

I was demobbed in January ’46 from Hereford. I was given a ‘Burtons’ suit. We had to hand in our uniform. Then I was given three months pay, took a 14-month teaching course and spent the rest of my life teaching in primary schools in Birmingham.

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