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He was The Gunner in our Cromwell tank crew during the summer of 1944 in Normandy - a lively, likeable, blunt, broad Geordie. He was of much the same age as me, both of us having had our nineteenth birthdays a few months previously - mine in May, his, I think, in March.

We had arrived originally in Normandy as a troop of Crusader anti-aircraft tanks, each one equipped with a couple of Oerlikon 20mm cannon. We waited with H.Q. Squadron, wondering if indeed we were ever going to get moving - who needed tanks as anti-aircraft cover anyway? There wasn’t an enemy aircraft to be seen! The only time we saw any aircraft action was when we were attacked by low-flying ‘friendly’ American fighter planes - but that’s another story.

The situation must eventually have registered with someone, somewhere, because after a week or so we turned our useless Crusaders in, were given Cromwells and became an operational troop with ‘A’ Squadron of the Regiment.

It was then that Gunner joined us - until then we had been a crew of four. Our original gunner became co-driver and so we needed an extra crew member. We immediately took to him and he felt at ease with us. Mutual acceptance and trust were there from the very beginning - and that was essential when five of you had to live together closely as a team.

I found a particular affinity with him because I too was a Northerner - well, from the North-West, but that, in those days, was always thought as ‘the North’ if you lived South of Birmingham - not that anybody held that against us - it just gave the two of us a little something in common - a reason to rely on each other perhaps, and that was essential from the start. I was the wireless operator/gun loader, and he was going to fire the thing when I had loaded it. Mutual trust between the two of us was essential.

Crouched on the 9-inch diameter thinly-upholstered metal seat of the75mm gun which was his station whenever the tank was on the move, the tiny eyepiece lens of the telescopic gun-sight together with the roof periscope was his only window on the world. The restricted field of view they gave had to be seen to be believed!

When not needed to heave shells into the breech of the gun, or to attend to the demands of the No.19 wireless set, I was able to stand on the rim of the turret bin and have an overview of what was happening outside. Not so poor old Gunner down below in the bowels of the turret, jammed into a narrow, confined space with his right shoulder pressed into the leather harness of the 75mm gun-levelling mounting, while his left shoulder was scrunched-up against the inadequate armour-plate of the turret wall

And so, over the ensuing months, like all other tank crews, we kept many appointments with Start-Lines in the pre-dawn hours, waiting with gnawing, gut-wrenching apprehension for the order to advance. Sometimes it came early, which was better. At other times, we waited, and chain-smoked cigarettes, thinking that the longer we waited here, the longer the Germans had to prepare for our advance and to get their almost invincible, indestructable Tiger tanks into
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position or to prepare their 88mm anti-tank guns to blow us out of existence - they would be in carefully-chosen, well-hidden defensive positions. Our task was to advance, more-often-than-not across ground with only scanty or no cover, and seek-out and then destroy them, presumably while they waited politely for us to find them and start about the business of doing just that!

It isn't difficult to understand how the apprehension could build up, accumulate and magnify in the imaginations of impressionable youngsters during a couple of hours wait for the signal to advance.

That's why they gave us a very generous and supposedly fortifying rum-ration, from about late July of 1944 onwards, with the excuse that it was to keep-out the pre-dawn chill! Matelots serving in the Royal Navy at that time, just did not and still do not believe it was fact - they were the only people, they thought, who by tradition, deserved that - how dare a few jumped-up squaddies share their Nelson-given right!

We survived, but in late August 1944, we had to take our Cromwell tank back to R.E.M.E. workshops on a tank transporter for an engine replacement - a distance of about forty miles. The work, we were told, would take a maximum of thirty-six hours - meanwhile, we were free to relax. We slept! In the short waking spells, we cooked and ate well - fried, tinned bacon, fresh eggs that we found in a local deserted farm, mushrooms from the cow pats and a few ripe tomatoes which we liberated from the greenhouses of the deserted farm, followed by pears and peaches straight off the trees - if we hadn’t used them, they would have rotted and gone to waste.

The work on the tank finished, we were given a map reference of the position to which our troop had moved in readiness for the advance which, although we did not know it then, was to be the beginning of the break-out from Normandy. We had to be there in time to make another Start-Line at 0500 hrs that morning - it was by now well after midnight.

It was a dark night with no moon, when we set off on the journey to make our rendezvous with the other two tanks of our troop. We had the map reference, a 1-inch-to-the-mile O.S. map and a prismatic compass, although for all the use that was going to be to us it might just as well have been left at the R.E.M.E. workshops. However, we had Jock, a first-rate Glaswegian Scot as driver, a good crew and the resilience of youth on our side so that we set off full of confidence that we would find the troop's location in ample time to meet the deadline. I was aware that Gunner had become unusually quiet, but then none of us felt in the mood to be the life and soul of the party.

The march was not easy. We found ourselves stopping every mile or so to try to establish our position on the map. We were hopelessly, horribly lost - a fact which was NOT lost on Gunner, sitting on his tiny seat by the gun, unable to see, not knowing where we were going or even if we were travelling in the right direction. Frankly, the tank commander and I didn’t even know that. The shortest way, we had estimated, lay along a route which proved to be tree-lined country lanes and unmarked tracks. Time flew by, as it inevitably does in such circumstances.

Yet again we stopped at the junction of two very narrow lanes. The commander and I dismounted to try and establish our position on the map - we hoped that there might be a
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a church or a small group of buildings, or some other feature of the darkened landscape, by which we might fix our position with certainty. We failed, and decided to continue in the direction in which we were then travelling. The prismatic compass showed it to be roughly the correct direction

Silently, each of us pre-occupied with his own thoughts, we took our places in the turret and the commander gave the driver his instructions. No one spoke - there was nothing to say which could be constructive and we had long since run out of jokes about our situation. We moved off slowly and cautiously, the same unspoken question probably going through all our minds - where were we in relation to the German positions?

Were we perhaps at that very moment heading straight towards them? Was there a whacking great Tiger tank or an 88mm anti-tank gun just around the bend in the track ahead of us waiting for us to get round that bend so that they could blow us out of existence? Was there a Jerry infantryman in the ditch, warned by the sound of our approach, pointing a panzerkraftfaust (the German version of the PIAT anti-tank mortar, and very efficient at that) straight at us?

I reached down to pass a cigarette to Gunner. It remained in my hand, and there was no reply from him. We realised then, although we did not want to accept the significance of it, that he was just not there. We halted and the Tank Commander and I decided to dismount and go back to where we had stopped just a few minutes ago, in case he had left the tank to obey a call of nature while we had walked the few hundred yards or so farther on down the lane.

We reached the spot where the two of us had previously dismounted, to see if he could be found. We called his name, hoping that he was perhaps squatting somewhere close by. We gave up and returned to the tank, having decided that he had gone, but knowing also that we had to keep going.

I knew that the worst had happened. I was now fairly sure that I knew what had been going through Gunner’s mind, but I didn’t want to believe that he had actually done it. We said nothing to each other about his disappearance - we had other things to think about.

We pushed slowly on, as we had to do. We found the troop and started our advance when the order to do so was given, the co-driver taking over the gunner's seat.

A few weeks later we heard rumours that Gunner had hidden in undergrowth that night, until daylight when he started to make his way back to the first British unit he could find in order to give himself up as a deserter. As luck had it, he found the first such unit after what had seemed to him like a couple of miles to the rear - it was a Royal Military Police post!

Some months later, by which time we had progressed into Holland, the four of us, commander, driver, co-driver and I were called as witnesses at his court-martial, which was to be held in Geleen-Sittard. We were allowed a half-hour to speak to him privately before the proceedings began. We tried to talk him into saying that he had dismounted from the tank to relieve himself whilst the commander and I were out of the turret trying to locate our position and that when we moved off he had called out to us, but could not be heard over the roar of the engine.

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We knew that some deserters had in the recent past been shot. We knew also that Gunner was too truthfully blunt to change his story at that stage in events, although he knew our fears about the fate of deserters. He was clear-minded in what he was going to do - adamant that if the worst came to the worst, he would accept whatever was to be his fate. To him, the worst could not be any worse than the shivering fears he had experienced frequently whilst waiting throughout the night before an advance the following morning, and the terrors he had bitten back whilst at the Start-Line waiting for action to begin.

To him, nothing was worth that, even dear life itself. He was so calm that I, probably the closest to him, found difficulty in believing what he was telling us. But I did know him to be truthful, and I knew that he meant every word that he was saying. I believed him - and was filled with dread.

When Gunner was called into the courtroom he faced the court with complete calmness. The
charge of desertion was read out to him and he was asked whether he understood the gravity of that charge. He answered the charge with complete and frightening simplicity, telling the whole story exactly as it happened. He made no attempt to deny the circumstances. He was frank and truthful, and seemed to be completely without fear. I was more nervous giving my evidence than he was in answering the charges against him, but his simple honesty was there for the whole court to see.

He was sentenced to three years penal servitude. Had I been alone, I know that I would have broken down and shed tears of relief.

We never saw him again. Some months later, towards the end of February 1945, I was sent back to Brussels to follow a two-day refresher course, where I suffered severe burns to the face, head and hands.in an incident there, was hospitalised in Brussels and was flown back to the R.A.F. Burns Unit at Swindon. The war was over before I was declared fully recovered and convalesced, and I was then posted to a another regiment, bringing to an end a never-to-be-fogotten period of my life. I celebrated my twentieth birthday on VE day, May 8th 1945 at Crowborough in Sussex.

I must make just one correction - I did see Gunner once more. It was in the early ’fifties - perhaps seven or eight years later.

I had been into the city at Liverpool one lunch-time, and was walking back to where my car was parked. I stepped off the pavement to avoid a toweringly high ladder which was leaning against a well-known public building, seven or eight storeys high - . Lewis’s on the corner of Ranelagh Street for those who know their Liverpool!

As I walked around the foot of the ladder, I collided with a body that had just detached itself from the rungs, having slid down the ladder from the lofty heights above. We turned towards each other to apologise. There was a moment of incredulous disbelief as each recognised the other. There was no hesitation, each knowing the other as though it had been only the day before that we had parted at that court-martial.

We spent only moments together - he to tell me that he was working as a steeple-jack and
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was in Liverpool for that day only - I to say that I was teaching in Prescot and was hurrying to be back at school for the afternoon session. We shook hands and parted. It was almost as though we had barely known each other, except sketchily and briefly in the distant past, despite the closeness under which we had all existed in Normandy.

We each appeared to accept that that was how it should be - that there was no need to re-live those days. We were completely at ease with each other and we knew that there was nothing more to be said. Had we felt ill-at-ease, we would surely have wanted to pursue the occasion further - perhaps over a pint or two. Each went on his own way knowing that trust had been preserved.

Some may feel that I have broken that trust by putting all this into words - I do not however, feel that way - I believe that this is perhaps a small, but significant incident that should be recorded - I know that Gunner would agree with me.

On my way back to school, I couldn’t help but think about what had happened all those years ago. Would I have had the courage to take on the Army establishment in such circumstances, with the humble but unafraid self-belief that Gunner had shown, in the face of the terrifying atmosphere of a court-martial - and all this at the tender age of nineteen? Could I have done that job that he was now doing quite happily and without a hint of fuss or fear? The answer to those questions has to be a resounding ‘NO’!

So, I wonder, but cannot explain - what exactly IS the nature of fear?

If, perhaps someday, he should happen to read this he will certainly recognise himself and he will know who I am - if he does, I should like him to know that I am proud to have served with him more than half-a-century ago, and that I shall remember those harrowing events clearly, until the day I die.

Good on yer, Gunner!

Anon. March 2000

(Stored, for public accass, in the library archives of the Tank Museum, at Bovington, Dorset)

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