大象传媒

NIGHT PATROL TO BARBEE FARM

During the Normandy Campaign 25th June 1944, as part of operation Martlet (the opening prelude to Montgomery鈥檚 operation Epsom) My unit, the 1/4th KOYLI鈥檚 were dug in at the front-line alongside the Hallamshires at the north west end of Tessel Wood in the Bocage region, within 300 yards of the Boche positions. Prior to the main assault I have described in 鈥渁ttack on Barbee farm鈥�,
I was detailed by a corporal, who informed me that I was to be a member of a patrol that night. .Towards dusk our detail made its way to the Battalion H.Q. which was established about 300 yards to our rear close to the Fontenay to Vendes road. The H.Q. was on uneven ground, in places the ground was sunk very deep, the battalion H.Q. and R.A.P. were dug into the hillside on the north east comer of Tessel Wood .When I entered the H.Q. and saw the gathering of officers together with our padre, I thought "Aye aye this must be a dangerous patrol"!
We were introduced to a Canadian officer; he was the youngest officer that I had ever seen. He told us that we were going to try to capture a prisoner from the enemy positions at Barbee Farm. These night patrols were a frequent task for the infantry, from which such prisoners taken often volunteered valuable information. I handed in my rifle and received a Sten gun and new webbing with pouches suitable for Sten gun magazines, also a pocket watch with a luminous face. The officer told me that I would be his runner. The method of identifying myself was by showing the luminous face of the watch. He also told us of the code word to use when returning through our lines; it was "Petain "and this would be current for 24 hours. We were given two tablets to take. I can't remember now what they were for, but probably to keep us wide awake.It was now dark and near to start time. Some of the lads were writing letters and the padre had a few words with us, then after blacking our faces we were off.
We set off along the road running from north to south along the side of Tessel Wood, actually the road from Fontenay to Vendes. This road was shelled daily. We arrived at the forward positions of The Hallams' at the south west comer of the wood; this point was about 400 yards from Barbee Farm. We were met by The Hallams' Company Commander. He was a very tall man, so it was probably Peter Newton. He told us of a minefield and that a white tape had been laid (presumably by The Hallams' Pioneer Platoon) to guide us safely through and back. One good thing, the weather was fine and dry.
The Hallams officer took our patrol about 100 yards along the hedgerow running southwards to where we could see the two white tapes going out in the direction of Barbee Farm. We were soon on our way between the tapes, 10 men strong; the Canadian officer, a full corporal and 8 privates. We reached the end of the tapes and the minefield, and started to crawl through no man's land.
With the corporal leading the way, we crossed the first hedgerow. Then we made our way to the left to another hedgerow, this one was running in the direction of Barbee Farm. Next there was another small field with hedgerows on three sides. These fields were grazing land and obviously had no cover for us at all. Then we turned right and through the hedgerow across a cart track and into a field of standing com which was over three feet high. Our moves had brought us opposite to our objective, Barbee Farm.
In the middle of the cornfield there was two or three trees, we grouped under the closest tree to Barbee farm, speaking in whispers after all were only fifty yards away from where the German positions were known to be. This tree was to be our H.Q. The plan was. to form two sections, one to be the fire section to give covering fire to the other section, the fighting section, whose job it was to capture the prisoner.
The corporal and his fire section moved off to their new positions in the direction to the left of Barbee Farm. After they had been gone a while, the officer told me to make contact with them. The Corporal and his men had left in single file through the corn; I followed in the same track, I did not anticipate any problem in contacting them. Unfortunately, some way from the tree the corporal must have come across other tracks. These tracks were going in several directions and it was anybody's guess which one to take. I chose one in the same general direction as previously, which led me to the edge of the cornfield, but still covered by the corn. I carefully rose up to a kneeling point with my Sten gun at the ready. With great caution I parted the corn and there, diagonally across from me stood a German sentry. He was behind the hedgerow and I can vividly recall seeing him from the waist upwards. He was standing side on to me and was easily identifiable by his steel helmet; he was no more than 12 feet from me. Being so close, I was certain that he had heard me, but didn't know where I was, and my impression is that he had frozen.
I decided that unless he made any movement, then it would be best not to fire at him, but to return to the officer and report what I had seen, as there was no hope of continuing my mission to find the fire section. As quietly as possible I pivoted on one knee and keeping as low as I could I crawled back through the corn the same way as I had come. After I had progressed 6 or 7 yards with no reaction from the enemy, I was beginning to feel that I was in the clear. When I had covered less than 20 yards, the Germans opened up with machine guns and I could see the tracer bullets flying over me. The fire intensified as more machine guns joined them, until they had a whole. network of guns covering the area in crossfire.
By the time I got back to the tree, where the officer and the men were waiting, the fire was really intense. I told him where the Germans were and he decided that in view of them being aroused, it was out of the question to try to capture a prisoner that night, and ordered us to return to The Hallams' trenches.
The tracer bullets were still scything through the corn just over our heads; they seemed to be everywhere. I suggested that we crawl back to the edge of the cornfield; the young officer agreed. We commenced crawling. I had never been so close to the ground before. The enemy machine guns were obviously set on fixed lines, the bullets coming even lower through the corn, which meant that the ground was rising. I wanted to try and burrow into the ground as the bullets came lower and lower, seeming to be just above my steel helmet.
Driven by the urgency to survive, the speed at which we crawled was almost equivalent of running; I would not have believed it possible if I had not actually done it. One of the webbing pouches containing my spare Sten magazines came open and I was losing them one by one in the corn. There was nothing that I could do about it. In any case I knew that we were going to be lucky to survive this one.
The machine gun fire was getting heavier, but thankfully we were at the edge of the cornfield. The section was working well together and we seemed to be doing everything right, however our next move was probably the most dangerous. I had fixed in my mind where the German positions were, they had a good view down this cart track, and I told the officer and the other lads this. Next the enemy started illuminating the area with flares so they had a pretty good idea where we were. To cross the cart track singly would be suicide, so we lined up in the edge of the corn and agreed that we would all cross together on the officer's signal.
The hedgerow, typical of the Normandy Bocage, consisted of a solki bank practically waist high, made of stone, sod and earth topped with a thick hedge sometimes of double thickness. Once behind this, our way back to The Hallamshire's positions was to turn left along its length, hopefully to be covered by the mound from the machine gun fire that was harassing us.
The command was given. We all dashed as one man and forced our way through the hedge and laid under cover preparing for our next move. We were certain to have been seen crossing the cart track, so what happened next came as no surprise. As we crawled down the length of the hedgerow, they started to mortar the field that we were in. The only protection from the flying shrapnel was at the base of the bank where we were crawling, this ground being slightly lower. The open ground was being liberally pasted with mortar fire; in hindsight an obvious fire plan, just the same as we should have had, had the boot been on the other foot. I got the impression that the Germans thought that we were more than just a patrol.
I was just on the point of entering the last hedgerow before the field which contained our minefield, when a shell exploded at the side of me. In the dark I could see all different colours. The shell had exploded within four yards of me; how I had remained unscathed was beyond belief.
We went through the hedge and were now running for all we were worth across the open ground towards The Hallams' positions, the exploding mortar bombs urging us even faster. We saw the white tape marking safe passage through the minefield and at the other end was the same Hallams officer who had seen us out into no man's land waiting for us. Despite the heavy pasting that the area was receiving, he was out in the open, concerned that we got under cover as quickly as possible. I'm fairly certain that this officer was Peter Newton M.C., but whoever he was, he was a very brave bloke and we were more than glad to see him. He directed us to their slit trenches.
Now the enemy started to open up with heavy guns, not only on our sector, but all along the front; possibly they suspected that a strong night attack was afoot. As we ran the last few yards and scrambled into one of the Hallams slit trenches, I repeatedly said, "I'm English, I'm English", to avoid being shot by mistake. In my eagerness to get under cover, I am afraid that I dropped rather heavily on to a soldier already occupying the trench, no doubt saying, "Sorry mate", as I did so.

NEXT MORNING
The shelling continued until daylight, then the patrol was ordered to regroup. On getting out of the trench that morning, that I was impressed by the good job they had made of it. They had cut some tree branches about 5 feet long and 4 to 5 inches in diameter and laid them across the top of half the length of the trench. I remarked to my Hallam's companion of the night that it was an excellent cover. I think that he had forgiven my earlier clumsiness.
We set off back to our Battalion H.Q., along the southern end of Tessel Wood and turned left up the Vendes to Fontenay road. To my surprise and delight, coming strolling along the road from the direction of Vendes, like four musketeers, were the fire section whom I had failed to contact in the cornfield! The feeling of comradeship in survival cannot be equaled at any other time in life. Some of the men in the patrol were family men with three or four children; myself being eighteen years old and single, I felt very concerned for them.
We arrived at Battalion H.Q., where I handed in the Sten gun, the webbing and the pocket watch and collected my rifle. My own platoon officer asked me what had happened to my Sten gun magazines. I said that the pouch pockets had come open when crawling fast and the mags had fallen out and they were lost under pressure of survival., this explanation he duly accepted.
I never saw the young Canadian officer again, and I assume that he returned to his own unit. It is my opinion that the night patrol had been a battle indoctrination for him and this being so, we had great admiration for him. I'm sure that whatever his later experiences were in battle, he would never forget his night with The KOYLI at Barbee Farm.

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