大象传媒

In July 1940 my father James Marshall was a scot working in Manchester. By the middle of August 1940 he had enrolled in the Army in Edinburgh and was in Carlisle training.

When he was a child, around 1917 he suffered from TB which affected the fingers of his right hand and following operations at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary had some of the bones removed and replaced with bone from his thigh. The consequence of this was that his 3rd and little finger were weak and identical in size making it quite impossible to grip things, especially a rifle. (When I was a child he never could grip the ball when we went ten pin bowling)!
Nevertheless, having that steely determination which the Scots possess he stuck with it.

Following training all over the Uk he was subsequently posted to the RA but his weak hand restricted him and following further medical examinations at Fairlop was re-classified. While he was waiting to be posted he was up in London helping to dig people out of bombed buildings. He told me he rescued some people alive but mostly they were dead. He found this hard to bear.

By 1944 he had been trained as a driver with the RASC and was the custodian of his own Bedford lorry which he used to say he loved to drive.

On 17th July, 1944 he embarked from Norwood to NWE and landed just off the Normandy coast. Everyone had to clamber down the scramble nets into the landing craft below. The swell was so great that the man next to him missed the craft and sunk between it and the ship. The weight of their equipment was so great that the man never resurfaced.

On landing, he claimed his Bedford lorry which was to be his lifeline and a good friend to him throughout the war.

He was part of Monty's Second Army under Dempsey but being an RASC driver a certain amount of flexibility in movement was allowed.

Caen was his first stop and then on to Le Beny Bocage. He used to love to pronounce this "foreign word" with his gutteral scottish tones. He also did the same with German words!! Then it was Falaise and across the Seine and the Somme to Brussels and the town of Antwerp by early September. By November the germans had been cleared from the port of Antwerp and Jock was able to access the supply ships easily. On an earlier occasion, on return from the port he and the officer travelling with him took a wrong turn and inadvertantly found themselves forward of OUR front line. Fortunatley, they were undetected and retreated forthwith.

Across the Dutch border and on the 18th September 1944 were with the Americans commerating in Eindvoven. I have a plaque my father received on that day signed on the back by dutch people from Gerwen. While they were in Holland my father spent some time with his accompanying officer living in a barn on a farm just outside Nijmegan. The dutch people were very kind and invited them into their farmhouse. Carrying supplies my father was in great demand and they all shared meals together. The farmer and his family were starving.

On hold in Holland whilst waiting to move forward, father was given 7days leave to go home to get married on 6th February 1945. He made his way to Ostend but the ship he was supposed to travel on was prioritised for the injured so he caught a later one. By the time they arrived at Tilbury the boom was over the harbour so their ship had to wait to dock but it was a happy evening as Joe Loss and his band were on board and they played until dawn. Eventually, my father made it to the church in Manchester 3 days late and his best man Donald Mackay who was a war correspondent in Whitehall for the Daily Express came up for the wedding AGAIN. The wedding reception was held at the Grand Hotel and chicken was on the menu and sausages. My mother always maintained the sausages were soya but the chicken was real!

My father returned to Holland and rejoined his unit who had moved up. He crossed the Rhine and the Weser with the 2nd army. On to Bremen and then spent some time in Hamburg going back and forth to the docks. Across the Elbe and on to the Baltic arriving in Rendsburg.

On the 4th May, 1945 my father stood with thousands of others on Luneburg Heath and watched the Germans surrender their forces in Holland, Denmark and part of Germany to Field Marshal Montgomerey.

He drove up to Kiel in his lorry and I have a few pictures he took of the ship Milwaukee in the Kiel canal.

My father couldn't fire a gun, he couldn't swim and he survived the war unscathed. He saw some horrific things which he never spoke of after the war. His military conduct was described as exemplary.

He had a great sense of right and wrong and throughout his life was always prepared to stand by his principles and take action where necessary.

What more can you ask of a hero?

He will always be mine.

He lived to a ripe old age of 84 and died in 1997 but he is remembered - always.

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