大象传媒

I was trained as a gunner on a flail tank,which was one of several specially designed tanks for the D day landings. As the flail was for sweeping the beech of mines we were among the first to land at 07.30am Gray-sur-mer Juno beach, we had been on the landing barge since the 2nd of June, it took a long time to load all of the equipment and men. Our barge held 5 tanks, we then had to move out to the asembly points in very rough seas, where the Armada was forming up, the weather forced the postponment of the attack for 24 hours, a lot of men were sea sick, so facing the enemy was more of a releif. We landed 30 mins late the Canadian regiment we were supposed to support had already suffered heavy losses, we rolled up the beach flailing away exploding many anti tank mines through the sand dunes and into a field behind, at this point our chains got tangled with barbed wire, which caused us to hit a mine which in turn blew our track off, putting us out of action, which gave us time to gather out thoughts.

The tank commander reported to the troup leader that we were out of action, who's reply was to send one of his crew to report to him. I was the one designated. Upon seeing him he told me to fill a huge bomb crater in, he mistakenly thought I had a bull doser. On the way back to my tank, another of our tanks which had just landed struck a mine which blew me off my feet, I quickly decided the best place for me was back in the tank. I cant explain how I really felt, it didnt seem real, I was obviuosly scared but very excited, I was only 21 years old. It had not sunk in I felt a bit like John Wayne, the most frightening thing wasn't what you saw it was the terible noise of shells exploding, bombs and aircraft. We could hear men shouting and screaming over our radios, we found an abandond slit trench and decided we would be safer in that than a sitting target in the tank. As night fell the drone of the German planes and the navy ack ack guns gave us a very good firework display, the tank commander and I carried the air intake that had been used to keeo the sea water out when we landed to cover the trench, as we did so I trod on an anti personel mine which exploded but fortunately for me shot off at an angle, we stayed in the trench until we could recover our tank which was a long time, as thousands of other men were landing after us.

We reformed our regiment in a field outside the little village of Cresserons, the field was large enought for us and had a substanial hedge. This was to be our base for the next few weeks. A few days after we become used to the sound of German planes and Canadians shelling the rador station and were too relaxed when a German plane dropped a cannister of antipersonal bombs, 20 of our comrades were injured, 1 died later the others sent to a casulty clearing staion. From then on we were one man short in every tank. While we were at Cresserons, we were called on to capture the rador station at Douvres La Delivrande consisting of 2 under ground forts surrounded by anti tank guns enplacements, mines and machine guns, it was a job we had been trained for. We first cleared the mines then the assault engineers blew the concrete forts followed by the commandos, in the cause of the action we again blew up on a mine. The whole operation took about 1 1/2 hrs, inside we captured about 200 hundred German soldiers and about 20 French girls, they had been living like lords plenty of booze and food.

We were engaged in several battles up to the fall of Caen, one being the capture of the airfield of Carpiquet, which was a lengthy game of cat and mouse which went on for some days,eventually gaining control of it. After Caen was captured we were in a field near Falaise, when we were inadvertidly bombed by the American airforce. We was not injured but our tank commander went bomb happy after one or two near misses, so we didnt see him again!! He was sent back to England. On the road to Falaise it was decided we should stand down B squadren, because we were in need of a rest. The rest of the regiment carried on to point 112 which was a strong hold for the Germans. The RAF Lancaster bombers came over for more than an hour bombing the encircled Germans, when one dropped his bombs short of the target and in the field in which we were resting, of course the follwing planes saw the dust and smoke rising and thought that was the target and although we released our orange smoke they continued to bomb us. Fortunately only one tank and two men were wounded, but in the next field the polish division were not so lucky with heavey casulties, with dead cows and horses and other debris in the rivers and fields the mosquitos came out in their thousands at night and caused an outbreak of disentry, the pills issued didnt make any difference. We had many battles along our way Tilly-sur-seulls, Cagney, Villers, Bocage and Borgebus. Our next big battle was the port of Le Harve it had been bypassed because it was heavily fortified with 12 thousand Germans, we set up camp in the village of Bolbeck where for the first time we could eat our meals at tables and chairs. We had to move at night to make our way to the start line before the battle commenced, it was pouring with rain and the tanks got stuck trying to get up the hill, so we had to use the road which was under German observation and being shelled, we just had time to make a cup of tea when the RAF started bombing, this time very acuratley, we commenced flailing within 40 minutes the lanes had been cleard of mines and we had turned at the anti tank ditch, in doing so we hit a mine and blew a track, so our lanes were then ready for the bridging tanks, then infantry. Within 36 hours the battle was over.

We carried on our journey through Belgium and into Holland crossing the many canals and dikes where the Germans had opened the flood gates to saturate the area. For 2 months during the winter we did little fighting, it was the end of the year and into 1945, we then saw action at the siegfried line up into Bremen, the enemies will was not broken so we still fought many battles we lead the 5th camerons through Bremervorde which was to prove the last action fought by the 22nd dragoons, sadly losing a tank and three men which was 2 days before the armistice. I was given 14 days home leave after joining the 4/7 Royal Dragoon guards and then being posted to the former Palastine as peace keepers between the arabs and jews.

This is a brief glimse of army life for me trooper T.Carroll 22nd Dragoons.

(Was it worth it??)

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