大象传媒

This story was submitted to the peoples war site by Wendy Young and has been added to the web site on behalf of Harry Mackrel with his permission and fully understands the sites terms and conditions. I did my training in Scotland prior to the invasion in Normandy.
Before we left England I remember the briefing officer telling us that we would be in Poland by tea time, Poland being th code name for Caen. Infact we didn't reach there for a month.
I was on a ship where we had a casualty before we even reached the beach. A shell had come through the landing ship and made a hole, the water had come in and one of our poor chaps was killed. As we were coming down the ramp we saw bodies lying on the beach, and floating face down in the water. They were all nationalities.
It wasn'tas bad as we really thought it was, but it was the troops that came behind us that really caught the brunt of it.
I was part of the infantry of the 5th Battalion Kings Regiment Liverpool. We landed on Sword Beach at a quarter past seven in the morning and caught the Germans by surprise; but nevertheless there were still casualties. By the evening we were on the first lateral road. I was a member of an anti tank detachment. Our gun was obstructed by the hedgerow, so the sergeant told me to jump over the hedge and clear it. I left my rifle behind and jumped over, landing on top of a German. I only had a bayonet. I pulled it out and held it up to his throat, and said "surrender". He said "Ne Roski" (I am a Russian). Russians were conscripted into the German army. He tried to jump up but couldn't because I was kneeling on him. I liberated his watch, gave him a cigarette, pushed him over the hedge and off he went. I presume he was taken prisoner.
We arrived at the market town of Falaise, the German 15th army were trapped in the valley.
We took up a defensive position close to a river, and we were dug in two main slit trenches.
My companion had just liberated a small pig which he cut up into small pieces, the uncooked bits were put o top of the trench. We used a discie lid to cook the pig in. Soon we came under mota and shell fire from the Germans. A mota shell landed in close proscimity to the slit trench and bits of the pig shot up in the air and landed yards behind the slit trench of the HQ. Someone shouted out "Harry's copped it", as they were covered in flesh and bone. Seriously it wasn't a picnic.
We went right through Normandy, Nymegen, the Aidennes and finished the war in Hamburg.
The only thing that bothers me now is the sight of the dead horses and cattle with their legs stuck up in the air, and the terrible stench which made our clothes smell. When I talk about it I can still smell the smell. We've learned more since the endo of the war by the interviews and trips abroad, than what we knew when we were there beacause in those days our vision was limited.

Story submitted by Wendy Young

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