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I was mobilised at the beginning of September 1939 because I was in the TA. At the end of September I went to France with my Unit. We served in various parts then, and eventually, when the Germans attacked, we had to retreat and finally got off the beaches at La Pin which was not far from Dunkirk at the end of May.

I was in England for about two years. We did various jobs including farm work and training, and I was then posted to North Africa, had a ride out to Africa on the Queen Mary, served with the Eighth Army (the Desert Rats). Eventually, after the campaign in North Africa finished, we did the landing at Salerno, which they reckon was one of the most bitterly contested landings of the War. We got up as far as Cassino and we were pulled out of the line there, came back to Naples to be shipped home for the Second Front.

We went ashore at Arromanche , D Plus One and served all the way through until we got to Berlin. We finished up in the swimming pool in Berlin. It was about another seven or eight months after that I was demobbed.

I was very lucky because I was never wounded, although on one occasion I saw a shell coming down out of the air and I ducked, not quite quickly enough… I had three or four bits of shrapnel in my tank suit and about an inch of my zip ripped out. On another occasion I was staying in a house with three of my gun team and a couple of shells went off near by, and of course there was a lot of cursing and so on, because we were covered in plaster. When we investigated the situation the following day we found a bit of shrapnel about the size of my fist which had gone through the wall on one side of the house, under two chaps on the bed, over me sleeping on the floor, and out of the wall on the other side! …and all we were moaning about was getting ourselves covered in plaster.

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