大象传媒

鈥淭his poem was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer from Cleveland on behalf of Robert Hogg, and has been added to this site with his permission. Robert fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.鈥�

鈥淲鈥� Coy. 1RNF. N.Africa WWII

Our Platoon鈥檚 First Loss

He was then aged twenty 鈥� one,
A fine young man, big and strong.
A Yorkshire plough- lad he had been,
But joined the army at eighteen.
Armed with the medium machine gun,
In his section he was number one.
An artillery officer came to ask
If we could undertake a task.
They were under fierce attack
And had no way of hitting back.
The enemy used pole 鈥� raised O.P鈥檚
And they鈥檇 been seen by one of these.
He thought that with machine gun power,
Perhaps we could destroy the tower.
Platoon Commander, with one and two
Went to see what they could do.
It was a tricky situation,
They could not get high elevation.
Before they were prepared to fire
The situation was most dire,
From a single shot, they said,
Alas, our number one was dead.
Number two then took the gun
To avenge what they had done.
Soon the whole contraption crumbled
And from it two Italians tumbled.
Before either could find cover,
For both of them their days were over.

Robert Hogg

No1 Eric H. Smithson of Hull. Killed 03/01/41
Platoon Commander PSM Percy Smith of Sunderland. Killed 21/04/42

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