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Introduction

This article is submitted on behalf of Mr Jack Farrell of Cleator Moor, Cumbria who served in the East Riding Yeomanry during World War Two. Jack landed at Luc-sur-mer, on the Sword Beach sector of the Normandy landing Beaches at about 14.30h on Tuesday 6th June 1944. He has been an active member of the Normandy Veterans Association (West Cumbria Branch No 51) for a number of years.

Jack has assisted me with information about the Battle of Normandy for my university research and I am pleased to acknowledge this. It is an honour to submit this article on his behalf.

The end of the war

"After V.E. Day on 8th May 1945, what happened to the East Riding Yeomanry was that they were disbanded soon afterwards because they were a Territorial Regiment. That meant I was posted, along with the others to the County of London Yeomanry, who were called ‘The Sharpshooters’. Whether they were sharpshooters or not I don’t know! Anyway, I was only with them a short time, maybe about three months or so, when again they were disbanded.

Then I was sent to the Royal Scots Greys. This was a regular Regiment, and I think they still are a Regiment. However, it was like going back to our training days. We had to polish our boots and everything had to be spick-and-span, otherwise you didn’t get out at all that night. That was in Lüneberg and then it was from there in 1947 that I was demobbed on this ‘Class-B’ release to do construction work.

That’s when I went back to John Laing’s to build the Foxhouses and then the nuclear reactors at Sellafield up to the level of the chimney’s, ‘Cockcroft’s Folly’ as it became known. I also worked on construction at the Marchon Chemical Works. I had spells working for Kangol again, then at Thames Board Mills at Siddick and Sellafield. When I retired at sixty-five years of age I was still at BNFL, Sellafield.

Previous to me coming out of the army in 1947 I met my wife Teresa. We got married in 1948 at Cleator, St. Mary’s Catholic Church. We had three lads and two lasses. We were very lucky in many ways even though there were a lot of hard times. When Teresa and I were married and having a family many times we didn’t have two pennies to rub together come Monday morning. We had over fifty happy years until Teresa passed away a couple of years ago. There wasn’t a lot of money about in the early years we were married. I often said to Teresa, “If I knew somebody, some family somewhere, that was as hard up as us, in those days, I would willingly help them out”.

The Normandy Veterans Association

I have been a member of the Normandy Veterans Association, West Cumbria Branch, for a number of years. It was a fellow called Joe Bainbridge from Whitehaven that got me to join. He’s since passed away. We had our first meetings of the Branch in the ‘Dusty Miller’ public house in Whitehaven. From there we moved to the Rugby Union Club in Whitehaven and we were there for a few years, then we moved to the Rugby League Club in Whitehaven. Being a member has been great. We couldn’t thank the people who help us like that enough and we have a small room to ourselves for meetings.

I’ve been back to Normandy just the once with the Association for the 45th Anniversary I think it was, in 1989. I went with my wife Teresa. Joe Bainbridge organised that trip. There are some of the lads in the Branch who have been back many times. Some go back nearly every year, but I’ve been back just the once.

However, I have been a regular at many of the various Commemorative Services for the war that the Branch have held in Whitehaven and other places. Through the Normandy Veterans, we’ve been to various places where they have been commemorating events or placing plaques or monuments to the war. We’ve had lots of invitations to various places throughout the country. We had one big parade in Whitehaven, in 1993 I think it was. That was our big commemorative ‘do’ when they unveiled the plaque in St Nicholas’ Gardens in the centre of Whitehaven. It was really good, that. There was a lot of comradeship there. After all these years, the comradeship is still there.

People came from all over the country to that parade in 1993, including some from London. There is another big parade planned in Whitehaven in June 2005 commemorating the end of the war. I’m looking forward to that.

I kept in touch with a number of people from my East Riding Yeomanry days. One was a fellow from Scarborough called Dick North, who was an ex-policeman. There were quite a few who went in to be policemen from our Regiment. Some of the others lived all over the country, such as Yorkshire or Kent. When we got together or talked to each other on the telephone we used to reminisce about the war.

Reflecting upon World War Two

Regarding all these war films that have been made, there was one film I went to see with members from the Branch. This was the Stephen Spielberg film, ‘Saving Private Ryan’ with Tom Hanks. Obviously it was a good film, it was an ‘All-American’ film. Of course, it was meant to be an American film. We’ve never yet seen what I call a good picture about the war that was really ‘authentic’, if you can put it like that. They haven’t depicted what happened to us in the war.

Regarding books, over the years my family have bought me a lot of books about the war and I don’t think I’ve read many of them through. The Branch got a book about D-Day in 2004, with hundreds of pages in it. I read this through and I don’t think they mentioned the East Riding Yeomanry at all even though we actually landed on D-Day.

There is this one book about the East Riding Yeomanry that I treasure (‘Europe Revisited’ by V.C. Ellison). It’s getting a bit worn now, but I really treasure this book because it’s a great reminder of most of the people and places and things that we did. At the end of the book, there is a ‘Roll of Honour’ of those that were killed or wounded and those ‘mentioned in despatches’ and so on. To me, that’s a great book and it’s easy to read.

Of course the best thing about service life was the comradeship. To summarise the comradeship during the war, it was time when everybody was out to help everybody else. Everybody would safeguard each other in any way, if they could. I must also say that some of them laid down their lives to save other people in some cases. It was a really great time! I believe the comradeship was what won the war for us.”

Conclusion

After leaving the army in 1947, Jack married his wife Teresa in 1948 and they were married for over fifty years until Teresa passed away in 2003. Jack had a ‘Class B’ release from the army and a lot of his working life was spent working in the construction industry.

It has been a privilege that Jack has shared some of his wartime memories with me. The book ‘Europe Revisited’ is by V.C. Ellison a former officer with the Regiment. It gives an accurate account of the Regiment’s experiences during World War Two. So far as I can know, it has unfortunately been out of print since its first publication. I am delighted that I have been able to submit this article on behalf of such a fine gentleman so that others may also share some of Jack's knowledge about wartime.

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