大象传媒

My Regiment (Second Northamptonshire Yeomanry) were the Heavy Armoured Recce Regiment of the 11th Armoured Division. Divisional Troops apart from the Armoured Brigade were often loaned out for other operations, as we were when I tell you my story.
On this occasion we were operating with the Infantry, but we were doing what was known as a 'Forward Movement'. In other words we were in front of the Infantry until the time came for the Infantry to come through our positions. They would then continue the attack after we had established the enemy positions, we would at this point take over the job of supporting the Infantry.
Now a troop of tanks through the medium of 'radio contact' would as often as not be out of sight of each other, as we were on this occasion. I was the Troop Corporal Tank Commander, code name BAKER in contact with ABLE (Sergeant) and my Troop Leader SUN-RAY.
We had taken up a position along the shady side of a tall hedge when my wireless operator informed me we had suddenly gone off the air and lost all contact. We checked the set (the good old No. 19) and tried several flick frequencies (pre-arranged frequencies) all to no avail. We moved further down the hedgerow in case we were in a blind spot, still no improvement!! I instructed my operator to try for a contact using morse code - nothing.
Now Tank Commanders strange as it may seem will tell you that (especially in Normandy) they spend quite a fair time out of the tank to check the area. On these occasions I always took my co-driver along with me leaving my operator in charge. I was hoping to locate one or other of my fellow troop tanks. Having searched as far as we felt safe to do so we returned to our tank to find the situation still the same. I had already noticed a 17 Pounder Anti-gun behind us at the top end of the hedge. Starting to walk towards it I was rewarded by a wave from a Sergeant from behind the shield, so I returned to our tank confident that we were not alone. (Take note of this).
Time passed by when suddenly my operator said "Get on the A set". This I did to receive an ear splitting shout from my Troop Leader who wanted to know "Where the hell have you been this last half an hour", accusing us of having a brew (tea).
Well the infantry duly arrived and for us the war recommenced, things settled down and suddenly the Sergeant from the 17 Pounder came to us and said "A funny thing happened a while ago, our set went off the air for about 40 minutes, but I told my crew 'Not to worry, there's a Cromwell tank of H Armoured Division farther down the field that wouldn't be there if it wasn't safe'".
I didn't tell him of our experience and that we had felt the same satisfaction knowing that he was there!!
I really DON'T believe there are ALIENS - ?

Reg - your vet.

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