大象传媒

Part two of an edited oral history interview with Mr. Stanley C. Legg conducted by Jenny Ford on behalf of Bedford Museum.

鈥淚 went to Hayling Island because then I became Combined Ops. but I was not trained. On Hayling Island we went to Warner Brothers Holiday Camp, we took the Holiday Camp over. There was nothing in it - we had to get everything ready for ourselves and there were some good days there. It was a holding camp for us, the Navy took it over, it was an HMS something, they name them. From there I think I went to Don Donald in Scotland and did a navigation course, did a firing course, they were in Combined Ops. If you went to a camp it didn鈥檛 mean to say we were Navy whether there was a Navy Officer in charge. The senior officer was in charge you鈥檇 come under Army, Navy or Air Force rules. One episode I remember - we were in Don Donald and it came under the Army and there was Naval bloke, a little Cockney and he had to get this jeep and he was late for the Parade so he drove in the Drill Shed and went straight through the side! Anyway he ended up, because the Sergeant Major tried to say something to him, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e Army!鈥� But the other senior Adjutant, well apparently in the Army if you had to see the Colonel you have go through him, him and him but him being Navy, he knocks on the door and goes in and sees the Colonel! He explained to him that he鈥檇 have to pay for the damage. He said, 鈥榊es, he鈥檇 have to pay for it if he gets a receipt.鈥� 鈥業 don鈥檛 give a receipt.鈥� 鈥榊ou don鈥檛 get the money!鈥� That was it 鈥� nobody paid! We did the training and then I went down south again to a Combined Ops. Place.

The camp was near the beach, it was a holiday place anyway we went there and that was another place for Combined Ops. Ham Common, near Poole that was a big camp that was, a proper Combined Ops. Camp. Did some stuff there and we did training and all this lot. You see one camp that we went to, went from Ham Common, oh, up the Amble, up the river Amble. The river Amble is there and we were in this place, it鈥檚 in like a forest. That was under Nissen huts and then we went from there to somewhere else down there on the Amble but I think it was a Golf Club. We took, because what had shook us, we came in for breakfast, we had WRENS dishing us food out and we didn鈥檛 even know what a WREN was! We did time there, boat training, assault craft. And then I went up Don Donald, Scotland again oh and then from there we went to the Duke of Argyll鈥檚 place, Largs, somewhere in there. Because were they have the golf course now we took it over for training and they didn鈥檛 go much on it, I mean there was an old caretaker or something and when we walked in with hob nailed boots on their polished floor! From there, I鈥檇 know the place if I walked in again! It is a proper holiday place and the sea is just below the level of the sand and we had a place over here we ate in and slept over there. Then we went to Brighton.

If you go to Brighton the statue of Queen Victoria is there, you have Brighton there and Hove here, well there is a block of flats on the sea front so we took that over. So we walked from Hove to Brighton for our meals and the Victoria Hotel here, the Navy had that.

We went to Dartmouth College, I thought I was on a good thing there. But in the river Dart we had assault boats we used to train on them and go in and out and we used to go round Brixham harbour and come back. The landing craft was crewed by a stoker, the engineer/mechanic and a couple, that鈥檚 all and myself, the Coxswain. When we were training we had other troops on board.

Then I went from there, because I didn鈥檛 last long there. I don鈥檛 know we had a queer crowd. One of them with us in Combined Ops. was the only one from a Regiment, he was in the Army and he had his Sergeant black stripes red, (RSM) Rifle Brigade or something, he was what we used to call 鈥榖omb happy鈥�. We all were, if you hear anything you go down. But I think he upset them because the Navy had a strict code of conduct but I think his Army one didn鈥檛 agree with it so we moved out.

We got treepence a day extra I think it was for the badge. The badge had the Anchor, the Crown and Tommy gun. Oh, yes we were trained to fire tommy guns and all this lot.

We went to Southampton to join the Invicta, that was a cross channel ferry boat taken over by the Navy with the landing craft on it and everything, that was for training. You know troops on, loading them up. And before 鈥楧鈥� Day we were all ready for 鈥楧鈥� Day, they took us off the Invicta and put us all on the 鈥業sle of Thanet鈥欌��. Why, we never knew! That was another ferry boat, I don鈥檛 know whether it was SS or HMS but that鈥檚 what we did and that was 鈥楧鈥� Day.

We were in Southampton! I was courting the wife! She was in the WRENS. HMS Shrapnel was the big hotel at the end by the railway station, the Great Western Hotel, some hotel - the Navy called it HMS Shrapnel. She was billeted there and I was on the ship.

We were on the Invicta and we were already there to go, and they took us off and put us on the 鈥業sle of Thanet鈥�. I don鈥檛 know whether something happened on her or what but we went on that and they loaded up and that was it. Away they go, 鈥楧鈥� Day. (6th June 1944). We went to Arromanches (GOLD Beach). When the first wave went, that was it - they called us back. They were loaded on and then they went in and unloaded the troops, come back. Hoist up and return, because you couldn鈥檛 hang around because there were more ships coming in all the time. When you were there on 鈥楧鈥� Day there were all these ships, there were ships firing in shore - aircraft coming over bombing but the best thing I ever seen was when they went to bomb Caen. There was one stream of them coming over like that 鈥� bombing 鈥� going back - continuous. I was on the ship while they were going in bombing. We just did our job!

After that I went up to Tyne and Wear, Newcastle way, North Shields and South Shields. I think it was North Shields, I went up there to the Calopi which is an old wooden ship, something like the Victory. They boarded at the jetty and I was on as Coxswain, not on the ship but they gave us 鈥� you could go Cox and you could go to Newcastle, Southampton, different places. And you did not less than three months and not more than six months and you were ferrying boats and stuff around, I ferried some to Poole harbour.

The Americans were ferrying stuff over on merchant ships and we had to ferry it, whoever wanted it. Well you would get a load and you鈥檇 take it down to wherever. They just said, 鈥楧own there!鈥� No you didn鈥檛 get a navigator, no you were just a Coxswain. Like when we went to Sierra Leone they said to me, 鈥楪o up river鈥� and there鈥檚, I don鈥檛 think it was a British Consulate but there was a white bloke had a plantation or something said, 鈥楪o up and get some bananas.鈥� So you鈥檇 take a boat up, there was no maps of the river, you just know and we loaded up and brought them back. They were hanging up all over the ship!

After the North East we went to Leigh鈥攐n-Sea, near Southend. The Navy had taken over three rows of houses and put a fence round for a Combined Ops., but the camp was run by the Navy, it wasn鈥檛 Combined Ops. people. And then they kitted us up in tropical gear to go against Japan and we got all our gear and the next day they said, 鈥楥ancelled, return it, Japan has surrendered!鈥�

I was on a minesweeper after the war, the Corrigan, an oil fired one and this was while I was waiting to go to Fleet Air Arm and I was going into Portsmouth harbour on the wheel and the voice come down 鈥楾wo spokes to starboard, Coxswain.鈥� I thought, bloody hell 鈥� real Navy that was! But it was a good ship though. When the war finished I went into the Fleet Air Arm, I turned over. I went to the Fleet Air Arm at Gosport, did a course there and then went to St.Merryn, Air Traffic and from St.Merryn to up North somewhere. St.Merryn, down in Cornwall near Padstow, St.Merryn, St.Austell, St.Ervan, two rifle, one Navy. There was an aerodrome up North, went to that. Then to Bramcote in the Midlands, another aerodrome and then to, towards the end of my time I went to Yeovil and Culross and in between times I went on the aircraft carrier, Eagle. I ended up as a Chief Airman because I鈥檇 gone to Fleet Air Arm.鈥�

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