- Contributed by听
- Horncastle College, Lincs
- People in story:听
- George Chester
- Location of story:听
- PHILLIPVILLE, ALGERIA, NORTH AFRICA
- Background to story:听
- Army
- Article ID:听
- A3162890
- Contributed on:听
- 21 October 2004
We were in Phillipville in December 1942 and we had an early morning raid by German Stuka dive bombers. After the raid our officer, Lt David Smail, was called out to an unexploded bomb in a garage in the centre of Phillipville, the Rue de Gourgas. He found the bomb in the dickie seat of a French car a 250 kg unexploded German bomb. The bomb lay in the dickie seat as if it had been placed in like a parcel.
We manhandled the car out of the garage but the bomb fuse could not be withdrawn because the casing was damaged. Four of us moved the bomb out of the dickie seat into the back of a 15cwt wagon and took it 14 km to the outskirts of Phillipville and tipped it into a dried-up riverbed and tried to split the casing with gun-cotton primers without success.
When we left Phillipville a few days later the bomb was still there.
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