大象传媒

Mr Birkett Dixon has confirmed his willingness to have his story entered on to the People's War website and has agreed to abide by the House Rules.

I joined the Royal Corps of Signals on 13 April 1942 and after initial training was posted to the 53rd (Welsh) Division which was stationed at Harrietsham in Kent. After passing exams I was appointed to a newly formed "S" Section as a Security Operator and sent on a 3 week course to Douglas on the Isle of Man.

We were supplied with a five ton LCV which contained a high power 12 set (transmitter and receiver) and four R.107 receivers used for monitoring. We were directly under control of Divisional H.Q. and one of our jobs was to issue a list of Code Signs every day for use by all units under our command. When we became operational we also had two cipher operators at the rear of our vehicle separated from us by a partition with a slot underneath for passing messages through for them to decode. They were locked in and we never met them until hostilities ceased. Until then, we were locked in whenever they entered or left the vehicle.

I remember receiving the news from the General Forces Programme of the 大象传媒 at 0900 hrs GMT on 6 June 1944 transmitted in morse code at I believe a sedate 10 words a minute giving the news that the invasion had commenced. I still have copies of this and several subsequent news bulletins.

We left Harrietsham and moved off on 18 June via London for Tilbury where we embarked on MT35, "S.S. Crevecoeur" a Victory Type Canadian vessel. Delayed by the weather we arrived off Arromanches at dusk on 26 June where there was still some action, HMS Warspite firing and a few enemy shells landing in the sea. The following evening we were transported by LCT 2440 and drove our vehicle ashore through deep water on to the beach.

At 2200B hrs. on 5 July we witnessed the great Lancaster raid on Caen only a short distance away. 8 September saw us in Antwerp where for a fortnight we monitored the civilian telephone network. An airborne assault covering three days from 21 to 23 September saw thousands of transports and gliders passing overhead, Stirlings, Dakotas, Hadrians and of course Spitfires and Typhoons. On 21 October there was a massive barrage opening the offensive to liberate 's;Hertogenbosch, the provincial of Noord Brabant in Nederland. This was successful and I have returned there for many happy reunions.

Our New Year's Eve was interrupted by the Ardennes breakthrough which meant a rapid move through snow to Tilff where the river was frozen over. On 16 January we entered the muddy and shattered Reichwald Forest. For a week we were near Geldern where we used a bath and a raft to get between our billet and our vehicle separated by yards of flood water caused by breached dams. The "open" city of Hamburg was entered on 4 May, after a very rapid journey through many towns.

I left Germany on 24 June from Hilden near Dusseldorf. Being transferred to gliders for the far East, the war ending at Cairo and my year of waiting for release in Libya is another story.

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