大象传媒

Cyril and James Hill were brothers, both of whom served in the second world war. No ones war can be described as a happy one, but unlike many of their comrades, they at least survived to tell the tale.
Cyril was part of the East Kent Buffs. He joined when conscription came in and the training took him everywhere, from Wales to Cornwall and Newcastle. His frist taste of the action was firing some of the big cannons off the white cliffs at Dover.
Over seas in North Africa he again saw action. he and his comrades won the battle, and Winston Churchill personally came to than the soldiers. The soldiers thought he would give them leave, but instead he said they must go and fight in Italy, of course the soldiers werenot happy at this prospect so booed him, Cyril joined in!
When Italy he was placed at Monte Casino, but did not fight there so simply waited behind British lines.
hough in Italy with nine or ten other soldiers, he got to meet the pope, Cyril though not a Roman Catholic thought this a great honor as few allied soldiers got to meet the pope during world war two.
Again in Italy, when italy changed sides all the allied soldiers were given a box of lemons each - Cyril sent his home. He had to cross the river POw? in Italy, lot's of boats got sunk here and they ended up in the top of Italy, in a No mans land which they had to guard.
Nearing the end of the war he was posted to greece. Cyril had to guard a weapons depot to stop the locals stealing them. One night he accidently shot one of the local men, unfortuantly he died. A Cornal was called so English and Greek relaions were not upset. The cornal lined the men up and ordered the soldier who had shot the man to step out, Cyril was very nervous thinking he was going to get into a lot of trouble, but instead the Cornal shook his hand saying " Well done Lad, one less blasted foreigner to worry about" ( not very PC, I hasen to add)
His brother James was in the Territorial Battalion of the Essex Regiment duing WW2. James on the way to Eygpt in WW2 caught pnemonia on the boat, so had to get off the boat to go to hospital in Alexandria. This meant he was seperated from the rest of his comrades. He was originally part of thw 1st/5th but by the time he was better they had already gone to Iran and Iraq so had to join the 2nd/5th.
He built up the defensives in Allemange. many of the men died here, so they had to surrender. he was taken to italy as a prisoner of war. He escaped but was quickly caught by the Germans and taken to a camp on the Polish/German boarder. they were finally liberated by the Russians, some say when the Russians liberated them that is when the trouble started as they were no treated with a lot of respect.

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