Chotie Darling: Army life

The Castle - Monday 10th January 1944

2/Lt Williams RK

61^st Recce Regt

Home Forces

Monday Eve

Chotie Darling,

Have a few hours to myself , so here goes.

After my having been commissioned for some nine weeks, the adjutant has suddenly discovered that the Joining Certificate (which is the authority for issue of pay) was never sent off by the Orderly Room! However, I have duly completed another which has now been sent off, and I can optimistically hope to see some solid cash within the next week or so. I am now obliged to remain in the mess where I can get my beer on tick, but have to smoke cigarettes as they don’t stock tobacco.

I don’t believe I’ve told you about the billets (?) we live in here. All other ranks live in a castle, which overlooks some 20-30 miles of low-lying country*. The Officers mess is a country house some 600 yds from the castle. It’s quite large – some 6 or 7 bedrooms, and reasonably comfortable. At the moment I have a room to myself owing to the temporary absence of my artist companion on a course.

I came across a Chianti bottle on a scheme and this now takes pride of place on my table. It’s green glass and holds a horse-chestnut twig which I trust will flower (?) in the spring.

Have you found time to read that Claude Houghton yet? Let me know what you think of it – if you think it’s lousy, say so…

My drinking companion is on leave at the moment. His name is Winzer and is known affectionately (?) as the ‘Duke’ by his troop. His WAAF** (from the local waffery) consequently becomes ‘The Duchess’, or sometimes Mrs Simpson***, when the wags are feeling a little bitter.

He’s quite a sound bloke on the whole but tends to drink himself to death – his gin bill over the Xmas week amounting to £15. At least he’s not so completely dead as the remainder here. They all try to give the impression that they’re God Almighty as regards music and the arts. However, when ‘Junior’ (the artist) and I turned up we managed to shake them considerably. They appear to be jumped-up bank clerks, etc. just spreading their wings a little.

(I have to pause here for a wretched mess meeting – the mess is bankrupt at the moment.)

Well we soon wound up the mess meeting. The net result was that messing has been increased by 6d per member and a monthly mess subscription of one day’s pay has to be paid. This will involve an extra 25 shillings per month as far as I’m concerned.

I had a stroke of luck an hour or so ago. Going through some old papers I came across a Post Office book with a quid balance so I repaired to the pub immediately after dinner, for a beer or four.

Met the Duchess there, with a couple of Dutch Officers who it appears are both Barons. Trust her to get a grip as soon as Jeff’s away.

Don’t forget to give me all the dope on Eric’s present position, will you? If I can get his next leave taped, I’ll make the effort to go up and see him - & Eve…When’s the baby expected, or has it come already?

As for leave, as far as I’m concerned, I can’t get away for another eight weeks at least. Perhaps only seven – though I could get a 48 any time now. The only snag with this is that it’s such a devil of a way to travel. However, we might well manage something in the next month or so – I could certainly do with a little relaxation – if you know what I mean.

There’s going to be a colossal inspection by the Colonel on January 22^nd and everyone’s getting keyed up with plenty of gimping and you know what.

I’m out patrolling at 3 o’clock tomorrow morning for a couple of hours. Luckily there’s a full moon which makes things very much easier. It’s a pity you’re not here – I could take you round….

Well, Darling there doesn’t appear to be any news to tell you. I had a ten-page epistle from Chunky but haven’t found time to reply yet. Here’s hoping. I should like to spend a day with him in town, but you never seem to get round to these things.

I have to sleep in the castle tonight in an oak-beamed room with stone floor & walls. Very romantic but bloody cold. Why aren’t you here? I reckon we could keep warm, at least….

Must close here ‘Chotie’ to get some sleep in before this wretched patrol.

All my love, Darling

be Good….

Dicker

*Lympne Castle, overlooking Romney Marsh in SE Kent.

**WAAF = Women's Auxiliary Air Force.

***King Edward VIII abdicated in 1936 to marry Mrs Simpson, a divorcee. They became the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.

The troops in the Castle were living a rather different life.

Anthony Rampling remembers being served burnt rice pudding:

‘Everybody got up leaving leaving their rice pudding…the duty Officer caught me leaving mine and put me on a charge - a 252. Later I was marched into the Officer in Command room (Major Johnson) – halt, salute. “Why didn’t you eat your rice pudding?” “It was burnt Sir, everybody left it.” “Case dismissed.” Like a scene from Dads’ Army.’

10th January 1944 - Fascist Ministers responsible for Mussolini’s downfall are sentenced to death by firing squad by the Axis powers in northern Italy. They include Mussolini’s son-in-law, the diarist Count Ciano.(See WW2-net Timelines.)

Russia proposes moving the Polish border west to the 'Curzon line' proposed after World War 1. The Allies eventually agreed to this at the Yalta conference. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

14^th January 1944 – Soviet ‘Shock Troops’, secretly brought in to the Soviet bridgehead at Leningrad, attack the German encirclement to break the city’s siege. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

15^th January 1944 – the Australian Army takes Sio on the north coast of New Guinea’s Huon Peninsula, marking the culmination of the Huon Peninsula campaign. Since the landings at Lae in September 1943 the Allies had advanced north fighting the Japanese for possession of the coast guarding the straits that connect the Bismarck and Solomon Seas, between New Guinea and New Britain.

16th January 1944 – Dwight D Eisenhower of the US, having led Operation Torch and the Allied invasion of Italy, becomes Commander–in-Chief of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in Britain in preparation for Operation Overlord.

17^th January 1944 – Beginning of the Battle of Monte Cassino, one of the most important battles of World War 2 and probably the largest land battle in Europe. The mountains of Monte Cassino defended the Allies only remaining route to Rome and were a linchpin in the German’s Winter Line. The Allies took four months and four major assaults to capture the high ground of Monte Cassino and a quarter of a million soldiers were left dead or wounded. Initial failed attempts to cross the Garilgliano and Rapido rivers on 19^th January resulted in 2,000 casualties but succeeded in diverting German attention from the Anzio landings.

Posted on 10 January 2014 in Army life, Books, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Pubs, The Recce Men | Permalink

Don Aiken

Back in Folkestone Don Aiken, of Kirkham in Lancashire, arrived to join the 61^st Recce. He had worked as a fireman before his call-up to the Army. After Primary Training in Catterick he had a grim time in Scarborough with the 63^rd Reconnaissance Training Unit before completing his training as a Driver/Radio Operator back at Catterick.

“From Catterick I was posted to the 61st.Reconnaissance Regt. who were encamped in Shorncliffe Camp, near Folkestone.”

“As my new regiment had been left undisturbed for a very unusual length of time, the troops had become very accustomed to each other and had grown into a close, even clannish, relationship. This made it very difficult for newcomers to be an accepted part of their lives, especially if the interloper was a young 'new recruit'.

Although I was accepted quite readily as a member of the Troop to which I was assigned, and was never given any sort of hard time, it seemed a long time before I too became part of the clan.

We didn't stay in any location for very long. Just a few weeks at a time before we moved on from one Nissen hutted camp to another. Whittlesford, near Cambridge, and Brandon, Norfolk, came next.”

(Republished from the BBC People's War website by kind permission of Don Aiken)

Don Aiken

See Don Aiken’s vivid account of 61^st Recce from January 1944 on the BBC History People's War website .

Posted on 06 January 2014 in Army life, Photos, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Improvisation - Sunday 2nd January 1944

Chotie Darling,

At long last, I find myself with a little spare time, so will write you to let you know that I am still alive, after all.

First, Darling, I must thank you for sending the Sobranie at Xmas, which you shouldn’t have done, as you can’t really afford to do these things on private’s pay. I certainly enjoyed it though. It always smokes better coming from you….

I’m also enclosing the book* I said I’d send which I hope you’ll find time to read and which I’m sure you’ll enjoy.

It’s the first book I’ve read which bears out a theory I’ve entertained for some years, viz. that however long you live you will always come to regard your childhood as your happiest years. This also served to show my lack of erudition in matters literary as the author quotes from three or four others who bear out this idea. There will always be extenuating circumstances, however, which will give rise to cases contrary to the general rule – Dickens’ is an example – but these cases are isolated I’m sure.

You probably think this is all rot…. – though personally I know I’m right.

I’ve got all my camp kit now and am just starting to get organised. We’ve got some furniture on loan in the mess and I managed to scrounge an old oak circular table for my own personal use. Improvisation is the key note in this army , so I pinched two old bricks from the 16^th century cottage to use as book rests. The mixture of matured oak and red brick gives my room a touch of the Tudor… Absolute rot…

I share a room with a new arrival – a bloke I was at OCTU with. He’s a portrait painter – knows everyone from Titian to Augustus John. He’s now assault troop commander**…

I still haven’t received notification that I’ve been credited with pay for November or December and, unless I win at pontoon tonight, I’ll never meet my mess-bill, severely swollen by the untimely advent of Xmas.

Happily I’ve still a few quid in war savings, etc. I keep fighting off ruin – even giving my batman my last five bob on Xmas Day. I hope to become, comparatively, fabulously rich in the next few days, however, with two months’ pay, about £30-£35.

The major we had has now left us – left the army in fact and the Senior Subaltern is acting Squadron Leader – a very happy state of affairs.

I haven’t had time to write either Diller or Brinner yet – expect they’ve written me off by now.

Must close here, Darling, for dinner

All my love

Dicker

*by Claude Houghton

**Ronnie Jury (later Dick’s closest friend in the 61^st Recce.)

3rd January 1944 - General Bernard Montgomery (‘Monty’ of El Alamein and the British Eighth Army) had left Italy at the end of December and now took command of the 21^st Army Group – British Second Army and First Canadian Army - to prepare for Operation Overlord, the D Day landings. He immediately decided a wider assault front was needed and two more beaches were added to the west (Omaha and Utah, near the base of the Cherbourg Peninsula).

4th January 1944 – the US Army Air Force begin to re-supply resistance groups in France, Italy and the Low Countries in Operation Carpetbagger. (From Chronology of World War II.)

5th January 1944 – end of the Battle of Changde (in SE China’s Hunan province) with the Chinese repelling the Japanese invasion of the city, begun in November 1943.

Posted on 02 January 2014 in Army life, Birthday and Xmas cards, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos | Permalink

Reconnaissance, Royal Armoured Corps

1^st January 1944 - the Reconnaissance Corps was absorbed into the Royal Armoured Corps. The RAC was formed in 1939 from former cavalry units, the Royal Tank Regiment and the Territorial Army’s Yeomanry. Although the Recce were very different from normal RAC units, being organised for 'dismounted' action, they used light armoured cars and other vehicles for close reconnaisance. They retained their identity as a Corps within the RAC, including their badges, shoulder titles and arm-of-service strips but gradually changed to the RAC black beret. Dick’s former regiment, the 43^rd (Wessex) Reconnaissance, did not change to the black beret until 4^th April 1945.

Dick's Reconnaissance shoulder strips

The British Army List for January 1944 (corrected to 26^th December 1943) - the list of serving regular, militia or territorial British Army officers, kept since 1702 and published quarterly during WW2. This page has RK Williams first entry as an Officer (2nd Lieutenant).

(From Recce Mitch's post of 7th June 2013 – see the last thumbnail of Army list for January 1944.)

Posted on 01 January 2014 in Army life, History, The Recce Men | Permalink

A new Troop - Sunday 26th December 1943

2/Lt Williams RK

‘B’Sqn. 61^st Recce

Regt

Home Forces

Sunday

My Darling Chotie,

I’m terribly sorry I was unable to write you for Xmas. Actually it was extremely annoying to say the least. I got back from leave at about midnight and was out commanding a new troop by dawn the following morning. We were out until Xmas Eve. It got to such a state that we didn’t expect to get back for Xmas even.

I managed to get a postcard off to mother and, apart from the letter card I sent you, that was the only correspondence I could manage.

Needless to say I’ve no pay yet – and don’t look like getting any until December 30^th. I’ve cashed everything on sight including National Savings Certificates on which I’ve managed to keep going – if half-heartedly.

Spent the whole of the Xmas hols. trying to get dry, warm & clean again after the scheme.

At the moment I’m up to my eyes in work, having just taken over a new troop, and have been working all hours, even over Xmas.

If I can find some brown paper I’ll send this book along with this. I think you’ll like it.

Will write you again in a few days and send some shekels

love

Dicker

26th December 1943 – the battle cruiser Scharnhorst is sunk, with almost 2,000 German sailors, during a fierce battle off the North Cape of Norway in the Arctic Barents Sea.

28^th December 1943 – victory of the Allied 8^th Army at Ortona, on the Italian Adriatic coast, after fierce street fighting. The Canadian Army played a critical role.

30th December 1943 – beginning of the second Battle of Arakan as the Allies start an advance towards the East Coast of Burma (Myanmar). (See Second Battle of Arakan and Withdrawal from Maungdaw.)

During 1943 Allied merchant shipping lost 588 ships, equalling 3,042,371 gross tons (less than half the losses of 1942) to U-boats world-wide. 242 U-boats were sunk in 1943 (compared to only 35 in 1941 and 87 in 1942). (From WW2-net Timelines.)

“By the end of December 1943 the ‘Battle of the Atlantic’ was virtually won and the seas were clear enough for supplies to move freely across the Atlantic.” (Extract from ‘Poole and World War II’ written by Derek Beamish, Harold Bennett and John Hillier and published by Poole Historical Trust in 1980. See also German 'U' boats withdrawn.)

Posted on 26 December 2013 in Army life, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Towns & Cities | Permalink

In the Field - Friday 17th December 1943

Letter written on Friday 17th December 1943

In the field

Friday

Chotie Darling,

I got back from leave last night to find I was on a long scheme at 5 o’clock this morning. I’m endeavoring to write this during a lull in the battle (?).

I’m very much afraid that I won’t be able to send you anything in time for Xmas.

I’ve just met Chunky (we’re both on the same side!) and he doesn’t get back until Xmas Eve. I’ve no idea how long we’ll last but don’t suppose we’ll get back much before then.

Went up to Purley on leave and stayed with Gramp for a couple of days. Everyone’s got brand new babies – awful! I’m beginning to think I’ll have one soon…

My God, it's COLD! My fingers are just about freezing not to mention my poor bottom.

I’ll try to write you again in the next few days. Let me know if Eric’s home, won’t you?

All my love, precious

Dicker

P.S. Did you get 7 days or 14?

*In December 1943 61^st Division (reinforced, for the exercise by the 31^st Tank Brigade) played the defending force in Exercise Vulcan; a four-day training exercise aimed at improving the attacking process of the 43^rd Wessex Infantry Division (Dick’s former Recce unit).

Eric Postles remembers December 1943 with 61^st Recce:

“We had a 3 day exercise with 59 Division just before Christmas that was notable for incessant rain. Once I had a 48 hour pass to Ashford staying in the Salvation Army hostel. Lympne Castle was cold and we slept on the floor which was not a very good way of spending Christmas day.” (Extracts from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

19th December 1943 - evacuation of Tyneham Valley in Purbeck to extend Lulworth’s tank gunnery range in practice for Operation Overlord. The beautiful Dorset village is still occupied by the army.

20^th December 1943 – Allied air attacks begin on the V1 flying bomb ramps in France – the V1 was not used against Britain until June 1944.

Posted on 17 December 2013 in Army life, Dorset, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Towns & Cities | Permalink

In Front of the Fire - Friday 10th December 1943

“St Margarets”

Pagham

Friday

Chotie Darling,

I’m sitting in front of the fire at home, writing this on nine days leave! I’d just come back from a five days exercise, when I was told I’d been given a new troop (I only had the previous troop as a temporary measure) and that they were all going on leave the following morning so I’d better go with them.

I spent the first day in London and I’m going up again for a few days tomorrow – so that I can get this business of ‘seeing the relatives’ over for once and all.

Had quite a good time on the exercise, as I was not actively engaged – only umpiring, and on a motor bike,which gave me plenty of scope in getting about. Had half an hour or so in Herne bay and saw Monica and baby. She’s been under the doctor for treatment of some sort as she’s getting so fat. The baby looks all right to me, but then I’m no judge of that sort of thing. Her elder brother has just got married in Scotland so the whole family’s married now. Didn’t see anyone else I knew as I had so little time there, though most of them are away anyhow.

Spent one evening in Canterbury and had a little crawl by myself visiting the ‘Falstaff’, ‘Fleur-de-lis’ ‘Country’, ‘Shakespeare’ and ‘Three Carpenters’ , the five best known there.

Spent one night on a AA Site and slept on a sofa in the Recreation Hut. I don’t know whether it was mixed or not – if it was I was taking the helluva chance….these A/A women**….

Hope to see a couple of lunch-time concerts at the National Gallery – only missed one this week by a few minutes. Have heard a couple of Beethoven Symphonies this week which isn’t too bad.

It must seem ages since I wrote you last. Unfortunately I went on exercise with only about an hour’s notice which wasn’t even time to get a motorcycle or riding kit. I borrowed breeches for this show and wore them the whole five days. Either they were cut for a very thin bloke or they’d shrunk or something but they cut my legs to ribbons. Murder!

How are you these days? – cold I expect…If it were not for the fact that I’m sitting in front of a fire I should probably have written half a page – or less.

(Interlude for hot chocolate and cake….)

↑

Space to denote passage of time.

Do you remember the Green Child’s head on the mantelpiece – the one Diller got in Belgium? Dad’s latest trick is to put a cigarette in its mouth. Looks horrible!

Incidentally I’ll send you some shekels for Xmas – it’s no use me trying to get anything – so that you can do some shopping or a show or something in Bristol. I’ve had to give up coupons for the other ranks’ kit I’ve kept – 18 for 2 pairs of boots! etc so at the moment I don’t know how much I’m worth. I will send some eventually.

I’m enclosing a book which I’ve been trying to get for the past year or more. Tell me what you think of it.

I’d better close here.

All my love, Darling

Dicker

* 'The Falstaff' and 'The Shakespeare' are still open, ‘the Country’ was probably 'The County Hotel' and is now the Abode Hotel , the ‘Three Carpenters was probably the 'Three Compasses' and is now the the Lady Luck and and the 'Fleur de Lis' is closed.

** Chotie was an AA (Anti-Aircraft) woman in the ATS - they were also known as Ack-Ack Girls.) The situation of the Ack-Ack Girls, often posted alongside men in mixed batteries, and some initial disciplinary issues, led to a loose reputation that may have been ill-founded (although some male officers might have taken advantage of their command). American troops stationed in the UK referred to them as Co-ed Gun Girls.

15th December 1943 – the first war crimes trial against Nazi defendants took place in Kharkov (Kharkiv) in the Ukraine. 15,000 bodies had been found in the nearby ravine of Drobytsky Yar following a massacre of Kharkov’s Jewish population two years earlier. The Soviet military tribunal found the three Germans and one Soviet collaborator guilty and they were quickly executed.

The Allies finally recognise Tito’s Communist Popular Liberation Committee, which had led resistance to the Nazis in Yugoslavia since 1942, as the future Yugoslavian government.

The Battle of Arewe begins the Allies Campaign on New Britain, an island to the north-east of New Guinea. This diverted Japanese troops from a major Allied landing on the SW tip of the island on 26^th December. Rabaul, at the eastern tip of the New Britain, was Japan’s main military and naval base in the South Pacific and MacArthur’s campaign aimed to surround and disable the Japanese forces there.

Posted on 10 December 2013 in Army life, ATS, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Pubs, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Chocolate Biscuits - Sunday 28th November

2/Lt R K Williams

‘B’ Sqdn. 61^st Recce Regt

Recce Corps, Home Forces

Sunday 28^th

Chotie Darling,

I’m now back again and settled down after the scheme, which lasted for its original duration much to everyone’s disgust.

On the whole I had quite a happy time, as I either stayed at, or passed through, several old haunts well known to the family in the old Morris Cowley* days, and coupled with the opportunity so often missed of worming my way into a vast number of period farmhouses and the like.

The weather was excellent, cold but dry and as we stayed in one little village for three days without doing anything of military importance, we managed to get sufficiently well organised to hold ABCA** periods and run a football tournament. I evaded these two popular pastimes however, and mooched about a local farm until the daughter of the house asked me in for coffee and CHOCOLATE Biscuits! Her undoubted charms left me cold, but I took a lively interest in the biscuits. Lovely old house, with a massive oak beam over the fireplace marked 1600.

The major*** came back yesterday. He appeared quite a good type – reads Balzac, so I’m well in.

Nothing much happens here. I’ve just finished a 48 hr spell of Duty Officer, rather a cushy appointment.

I get another 24 hr next Wednesday so I may go up to ……….. (word inked out). There’s nothing to do here, or locally, but the snag is the fare. It will be the second day I’ve had off in three weeks, which isn’t so good, to my way of thinking.

Many thanks for your letter, Darling, most welcome at the conclusion of an exercise. Glad to hear you’ve got, or rather you’re getting, a rise****. I bet you’re getting more than me after all. After I’ve paid income tax, messing***** etc, I get the equivalent of Lance Corporal’s pay….

Must close here for dinner.

All my love precious

Dicker.

*presumably the family car from his childhood at Orpington in Kent.

**Army Bureau of Current Affairs – an organisation set up to educate and raise morale among British servicemen in World War 2 (see Wikipedia).

***possibly the Regimental second-in-command, who was a Major, or maybe the Major commanding ‘B’ Squadron. (See Reconnaissance Organisation December 1943 and Reconnaissance.) Dick was one of 23 to 30 subalterns in the Regiment – commissioned officers below the rank of captain, generally comprising first and second (junior) lieutenants. Dick, as a newly commissioned officer, was a second lieutenant.

****due to her new qualification as Operator Fire Control?

*****Commissioned Officers were required to eat in the Officers’ Mess and pay a subscription fee for supplies and upkeep. They would also be expected to wear formal attire for evenings in the mess.

2^nd December 1943 – A German Air raid on the Adriatic port of Bari, near the southernmost tip of Italy, hits a US ship secretly carrying mustard gas. Many civilians are poisoned by the gas and over a thousand Allied servicemen perished. Fires from oil pipleines and ammunition explosions put the port out of action until February. The Allies try to keep the ship’s cargo secret, since it might provoke the use of chemical weapons in the war. The incident was only fully exposed in 1967.

The Allied 5^th Army in Italy again attacks at Monte Camino and manages to take the peaks of La Difensa and Camino. After heavy fighting the Germans pull back from the Bernhardt line to the Gustav line and Monte Cassino, protecting the main route to Rome. On the Adriatic side of Italy the the Canadian 1^st Division lead the Allied 8^th Army across the River Moro and towards Ortona, suffering terrible losses from the German defenses.

In Britain a shortage of coalminers leads to the Ministry of Labour and National Service, led by Ernest Bevin, taking one in 10 conscripts to work in the mines. The ‘Bevin Boys’ service to the war effort was not fully recognised until1995.

4^th December 1943 – Leipzig, a city in eastern Germany, is bombed by the RAF causing an intense firestorm. More than 1,800 people are killed. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

At the second Cairo conference Churchill and Roosevelt discuss Turkey’s neutrality with President İnönü. However, Turkey did not join the war, on the side of the Allies, until February 1945. Exhausted after the conference Churchill collapsed from pneumonia on a visit to Eisenhower in Tunis and came close to death.

On 8th December 1943 Tommy Flower’s ‘Colossus’, the world’s first programmable electronic computer, was unveiled at the General Post Office Engineering Department (later BT) at Dollis Hill. It was installed at Bletchley Park codebreaking centre in January 1944 and provided unprecedented detail on German defences, crucial for the planning of the D Day landings.

Dicks's Registration and Discharge Card on 9th December 1943

Copy of Record - Registration and Discharge Card

0.Registration Number S/O Strength on Transfer

26282522. a7B Jou-1. Part.1. dated 3.4.43

1.Surname WILLIAMS 3. Army Number 5 731 671

2. Christian Names Richard Kelner

100 (Sandhurst) OCTU RAC. 903

4. Regiment or Corps DORSET R.136

PRE.OCTU.9005.

5. Nature of Engagement TA(W)

6. Date of Joining (Army Class) or Date of Enlistment (Others) 21-6-40

7. Date of Birth 28-7-21

8.Nationality or Dual Nationality E

9.Religion CE.

10.Industry Group O

11.Occupational Classification 900

12.Cause of becoming Non-effective Discharged under para. 390 (xbii) K.R. 1940 having been Appointed to a commission. 12.(a)Date 30/10/43

13.Single or Married S

14.Home Town and County (U.K.) or Country (abroad)

Weymouth, Dorset

Orpington. Kent.

19.Location H X Date Rejoined from Reserve

Wt. 10832/164 2,000,000 5/41 M.&H., LTD. T.51_229 43Regt A.F. 8. 102

A.Rank Pre

B.Service Trade (M) 2.9.42 Trade tested 2 9/40.qual Div Mach GpD ClII

Physical Training Inst.

Spec Qual (SG2 Div. Mech. GpD. Cl.II

C. Medical Category A1

Part II Order 133/42 124/42

Part II Order	Postings	Offr’s Inits
*79/12/42*	*Posted 1^st Air Landing Coy. (Recce Corps) 21.4.42*	WR
*52/42 1^st.A.L* *43 Recce 78/42*	*Posted to 43^rd Recce Regt Wef. 13.7.42.*
*43^rd Recce 38/43*	*Home Details 13 2/43*
*43^rd Recce 47/43*	*P.att. No 1 Pre-OCTU. RAC wef.*
	*4.3.42. Authority:- WOhr. 43/Trng/3250*
	*(AGIE) df-23.10.42 & WOUM BM ZP/9304/*
*41/43*	*AGIE* *df-23.2.43 Posted 162 OCTU. 15/5/43*

Entry Date 0 OCT 1941

29 APR 1942

Dates on which Amendment Slips were sent to Central Card Index

4/K 267 84) K96200 10) (12) N.12691

22/5/43 30.8.43. 11) 9.Dec.43

Posted on 28 November 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Records, Sport, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Operator Fire Control

On 10^th November 1943 Chotie had passed

an OFC (Operator Fire Control) Trade Test at Bristol.

On 26^th November 1943 she was mustered as OFC Group D Class II.

Copy of Record – Chotie’s Service & Casualty form

250/7 17.11.43 462/133

Passed Trade Test at Bristol on 10/11/43 and qual. For appt. as O.F.C. Gp. D Class II in accordance with ATS Trade Tests. 1942. Authy IFC 46 Bde

260/4 29.11.43 462/133

Mustered as O.F.C Group D. Class II wcf 10.Nov. 43. Authy ATS Records MRA/M dated 26/11/43

Copy of Record - Choties’ Registration form

Rank Pte
Service Trade and Classification SBO (M)

O.F.C.

Tti. O.F.C Gp D Class II 10/11/43 250/43

Mustered OFC Gp D Cl II 10/11/43 260/43

27^th November 1943 – the New Zealand 2^nd Division fighting with Montgomery’s 8^th Army on the Adriatic side of Italy succeed in crossing the River Sangro. Canadians then lead the Allies advance towards the strong defences of the German’s Winter line at Ortona. Germany’s main defensive position in southern Italy, defended the routes to Rome and the north. The Gustav line ran from Ortona, on the coast, along the north bank of the Moro River through the Apennine mountains and Monte Cassino to Formia on the Tyrrhenian coast. The Bernhardt and Hitler lines east and west of Cassino provided extra defences. Although the Gustav line had been penetrated by the end of November the Allies took over five months from November 1943 to May 1944 to overcome the winter line and continue their advance in Italy.

28th November 1943 – Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin meet at the Tehran Conference in Iran (occupied by Soviet and British troops to secure the oilfields and supply the supply route to the Caucasus). They agree on a cross-channel invasion of France in May 1944 and discuss other political issues, some contributing to the post-war establishment of Soviet dominated governments in Eastern Europe. Stalin agreed to declare war on Japan once Germany was defeated and tentative steps were made towards the establishment of the United Nations organisation. According to Beevor in ‘The Second World War’ (published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012) this was the conference 'when Stalin, supported by Roosevelt, had defined Allied strategy in the west' and 'Europe was bound to be divided in Stalin's favour.'

Posted on 26 November 2013 in Army life, ATS, History, Photos, Records, Towns & Cities | Permalink

The Lost Wallet - Thursday 18th November 1943

2/Lt Williams RK

‘B’ Squadron 61^st Recce Regt

Recce Corps

Home Forces

Thursday

Chotie Darling

Many thanks for letter. I would have replied before this, but managed to get a 24 hour from midday yesterday to noon today. Both Diller and Brinner were home so we had quite a reunion at the ‘Beach’.

Unhappily going back I had the most horrible experience – the worst experience that any man can have. I lost my wallet!

Not only did it have £6 in it but also my ticket. I was stranded on Brighton Station with some 5 shillings in all! There was no Railway Transport Officer there so I went in desperation to the YMCA* where the manageress lent me a quid. Awfully good of her, as I had no security to offer her. However, I managed to get back OK, if late.

I’ve just written to Bognor & Brighton Stations but don’t expect to hear anything. Don’t say anything about it or mother will go frantic.

On top of this I’m going on a scheme for a week and am afraid I won’t get a chance to write you.

I’m well settled down now and am quite enjoying myself, though I shall be glad when I get this next week over.

How are things with you? Glad to hear you arrived back without trouble, and hope you got the groundsheet O.K.

Met that old friend of mine from the 43^rd, Don Johnston** (the one who would repeatedly play the ‘Warsaw’). Hadn’t seen him for ages.

Have you heard of Eric lately? You might ask Eve to prod him a little about writing me. That is if you still correspond.

There’s a Lieutenant here, a burly West Country farmer, who buys anything on sight. Last week he bought a grand piano and a herd of Friesian cows! Quite a lad.

I’ve bought a new hat, though I didn’t pay much for it! Twenty shillings is about my mark….

No real news to tell you. Things here are very cushy until a scheme comes along – then everyone starts flapping.

I’m thinking about starting to buy some period furniture as you’ll never get any after this show. Period stuff is still reasonable, anyhow.

Must close here – write you next week.

All my love, Darling

Dicker

P.S. Don’t bother to write for the next few days as I won’t get it for a week.

*Young Men’s Christian Association

**See Chapter 7 43rd Reconnaissance - the beginning of the end.

18th November 1943 - beginning of the RAF’s bombing campaign 'the Battle of Berlin' (not to be confused with the Soviet battle of Berlin in April and May 1945). In 16 raids thousands of people were killed and hundreds of thousands made homeless. By the last raid, at the end of March 1944, more than 500 RAF planes had been lost. (From WW2-net Timelines and Wikipedia.)

20th November 1943 – beginning of Operation Galvanic, the US bid to capture the Gilbert and Marshall Islands from the Japanese. These strategically important islands lie to the west of central Pacific, between Hawaii and the Solomon Islands. The successful but brutal 3 day Battle of Tarawa Atoll reulted in nearly 5,000 Japanese and Korean dead and more than 1,000 Americans, with 3,000 US casualties. Tarawa land area is approximately 12 square miles.

22^nd November 1943 – opening of the Cairo summit between Roosevelt, Churchill and Chiang Kai-shek of the republic of China to plan for post-war Asia. The Soviet Union was not at war with Japan and did not attend. Roosevelt took an anti-Imperialist stance and agreed with Chiang Kai-Shek that Indochina would not be returned to France.

25th November 1943 – US air forces based in China bomb the Japanese island of Formosa, now known as Taiwan. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

26th November 1943 – sinking of HMT (His Majesty’s Troop Ship) Rohna, off the Algerian coast, by a radio-controlled glide bomb from a German Heinkel plane. The Rohna was carrying more than 2,000 troops, mainly American. 1,138 men were lost – the largest loss of US troops at sea in a single incident and kept secret until 1967. (See Rohna Memories.)

Posted on 18 November 2013 in Army life, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Pubs, Towns & Cities | Permalink

The Security Angel - Thursday 11th November 1943

PS Sorry its pencil but I left my only good pen at home.

2/Lt Williams RK

61^st Recce Regt

Recce Corps

Home Forces

Thursday

Chotie Darling,

Well I’ve arrived here and am just beginning to settle down, though rushed off my feet at the moment. I hope you also arrived back safely and without incurring 7 days CB*.

Things are, as far as I can see, pretty cushy at the moment owing to the fact that most Senior officers are away, on courses, etc.

Did you leave your groundsheet at Pagham? We looked everywhere but couldn’t find it. Let me know if you did and I’ll write them to send it on to you.

Weather couldn’t be better here – plenty of sun and wind.

I’m umpiring a stunt for three days soon on a motorcycle which should prove interesting, if the weather holds. It’s a lot easier than being involved in the wretched thing yourself.

‘Fraid this letter’s rather sketchy but the security angel cuts out everything worth writing – almost….

I didn’t thank you Chotie for a very happy leave – I hate to think of what it would have been like just by myself. Brinner, unfortunately couldn’t get his leave with me. He goes home next weekend I believe so he’ll see Diller anyhow.

Must close here as I’m a bit pushed.

All my love Chotie

Dicker

*CB – Military abbreviation for ‘confined to barracks’ also known as ‘jankers’ (slang). It involved being put on a charge and subjected to a variety of punishments for a minor disciplinary offence.

Dick had joined the 61st Reconnaissance Regiment

as a 2nd Lieutenant in ‘B’ Squadron.

In 1943 61^st Division in Kent had been relegated to coast guarding duties for the Home Forces* and he was stationed at Lympne Castle, near Folkestone. The 13^th century castle is set high on a hill overlooking the Romney Marshes.

East of Lympne lay ‘Hellfire Corner’ – the area around Dover in reach of the German cross-channel guns from Calais and Boulogne, which had been firing on the port since August 1940.

17th November 1943 – Oswald Mosley, founder of the far right British Union of Fascists, is released from prison on health grounds to considerable protest. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

Posted on 11 November 2013 in Army life, Family, History, Letters from Dick | Permalink

61st Reconnaissance

Chotie Darling

Dedicated to the memory of my mother

and all those who hold the forever young of war in their hearts.

Part 3 Lieutenant Williams

Chapter 9 61st Reconnaissance

From 30th October 1943 and for the rest of his war Dick was back in the Reconnaissance Corps. He’d served as a Trooper in 43rd Recce from July 1942 to March 1943 and before that was briefly in the legendary 1^st Airlanding Reconnaissance.

The Recce Corps had two official mottos “From One Learn All” (Ab Uno Disce Omnes) and “Beaten Paths are Safest” (Via Trita, Via Tuta). Their unofficial motto “Only the Enemy in Front…..Every Other Beggar Behind” was going to prove only too true for the 61^stRecce in NW Europe (see ‘Beaten Paths are Safest’ by Roy Howard, Brewin Books, 2004).

The Recce Corps' role was “that of the cat’s whiskers – armoured, mechanised transmitting whiskers. Those who served had to be intelligent, enterprising, brave, enduring and highly skilled” (Arthur Bryant on the 1940 Bartholomew Committee: PRO WO106/1741). It also helped if they were slightly short – like the riflemen of old (‘A Dorset Rifleman’ edited by Eileen Hathaway) they were less conspicuous and could also fit into their rather small vehicles (Anthony Rampling pers comm.). Dick was only 5ft 6½ inches when he joined up at the age of 18 in June 1940.

Unfortunately almost all the official war records for the 61st Reconnaissance Regiment have been lost so we have to rely on personnel accounts and diaries, such as this blog, to tell their story. See also ‘Memories of the 61st Reconnaissance Regiment’ assembled in ‘Beaten Paths are Safest’ by Roy Howard, Brewin Books, 2004.

Anthony Rampling was already in 61^st Reconnaissance when Dick joined the Regiment - and has kindly agreed to help me tell their story.

Joining Up & 61st

Coming from a little village called Tendring, not far from Colchester in Essex, Anthony had never even travelled as far as London before he joined the Army. He was sent to Norwich – quite a big adventure! – but that autumn Norwich Barracks were like a prison. “You had to take paper and string with you to post your belongings home”. So began 6 weeks of square bashing and inoculations. “Everything had to be so neat.”

Posted to Barnard Castle in the north of England (County Durham) Tony learned to use a Bren machine gun with the Royal Armoured Corps and passed out after 6 weeks at the beginning of 1943. He was sent to the Royal West Kent holding regiment but soon joined the 61st Recce.

61st Reconnaissance Regiment was camping in a field between Chalfont St Giles and Chalfont St Peter in the Buckinghamshire Chilterns, not far from Tring. Anthony was placed in the Assault Troup of ‘B’ Squadron – Dick’s squadron to be.

He remembers the Regimental commander, Lt-Colonel Sir William Mount (grandfather to the former Prime Minister David Cameron), sent them off on a 100 mile route march, sleeping out and living rough. Many men ‘cracked out’ with blisters, etc. Tony finished the march but collapsed when they got back to Chalfont St Giles. They were at Chalfont St Giles for some time - there was a dance there with about two girls and hundreds of troops - then they moved around, settling eventually at the Medieval Lympne Castle in Kent for coastal defence duties. Tony remembers “It was very eerie on guard there at night." (Lympne Castle is said to be haunted.)

Dick hadn’t arrived at the Castle yet

- after receiving his commission he had 9 days leave

and met up with Chotie at Pagham.

1^st November 1943 – US Marines begin Operation Cherry Blossom to regain Bougainville from the Japanese, who occupied the island since April 1942. Bougainville lies between the Solomons and Rabaul, the critical Japanese base on Papua New Guinea’s New Britain island. Bougainville was defended by 40,000 Japanese troops and supported four airfields. By the end of March 1944 the Japanese had retreated to the remoter parts of the island but, although US forces handed over to the Australian Army at the end of 1944, combat operations on Bougainville only ceased with the Japanese surrender in August 1945. By then thousands of Japanese had been killed or died of disease or malnutrition.

3^rd November 1943 – in Operation 'Harvest Festival' the Germans kill 42,000 Jews working in forced labour camps in the Lublin area of Poland. The plan to murder all the Jews in Poland had begun in autumn 1941 and was codenamed ‘Operation Reinhard’ after the Nazi leader Reinhard Heydrich. It was now approaching its culmination. Over 3 million Polish Jews lost their lives during the Holocaust - 90% of the Jewish population.

5th November 1943 – British X Corps, fighting with the US 5^th Army in Italy, attempt to seize Monte Camino, the mountain ridges guarding the route to Rome. After several days of German mortar fire they fell back from what they now dubbed ‘Murder Mountain’.

6th November 1943 – the Russian Army recapture Kiev, the largest city in the Ukraine. Soviet forces had advanced at night, bursting out of two bridgeheads on 3^rd November to encircle the capital.

Soon after the liberation of Kiev the ravine burial site of Babi Yar was discovered, 4 miles from the centre of Kiev. Here more than 30,000 Jews had been shot by the Nazis in three days at the end of September 1941. The site continued to be used by the Germans to murder and bury Jews and other persecuted groups until by August 1943 there were about 100,000 bodies in the gravesite, probably 90,000 of them Jewish. With the Red Army approaching hundreds of prisoners were put to work digging up and burning the bodies to hide evidence of the massacres, before being killed themselves –see 28th September 1943.

Posted on 31 October 2013 in Army life, History, Meetings with Chotie, Photos, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities, Villages | Permalink

A Commission

Copy of Record Service & Casualty Form

O.C.T.U., Sandhurst…..Camberley, Surrey DISCHARGED 30.10.43

For the purpose of being appointed to a commission in accordance with King’s Regulations, 1940, paragraph 390 (xvii)

Copy of Record “Exemplary” Military Conduct

PAGE I. Substitute A.F.B.268.

Army No. 5731671

Rank. Tpr Appointment Cadet

Surname WILLIAMS Christian Names Richard Kelner

Unit:- 100 (Sandhurst) R.A.C. O.C.T.U. Corps:- 43/Recce Rgt.

Reservist’s Identity No. Date of transfer to Reserve.

Date of discharge 30.10.43

W.O.Authority for Discharge 111/GEN/4885/AG.17/B d./24.10.43.

PAGE II.

(a) Military Conduct Exemplary

(b) Testimonial as recorded on p.2 of Certificate of Service (A.F. B.108.)

“Selected for training as an officer at the 100 (Sandhurst) R.A.C., O.C.T.U., and has obtained a commission on satisfactorily completing this course”.

Cause of Discharge (See Note J.)

“For the purpose of being appointed to a commission in accordane with

King’s Regulations 1940 para. 390 (xvii)”.

Date of discharge 30.10.43

Station Sandhurst R.A.C. O.C.T.U. SANDHURST

Date 30.10.43.

Copy of Record from Statement of Service

Military History Sheet

Service at Home and Abroad

Country HOME Service to count as British or Indian. BRITISH

From 21-6-40 To 30/10/43 Length of Service 3

PT/II 126/43 100/OCTU

Discharged under para.390 (xvii) K.R. 1940, having been appointed to a commission

61, RECCE REGT. Authority WOL 112/GEN/4885 (A-G. 17. B) D/24/10/43

Army Rank Pte 30/10/43

AW.K Row Ltn for O. 11c Infantry Records, Ashford, M2.

L.G.No 36265. 26 11/43

Total Service Engagement to 30/10/43 (date of discharge) 3 Years 132 Days

Total Service Pension to 30/10/43 3 Years 132 Days

On 30th October 1943

Dick received his commission and was

appointed to the 61^st Reconnaissance Regiment.

Posted on 30 October 2013 in Army life, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Records | Permalink

Band and Banners - Tuesday 26th October 1943

Tuesday

Chotie Darling,

Just received your letter and am replying instanta. Very pleased to hear you can manage some leave, if only three days.

I suggest you come down to Pagham – I’ll pay your fare, and we can renew our former brief acquaintenship (sic) with the ‘Lamb', ‘Bear’* & ‘Beach’.

Things are so quiet for Mother & Dad that I think I should stay home as I don’t know how long my leave will be. The point is that I may be posted and recalled from leave after a week or so at home.

If I can float a loan from someone I’ll enclose some shekels in this letter.

Glad to hear you had a happy time in Whitby**, you certainly get about a bit. My only travel consists of going out on schemes etc, when you’re usually wet, cold and generally miserable and certainly not in the mood to appreciate the beauty of the west country.

However, I have seen enough to convince me that the people who say ‘See England first’ do know what they’re talking about.

Can you let me know probable time of arrival at Pagham? – and I’ll get the band and banners out.

Will close here, Darling for dinner – it’s a Band night.

All my love

Dicker

*Pubs in Pagham.

** See Chotie in Yorkshire.

30th October 1943 – the United States 5th Army breaks through the Barbara line, Germany’s defensive position across Italy, at Mondragone on the Tyrrhenian Coast. The British 8^th Army attacked across the Trignov River near the Adriatic Coast on 2^nd November 1943. (From Chronology of World War II and WW2-net Timelines.)

Posted on 26 October 2013 in Army life, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Promotion/Demotion, Pubs, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Mucking about now - Saturday 23rd October

As before

Saturday

Chotie Darling,

Many thanks for letter. I didn’t get it until yesterday as we were out on exercise for a week.

Firstly, as regards leave I definitely get it on the 30^th inst. Though I don’t know, as yet, for how long. It’s almost sure to be 9 days but you know the army.

I’ve received my final reports and have only a week of mucking about now. I’ve also got my clothing coupons…I bet that made you wince!. Thousands of ‘em.

Anyhow let me know whether you can manage anything as regards leave won’t you? Brinner may be home on the 5^th before he goes to OCTU but nothing definite as yet.

Had glorious time on exercise in the Cotswolds. Went to Cheltenham and Gloucester, etc.

Can’t write anymore now as dinner’s up

Love

Dicker

P.T.O.

Do your damdest to get leave, Chotie.

24^th October 1943 – The Soviet Army takes Melitopol, near the Sea of Azov in the Ukraine, breaking the Wotan line (part of the Germans’ hastily constructed defensive position from Smolensk along the Dnepr River to the Black Sea). By 1^st December the entire line had been broken and the German 17^th Army were isolated on the Crimean Peninsula. Only the German’s Panther line in the north between Lake Peipus (now between Estonia and Russia) and the Baltic Sea along the Narva River remained intact.

Posted on 23 October 2013 in Army life, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Putting in for Recce

On 13^th October 1943 Dick signed a preference form

for the Recce Corps

with a ‘family or territorial claim’ for the 61^st Reconnaissance Regiment, then stationed in Kent.

Copy of Record Preference form

5731671 AGE 22 years 3 months 299440

(M.S. Form E.C.1) ARMY FORM E.562

OFFICER CADET TRAINING UNIT 1A

77 TROOP FIRST APPOINTMENTS EMERGENCY COMMISSIONS B

FORM to be filled up by successful Candidates for appointments to Emergency Commissions in the Army

Name in full WILLIAMS, RICHARD KELNER

1.Regiment or Corps of the British or Indian Army for which I desire to express a preference. Officers wishing for Scottish, Irish, or Welsh Regiments should state their connection, if any, with the country in question. (Not more than three Regiments or Corps should be specified. Family or Territorial claims should be fully stated.)	(1) *RECCE CORPS*	Family or Territorial Claims (if any), to be fully stated
		61
	(2)
	(3)
2. (For applicants for Household Cavalry and Foot Guards only) Have you been accepted by the Colonel of the Regiment for which you have applied above? (NOTE. No commissions in Regiments of Household Cavalry or Foot Guards will be granted unless applicants have previously been accepted by the Colonels of the Regiments concerned.)

Signature RK Williams

Address to which notification of appointment should be sent. Any change should be at once notified to the War Office

“St Margarets” Sea Lane PAGHAM SUSSEX. (To be written in BLOCK LETTERS)

Date 13.10.’43

NOTE.- This Form must be filled and forwarded to “THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE, THE WAR OFFICE (M.S. 2.), WHITEHALL, LONDON, S.W.1,” through the Officer Commanding, Officer Cadet Training Unit.

(2331) Wt.29614/1238. 20,000. 9/39. W.R.M. Gp.69s

13th October 2013 – the official Italian Government declares war on Germany.

14th October 1943 – half of the prisoners in Sobibor, 300 men and women, escape in an uprising (although only 47 survived the war). Sobibor, in eastern Poland was constructed in spring 1942 and by the time of the uprising at least 167,000 people, mainly Jewish, had been murdered there. Although the killing centre was dismantled shortly after the uprising and kept secret by the Nazis, it has been estimated that over 250,000 people died there. (From WW2-net Timelines and and The United States Holocaust Museum.)

14^th October 1943 – after suffering heavy losses over Germany the US Air Force calls off long-range unescorted daylight raids. (From Chronology of World War II. See 'precision bombing in daylight.)

16th October 1943 – beginning of the Roman ‘Razzia’ or round-up of the Jews in Rome. Although in September 1943 the Germans had levied a ransom in gold for the safety of the Roman Jews, which had been paid, the SS still proceeded to seize the Jews in Rome and deport them to Auschwitz-Birkenau. 1,800 were sent to the death camp and all were killed. However, for every Roman Jew deported 10 escaped, with the Italian people helping them to hide.

In 1933 there were about 50,000 Jews living in Italy. Anti-Jewish discrimination laws were introduced in 1938 but the Italian military authorities refused to participate in the mass murder of the Jews and Jews were generally safe from deportation in Italy or Italian-occupied territory until the Italian Armistice. More than 40,000 Jews survived the Holocaust in Italy. (See United States Holocaust Memorial Museum for Rome and Italy.)

17th October 1943 – completion of the Thailand to Burma railway, between Bangkok in Thailand and Rangoon (now Yangon) in Burma (Myanmar). Built by the forced labour of 180,000 Asian labourers and 60,000 Allied Prisoners of War (half of them British) for the Japanese military. Conditions and treatment were so horrific that half of the Asians and over 12,000 of the Allied PoWs died or were killed – the railway construction is viewed as a war crime. ( See the Second World War Experience Centre and Far East Prisoners of War.)

19th October 1943 – the Treblinka death camp in eastern Poland, is closed and steps taken to completely dismantle it, returning the site to farmland to hide the atrocities. Between July 1942 and August 1943 25 German SS men assisted by 100 Ukrainian auxiliaries murdered around 800,000 Jews and Roma at Treblinka.

20th October 1943 – creation of the United Nations War Crimes Commission by a meeting of Government representatives of seventeen of the Allied Nations, including all of the major powers except the USSR at the Foreign Office in London.

22nd October 1943 – more than 10,000 people die in the explosions and fires caused by a bombing attack on the city of Kassel, in central Germany.

This was also the beginning of Operation Corona – the RAF used native German speakers to impersonate and broadcast as German Air Defence Officers. When the Germans switched to using women controllers in November so did the RAF.

Posted on 13 October 2013 in Army life, History, Promotion/Demotion, Records, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink

The Gentle Sex - Tuesday 28th September

Same Address

Tuesday

My Darling,

Many thanks for your letter. Was very glad to hear that you enjoyed your leave and were lucky enough to get the same time as Mary*.

Still, I expect you’re glad to be back …..I was home myself this weekend but felt so wretchedly ill, I did not really enjoy it. I started on a pint at the Beach on Saturday and hadn’t the heart to finish it.

Been very busy lately on schemes and will be on them nearly all the next month. They’re not too bad in the summer but it’s getting just a wee bit nippy these days. On top of this I’m Troop Sgt. for the week which all means added work.

Found time to read D.L.Murray’s ‘Tale of Three Cities’ which I’ve always meant to read, and enjoyed immensely. Have read virtually nothing else. Saw ‘Gentle Sex’ and Col. Blimp** during past few weeks – I believe I told you. Enjoyed Blimp but found Howard’s influence on ‘Gentle Sex’ just a little too much. He always was hammy.

Sorry to hear about your indisposition – hope it’s better by now.

Everyone seems to be having a competition as to who can produce the most offspring. News from HB < Herne Bay***. Gives lurid details of further progress in this direction. There are times when I think the world’s gone mad. They’re no sooner married than the poor girl’s tied down for life, and in most cases before she’s even started to live! I hope there’s enough money in circulation after this war to feed them all.

Had a letter from Brinner with yours. Full of his customary appalling language. He’s met a soprano of ‘Tosca’**** fame. It won’t last long. Apparently the Austrian refugee affaire has closed down for good this time.

I’d send you some denarii if I had any – but at the moment I’m bankrupt.

Did you hear the Beethoven on Sunday pm? Pouishnoff*****.

I must close here for dinner – not that I shall eat any, but I have to attend anyhow.

love & kisses

Dicker

This letter was addressed to:

W/242328 Pte Chalkley BE.

‘B’ Tp. ATS OF.C. 462 Hy (M) AA Bty RA

Markham, Easton in Gordano

Bristol

Maybe Chotie was back at Markham Camp when Dick sent her the postcard addressed to Portishead on 7^th September, or maybe she’d moved the short distance to Easton-in-Gordano since then.

*Chotie’s best friend Mary Dakin, who later married Geoffrey Thomas, gentleman.

**’Gentle Sex’ - a romantic comedy film about the ATS, directed and narrated by Leslie Howard, who had been killed in June 1943 and narrated by Leslie Howard. ’The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp’ - a comedy film derived from the satirical Colonel Blimp comic strip.

***Monica, Dick’s ex-girlfriend and Diller’s best friend, lived at Herne Bay.

****Giacomo Puccini’s opera ‘Tosca’ - the lead soprano has the eponymous title role, so Brinner’s new girl was presumably quite a singer.

*****Leff Pouishnoff, a Ukrainian pianist and composer.

28^th September 1943 – Chotie visited the dentist at Bristol.

Copy of Record

Dental Treatment Card – 28/9/43 Bristol

28^th September 1943 – two years after the shooting of nearly 34,000 Jews at the Babi Yar ravine near Kiev a number of the concentration camp prisoners now tasked with covering up evidence of the massacres there manage to escape. By the autumn of 1943 at least 100,000 Jews, Roma and Communists had been murdered by the Nazis at Babi Yar.

29^th September 1943 – Marshal Badoglio, the new Italian leader meets General Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander of the Allies Expeditionary Force to sign the armistice agreement aboard HMS Nelson in Valetta Harbour, Malta. (From Chronology of World War II.)

After Exercise Link in mid-September 1943 61st Division, including 61^st Recce, was relegated to a static role in home defence (Lower Establishment status – Higher Establishment Divisions were intended for employment overseas and combat.) The Division was also a training formation and was intended to find suitable replacements for fighting formations: “when the 61^st Division was relegated to Home Forces…we had to draft many of our best men away”. (Lt-Colonel P.H.A. Brownrigg’s account of ’A Reconnaissance Regiment in the B.L.A.’ in ‘Beaten Paths are Safest’ by Ron Howard, Brewin Books 2004)

By October the 61^st Division had been assigned to anti-invasion duties in Kent.

Eric Postles writes:

“The regiment was responsible for patrolling the coast from New Romney to Battle. Our squadron was stationed in Lympne Castle next to an RAF airfield. We did day and night mobile patrols into Folkestone and Romney. On a clear day you could see France from the castle tower and at night flashes from the German guns shelling the Dover area. One night we watched as a night fighter shot down a German bomber in flames. Our fighter planes took off and returned from France very low over the castle often returning damaged and sometimes with their rockets hanging down from the wings. On our patrols we reported to the coastguards and coastal gun sites. We often got a welcome cup of tea.” (Extract from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

1^st October 1943 – the Allies enter Naples. Much of the city had been wrecked by the Germans, including its historic aqueducts, in revenge for the Neapolitan resistance begun on 27^th September.

Britain’s 8^th Army on the Adriatic coast of Italy seizes the Foggia plain with its airfields vital for bombing southern Germany, Austria and the Ploesti oilfields.

1st October 1943 – the Germans begin to round up Jews in Denmark. However, their plans have been revealed in advance by a German naval attaché, Ferdinand Duckwitz, and most of the 7,500 Danish Jews were helped into hiding and then ferried to safety in Sweden by Danish citizens and the Resistance. 470 Danish Jews were deported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia but relatively few Danish Jews (120) died during the Holocaust for a German occupied country. (From United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.)

2^nd October 1943 – heavy RAF raid on Munich, deep inside Germany. Germany’s third largest city was an important industrial centre and suffered 71 bombing attacks during the war. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

3^rd October 1943 – the Battle of Termoli commences the Allies’ attack on the Volturno line. This was a German defensive position stretching across Italy from Termoli on the Adriatic coast to the mouth of the Volturno River, north of Naples, on the Tyrrhenian Sea. The line was breached by the British 8^th Army at Termoli on 6^th October and the US 5^th Army crossing the Volturno a week later. The Germans retreated back to the Barbara line. Both lines had been established to delay the Allied advance to the main German defensive position (known as ‘the Winter line’) protecting the access route to Rome at Cassino.

4th October 1943 – Corsica is liberated when the last of the Germans are evacuated from Bastia.

6th October 1943 – at a conference with high ranking Reich officials at Posen in Poland, Heinrich Himmler is frank about the Jewish ‘Final Solution’ for the first time, admitting that women and children as well as men were being killed so that “this people disappear from this earth”. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

The Devil's punchbowl - Tuesday 14th? September 1943

Same address….

Tuesday

My Darling,

Many thanks for letter just received – and for programme enclosed. I had hoped I could have written to you during the week but have been on schemes almost continually.

It’s now about seven in the evening and I’m all packed for another three day show after dinner. We’re going down as far as Hindhead which is wonderful country, and luckily I’m driving all the time. The road runs south from Aldershot, over the Hog’s Back and down to the ‘Devil’s punchbowl’, a famous venue for motorists pre-war and one of Surrey’s best known beauty spots. We’re going right through the night and are all swearing on fine weather.

Mother enclosed a letter from Brinner in her last. He’s now a Cadet at Wrotham which is only a few miles from Sevenoaks, Eric’s place. (Incidentally, I’ve never heard from him despite you’re saying he’d written. Also, no cracks about my repaying – if I had a letter from him I’d reply straight away, but I definitely wrote last …)

I managed to see Diller last week-end – she went back on Sunday. I gather she likes the life but would prefer to be in anything but the Pay Corps.

I don’t get any leave for another three weeks, I’m afraid and then only a weekend.

Theoretically I should pass out in six weeks’ time – but things are going very badly as regards Recce Corps. They’re over staffed as it is which has the annoying habit of making them very difficult to please. They cheerfully accept about five in every fifty and the unhappy remainder have to go all through an Infantry OCTU, which takes nearly another five months. The only consolation I’ve got is that I should go to Wrotham, for some weeks anyhow.

Hope you enjoyed the concert under Sargent**, whom I think is still the best conductor in the country. ‘Fraid I never get a chance to see anything these days.

As you remark, the news is good, but as usual is inclined to be taken far too optimistically. We still have the hardest fighting to do.

Must close here for dinner, as I’ve got to get my carrier started which takes me anything up to an hour….

Here’s to the Devil and his punchbowl.

love & kisses

Dicker

*Hindhead Common and the Devil’s Punch Bowl are an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty protected by the National Trust.

** Malcolm Sargeant, famous English conductor.

15th September 1943 – Australian and US troops capture the Japanese base of Lae, on the east coast of New Guinea, north of Port Moresby.

16^th September 1943 – the Danish resistance underground, Dansk Frihedsrådet, sets up the Freedom Council as a shadow administration.

18th September 1943 - German forces from Salerno withdraw towards the line of the River Volturno, north of Naples. American forces at Salerno had suffered 3,500 casualties and the British (on the exposed left flank) 5,500. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

20 September 1943 - the ‘Jewish Affairs Commission’, headed by Dieter Wisliceny, arrives in Athens. In Thessaloniki the Commission had been responsible for the deportation of over 46,000 Jews, mainly to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Athenian Jews, previously under Italian Occupation, were now threatened with a similar fate. However, two thirds escaped - many with the help of Archbishop Damaskeno and other Christians who hid them and produced false baptism certificates. Even the Chief of Police in Athens, Angelos Evert, issued Jews with false ID to protect them.

60 to 70,000 Greek Jews perished in the Holocaust – more than 80% of the Jewish Greek population. (See United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.)

22nd September 1943 – six British midget submarines succeed in attacking the Tirpitz (see also St Nazaire and Brighton) in a Norwegian fiord, putting the battleship out of action until March 1944.

22nd September 1943 – Soviet forces begin to cross the heavily defended Dnepr river in central Ukraine, suffering heavy losses but ultimately succeeding in advancing their front line.

On 23rd September Mussolini proclaims his return to power with the re-establishment of a fascist government, the Repubblica Sociale Italiana in northern Italy. All Italians carrying arms in German occupied areas face the death penalty.

24th September 1943 – 5,000 Italian soldiers of the Aqui Division are massacred on the Greek Ionian island of Cephalonia when they eventually surrender to the Germans. In all, more than 10,000 Italian soldiers who chose to resist the Germans died in Greece.

25^th September 1943 – the British 8^th Army and the US 5^th Army join up a front line across Italy.

25th September 1943 – the Soviets re-take Smolensk, 200 miles west of Moscow in Russia.

27th September 1943 – in a popular uprising the people of Naples successfully drive the Germans out of the city before the Allied liberation on 1^st October. (From Chronology of World War II.)

Posted on 14 September 2013 in Army life, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink

A Young Novel - 1st and 2nd September 1943

Same address

Wednesday (nearly Thursday)

My Darling Chotie,

It’s a long time since I’ve written to you at this time of night, but I find myself with two others operating a wireless for three days and nights and this being the first I thought it would give me a golden opportunity to send you a young novel – so here goes.

The remainder of the troop are out on a three days exercise and we are maintaining contact with them the whole time. The system, as it stands sounds quite fun but unfortunately we are not allowed to sleep as those on the exercise aren’t able to.

This little discrepancy is, however, compensated by the fact that I get a weekend on Saturday, so things aren’t really too bad. Diller will be home I believe so she’ll have a glorious chance to moan to her hearts content, an opportunity I know she won’t be slow to seize.

Came back from 48hr scheme yesterday, just about all in. This wireless* is murder, it’s not only the mental tiredness you get, but also chronic headaches owing to the headphones which have to be worn continually. I’ll spend the week-end in bed – lonely and cold ….

We’ve managed to scrounge some cocoa and milk, also a shave, so we have hopes of something hot soon.

Weather here is typical autumn – lots of mist and rain and last night a beautiful sunset, one of the best I’ve ever seen. The trees – hundreds of them here are just beginning to turn – though it’s early yet. It will be lovely by the time I leave – always presuming I don’t leave prematurely …

We have a pretty sound wireless officer, one of the pleasant slavedriver type who works all hours from morn ’til night and expects the whole troop to do the same…Luckily he likes his pint and consequently we always find ourselves some hundred yards from the Duke of Wellington for lunch and he always stands the troop a pint apiece. God knows how much it must cost him.

I was talking to the publican who says that the present Duke (who lives in the neighbouring estate – Stratfield Saye) is quite a pleasant bloke – Captain in the Commandos in Sicily and always goes to the pub when on leave to play darts with the farmers. Apparently he’s about 30**.

Did I tell you that Dad went up to Purley*** to see all the relations? It’s the first time he’s seen his father for about five years! Awful isn’t it? Apparently things have changed quite a bit. Gramp now looks his years – he’s about 78, which he never has done before and has slowed up considerably. Cyril (Dad’s brother) took him on a trip which included all the most dubious of London’s night clubs.

They all expect me to go up (after Brian going, of course) but I still prefer to go home, or if possible come down to see you. (I still owe you about a dozen spankings…****)

However, he did see them, they were all very pleased, and that’s that – for another five years anyhow.

Incidentally is there anything I can get you for your Birthday? I haven’t had a chance to get out for ages, and you can’t do anything on schemes. Let me know – and if there’s no chance of my getting it, I’ll send you some shekels*****.

The ATS are a better crowd than I thought, despite their being mostly Generals’ daughters. The one I had (not literally….) yesterday did all the cooking for us – and did it very well – probably because they were scared of letting us do it, as they have to eat it as well. I managed to get her a room in a farmhouse and she managed to get me half-a-dozen eggs so we had quite a happy time. She comes from Kent of course – Pett’s Wood – about a mile from Orpington†. We had several common friends. I should say friends in common – there’s a subtle difference….

I still haven’t had an FFI†† – you really must organise another meeting…See what you can do. I always get atrociously rude this time of night – at the moment I’m thinking awful things. I couldn’t even tell you…

That’s enough of this – I’d better do some wireless for an hour or two.

Well, I’ve done some morse – over an hour in fact and have just been relieved. Still feel the same. Good thing I’m not in the Bristol area.

Read Deeping’s ‘Two Black Sheep’ on the scheme and also “Fanny by Gaslight” again (Michael Sadleir) which I’ve always thought an awful lot of. It’s the finest picture of Victorian England of the last ten years and heaven knows there have been enough books on that subject! I’m sure Fanny would get the same hold on you as she has on me.

Won ten bob on a little side bet last night. Bill said it was Tchaikovsky’s ‘Casse Noisette’††† and I said it was ‘Eugen Onegin’ and Eugen Onegin it was. Just as easy as that. Wish money was always so procurable as that 10 bob.

It’s now nearly 2 oclock and we’ve got the water on the boil for some luscious cocoa! Jeez!

My two colleagues have just started to take an interest in things – now that there’s a chance of a hot drink! One is that madman I told you about from Corfe Castle – incidentally his name’s Peter Collins (happy memories?) who still intends to live on Round Island after the war††††. A genuine hermit’s life with just his wife. Notice I say just! This is where I should say “what more could a man want”… (after his pipe of course…Never mind Darling – you come second …)

The other one’s an Oxford law student, pretty nearly broke. Tennis champ of north of England. Quite a good type.

I’ve just had my COCOA(!) and, it’s good. I’ve got a lovely warm feeling in my tummy which I definitely didn’t have before.

Well, Chotie Darling I must close here as I have to go on the set again. I’ll let you know how things went on the weekend and enumerate some of Diller’s moans.

All my love, precious.

Always thinking of you.

Dicker

P.S. You should read Napolean’s letters to Marie Louise and Josephine. They’re good….

*Wireless – “not enough emphasis can be put on the importance of communication in battle situations”…Wireless operators needed high quality training “to pick up weak signals against a background of atmospherics and interference” known as ‘slush’. (From ‘Phantom at War’ by Andy & Sue Parlour, Cerberus 2003)

**The Duke of Wellington’s estate at Stratfield Saye near Basingstoke in Hampshire. The 6th Duke of Wellington, Captain of No 2 Commando, was killed in action at Salerno on 16^th September 1943.

***Purley, near Croydon, South London.

****Possibly referring to Chotie’s involvement with her officer at the Bristol camp earlier that year??

*****slang for cash. Chotie’s 20^th birthday was on 6^th September 1943.

†Dick was born in Orpington in Kent and spent his childhood there.

††the 'Free from Infection' inspection for venereal disease (presumably being used by Dick as a euphemism here).

†††Tchaikovsky’s ballet ‘The Nutcracker’ and not his opera ‘Eugene Onegin’.

††††an island in Poole Harbour.

Peter Collins was the name of one of Chotie’s early admirers:

“Peter Collins, the boss’s son, home from Blundell’s, a posh school in Devon, also took a fancy to me and given the chance, we would canoodle in the store room. His mother was very kind to me and I was invited to stay at their lovely house in Talbot Woods for a weekend. Peter had won a scholarship to Blundell’s for his brilliant piano playing and taught me about classical music - a love that has stayed with me all my life.” (From ‘Chotie’s Story’. See also F.W.Collins.)

3^rd September 1943 – the Italian government, under Marshal Badoglio, signs a secret armistice with the Allies at Cassibile in Sicily. In Operation Baytown, British and Canadian forces crossed the Messina Straits unopposed, landing at Reggio de Calabrio (the tip of Italy’s toe) in an unsuccessful attempt to draw German forces away from the main landing areas further north.

Posted on 01 September 2013 in Army life, ATS, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Promotion/Demotion, Pubs, Villages | Permalink

Wireless Schemes - c.Saturday 21st August 1943

5731671 OTC Williams RK

77 Tp HAC Sqdn

100 (Sandhurst) OCTU

RHC RMC

Camberley, Surrey

My Darling Chotie,

I’m very sorry I haven’t been able to write before but have only just got back from a wireless scheme and am also squadron Leader into the bargain.

You always seem to be on the move*, which is a good thing as you see a little more of the country than I did for the first year or so.

Just had a letter from Brinner – passed his WOSB easily – the same one that I went on at Betchworth Surrey. He’ll probably go the (sic) Wrotham pre-OCTU, where Johnny went.

I get a long(?) week-end in a fortnight’s time which is when Diller gets her leave so I may manage to see her then.

Had a good time on the scheme although we worked until eleven every night. Our particular group consisted of four cadets, 2 cars and 2 ATS. They were very good, doing nearly all the cooking and egg-scrounging from the farms. We slept in the hay-loft of a barn and they slept in the farmhouse itself. Quite fun.

We do nothing but wireless schemes all the next fortnight which are pretty cushy physically but pretty bloody mentally.

I’m trying to write this on my knee – murder, isn’t it?

I can still see my old tree from our new room. It’s just beginning to turn brown… As one of our Canucks** said “I guess that means the fall”…

Haven’t read anything for ages – or seen a flick for that matter. ‘Spect you still manage to find time for a little quiet reading. Wish I could.

No news of any kind – nothing seems to happen these days, except in Berlin.

Will close here as there’s simply nothing to write about.

All my love, precious

Dicker

*Chotie’s unit moved to Portishead, on the coast west of Bristol, in late August/early September.

**Canuck – slang for Canadian.

23^rd August 1943 – the Soviet Red Army recaptures Kharkov in the western Ukraine, after a fierce German defence.

23rd August 1943 – heaviest raid on Berlin to date with 717 RAF bombers to test the defences around Berlin. The city was covered in a blanket of smoke from the fires and thousands were killed. Further bombing was carried out on 31st August (600 bombers) although the main ‘Battle of Berlin’ bombing campaign did not follow until November 1943.

25th August 1943 – Germans first use the HenschelHs293, radar-controlled and rocket propelled glider bombs, in the Bay of Biscay.

28th August 1943 – King Boris III of Bulgaria dies suddenly in mysterious circumstances having angered Hitler by his refusal to deport the 50,000 Bulgarian Jews Bulgarian Jews (although Jews were deported from Bulgarian-occupied territories in Macedonia, Thrace and Serbia) and to declare war on the Soviet Union.

28^th August 1943 – the Danish government resigns, having refused Germany’s demands to impose the death penalty on saboteurs. Martial law is imposed and Denmark becomes de facto ruled by Germany. The Danes succeeded in scuttling most of the large ships in their Navy before they fell into German hands.

Posted on 21 August 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Quelques fleurs! - Wednesday 11th and Thursday 12th August 1943

Same Address! (almost)

77 Tp HAC* Squadron

100 OCTU RHC

RMC Camberley

Surrey

Chotie Darling,

Sorry I just haven’t been able to write before but just tumbled into bed at night without having had a moment to spare.

I must begin by thanking you very much, Darling, for a very happy week-end. It was a pity it wasn’t longer – but we must always hope for better things rather than dwell on the imperfections of the moment.

However, enough of this twaddle.

(Just having an argument with Chunky about Elizabeth** as a girl’s name. He says it’s his favourite name. Actually I believe it is.)

I’m now on wireless which is just about killing me…I’m getting fed up with this place – especially after seeing you. It’s all so useless.

I’m beginning to feel that I’ll be damn glad when this show’s over. How about you? Then maybe we can get down to things as they should be got down to.

I’ve still forgot to post that letter home. You’re as bad as I am….

I seem to be writing to no purpose tonight. Think I’d better leave this until tomorrow and see if I’m feeling in a better frame of mind then.

Thursday Eve

Received your letter this afternoon. Many thanks, Darling. Glad to hear you had a safe, if premature, arrival.

Moved again today to another part of the building and am now in HAC Squadron as you will see from address overleaf.

Am now working literally all day as I have morse to do which has to be done in spare time (?). Have to do 12 words per minute to pass out which takes at least an hour a day for me to achieve - if ever.

Am still with Brian and Chunky and things are on a sane basis once again.

I’ve had my week-end cancelled – the whole troop have in fact – which has annoyed me intensely. Good thing it wasn’t last week.

Haven’t heard from Brinner – ‘spose he’s on Selection Board or somewhere.

Must close here, Darling as I have tons of work to do.

Bye,bye,precious

All my love

Dicker

PS Can’t see you for at least 12 months – cos I’ve shaved my tache off!!

*HAC stood for ‘Honourable Artillery Company’, one of the oldest military organisations in the world, having been established by charter under Henry VIII in 1537. In World War the HAC Infantry Battalion became the Officer Cadet Training Unit for the Reconnaissance Corps at Sandhurst.

**A Chalkley family name (her mother’s name, Chotie’s middle name, my middle name, etc.). If Chotie and Dick had a daughter they were going to call her Elizabeth.

On 12th August 1943 Dick changed to HAC Squadron

OCTU RHC RMC.

He was still in 77 Troop.

12^th August 1943 – heavy RAF attack on Milan. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

15th August 1943 – heavy German bombing raid on Portsmouth where Dick had been stationed from June to September 1941

17th August 1943 – Patton and his US 7^th Army enter Messina on the north-east tip of Sicily, the critical port for access to Italy. The island was now in Allied hands.

17^th August 1943 –Beginning of the Quebec Conference headed by Roosevelt, Churchill and Canada’s Prime Minister Mackenzie King. Agreement is reached that the Allies will invade Europe on a second front through France (Operation Overlord) and that a South-East Asia Command (SEAC) will be established with Lord Louis Mountbatten (Head of Britain's Combined Operations - including Dick’s Airborne unit ) as Supreme Allied Commander. Major General ‘Vinegar Joe’ Stilwell , the American Army Commander in China and Burma, would be one of his deputies.

17^th August 1943 – in the Schweinfurt-Regensburg daylight mission the US Air Force attacks Luftwaffe production factories deep inside Germany, suffering heavy losses. The targets were beyond the range of fighter escorts so the Americans had to rely on their heavily fortified ‘Flying Fortress’ bombers.

On 17^th and 18^th August 1943 in Operation Hydra over 1,000 RAF night bombers attack Peenemunde on the Baltic Coast, where the V-2 rocket (the world’s first long range ballistic missile) was in development. V-2 production was subsequently moved to the underground Mittelwerk factory near Nordhausen in central Germany, which used forced labour from Mittelbau-Dora (part of Buchenwald concentration camp). The Luftwaffe Chief of Staff, Hans Jeschonnek, commited suicide on 18^th August, having mistakenly ordered gun defences to fire on German planes when the use of 'window' by RAF Mosquito bombers effectively feinted an attack on Berlin. Hitler had also blamed him for the destruction of Hamburg in July

18^th August 1943 – advancing Soviet forces north of Kursk liberate Briansk, south-west of Moscow.

19^th August 1943 – in the secret Quebec Agreement Britain, the United States and Canada agree to share atomic energy research, which, in 1945, led to the production of the atomic bomb.

Posted on 11 August 2013 in Army life, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Swimming - 31st July 1943

By the end of July 1943 Chotie’s Royal Artillery Anti-Aircraft unit

had moved back to the Bristol area, this time to the north of the city

- her address was

W/242328 Pte Chalkley

O’s FC ATS ‘B’ Tp

462 Hy (M) RA AA

Cribbs Causeway

Nr Henbury

Bristol.

Letter written on Saturday 31st July 1943:

Same Address

Saturday

My Darling Chotie,

Sorry, this will have to be in pencil but Chunky has pinched our only table and chair and is very inauspiciously writing to his wife.

Received your two letters, for which many thanks. I was surprised to see you are once again in the Bristol area. If you remember, Eric was convalescent at Westbury for some months. At any rate you’re a little nearer home, which I suppose is something, if not very much.

As regards next week-end I’m afraid I won’t be able to get down before Saturday Evening, as our leave doesn’t start until the afternoon, and it’s a fair journey.

I shall have to leave again on Monday afternoon as we change squadrons on that day and I’ll have about six months accumulation of kit to move to the New Buildings, which are some half mile or so.

Been swimming all the afternoon at the ‘Blue Pool’, the nearest baths (apart from the college baths) and am now beginning to get brown. I’m already pretty browned off as they’re chucking out Recce cadets right and left as the corps is already too full. The trouble is that in most cases they’re not even giving infantry commissions! So I’ll probably be RtU’d* in the near future.

These things run in cycles – one minute they’re clamouring for officers and the next they’re full up.

Read Linklater’s short stories entitled “God likes them plain”, which are very good. Haven’t had time to read anything else. Heard from Diller (still browned off) but haven’t heard from Brinner, needless to say.

Swam in an inter-squadron competition and managed to win my event the net result being we won the whole show easily. Rather funny really, and that’s the first swimming event I’ve been in. On the 28^th** too! Hell of a fluke – the other 3 were U.S.***

I’ll close here Darling, as I’ve exhausted my mediocre letter-writing talents.

All my love, Darling

(until Saturday)

Dicker

*RTU – Returned to Unit

**Dick’s 22^nd birthday on 28^th July.

***Slang for useless?

Dick's future comrades in 61st Reconnaissance Regiment were still in the Chilterns:

“Every Saturday morning we had a 10 mile run/march/route march after which we could go out. I sometimes went down to London, Tring or Berkhamsted to see a film. We did troop exercises on the Common and Ashridge Golf Course.” (Extracts from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

This photo of B Squadron's Assault Troop, including Anthony Rampling, was taken in August 1943 (Tony is third from the left at the back):

Eric Brewer joined the Assault Troop soon after this photo was taken and continued to fight in the Assault Troop until December 1944.

1^st August 1943 – Japan proclaims an independent State of Burma, led by Ba Maw. He declares war on Britain and United States while Aung San, head of the Burma Defence Army, begins negotiations with the communist and socialist parties. By November 1943 Aung San is making plans with the British to turn his forces against the Japanese occupants. (From Chronology of World War II and Wikipedia.)

1st August 1943 - American bombers attack the Ploesti oilfields of Romania from North Africa in Operation Tidal Wave but suffer devastating losses. The Germans had broken their codes and were ready for them. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

2^nd August 1943 – more than 300 prisoners escape from the Treblinka extermination camp in Poland in a break out organised by the Jewish inmates - although two thirds were eventually captured and killed. The bodies of the thousands who had been gassed or shot at Treblinka were being exhumed from the mass graves and burnt, removing the evidence of genocide. Deportation of Jews from the ghettos to Treblinka had ceased in May 1943 and the camp was to be dismantled. All the remaining prisoners in the camp were killed. (From United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and WW2-net Timelines.)

2^nd August 1943 – a Japanese destroyer in the Solomon Islands rams a US Torpedo boat, which catches fire. The commander, J F Kennedy dives in to rescues his crew from the burning oil. Abandoning ship after 12 hours clinging to the upturned hull he helps them reach the isolated Plum Pudding Island and then Olasana Island, which has coconuts but no water. On 8^th August they were found and rescued with the assistance of local islanders who were coast watchers and a message written on coconut shell. JFK kept the shell on his desk in the Oval Office when he became President of the Unites States.

3^rd August 1943 – the Russians launch Operation Rumyantsev, a vast offensive south of Kursk taking Belgorad on 5^th August. North of Kursk Soviet forces reclaim Orel, following the German retreat. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

5^th August 1943 – US troops at last take the airfield of Munda on New Georgia, in the Solomon Islands, from the Japanese.

6^th August 1943 – American destroyers in the Solomon Islands sink 3 Japanese destroyers carrying 900 troops in a night-time ambush.

6^th August 1943 – German troops pour into Italy as Italian and German government leaders meet near Venice.

Posted on 31 July 2013 in Army life, ATS, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Meetings with Chotie, Promotion/Demotion, Sport, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink

Guido Benetti - Tuesday 20th July 1943

Dick at Pagham?

Same Address

Tuesday 20^th July

My Darling Chotie,

I’ve got the afternoon off so here goes.

Had quite a pleasant leave though very quiet.

Went over to see Guido at Brighton on Wednesday last, on spec. as he wasn’t expecting me. He’s got a lovely flat on the front at Hove, beautifully furnished – the dining room in old English oak, nearly black*, and the drawing room in Japanese stuff, similar to Dr Barker’s place at Parkstone. He’s got about a thousand records of opera of all types. We played one after the other for about seven hours altogether.

His niece was there – about seventeen – wearing mauve and old lace, and looking for all the world like Lucrezia Borgia**. She’s at an art school in Brighton – does dress-designing or something. She’s been staying with Eva Turner** for the past year and now lives with Guido.

Had lunch and tea with them and some pukka Italian Vermouth which I hadn’t seen for years.

I had intended staying the night in Brighton but thought that anything after Guido’s place would savour too much of the anti-climax so caught the next train home.

Brinner turned up without notice on Saturday afternoon, and stayed for 36 hrs. He’s at present waiting for OCTU Board.

Had a letter from Diller with yours. Fed up as usual as I expect you’ve heard from Mary****. She’s trying to get a transfer somewhere else I believe. What a hope!

Had a swim in the Lagoon***** on Saturday. Not too bad at all – quite warm.

How do you like the old homestead! Sort of Georgian-Renaissance – pseudo-Greek style! I bought half a doz. photos of the place but unhappily had to get them “artistically – hand-coloured”!

How’s life in Devon? Hope the weather improves – it’s hell in the west otherwise.

When are you coming further East? I’m on long weekend Friday Eve to Monday night on the weekend of the 7^th August. If you can manage anything, I could get to Poole OK.

Let me know, any how,

All my love,

Dicker

*oak wood goes dark brown and then black with age.

**an infamous beauty (described as having heavy blonde hair which fell past her knees, a beautiful complexion, hazel eyes which changed colour, a full, high bosom, and a natural grace which made her appear to "walk on air"). Her father, Rodrigo, became Pope Alexander VI in 1492 and the notorious family were suspected of many crimes including simony, incest and murder.

***Eva Turner was a famous English soprano of the inter-war years.

****Chotie’s best friend Mary Dakin was also a close friend of Diller, Dick’s sister.

*****Pagham lagoon.

See letters of 3rd September and 25th February for Guido Benetti.

22nd July 1942 – the US 7th Army takes Palermo, capital of Sicily while British forces are ‘bogged down’ around Mount Etna.

24th July 1943 – the RAF bomb Hamburg in Operation Gomorrah, the beginning of the Battle of Hamburg. More than 700 planes are deployed and this is the first use of the “window” tactic developed following the Bruneval Raid (releasing strips of metal foil to confuse the German radar), reducing Allied plane losses that night to 12. Raids continued for a week and by 3rd August the intense heavy bombing, and the firestorm of 27^th July (when the heat from the fires generated its own wind, blasting flames through the city), had killed 40-50,000 people.

24th July 1943 – a US air crew crash lands in neutral Sweden and is granted refuge. This precedent is extended to nearly 1,000 Allied air crew during the rest of the war. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

25th July 1943 – Following a vote by the Italian Fascist Grand Council for the King of Italy, Vittorio Emmanuele III, to take over command of all Italian forces from Mussolini, ‘Il Duce’ is arrested and the fascist regime in Italy ended. Marshal Badoglio is appointed head of Italy. Although Badoglio promised that the Italians would continue the war German troops seize the Brenner Pass and key installations in northern Italy as a precaution.

Eric Postles of 61st Recce remembers July 1943:

“On 28^th July, Harry Parr, who was in 59 Division Recce regiment, was killed on an exercise in Kent when his heavy armoured car turned over and he was crushed by the gun. I was given leave to attend his funeral in Burscough and a number of members of 59 Recce also attended. It was one of the biggest attended funerals that I have ever been to – very sad.” (Extracts from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

29^th July 1943 – in Britain Bevin announces that women up to age 50 must register at the Labour Exchange for war work. In 1943 almost 90% of single women and 80% of married women were employed in essential work for the war effort but were paid significantly less than men. (From BBC Women at War and Wikipedia.)

Posted on 20 July 2013 in Army life, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Photos, Poole, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Student

25^th June 1943 Record:

Industry Group and Occupational Classification record from Sandhurst

Questionnaire under the provisions of A.C.I. 183 of 1941

What was your normal civilian occupation? NONE

6. What was your home town and county? Town Orpington County Kent

No 5731671 Date 25 June ‘43

Rank Officer-Cadet

NAME WILLIAMS, R.K.

Unit 100 (Sandhurst) O.C.T.U. R.A.C.

Occupation student 900

Posted on 25 June 2013 in Army life, Photos, Records | Permalink | Comments (0)

Registered Letter - Friday 11th June 1943

As before

Friday

My Darling Chotie,

I’m afraid this will have to be a very short effort, as I’m Troop Leader this week and haven’t a moment of my own.

I’ve been working up till midnight all the week and have all the worry of getting the admin. side done for the trip to Wales*. We go at 4am Sunday! Reveille’s at 3!

I’m enclosing a troop photo we had taken the first day we arrived.

It’s pretty bloody. If you can’t find me, let me know and I’ll give you the details of where I’m sitting.

I’m also enclosing a quid which will help things along a little. I hope ….

I’ll try to get this letter registered tomorrow afternoon – if I get it off.

Received your letter today. Glad to hear you’re getting on as well as can be expected. Must close here Darling.

All my love

Dicker

Will write again just as soon as I can.

*Dick appears to have been at battle camp in Snowdonia for a week from Sunday 13^th to Saturday 19^th June.

Group photo with badges covered - possibly the Officer Cadet photo sent in this letter? Dick is third from the left in the front.

11^th June 1943 – bombardment of Sicily begins in preparation for Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Europe from the south. However, airfields in Greece, Sardinia and northern Italy are also targeted as part of an elaborate deception that included 'Operation Mincemeat' (the planting of a dead body carrying ‘secret plans’ to convince the Germans that the Allies would invade through Greece and Sardinia).

11^th June 1943 – Heinrich Himmler, the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood, orders the liquidation of all Polish ghettos by decree. This is extended to the Soviet Union on 21^st June. (From Holocaust Research Project.)

17^th June 1943 – Eric Brewer, later of 61^st Recce’s B Squadron and diary recorder of their activities (see this blog and ‘Beaten Paths are Safest’ by Ron Howard, Brewin Books 2004), was enlisted. Extracts from his letters have also been published on this blog by kind permission of Derek Brewer and his family.

18^th June 1943 – ‘Radar’ (Radio Detection and Ranging) becomes the official term for ‘Radiolocation’. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

18^th June 1943 – Chotie visited the dentist at 71 MDN for the removal of a loose filling.

See Dental Treatment Card – 18/6/43 71 MDN

20th June 1943 – RAF begin ‘shuttle bombing’ – planes leave England to bomb Germany then reload in North Africa to bomb Italy on return to England. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

21st June 1943 – Jean Moulin and other key members of the Conseil National de la Résistance captured at Lyons, leading to many arrests in the French underground networks.

21st June 1943 - beginning of Operation Animals, an organised campaign of sabotage in Greece to deceive the Germans that they intend to invade there.

Posted on 11 June 2013 in Army life, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, The Recce Men | Permalink | Comments (0)

Brian and Chunky - Tuesday 1st? June

5731671 Officer Cadet Williams RK

77 Troop ‘B’ Sqdn

100 (Sandhurst) Octu RAC

R.M.C. Camberley

Surrey

Tuesday

Thanks very much for your letter and photo*. It’s quite good don’t you think? I’ve got a God awful photo of my troop taken the first day we had here. (Actually I haven’t yet got one – it’s on the way). We had one taken at Blackdown and that was so horrible that everyone refused to buy one. I paid for mine and am still hoping to get my money back….

I’ll send you one of the Sandhurst ones when they arrive.

I’m writing this during a Gas lecture under pretence of writing notes so I have to keep stopping and pretending to look interested. I don’t think I’m kidding this bloke, though.

Well, how do you like Plymouth**? You appear to have struck it lucky in getting such frequent changes of location. I always seemed to stick for months in really horrible places. Brinner had ten mths at Basingstoke and I can’t think of much worse than that. Mind you move Eastwards next time. Somewhere about Lilliput*** would be rather handy or even Chi or somewhere like that.

(It’s a murderous job trying to write on one knee watching the lecturer with one eye and trying to appear reasonably attentive.)

I get quite a nice time here on Sundays as all O/D’s**** draw cycles to go to church in Camberley. Needless to say no one goes to church. For my part, I repair to a certain YOCH I wot of and there drink gallons of tea (no sugar ….), smoke a pipe or two, and read ‘Country Life’ ‘Tatler’ and ‘Field’ until about noon when I lazily mount the crate and trundle back to my present abode at approx... 2mph. However, we make up for it during the week, especially in PT which consists of pretty bloody runs of about 3-4 miles over obstacle courses in battle order. Quite fun when you get used to it. I shall have to use pencil from here as I’ve run out of ink.

Life here, however, is quite pleasant on the whole though I hope to get transferred to an Infantry OCTU before I finish here. Recce’s all right but I prefer the old infantry.

Diller as you know I expect went to Leicester for initial training. I bet it’s shaking her. I went to Leicester once from Branksome***** if you remember but wasn’t impressed. Good huntin’ country.

Read Rose Macaulay’s ‘And no man’s wit’, also Noel Langley’s 'There’s a porpoise close behind us’ (re-read).

Plenty of swimming here, nearly every day in fact – I’ve got quite brown (-ed off…)

I’m supposed to be going home this wk-end for a few hrs. Only wish I could get to Plymouth but it’s really too much. I could have made Bristol I think. However you may move this way soon.

I was slung on a charge last week! Late on parade – but spun the Sqdn Cmdr a yarn and got admonishment – cushy. I’ll never make it again though, at any rate not with the same bloke – a Grenadier Gds major. All the officers here are either Grenadier Irish or Welsh Gds. No Scots or Coldstreams.

It’s now Tuesday evening and as I have a few minutes before dinner I’ll round this letter off. We're on parade again at 9 o’clock for a night march….

It’s been alternate sun and rain here all today, which is a good thing, for this place gets pretty dusty, also the rain helps to fill the swimming-pool.

The library here contains the Encyclopedia Britannica and Oxford so I’m quite happy to spend a few weeks there every now and then.

Our troop officer goes by the name of Brixey – Battle-mad Brixey – who’s really very decent and very cushy. The Guards Officers here nearly all wear long puttees, the old style, that is with service dress slacks. Very comic appearance until you get used to it.

I’m afraid this letter’s rambling on in my usual inimitable style (?) ….

(I’ve put your photo on my chest, furniture not anatomical – looks very good).

I’m very lucky in having Brian & Chunky as room-mates as we never seem to fight although we argue incessantly of course. Chunky being a Londoner hates the country period houses, beer, smoking, in fact all the luxuries of life. Brian being Irish and a pianist in the bargain is often moody and sometimes says hardly a word all day. He’s over six feet, about fourteen stone and will make a brilliant soldier. Plans to stay in the army after this show.

Chunky’s married but being ultra-modern has no children. Brian says he’s going to get married on his next leave. I believe I told you he was a ham before joining-up, and was a Captain in the IRA for two years. Nice people…..

Warrant Officers here call us Sir and we call them Sir so everyone’s happy. Occasionally the Sqdn Cmdr or someone dines with the troop which means about an hour and a half in the mess making conversation over really horrible coffee. Happily I smoke and get rid of the coffee to Brian who eats like a horse.

Well, Darling I’ll close here as I’ll have to post this before Dinner and the stunt tonight.

Hope to see you soon, Chotie Darling

All my love

Dicker

PS. Sorry half is in pencil but no-one has any ink at the moment I want it.

*See group photo of ATS from Bristol .

**This letter was addressed to:

W/242328

Pte Chalkley B.E.

ATS OFC ‘B’ Tp,

462 Hy (M) AA Bty RA

c/o GPO.

Millbrook

NR Plymouth

so Chotie’s unit must have moved to the Plymouth area. Millbrook is actually in Cornwall, on the western side of the Tamar estuary but defences here would have guarded the entrance to the Plymouth docks. Unfortunately there is no date visible on the envelope for this letter so the date is only guessed at in the context of the other letters. If I am right about 1^st June the move seems remarkably prescient since on 14th June Plymouth citizens had ‘one of their liveliest half-hour’s’ of the war in a heavy raid, which dropped between 70 and 80 high explosive bombs of between 250 and 1,000 kg. (From Plymouth Data. See also the National Archives.)

According to Phyllis M Rowe and Ivan Rabey on June 14^th “Hundreds of incendiary bombs fell on Saltash” (just north of Millbrook). “Torpoint suffered the effects of a blast from a direct hit on the Devonport Dockyard and phosphorous bombs fell on Mount Edgcumbe Park” (located on Rame Head near Millbrook).

(From “When Bombs Fell” "When Bombs Fell" contributed by Cornwall Action Community Service on the BBC People’s War website.

'WW2 People's War’ is an online archive of wartime memories contributed by members of the public and gathered by the BBC. The archive can be found at bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar.)

***a little village by the Harbour in Poole.

****Officers of the Day or Officer Developers?

*****Dick was stationed in Branksome from September 1941. See To Branksome.

3^rd June 1943 – de Gaulle establishes the Comité Français de Libération National as a ‘government in waiting’ (for the liberation of France).

4^th June 1943 – death of General Sikorski, head of the Polish government in exile and several other Polish leaders in a plane crash after take-off from Gibraltar. Sabotage has been suspected and there are various conspiracy theories. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

10^th June 1943 – the Pointblank Directive sets out a co-ordinated approach to Allied bombing in Europe with the Americans flying precision bombing missions by day and the RAF undertaking saturation bombing by night, mainly against German cities. (From Chronology of World War II and WW2-net Timelines.)

At last the Admiralty replace Naval Cipher 3 , which had been decrypted by the Germans in March 1942. Although the Germans were able to read 80% of the messages in Naval Cipher 3 only 10% were decrypted in time to take action. Still this had had a devastating effect on Atlantic shipping.

Posted on 01 June 2013 in Army life, ATS, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Sport, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Officers and Gentlemen - letter posted Saturday 22nd May 1943

ROYAL MILITARY COLLEGE

CAMBERLEY, SURREY

My Darling Chotie,

It seems ages since I heard from you and as I expect it’s the same with you – here goes.

As you will see from above I’m now at Sandhurst, which is quite a place.

I’ve been so busy the last few days, what with passing out (in more ways than one) at Blackdown and getting settled here, I haven’t had a moment to myself.

I was very disappointed with your inability to make Pagham, but realise what the hell of a journey Bristol is. But why didn’t you send a wire or something? Then I could have come down. Brinner and Diller were home as you probably know. We could have got really stewed – actually we did, but that’s another story. However, we must try again soon. I shall be able to get a week-end here and there, though I expect to be up to my eyes in work. I’ve been very lucky here in getting a room with Chunky* and Brian (my mates …. ) and an excellent servant who knows all the tricks of the trade – and then some.

(Don’t smile at this paper. It’s all they’ve got here, and needless to say they robbed me … Never again). I had a letter from Eric last week! No kidding. He “didn’t want our correspondence to collapse” or some rot or other. The rat. Doesn’t appear over happy, but then he never does.

Is Rosemary** still with you? Lucky Rosemary…. However, all good things come to an end – we’ll be kicked out of this Army before long – I hope.

I haven’t seen a flick for nearly a month, which cuts out that topic of conversation.

We’re allowed to wear civvies in the evenings here, also dine in them, but as I’m couponless it doesn’t really interest me.

So much for Sandhurst. I expect you know all about Bristol by now - all the pubs anyhow.

Diller and I found quite a good one in Chichester. It’s so old it doesn’t have a licence. It’s got some ancient charter from James I or some other bloke which dates back before shame even.

You’re lucky in having some relatives in the neighbourhood – I’ve never been near anyone.

Nothing new at home. Mother’s been offered Gentians (that little Tea Rooms by the Kings Beach) for £100 and is toying with the idea. Mike*** presents the only snag. I’m all for it as we would be able to get buckshee teas on leave. She always has these vague obsessions as well you know. She also wants to make out a thousand in our names (Diller, Bryn & myself) to avoid death duties should she be killed by a stray bomb…. Crazy’s right.

It must be over five months since I saw you last. Have you changed at all Darling? Don’t tell me you’re any slimmer ‘cos I’d never believe anything but my own eyes. I’ve had so many 771’s in the last few days I reckon it would be easier to turn nudist and have done with it. The old British public would raise horrified eyebrows, though you, I should imagine would remain entirely unruffled. (We’ve got a wonderful old oak outside our window. I have to keep stopping to gaze in rapt appreciation …. Must be the artist in me crying out like a voice in the wilderness against some aesthetic repression ….)

Brinner bought another Gigli**** when he was home. I won’t comment on it, as he and Solomon are the only two men in this poor world I would never attempt to criticize.

Have you read ‘Clochemerle’***** yet? Don’t ask for it in a bookshop as they would only give you a pretty old fashioned look anyway.

I spent a day up in town on my way back to Blackdown. Piccadilly was, as usual, full of the usual who keep stopping you which is all very embarrassing, especially for an innocent little boy like myself, in London Town to see the bright lights. I told one of them that she should be paying me, if only she knew me, which annoyed her not a little. I didn’t tell her I existed for Chotie alone.

Well Darling I must close here. Hope to see you soon. I’ll advise you when I can get a weekend.

All my love, Precious

Dicker

5731671 Officer Cadet Williams R.K.

77 Tp. ‘B’ Sqdn.

100 (Sandhurst) O.C.T.U. R.A.C.

Royal Military College

Camberley

Surrey.

*see letter of 18th April 1943.

**Rosemary was Chotie’s young cousin I think

***Mike was the family dog

*** Beniamino Gigli was an Italian tenor singer and Solomon was possibly the pianist Solomon Cutner. See letter of 7th February.

****see letter of 11th April.

“The eighteenth and nineteenth century British army was never that concerned about training its officers believing that character was the important thing and that the officer being a gentleman already knew how to use weapons and ride a horse. What was important was character.

During World War II the UK was faced with the major problem of having to train many thousands of lower middle class and working class, young men as officers. These young men had the military skills, they were veterans of campaigns in the desert and the jungle. They knew about war but they weren’t gentlemen as defined by the existing Army hierarchy.

The British Army developed a course based to a large part on the competencies related to being a gentleman. They realised of course that attitude and character are almost impossible to assess in terms of competencies so they had to identify the competencies that a gentleman would require and that could be assessed within a Competency Based Training Assessment (CBTA) model.

The competencies identified involved such things as accent, the way one walks, what one reads, and most important, how one eats.” (From the blog LowCloudCover.)

23^rd May 1942 - Beales, the Department store where Chotie worked through 1942, is bombed and burnt out in Bournemouth's worst bombing raid.

24th May 1943 – German ‘U’ boats are withdrawn from the North Atlantic effectively ending the battle of the Atlantic with an Allied victory. The campaign had come close to starving Britain into submission. Now America could build up forces in Britain ready for the invasion of Europe.

27^th May 1943 – The first meeting of the Conseil de la Résistance, led by Jean Moulin (de Gaulle’s appointed head of the French Resistance) succeeds in linking up the networks in northern France.

29^th May 1943 – in the Aleutian Islands, part of the Alaska territory between the North Pacific and the Bering Sea, the occupation of Attu Island by the Japanese ends with a banzai charge (a form of honourable suicide), killing over 2,300 Japanese with only 28 taken prisoner. taken prisoner. The Japanese withdrew from Kiska on 28^th July 1943 but this was only discovered on 15^th August when a large Allied invasion force landed on the island. (From Chronology of World War II and Wikipedia.)

29^th May 1943 – major RAF bombing raid on Wuppertal in Germany’s industrial Ruhr area creates a firestorm for the first time causing mass destruction and killing 3,400 people.

30th May 1943 – General de Gaulle lands in Algiers and is welcomed by Giraud, the French Vichy leader and now the Commander-in-Chief of French forces in North Africa. Suspicions remained between the former Vichy Army (the ‘moustachis’) of 230,000 troops and the 15,000 Free French (or ‘hadjis’) of the French Armée Afrique. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

1^st June 1943 – the British Actor Leslie Howard is killed when his plane is shot down returning from Portugal. The Luftwaffe may have been targeting the actor for his work supporting the Allies in Spain and Portugal or thought that Churchill on the plane. (P.S. Name-dropping! My father, Commander Victor Stephens, was also scheduled to fly with Howard but he had been drinking too heavily with him the night before, having just joined the Admiralty, and missed the plane. He was left with Leslie Howard’s tie as a sad memento. Dad made no mention of Howard's death or being in Portugal in his diaries but he presumably knew Howard through Laurence Olivier, whose wife Vivien Leigh was Howard's co-star in 'Gone with the Wind'. In the Fleet Air-Arm Dad was stationed with Olivier and his friend Ralph Richardson, who he later shared a flat with in London.)

Posted on 22 May 2013 in Army life, Books, Dorset, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sandhurst

On 12^th May 1943 Dick joined 100 Royal Armoured Corps OCTU

at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst

Record from Service & Casualty Form 12^TH MAY 1943:

C.B.T.A.* to No 1 Pre-OCTU, R.A.C.

W.E.F. 15^th May ’43 posting to 162^nd OCTU (HAC**) Sandhurst.

*Competency Based Training Assessment?

**Honourable Artillery Company

The Royal Military College in Sandhurst, Surrey, is now where all officers of the British Army are trained to lead soldiers. However, in World War 2 Sandhurst was used solely as the Royal Armoured Corps Training Unit OCTU from 1942.

12^th May 1943 – start Churchill and Roosevelt’s Trident Conference in Washington with the British seeking commitment to the invasion of Italy and America urging the invasion of Western Europe. D-day, the target date for the Allies cross-Channel invasion of Europe was set for 1^st May 1944 and the British agreed that 7 Divisions would be withdrawn from Italy before 1st November to support the forces landing in France. One of these was Dick's future fighting Division, the 50th. Roosevelt agreed to the US 14^th Air Force continuing to build up air power in China to attack Japanese shipping although Stilwell, the US Commander in China and Burma, argued for more land forces to retake northern Burma. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

13^th May 1943 – the Royal Navy begin the bombardment of Pantelleria Island between Tunisia and Sicily. This was followed by aerial bombing in early June and Allied invasion on 10^th June 1943 (Operation Corkscrew) in preparation for the invasion of Sicily. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

14th May 1943 – the Government Code and Cipher School at Bletchley Park decodes a message confirming the success of the Operation Mincemeat deception.

15th May 1943 – Stalin announces the dissolution of the Comintern, the Communist International organisation working for world revolution. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

16th May 1943 – RAF bomber squadron No 617, known as ‘the Dambusters’, successfully breaches the Möhne a nd Eder dams with bouncing bombs, flooding the Ruhr valley and damaging the electricity supply to Germany’s industrial heartland. Unfortunately more than a thousand of those killed in ‘Operation Chastise’ were Allied prisoners of war (mainly from the Soviet Union).

17^th May 1943 – Operation Schwartz, Germany’s 5^th offensive against Marshal Tito’s communist partisans in Yugoslavia, who had liberated large areas of Yugoslavia from Axis control. 10 days later a British liaison team parachuted in to join up with the Partisans. The Allies had previously supported their rivals - General Mihailovic’s Royalist Chetnik forces, based in Serbia. By September 1943 Britain had established permanent formal liaison with the Partisans.

Large German night raid against Cardiff, believed to be in retaliation for the Dambusters raid. (From WW2-net Timelines.) Chotie's anti-aircraft unit was probably involved as planes approached the city via the Severn Estuary.

18th May 1943 – a German ‘wolf-pack attack’ begins on the merchant Convoy SC-30 but, thanks to the Bletchley Park codebreakers, no Allied ships are lost and five U-boats are sunk.

Posted on 12 May 2013 in Army life, ATS, History, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Records, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Leave without Chotie

Telegram 5^th May 1943

GO STRAIGHT TO PAGHAM = RICHARD ++

Dick was given 7 days leave at the end of his Pre-OCTU training.

Chotie didn’t make it down to Pagham, meet up with Dick during his leave or wire him.

7^thMay 1943 – Following the success of Operation Strike British forces capture Tunis and the Americans enter Bizerte in Tunisia. This ends the Battle of Tunisia and the Axis North Africa Campaign. On 13^th May German and Italian Forces in Africa surrendered to the Allies who took over 230,000 prisoners of war. (See WW2-net Timelines.)

9^thMay 1943 – defectors, who may have been British agents, flew a Junkers 88 fighter bomber from Denmark to Scotland, narrowly avoiding being shot down by spitfires before landing. The plane was of great value to British intelligence because it carried the new Liechtenstein BC radar set, contributing to the development of new Window (see Telecommunications Research Establishment) radar interference by T.R.E. (See Wikipedia.)

11^th May 1943 – the withdrawal of the British and Indian armies from Maungdaw in western Burma marks the end of the British Arakan campaign. All the ground gained since September 1942 has been lost to the Japanese with c.5,000 Allied casualties. (From Chronology of World War II .)

American forces land on the Aleutian Islands in the far northern Pacific (between Russia’s Kamchatka and the USA’s Alaska). Two US Aleutian Islands, Attu and Kiska, had been occupied by the Japanese since June 1942 - the only US soil taken by the Japanese.

Posted on 05 May 2013 in Army life, History, Photos, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Gunnery - Wednesday 28th April 1943

Wednesday

My Darling Chotie,

Many thanks for letter of a few days ago. I seem to have a couple of hours buckshee so I’ve decided to reply while I have the opportunity.

Glad to hear you’ve settled down at Bristol – I use Bristol in a rather broad sense – and finding the company of your friends congenial if not that of your male companions*. Never mind Lulubelle – you’ve always got me to fall back on….

I’ve managed to get this far without being retarded though I had a shaky time on wireless. At present I’m doing gunnery which is pretty cushy – I hope. If I get through this – and all goes well I should get leave on the 8^th May – 4 days only. Bit naughty isn’t it? Then its Sandhurst here I come …. (and go!) But remember I shall have to get through gunnery….

However that’s enough of this wishful thinking.

I hope to get home this weekend if all goes well. The snag here is that if you drop your rifle on parade or anything stupid like that, you lose all your weekends for a month or so. So far I’ve managed to escape this nightmare.

Had to give a lecture this morning – and chose ‘Factors in Post-War Economic Planning’ – sounded rather good to me. It went over very well. Lot of rot, of course, but then you know me ….

There were three of us here discussing letter-writing in all its aspects. We have come to the inevitable conclusion that as an art it has definitely degenerated, in fact we have the greatest difficulty in writing anything at all. All my notes are much behind schedule and leave a lot to be desired.

Had rather a good tea today. Went into the mess and had egg & chips – so we just walked out and in again at the other end and had some more egg & chips. Pretty nippy.

Well, Darling I must close here owing to ink rationing,

All my love

Dicker

*Mum told me she developed quite a crush on one of her male ATS officers early in her career. Unfortunately he seemed to be ‘working his way through the ranks’. Although initially ATS girls had gained a poor reputation for behaviour by 1942 Major Rees Williams wrote in this article on the Gunner Girls: “No mother need be afraid of entrusting her daughter to a gunner unit”. Not strictly true of all Mixed Batteries perhaps?

I wonder if this photo is of Chotie's officer? It was among her wartime memorabilia.

He is included in this group photo ATS (taken by R.F.Wills of 40 Clarendon Road Bristol - click on the image and it will appear in a separate window) so seems to date from summer 1943. Chotie has ringed her face (end of second row from the back on the right). The officer is in the third row back, fifth from the right.

This photo of ATS officers from the group above has had others torn out – possibly including the handsome officer above? All the photos were kept by Chotie.

Chotie would also have met Lance Corporal Rosemary Stewart (see Rosemary's comment ) during her time with B troop:

“I am on the group photograph – 1^st left on the second row up. I had lost my copy of that photo so it was marvellous to see it again!

How well I remember Barbara, – she had the most lovely smile and the most beautiful hair which she had great difficulty in keeping up above collar level as laid down in Kings Regulations!

I was a Lance Corporal in those days, and she was a member of my team. I always remember how she had a pair of eye lash curlers which she always insisted on using before going on parade! None of us aspired to such sophisticated beauty aids.

I also remember that she had a picture of her sister’s wedding on show in the barrack room. Barbara told me all about her family and her work before she joined up, and I remember how much she looked forward to the letters from Dicker.

I was with the battery in Bristol, Plymouth, Hull and a few other places before going off to OCTU.”

30th April 1943 – a Spanish fisherman discovers a corpse in the sea near Huelva, apparently the body of a drowned English major. This was Operation Mincemeat -a hoax carefully constructed by British Intelligence with the corpse carrying false letters that suggested the Allies planned to invade southern Europe through Greece and Sardinia but would pretend to invade via Sicily. The Spanish passed this information to the Germans who strengthened their defences in Greece, Sardinia and Corsica, reducing them in Sicily, even just prior to the Allies’ invasion in July.

3^rdMay 1942 - Lieutenant General Frank M. Andrews, the Commander of the US Forces in Europe (he had succeeded Eisenhower when Ike was appointed Allied Commander in North Africa in February 1943) and one of the founders of the US Air Force, is killed in an air crash in Iceland.

Posted on 28 April 2013 in Army life, ATS, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Naked - Sunday 18th April 1943

Same address

Sunday

My Darling Chotie,

Many thanks for your letter received a couple of days ago.

Glad to hear you’re stationed in a fairly decent area* at least better than this horrible place – nothing but military for miles, and you know what they can do when they feel like it.

I’ve had to spend this weekend here again owing to Church Parade (UB**) and as there’s no travel next week (Easter) I’ll not be able to get home for some time. I’ve so much work to do, I couldn’t really have spared the time anyhow. I’ve been writing up notes for hours and hours this week-end – having had no time to get a beer even. Horrible….

Sorry to have missed your relatives in such a sorry way, but I see you didn’t lose anything. Trust you….where your tummy’s concerned anyhow.

I haven’t read anything or seen any flicks for weeks – my pipe’s my only solace in these hard times.

I’ve been thinking of going to see the family at Purley – I shall probably go when I’m at Sandhurst. The happy advantage is that it doesn’t take long to get there and what’s more important, doesn’t cost much.

I didn’t tell you that I shaved my tache*** off, did I? It’s been growing again for the last fortnight or so. This means that I couldn’t see you in my present naked state, anyhow. Only hope it grows before our next encounter. I don’t know how it happened
– I just sort of dashed it off. Shook me, pretty badly. However I rallied and started again. It’s coming along very nicely, thank you.

The blokes here have started tumbling in the barrack room on a couple of mattresses – helluva racket. Needless to say, I started it. Initially, I had control over it but now it’s run amok and no-one can do anything about it. ‘Chunky’ 5ft2 ex chef of the ‘Trocadero’, is pretty good. ‘Enoch’ is U.S.****

Well, Darling, I must close here.

Hope to see you soon.

All my love

Dicker

PS Have you heard from Eve lately? I’d like to know how that rat’s getting on ….

*“Our camp at Pill was close to Avonmouth, nearer the sea” (from ‘Chotie’s Story’.) Chotie, brought up not far from the beautiful beaches and Harbour in Poole, hated being away from the sea.

ATS paddling - one of Chotie's photos (1943 or later?)

**UB – utter bore?

***moustache

****U.S. – British slang for useless.

18^th April 1943 – having intercepted Japanese secret communication codes, US fighter planes successfully shoot down the plane carrying Admiral Yamamoto, Commander of the Japanese Combined Fleet. (From Chronology of World War II.)

Allied fighter planes from North Africa shoot down 74 Luftwaffe planes in what became known among US troops as the “Palm Sunday turkey shoot”.

19^th April 1943 – Waffen SS German troops attempt to storm the Warsaw Ghetto. Jewish inhabitants of the ghetto, with some support from Polish resistance groups, fought against transportation by the Nazis to Treblinka extermination camp. They had been told they were to be resettled in the east and thought they might go to forced labour camps but by 1943 news of the death camps had leaked out. Almost 300,000 Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto had already been murdered at Treblinka in 1942. The defenders were initially successful but despite bitter resistance were defeated by 16th May - the SS set fire to the buildings and flooded the sewers where they were hiding. By June the Ghetto had been destroyed and most of the c.70,000 Ghetto residents were killed there or at Treblinka.

19th April 1943 - Montgomery’s 8th Army attacks the Axis defences near Enfidaville, south of Tunis but suffers heavy losses. Operation Vulcan with the Allies First Army followed on 22nd April and was able to slowly advance west of Tunis and Bizerte.

Posted on 18 April 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Poole, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Out Driving - Sunday 11th April

Same address

Sunday

My Darling Chotie,

Many thanks for your letter and the news of your change of address. Hope you prefer it to Oswestry, - at least you’re a little nearer home ….

I shall be here for the next seven months or so – at least in this neighbourhood I suppose.

‘Fraid I don’t know Bristol – all the blokes in my room at Dover came from this most antique of ports, and, needless to say, consider it the model town of the whole country. The Clifton Suspension bridge is considered one of the chef d’oeuvres* in the structural engineering world. I also know a BA who lives at Clifton, hails from the varsity. That about finishes my knowledge of the town. Glad to hear you’ve made a friend there. Always seems to help matters.

I’ve dropped for Guard Commander for Tuesday next so I’m spending the weekend blancoing etc.

I start on wireless tomorrow – for a fortnight then a fortnight gunnery – then leave and Sandhurst, maybe…

I believe I told you there’s an RA** crowd here (ATS). Always seem to be doing predictor stuff.

(Have stopped writing to have chat with bloke who’s hobby was mountaineering – very interesting. Another bloke here – the medico - says his greatest ambition in life is to become a member of the Royal Yacht Squadron! Nothing like aiming high, is there? He’ll probably make it.)

We’ll have to arrange something about my next leave. You may be able to get a 72hr or something. I’ll let you know all details when they arrive.

Had two days out driving last week. Went to Brighton on Thursday and Oxford on Friday. Saw Gloucester*** arriving through Oxford in his Rolls. (One of his Rolls). Also went through Bicester, Aylesbury, Windsor Great Park, etc. Made quite a change as I don’t really know this area.

The country round here is pretty marvellous but the Army of course have got their hands on most of it. There are literally hundreds of period houses, mostly Tudor cottages which have been used as weekend hide-outs, I should imagine. It makes me wince every time I see the military in them.

I’m reading (in brief snatches) Gabriel Chevallier’s ‘Clochemerle’, which is a rather licentious tale of life in a French village. Very amusing.

I’m boring you again I suppose so will close here. Will let you know of any developments as regards leave, etc

All my love

Darling

Dicker

P.S. Excuse envelope – it’s all I have.

* ‘chef d’oeuvre’ – French for masterpiece

** RA – Royal Artillery

***Presumably Prince Henry, the Duke of Gloucester and third son of King George V. He was appointed potential regent by his brother George VI should he die while his daughter, the future Elizabeth II was a minor.

Meanwhile Eric Postles , our friend from the 61^st Recce, was in the Chilterns of Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire:

“We moved to Ashridge Park near Berkhamsted. While there we had a local exercise with the Dutch Princess Irene Brigade and got an almighty rocket for setting fire to a haystack. We lived rough for about a month at Cheddington and Chalfont, range firing at Orford Ness on the Suffolk coast, anti-aircraft firing at Clacton (many streets were evacuated and we slept in one of the empty houses). We regularly went to Thetford Battle Range for live firing and had an exercise with the Polish Army in the same area. We caused mayhem in Ely on our way back to camp when someone fired a smoke bomb from their armoured car, which resulted in the fire brigade being called out.”

Anthony Rampling joined the 61st Reconnaissance Regiment while it was camping in a field between Chalfont St Giles and Chalfont St Peter, not far from Tring.

12^th April 1943 – German radio announces they have found the mass graves of thousands of Polish officers, deported and killed by the Soviet Union, in Katyn Forest near Smolensk in Russia. Almost 15,000 Polish army and police officers and intelligentsia had been killed by the Soviets in April 1940. This threatened a diplomatic crisis among the Allies and was denied by the Soviet Union, who blamed the massacre on the Germans, until 1990. (From WW2-net Timelines, Chronology of World War II and Wikipedia.)

17^thApril 1943 – in a US daylight bombing of aircraft factories in Bremen with 115 B-17 bombers 15 Allied planes were lost. Allied air losses over Germany were very high in spring 1943.

Japan mounted its largest air strike since Pearl Harbour attacking Guadalcanal, Tulagi, Port Moresby and Milne Bay in New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

Posted on 11 April 2013 in Army life, ATS, Books, History, Letters from Dick, Promotion/Demotion, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Getting fat - Sunday 28th March 1943

Chotie at home on leave in her ATS uniform

Home address

Sunday

Chotie Darling,

Received your card & letter yesterday. Regret to say I couldn’t make Parkstone for a 24 hr, as I can’t get a pass that far.

I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do about this leave as I’m working up ‘til seven or eight every night, and even if you could get up to Woking, I wouldn’t be able to see you.

Hope you have a lazy time on your leave – try not to exert yourself too much …. At least there’s no reveille – but no cups of tea in bed!

I’ve managed to get home for a few hours so took this opportunity of writing a few lines. As you’ve probably heard Diller is home for a week – prior to enlistment I suppose.

When I get to Sandhurst I get 48 every month so will be able to travel far enough to see you, always presuming you get posted to the South somewhere. Try to.

I’ve passed out the first three weeks – ie the hard graft, and get it much cushier for the next six – nearly all theory. I shall probably get fat or something – then you won’t love me any more….

Must close here Darling

All my love

Dicker

By the spring of 1943 the Soviet Army had air superiority over the Luftwaffe for the first time (due to the toll on German planes in the Mediterranean and fighting Allied bombers in Germany). The Axis powers had 2,700, 000 men fighting on the eastern front while the Red Army more than doubled this with many more tanks, vehicles and armaments. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

1^stApril 1943 – President Roosevelt freezes wages, salaries and prices to stem inflation in the US where meat, fats, canned goods and cheese are now rationed. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

Posted on 28 March 2013 in Army life, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rather indelicate tales - Sunday 14th March 1943

5731671 P/CDT Williams RK

30.0 Tp ‘A’ Sqdn.

No1. Pre-OCTU R.A.C.

Alma Barracks, Blackdown, Hants

Sunday

My Darling Chotie,

As Sunday has again occurred I find I have a few minutes, to write to you.

It seems ages since I heard from you – but I expect you’re in the same position as I am – one of a temporary scarcity of spare time.

I’ve managed to settle down here, as much as is possible anyhow, but find myself pretty rushed off my feet and expect to be the same for the rest of my stay here.

The compensations, such as they are, consist of such luxuries as hot water, showers, marvellous food, and plenty of clothing exchanges.

There’s a whole harem of ATS here – they do all the admin. Duties, office work, driving, etc. They never seem to do any parades, apart from one Church Parade per month. Pretty cushy.

(I must make an apology here for using this paper, but I’m fed up with using poky little writing-pads.)

I rather fancy that this letter will read like a young novel. However, I resume.

The instructors here are all Guards N.C.Os. Coldstream, Grens*, Irish, Welsh
etc and aren’t too bad on the whole. We get a helluva lot of square-bashing, much too much for me, anyhow, as I reckon I’ve had enough after nearly three years in this racket.

I expect you’re getting interested in the leave problem – and what a problem! I only wish I could get mine, but I’m afraid I’ve missed it and certainly won’t get any until after this nine weeks.

The real job starts at Sandhurst, but there you get a batman and are allowed a collar and tie(!) even though still a cadet – but that’s a long time yet.

I can get week-end passes from here – provided I’m not on duty, but it’s a lousy journey and the fare would be well over a quid. On top of this there’s the fact that you need every available moment to blanco** and keep your notes up to date. What a tale of woe! – anyway that’s about enough of my troubles.

I suppose you’re quite the old soldier by now. You won’t, however, be able to give me any old buck as I know the ropes.

You should get a better time when you get on a site somewhere – the initial training is always the stiffest, and the most boring.

Needless to say, I don’t get any time to read here, and I gather it’s the same with you.

Happily, I’m with quite a bright crowd – an actor (ham), medical student, couple of school-marms, buyer from Lewis’ Leicester, art student and several other buckshees.

I met LISBY here; do you know him? Rather fat, blond, used to work at Bank in Broadstone and ARP at Municipal Buildings. Went to Poole Grammar. He’s a pre cadet for the Tank Corps. (I seem to be rambling on, all to no purpose).

Heard Ruth Naylor*** (waltz-song from Bohème) on Naafi Radio this morning. Pretty wonderful.

I miss my friend Alex**** from the 43^rd. Like Eric we had much in common, particularly opera. I promised to write, but then no one ever does.

The ham here knows lots of people we knew on the London stage, and every night-club in Mayfair. He knows enough about such people as Daphne du Maurier, Michael Redgrave, Noel Coward, etc to blackmail them a hundred times*****. Comes out with some rather indelicate tales after lights-out. (I’m thinking about taking this letter up with a publisher).

Had letters from home yesterday – no news. Brinner’s on a course somewhere. Diller is still expecting to do something. Expecting is as far as it will get.

How’s everyone at Parkstone? Give them all my best wishes when you write
won’t you?

Well, Darling, I must close here as its nearly lights-out and they’re pretty mustard on that sort of thing.

Hope I can see you before very long. I can’t tell you how much I miss you, Chotie, that would be quite impossible, but I do think about you and love you very, very, much.

Perhaps, this wretched show will end sooner than either of us imagine and we can be together again. I’m much more interested in that than any b----- commission.

God bless you, Chotie

always yours

Dicker

*Grenadier Guards

**Blanco was a cleaning compound used on the cotton of army uniforms.

***Ruth Naylor was an Australian soprano, famous for her appearance in Puccini’s opera La Bohème.

****Alex Johnston

****Practising male homosexuality was illegal in Britain at this time. Daphne du Maurier’s bisexuality has not been confirmed. She was Dick’s favourite writer and married to his former Commanding Officer in the Air Landing, Frederick ‘Boy’ Browning.

16th March 1943 – the largest convoy battle of the war begins in the Atlantic when three wolfpacks of 38 submarines attack a convoy of c.100 Allied merchant ships (Convoys HX229 and SC122). 22 merchant ships and one U-boat were sunk. More than 300 seamen lost their lives.

19^thMarch 1943 – Montgomery's British 8^th Army attacks the Mareth line, held by German and Italian defenders in southern Tunisia, winning the battle by 26^thMarch. The initial attack by the 50th Northumbrian Division (later to be attached to 61st Recce) was a disaster but by 26th March the Germans were forced to withdraw.

22nd March 1943 – the newly built gas chamber IV is opened at the Auschwitz Concentration Camp in Poland, followed by the opening of a gas chamber in Auschwitz II-Birkenau on 31st March and gas chamber V on the 4th April. Approximately one million people were killed at Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp - mainly Jews (approximately 90%) but also more than 70,000 Poles and about 20,000 Gypsies. (See Auschwitz-Birkenau and WW2-net Timelines.)

The Free French air fighter squadron, later known as the Normandie-Nieman group, go into action on the Eastern front in support of the Red Army.

24th March 1943 – the Chindits are ordered to return to India having lost about one third of the original force in Burma. (See Operation Longcloth.)

Posted on 14 March 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Poole, Promotion/Demotion | Permalink | Comments (0)

Best Battle Dress - Monday 8th March 1943

5731671 P/Cdt Williams R

30-0 Tp ‘A’ Sqdn

No1. Pre-OCTU R.A.C.

Alma Barracks, Blackdown, Hants

My Darling,

I have at last found a spare moment to drop you a line. I arrived here on Thursday last and this is the first chance I’ve had of doing anything for myself.

I’m here for a minimum of 9 weeks – probably longer before going to Sandhurst* – that is of course if I pass this.

The old spit & polish here is murder, have to change to best B.D.* for every meal…..However, that’s enough of this.

Have you heard of Eric & Eve yet? I suppose they’re well & truly hitched by now….poor old Eric.

Seems ages since I saw you, Chotie. Don’t suppose I’ll be able to see you for some time either. I’ll get leave after this course and another half way thro’ OCTU I hope….

I haven’t had any pay for weeks – don’t know when I’ll get any either. I’ve been living on capital (?) since I’ve been here.

I’m afraid I won’t be able to write very much for the first few weeks – at least that’s what we were told by the C.O. The general idea is to rush you off your feet for some time, until things quieten down a bit.

At Sandhurst we get our own billets & batman. Some life.

Well, Darling, there’s really nothing to write about – I’d much sooner hear how you’re getting used to Army life. I expect you’re just starting to get browned-off by now.

I must close here as I’ve tons of work to do. We’re on parade from 6 am to 7.30 pm. Murder.

Bye bye, Chotie Darling

Always yours

Dicker

xxxx

P.S. Please get address right as there’s a helluva lot of delays.

*Then the Royal Military College Sandhurst Royal Military College Sandhurst used as the Royal Armoured Corps OCTU for the latter part of WW2.

*B.D. – battle dress.

© Chotie Darling
Eve and Eric (Kessler?)'s wedding on 6th March 1943

9^thMarch 1943 – Rommel, the German Commander known as ‘the Desert Fox’, leaves Africa with jaundice and exhaustion and never returns.

13^thand 14^th March 1943 – ‘liquidation’ of the the Krakow Ghetto in Poland. Polish Jews had been persecuted since Hitler’s invasion of Poland at the beginning of the war. In March 1941 all of the city’s Jews were forced to leave or crammed into the Ghetto area. From 30^th May 1942 Jews were systematically deported from the Ghetto to surrounding concentration camps. During the Krakow Ghetto massacre those able to work were deported to the Plaszow slave labour camp; c.2,000 Jews (mainly children, the old and the ill) were shot in the streets and approximately 3,000 others were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau where most were murdered in the gas chambers. (See Krakow Timeline and History of the Krakow Ghetto.)

13th March 1943 – an assassination attempt against Hitler led by Major-General Henning von Treskow fails when the bomb in Hitler’s plane fails to detonate. A second attempt on 21st March also failed when Hitler left the building before the suicide bomber, Colonel Fresher von Gersdoff, could successfully detonate his explosives. Staff of Army Group Centre, on the Eastern Front, were behind both attempts.

14th March 1943 – the German Army in Russia retakes Kharkov in the Ukraine and almost surrounds the over-extended Soviet Army on that front.

Posted on 08 March 2013 in Army life, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Pre-OCTU

Chotie Darling

Dedicated to the memory of my mother and all those who hold the
forever young of war in their hearts.

Part 3 Lieutenant Williams

Chapter 8 OCTU

On 4th March 1943

Dick was permanently attached to No 1 Pre OCTU* RAC**

30.0 Troop ‘A’ Squadron No 1

and stationed at Alma Barracks, Blackdown, near Aldershot in Hampshire

Copy of Record from Service & Casualty Form

*O.C.T.U. = Officer Cadet training Unit

**R.A.C. = Royal Armoured Corps

Dick was missing out on Exercise Spartan, the first Home Forces exercise for invasion of Europe. It's codename implied the severity of it's nature, with cookhouses withdrawn for two or more days at a time and instructions that on no account was anyone to buy food or accept gifts of food from the civilian population. The 43rd represented part of the Allied invasion forces - in 'Record of a Reconnaissance Regiment - History of the 43rd', edited by Jeremy Taylor, he writes "Exercise 'Spartan' will remain in the minds of those present as an aptly named endurance test ...." - while Dick's future colleagues in the 61st Infantry Division formed part of the German forces in occupation of Eastern England.

Eric Postles recalls:

“This exercise, the biggest ever held in Britain involved British and Canadian forces and was scheduled to last 2 weeks. Our start line was at Princes Risborough and involved fording the River Thames. The troop officer’s carrier got stuck in the water and towed out but was a non-runner. My carrier was detailed to tow it and in the early morning we pulled into a farm off the main Whitney-Oxford Road. We stayed there helping the farmer in return for milk and eggs and the villagers also brought us food. The REME (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) recovery truck found us and they also decided to stay until the exercise ended. When we ran out of money we sold a new officer’s (Lt. Winzer*) blankets, which were in the carrier, to buy beer at a nearby pub. He didn’t know who was responsible until we told him in Normandy. He was later killed. We re-joined the squadron at Woburn Abbey.”

“Men were still returning to Colchester for days afterwards, some having been taken prisoner and had to clear rubble at Southampton docks.”

* The officer, Lt. Geoff Winzer, later became a close friend of Dick’s. (Extracts from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

The 145 (Berkshire Yeomanry) Fd Regiment Royal Artillery War Diary records that the “61^st Infantry Division were on the move in Bucks and Berks” from 3^rd to 6^th March but by 10^th March had been “badly knocked up by the enemy” in Exercise Spartan. “Isolated units, including the whole of the Regiment withdrawn to Woburn area, where remnants of 61 Division come under command 49 Division” (from World War 2 Talk Forum.)

5^thMarch 1943 – the first Allied raid of the Battle of the Ruhr, on Essen in Germany. Pathfinder planes deployed the new oboe radar detection to locate targets. The Battle ended on 30^th July 1943 having finally stopped steel production at the Krupp armaments factory in Essen and delayed tank production for the eastern front summer offensives.

6th March 1943 - Rommel launches another offensive from the Mareth line but the British had successfully decoded his messages and Montgomery was ready with an ambush. The Germans suffered heavy losses.

7th March 1943 – a new North Atlantic wolfpack of German ‘U’ boat submarines is formed and codename ‘Raubgraf’ (Robber Baron). One four day period in the middle of March saw 27 merchant vessels sunk by German U-boats. (From WW2-net Timelines .)

Posted on 04 March 2013 in Army life, History, Records, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

How many women have you slept with? - Thursday 25th February

As usual

Thursday

My Darling,

Many thanks for your letter received yesterday. Glad to hear you’re still alive & kicking, even though rather over-worked…

Well, Precious, I have got an item of news this time, as, since last writing to you, I’ve been on and passed a War Office Selection Board for Commission. It will mean a long and arduous task ahead but with proverbial luck and good management I see no reason why I shouldn’t be successful in this respect.

I am now waiting to go on a pre-OCTU course, which may last any time before eventually getting to an OCTU. After that it’s about six months of merry hell before getting the old commiss!

What a game it is,,,I had three marvelous days on the Board, as all the time you’re there you’re treated as an Officer – even waited on at table by ATS….

Marvelous old Georgian House and Estate* has been loaned to the W.O. for this purpose and the owner had the decency to leave all his furniture there. The pictures alone were insured for £120000!

You spend three & ½ days there doing just about anything the human body can do – and more, - intelligence tests, exams, interviews with Brigadiers, Colonels and psychiatrists etc.

First question the last mentioned asked me, was “How many women have you slept with?”….

Shook me – rotten.

Most of the paintings I knew – several of Manet, Monet, Cézanne etc. so I had an interesting chat with the Brigadier and visiting woman M.P. Apparently the owner used to buy still life & his wife, the nudes. Some of the nudes shook us …..All excused like strip-tease, under “ART”.

I’ll let you know any further developments should they arise.

I wrote to and had a long reply from Benetti** the fellow at Hove. Sent me a
letter full of arias, and invitations to stay with him. The bloke’s a genius on arias. Hope to look him up on my next leave, which brings me to a sore point.

I’ve had the wretched thing cancelled indefinitely! Heaven knows when I’ll get it. However one can’t talk of commissions and leave in the same breath I suppose.

Saw ‘In which we serve’*** this week. Wasn’t very impressed I’m afraid, though Captain’s wife’s speech was rather brilliant.

Must close here Darling

All my love

Dicker

*Brockham Park, Betchworth, Surrey.

**See letter of 3^rd September 1942 – Return to Dover.

***Patriotic British war film – ‘the story of a ship’ – directed by Nöel Coward and David Lean and starring Nöel Coward. Celia Johnson played the Captain’s wife.

140,000 candidates attended War Office Selection Boards during the course of the war. Dick was one of the 60,000 successful candidates.

In 1943 a further instruction was given to WOSBs - that no questions about sex and religion should be asked by psychiatrists.

(From ‘The British Army and the People’s War’ by Jeremy A. Crang)

43^rd Recce continued Troop & Squadron Training to Friday 26^th February when there was also an All Ranks Dance. On Saturday 27^th there was Maintenance and the Commanding Officer’s Vehicle Inspection as usual, as well as ‘Recreational Training’.

Church Parade was held on Sunday and there was a presentation of a certificate for Good Service to Major B.V.J. Vigrass by the C.O. Major Vigrass also received an MBE and the Territorial Decoration during his career.

Troop & Squadron took place again on the 1^stand 2^nd March. At 5pm on 3^rd March the Regiment moved out of barracks to take part in Exercise Spartan, the
first Home Forces exercise for the invasion of Europe and the largest exercise the British Army had ever carried out but Dick was not with them.

(From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

28^thFebruary 1943 – Operation Gunnerside, the most successful of the sabotage attacks on the Telemark heavy water plant in Norway destroys the Germans' capacity to provide heavy water of a sufficient quality for nuclear bombs. The Norwegian commando saboteurs were trained by SOE (British Special Operations Executive).

28^th February 1943 – German wives of Jewish men gather in Berlin to protest against the deportation of their husbands to concentration camps. By 8^th March over 1,000 wives have gathered and Goebbels releases 1,500 Jewish men to stop the protest spreading. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

Eric Postles February 1943

“61 Division moved back to England. After many rumours and much speculation we went by rail to Larne, onto Stanraer and ended at Roman Way Camp, Colchester (a regular army camp) for Exercise Spartan.” (Extracts from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

Tony Rampling joined 61^st Recce after they returned to England. Having completed his basic training in Norwich in autumn 1942, he’d been posted to Barnard Castle, where he learned to fire a Bren Gun in the Royal Armoured Corps until January 1943. This skill and his intelligence would have marked him out as a potential Recce man. He was briefly placed in the Royal West Kent holding regiment before joining the Reconnaissance.

1^st March 1943 – American Jews held a mass rally in Madison Square Gardens, New York to pressure the US government into helping the Jews of Europe.

Early in March 1943 Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer of the Schutzstaffel (SS leader) visited Treblinka where 8,000 Jews and Gypsies were killed between 1942 and August 1943 and ordered that all the corpses were to be dug up and burned. The ashes were spread far over the surrounding countryside to hide the murders. This work took eight months. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

2nd to 4th March 1943 – in the Battle of the Bismarck Sea US and Australian air forces successfully attacked a convoy carrying Japanese troops to New Guinea. Thousands of Japanese soldiers were killed and the eight transporter ships and four destroyers were sunk. The Americans had adopted a new technique of ‘skip-bombing’ – coming in low and bouncing their bombs in by the side of the ship to explode. This gave them daylight supremacy in the sea. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

2nd March 1943 – heavy bombing of Berlin by the Allies

2^ndto 4^th March 1943 – in the Battle of the Bismarck Sea US and Australian air forces successfully attacked a convoy carrying Japanese troops to New Guinea. Thousands of Japanese soldiers were killed and the eight transporter ships and four destroyers were sunk.

3rd March 1943 – 173 people were killed by suffocation and trampling in Bethnal Green underground station when panic set in. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

END of Chapter 7

43^rd Reconnaissance – the beginning of the end

and Part 2 RECONNAISSANCE.

Posted on 25 February 2013 in Army life, ATS, Film, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Promotion/Demotion, The Recce Men, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Alex Johnston - Tuesday 16th February 1943

5731671 Tpr Williams R

Mortar Tp HQ Sqn

43^rd Recce Regt

Home Forces

Tuesday 16^th

My Darling,

Many thanks for letter received this afternoon. I haven’t been able to write you owing to pressure of work of late. However here goes.

I’m in a canteen at the moment which boasts a piano (NAAFI style), and am now hoping to get my friend† to murder the ‘Warsaw’. He’s very nervous & won’t play if there’re too many people about – hallmark of a great artist….

Sorry to hear you’ve been so busy lately, but the first 3 months are always the worst. After nearly three years I do practically nothing.

Had four letters today – Bryn, Diller, Mother & yours.

Bryn had ‘marvelous time’ on leave, ending up by meeting a woman in London. Apparently he met her in Bridport. Name of Pamela Gluning – redhead. Diller gave me all the ‘dope’ – Bryn never even mentioned her. I’ve told him he’d better come clean.

Went for a walk on Sunday afternoon by myself (my mate was on 48) and had tea at country pub. Quite a change.

Haven’t been to flicks for simply ages – lost all interest. Seems little chance of getting any leave, but still soldier on.

Bryn bought a couple of discs when on leave – the ‘Warsaw’ and Gigli’s* ‘La donna è mobile’ (Rigoletto)** so will probably wear these out when I get home.

Found time to read Eleanor Peters’ ‘Tare Harvest’***, little else.

Diller will have to leave bank shortly, as Quayle goes. She’s been offered a chance abroad with V.A.D.**** Doesn’t think she’ll take it. She’ll end up in munitions if she’s not careful. Probably do her good anyhow.

Weather’s lovely here. How’s it with you?

Should like to see N Wales, but don’t like the people, I’m afraid. Biased again….

What’s the crowd like you’re with? Hope they’re better than my lot. If ever there was a dull mob it’s the Recce.

I’ll close here, Darling and write again shortly

toutà toi Chérie*****

Dicker

* Famous Italian tenor Beniamino Gigli

** ‘The Woman is Fickle’ - a song from Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Rigoletto.

***A novel about an English family farming in the Chilean Andes.

****Voluntary Aid Detachment – unpaid nursing assistants on the front line. Diller was presumably affected by the new call up for women (see 13th January 1943).

***** “tout à toi Chérie” – French for “All yours darling”.

† Trooper DONALD ALEXANDER JOHNSTON

10600882

Who died age 21 on 24 June 1944 at sea when MV Derrycunihy hit a mine

Son of John and Amelia Johnston;

husband of Betty Johnston, of Sholing, Southampton.

BAYEUX MEMORIAL Panel 6.

MV Derrycunihy was a cargo ship transporting HQ, A and C squadrons of the 43^rdRecce to Sword Beach to fight in Normandy. On 24^th June 1944 she was sunk by an acoustic mine. 214 men lost their lives and 150 were injured.

(From the 43rd (2/5th Bn. Gloucestershire Regt.) Regt Reconnaissance Corps Roll of Honour courtesy of Recce Mitch and 43rd Recce on WW2TALK.)

WE WILL REMEMBER THEM

16th February 1943 – the Service du Travail Obligatoire forces all French men born between 1920 and 1922 to labour in Germany. Thousands escape to join resistance forces in the mountains and forests of France or the Free French in Africa.

43^rd Recce re-commenced Troop & Squadron Training on Wednesday 17^th February continuing to the 19^th. On Saturday 20^th there was Maintenance, the Commanding Officer’s Vehicle Inspection and the Final of the Inter-Troop Soccer Competition and on Sunday a Regimental Convoy Harbour Exercise. Troop & Squadron Training, again, every day from Monday 22^nd February.

(From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

18^th February 1943 – Joseph Goebbels, Gauleiter (Nazi leader) for Berlin and Hitler’s Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, calls the German people to ‘Total War – Short War’ at a rapturous rally in the city.

21^stFebruary 1943 – the 25^th Anniversary of the creation of the Soviet Red Army is celebrated in all Allied countries. (From WW2-net Timelines)

In Operation Cleanslate on 21^st February US forces occupy the Russell Islands in the central Solomon Islands. The Solomon’s archipelago is now controlled by the Allies.

Posted on 16 February 2013 in Army life, Books, Family, History, Letters from Dick, Music | Permalink | Comments (0)

War Office Selection Board

On 10th February 1943

Dick was attached to the No6 War Office Selection Board*

at Brockham Park, Betchworth, Surrey

Copy of Record from Service & Casualty Form

*War Office Selection Boards were established in 1942 to ensure potential officers were chosen on the basis of merit and more soldiers in the ranks would aspire to a commission. (The Guards, however, did not participate in WOSB selection.)

Boards of psychologists, psychiatrists and military experts presided over the vetting of potential officers over 3 days, bringing a scientific approach to selection. Candidates filled in detailed questionnaires on their civilian and military background, medical history and spare time activities. They took intelligence and personality tests and participated in group tests, involving discussions and outdoor exercises to assess their physical fitness and leadership ability. These included leaderless group tests to assess initiative, co-operation and social skills. A final interview with the military President of the Board was used to confirm officer quality. Assessments were usually held in large country houses. (From ‘The British Army and the People’s War’ by Jeremy A. Crang)

(I understand that the current process for officer selection is not so very different.)

See Dicks’ letter of 25th February 1943 and a personal account of the War Office Selection Board by Duncan Leitch Torrance in People’s War on the BBC website. ('WW2 People's War' is an online archive of wartime memories contributed by members of the public and gathered by the BBC.)

On 13th February 1943

Dick ceased to be attached to the War Office Selection Board

and was posted to Home Details (O.C.T.U. Candidate)

having been approved by No.6 War Office Selection Board

as a candidate suitable for training at an OCTU*.

*O.C.T.U. = Officer Cadet Training Unit

Copy of Record from Service & Casualty Form

43RC/34/1/43 43 Recce

Ceased to be attached to No.6 War Office Selection Board Redhill

Trooper 13.2.43 JGordon

13th February 1943 – the German Army withdraws from Kharkov in north-east Ukraine as the Soviet Army advances.

The RAF bomb Lorient and St Nazaire in their efforts to destroy U-boat bases and shipyards on the French Atlantic Coast.

On 14^th February 1943 Colonel A.W. Henman,

President of the No. 6 War Office Selection Board,

approved Dick as a candidate for the Officer Cadet Training Unit

- POTENTIAL OFFICER QUALITY C

(See Applying for OCTU, Recommended for OCTU and War Office Selection Board)

Copy of Record:

RECOMMENDATION FORM FOR CANDIDATES FOR OFFICER CADET TRAINING UNITS

14^th February 1943 – Rommel’s Afrika Corps advance on Allied positions in the Atlas Mountains of Tunisia culminating in the Battle of Kasserine Pass on 19^th to 25^thFebruary (the first major clash between German and US forces of WW2). Initially routed by Rommel’s attacks the Allies eventually halted the advance and the Germans withdrew to the Mareth line. The Americans had lost over 6,000 men. Allied aircraft and ground forces were also lost due to confused orders and ‘friendly fire’. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

Rostov-on-Don (north-east of the Black Sea on the Sea of Azov) is recaptured by the Russians having been occupied by the German Army for seven months.

Posted on 10 February 2013 in Army life, History, Photos, Promotion/Demotion, Records, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (2)

Safely in Salop - Sunday 7th February 1943

5731671 Tpr Williams R

Mortar Tp HQ Sqn 43^rd Recce Regt

Home Forces

Sunday

My Darling,

Finding myself on a 24 hr guard I thought I’d drop you a line or two.

Have just received your letter for which many thanks. Glad to hear you’ve been successful in getting your course and have arrived safely in Salop, which is a change after all.

From choice I’d move every month if it were practical, but as you know I have got into the unenviable habit of staying several months in one place. However, here’s to a change of surroundings.

Don’t forget to let me know about your new camp especially as regards your CSM! Maybe he prefers blondes….

I’m utilising nearly all my spare time (?) in going to Evening Classes – generally four or five nights per week. I’ve got to the stage of not knowing which class I’m in until I get there….Quite exciting. I told you I got a French text-book with your Token, didn’t I? I usually put in an hour or so at dinner-time etc, also in bed at night. If ever you want to learn anything, do it in bed just before you go to sleep. The subconscious is more in evidence then and consequently things make a deeper impression. Am I boring you again? Hope not.

At this Tech. Institute they hold a recital of discs every Thursday. Last week I heard Joan Cross, Gigli, Solomon and Kentner. Marvelous programme.

I’m still trying the old ‘Warsaw’ at every opportunity. I can now play (?) the first six bars….You should hear this friend of mine play it. Just like Kentner himself.

If you get your leave in approx. nine or ten weeks we should be able to manage something. I should get mine the 23^rd inst. At least I hope to. It’s not going to be much fun I’m afraid. I’ll send you some shekels though, so you can have a beer on me.

The main thing with your show is where you’ll go when you finish this course, as you’ll probably stay there some time.

This is the main guard I’m on and there’s bags of spit and polish. It took me 24 hrs to get ready for it. Heluva waste of time altogether. However these people must be humoured, I suppose.

Brinner’s still on leave (until Tuesday 9^th) and still hasn’t got his transfer. I may try to claim him here.

Well, my Darling I must close here to go on Stag (guard).

God bless you, Chotie.

Take care

Dicker

* Joan Cross was an English soprano, Beniamino Gigli an Italian tenor singer and Louis Kentner, the Hungarian pianist who played The Warsaw piano concerto (written by British composer Richard Addinsell) for the film ‘Dangerous Moonlight’.

The envelope for this letter was has tape is on the left side saying:

OPENED BY EXAMINER

9358

P.C.90

43^rd Recce commenced Troop and Squadron Training on Monday 8^th February and this continued until the 12^th when there was also an All Ranks Dance. On Saturday 13^th February the Commanding Officer carried out a Regimental Kit Check and an ‘A’ and ‘B’ Squadron exercise was held from 13^th to 16^th February with ‘A’ Squadron trying a new organization of carriers and Assault Troops. On the 16^th there was also Section training.(From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

8^th February 1942 - British Special Forces in Burma, known as the Chindits and led by Brigadier Orde Wingate, commence their first penetration behind Japanese lines (Operation Longcloth), advancing from Imphal.

10th February 1943 – the remainder of ‘Sparrow Force’, Australian commandos fighting a guerrilla war against the Japanese on Portuguese Timor, are forced to evacuate the island.

Posted on 07 February 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Photos | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Warsaw - Thursday 4th February 1943

As Usual

Thursday

My Darling Chotie,

Many thanks for your letter of a couple of days ago. I sent one letter which you probably got Monday or Tuesday.

Glad to hear you’ve had such a time on your 48 hr. Only wish I could have been at the old ‘Sloop’* as well. George and Bert seem to wangle it all right.

Brinner, as I suspected is home on nine days privilege leave**, not embarkation as he would have me believe.

I’m up to my eyes in work at the moment as I go to Evening Classes nearly every night I have free. The trouble with that Game is you never know when you’re going to be on guard, etc which makes a definite programme rather difficult to pursue. However, one must necessarily be a martyr to achieve the fruits of education.

Hope you manage to get to N. Wales. Should be really lovely in the spring. Not as good as the autumn of course….

The old man hates the people there, of course but then he’s prejudiced. Mother had a lovely time there in the last show. Do you know where you’re actually going? There’s plenty of castles there, I believe.

I was supposed to be reading a paper on education tomorrow night at the Technical Institute but find I’m on Guard. We do have fun, don’t we?

I’m supposed to be playing Rugger this afternoon but decided I’d write to you instead. Rather nice of me, eh?

Johnston (that’s this friend of mine) knocked hell out of a canteen piano last night. Played the professional copy of the 'Warsaw’***, and rather shook everyone. I can manage the first half dozen bars! I calculate it would take about fifteen years to get it pat…. Nil desperandum.

Must close here for tea

All my love

Precious

Dicker

*The Sloop was a Poole pub in Lower Parkstone, very near to where Chotie lived. It was demolished in January 2022.

** See letter of 30th January 1943

*** Ack-Ack girls learned to work with the guns at Artillery Practice Ranges such as Llandudno near the Great Orme headland on the North Wales Coast. At Ty Croes on Anglesey, in the far north-west of Wales there was a practice firing camp where the girls directed gun fire at textile ‘sleeves’ billowing out behind planes. (From ‘Girls in Khaki – a history of the ATS in the Second World War’ by Barbara Green, published by the History Press 2012). “We went on to a firing camp at Ty Croes, Anglesey, where they had the guns. When the first gun went off I nearly died because of the shock of the flash and the bang. We had no ear muffs and from that day onwards I had tinnitus.” (Ruth Hamilton, nee Minshull, on the BBC People’s War website.)

Dick’s family was originally from Wales but his father had fallen out with them.

****The Warsaw Piano Concerto

This letter was re-addressed to:

Private Chalkley B.E.

236 A.A. (ATS O.F.C.)

Trng Regt,

Wingate Bks

Oswestry

having originally been sent to Talavera Camp at Northampton.

Section Training for 43^rd Recce on 6^th February 1943 focused on ‘Battle Procedure – Withdrawal’.(From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

Posted on 04 February 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, Letters from Dick, Music, Pubs, Sport | Permalink | Comments (0)

Chotie goes to Oswestry

On 3^rd February 1943 Chotie was posted

to 236 Os.F.C.T. Regiment at Oswestry in Shropshire

to train for Anti-Aircraft work.

Record from Chotie's 'Service and Casualty Form'.

From ‘Chotie’s Story’:

“I had been sent from Northampton to Oswestry – an enormous camp – to train to be a radar operator. We did full military training with a Sergeant Major on the parade ground. God, it was just like prison. Food so awful and the tea implanted with bromide to stop us getting passionate. I lived on grub from the NAAFI and Andrews Liver Salts to make the water palatable. Life was grim. George visited me once and took me for a meal in a pub ‘heaven’.”

Women had joined men in mixed batteries on the anti-aircraft sites to cover an acute manpower shortage in the summer of 1941 at the request of General Sir Frederick Pile, the Commander-in-Chief of Anti-Aircraft Command in the Royal Artillery. The ATS carried out all the duties the men did except the actual firing of guns. About 74,000 ATS ‘girls’ were in the Ack-Ack at any one time.

At Park Hall Camp they learned to use radar, ‘spotter’ telescopes, sound detectors, height and range finders and predictors to calculate where the gun would need to fire to explode near enough to the plane to knock it off course, or score a direct hit. They were trained in aircraft recognition and ‘shooting’ – how to call the firing orders to the men on the guns. It was “very secret work requiring slightly higher academic grades than usual”.

(From ‘Girls in Khaki – a history of the ATS in the Second World War’ by Barbara Green, published by the History Press 2012 and 'History - Gunners'. For another first-hand account of training for radar location at Oswestry see 'Life on the Anti-Aircraft Gun-sites' by Joyce Stott in 'People’s War' on the BBC website. 'WW2 People's War' is an online archive of wartime memories contributed by members of the public and gathered by the BBC.)

The famous SOE spy, Violette Szabo, had also been stationed at Oswestry during her brief time with the ATS (September 1941 to April 1942). With her husband away in the French Foreign Legion she wanted to take an active part in the war.

“She had heard of a plan for using women in anti-aircraft batteries, not on the guns, but to aid and direct the guns by operating predictors, height-finders, and other instruments…

There was no hardship the men faced that the girls weren’t prepared to endure…They had Nissen huts to live in, the girls segregated in one group, the men in another. But in the general canteen there was no such separation…after supper, if a mobile film unit or ENSA entertainers were not visiting them, they danced or put on an improvised show. The exaggerated hip movements of the girls on parade were corrected and they were sent out on long route marches. All wore trousers and lipstick was only allowed off duty.”

Violette was selected to work as a Vickers predictor and went on to work on the Mersey anti-aircraft defences at Sutton Weaver, where the alarm went almost every night.

“At times the action lasted for three hours or more. The girls at the instruments had no cover at all and were liable to be hit by a falling bomb and by shell splinters.”

Violette left to give birth to her baby daughter, Tania, but when her husband was killed at El Alamein she joined the SOE (Special Operations Executive). She spoke fluent French and was trained as a spy while nominally an officer in the FANY (First Aid Nursing Yeomanry). In April 1944 she was parachuted into France to help re-organise the Resistance network around Rouen. Working with the Maquis in Limoges, to co-ordinate sabotage activities during the Normandy landings, she was captured, interrogated and tortured by the Gestapo. Having refused to talk she was sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp near Berlin and executed there in February 1945. (From ‘Carve Her Name With Pride’ by R J Minney.)

Posted on 03 February 2013 in Army life, ATS, History, Records | Permalink | Comments (0)

Post-War Reconstruction Committee - Saturday 30th January 1943

5731671 Tpr Williams R

Mortar Troop

HQ Sqn 43^rd Recce

Recce Corps

Home Forces

Saturday

My Darling Chotie,

Received your letter when on a scheme which brightened me up considerably. Had a pretty wicked time – really cold at night and raining all the first 48 hrs. However, am now back and getting something to eat once again. I’m addressing this missive to your Army address, as I don’t know when you’ll be home.

I had a wire from Brinner saying he was on embarkation leave and asking whether I could get a compassionate leave. If you remember, however, I tried this dodge once before, but on compassionate leave they check-up now so have written back to find out whether its genuine. If it is, I’ll try to get a 48 hr compassionate early next week.

There’s nothing much to write about. Life’s rather dull here, always nothing doing. Hope you’re a bit better off at Northants. I go to Evening Classes two of three nights a week to relieve the monotony. Take French and German and am also a member of a Post-War Reconstruction Committee! Quite entertaining. Unhappily I missed it tonight as the whole billet had to lay out kits again owing to a bad show this morning.

The boys chip me about your efforts saying you’ll probably contribute more to the War Effort on a Gunsite than I ever will…. Still, I bear up, in the true du Rose fashion (incidentally I haven’t heard from that Rat yet).

When will you get your first leave (7 days) If you let me know I may be able to hold mine on for a few weeks. I can’t guarantee anything but will do my best. Don’t forget.

I don’t relish leave without seeing you. We could probably spend half at Poole and half at home.

Saw a good show at the Hippodrome. Did I mention it in my last? Believe I did.

Sample of jokes there:-

Two old women in a pub.

“Are you going to have another one?”

“No Dear – it’s just the way I’ve got this coat done up”….

Pretty horrible.

I’d better close here owing to lack of material.

Still love you Darling, - hope to see you soon

love & kisses

Dicker

xxxxxx

This letter was addressed to:

242328

Private Chalkley B.E.

No 3Coy* Hut E1

No1 A.T.S. TC

Talavera Camp

Northampton

*Company

NB. THIS LETTER WAS FIRST POSTED ON 23rd JANUARY BUT MOVED TO CORRECT DATE

43^rd Recce had Church Parade on Sunday 31^st January. On 1^st February there was a cross country run and Section Training continued from the 1^stto the 7^th.

31st January 1943 – surrender of the Germans at Stalingrad, Russia with the capture of Generalfeldmarschell Paulus and Generalleutnant Arthur Schmidt, who was by then in charge.

Bomber command makes first operational use of H2S radar, the first airborne ground scanning radar system. (From WW2-net.)

Chotie managed to have 48 hours leave at home after her three weeks of Basic Training.

ATS recruits were only allowed 48 hours leave in their first three months.

2^nd February 1943 – The remnants of the German Sixth Army in Stalingrad surrender. One of the bloodiest battles in the history of warfare it had started on 23rd August 1942 and claimed nearly 2 million casualties. The Red Army took about 90,000 prisoners at Stalingrad. Nearly half had died by the spring from wounds or starvation and only 5,000 of the Germans taken prisoner survived to return to Germany after the war; the last arriving in 1955. The defeat was covered up in Germany but soon leaked out delivering a bitter blow to morale. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012 )

Posted on 30 January 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, Letters from Dick, Poole, Theatre & Ballet | Permalink | Comments (0)

Recommended for OCTU

On 30th January 1943

Lieutenant Colonel A.W. Crawford, C.O. for 43^rd
Recce recommended Dick as a candidate for the

Officer Cadet Training Unit

(see Applying for OCTU)

Copy of Record:

RECOMMENDATION FORM FOR CANDIDATES FOR

OFFICER CADET TRAINING UNITS

PART II. Certificate of moral character for the past four years to be pasted in here.

Certificate of moral character need not be attached when the certificate below covers the past four years.

I certify that No. 5731671 Rank Tpr

Name WILLIAMS R.K has served as a regular soldier

or embodied T.A. soldier since 21.6.40

Signature AWECrawford LT.COL.

Date 30 Jan 43 Commanding 43 RECCE REGT. RECCE. CORPS.

PART III. (To be completed by the candidate’s Commanding Officer.)

Military particulars of Candidate:-

Militarycharacter V.Good
Training standards attained Satisfactory
Courses attended Div.Mechs Course, Brighton.22.7.42 to 3.9.42.
Power of leadership Average
Medical category A.1.

I certify that I would be willing to accept No 5731671 Rank Tpr.

Name WILLIAMS R.K

As an officer in this Unit on his satisfactory completion of a course of training at an Officer Cadet Training Unit.

Signature AWECrawford LT.COL.

Date 30 Jan 43 Commanding 43 RECCE REGT. RECCE. CORPS.

Command in which Unit is stationed S.E.COMD.

Dick had tried unsuccessfully for OCTU

(the Officer Cadet Training Unit) in April 1941.

Posted on 30 January 2013 in Army life, Promotion/Demotion, Records | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Writing Letters - Saturday 23rd and Sunday 24th January 1943

My Darling Chotie,

I’m writing this now as I won’t be able to write for the next week or so owing to a scheme.

Hope you have got used to your new life by now. I expect you’re feeling quite an old soldier after three weeks service. Seems ages since I heard from you, though I suppose that you’ve discovered that writing letters is just about the last thing you feel like in the services.

I’ve just come back from the Hippodrome. Went with this newly acquired friend of mine* – quite an exotic thing there this week – from Cuba. I suspect it’s more like Whitechapel though we must be rational over these matters.

Haven’t had any beer for over a week and feel rather poorly for that reason.

Found time to read LAG Strong’s “Dewer Rides”**, WS Maugham’s “The Moon and Sixpence”*** and re-read “The Colonel’s Daughter”****.

I shall only send you some shekels if you agree to buy something definite – ie not repeat NOT beer….If it goes on beer you’ll get spanked, so take your choice.

I’m dying to see you in uniform… How’s the skirt?

I must close here to catch up on my kip so will finish this tomorrow.

Well, it’s now Sunday, our famous typically English day of mourning. There’s no church parade for me so I have a little time to relax. We’re on parade this afternoon for loading the vehicles ready for the scheme.

Rather chilly this morning – hope it warms up a bit for the next few days. Don’t mind sleeping under the stars on occasions but not in inches of snow or mud.

Had a letter from Monica a couple of days back. Full of her offspring. I’m pleased she had a daughter – it was really what she needed, I think.

I haven’t got my truck for this stunt so will have to travel in a carrier – lovely and warm and plenty of kip.

Well Darling I must close here – as there’s nothing I can tell you in writing.

Hope I can see you before very long – seems ages since I last saw you already.

All my love Precious

Dicker

PS No news from that Rat DuRose…

*Trooper Don Johnston

**a novel of old Dartmoor featuring Dewer, the evil spirit of the earth.

***the story of an artist in Paris and Tahiti, inspired by the life of Paul Gauguin

****possibly John Strange Winter’s “The Strange Story of My Life (The Colonel’s Daughter)” although there are a number of books with this title.

NB. THIS LETTER WAS FIRST POSTED ON 30TH JANUARY BUT MOVED TO CORRECT DATE

Church Parade was held on Sunday 24^thJanuary and there were preparations for Exercise “Hammer II” which took place in Kent from 25^th to 28^th January 1943 with rain on 25^th, fine on 26^th, mist on 27^th and rain again on 28th. Cold throughout. On 29^th January 43^rdRecce returned to Section Training, with Vehicle Maintenance accompanied by the Commanding Officer’s vehicle inspection on Saturday 30^th. (From the War Diary of the 43^rd
Reconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

26^th January 1943 – Rommel, the German Commander in North Africa, is told he is to be ‘relieved’ by the Italian General Messe. (From Chronology of World War II.)

27^th January 1943 – the US air force made its first raid on Germany hitting Emden and Wilhelmshaven and demonstrating their favoured strategy of precision bombing in daylight. (From WW2-net Timelines and Chronology of World War II.)

28^th January 1943 – all of the German workforce is mobilised for ‘total war’. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

British 8^th Army captures Tripoli, the capital city of Libya.

30^th January 1943 – Le Milice, the secret police modelled on the Nazi German Gestapo is formed in France under the command of Joseph Darnand, the Secretary General of Vichy France. (From Chronology of World War II.)

Daylight bombing of Berlin by the Allies on the 10^th Anniversary of Nazi Germany interrupts Herman Göring’s commemoration speech.

.

Posted on 23 January 2013 in Army life, Books, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Theatre & Ballet, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

An old soldier's ability - 18th January 1943

5731671 Tpr Williams RK

Mortar Tp HQ Sqn, 43^rd Recce Regt

Recce Corps, Home Forces

Monday

My Darling Chotie,

Sorry I haven’t been able to write before, but I’ve been on the Range for the last two days – they always pick the weekends – and didn’t receive your letter until this morning.

You seem to be settling down after your first week in the “Army” – (notice the parenthesis…). Things are a bit strange at first, but you soon develope the scrounging ability required to become the old solider. Eric & I rapidly became past-masters in this singular art.

Have you seen anything of the town yet? Never been there myself – only know they make shoes there among other things. I looked it up on the map and found it nearer to London than I had imagined.

As regards 48 hrs I’m afraid it’s out of the question as far as I’m concerned. Firstly I’m not allowed them as I live outside the limit, and secondly I shall be on a scheme then. ‘Fraid I can’t give you any details. Sorry it can’t be done Darling – I should have liked nothing better – especially on your first leave.

Been very busy lately – haven’t had time to breathe. However, found time to read a very good book Enid Bagnolds ‘National Velvet’ – don’t miss it. It’s published in Penguin’s “Forces Book Club”.

I scarce get time to light my pipe now – or rather your pipe….

Had quite a lively raid this evening. No details – sorry!

I’m now forced to wear a G.C.* tape (2 years undetected crime…). Coupled with the old beret, I rival the little pansy.

I’m afraid Eric will have to whistle for a Best Man as far as I’m concerned. All I’ve got out of him in the last six months is a Xmas Card, and I suspect Eve brought that. If I know him, Eve brought them and he just signed them!

I’m trying to economise in writing-paper – hope you can read this.

I wrote to Monica to congratulate her for her share in overcoming the Falling Birth rate problem (you see I always tell you these things..)

I’m going out all day tomorrow on a motorbike – haven’t ridden one for about 3 years. Hope I don’t break my neck – It’s the only one I’ve got after all.

Must close here to catch post.

Lots of love Precious

Dicker

Xxxx

*Good Conduct Good chevron worn on the lower sleeve of the jacket.

Section training for 43^rd Recce recommenced from 18^th to 23^rdJanuary. On Monday 18^th January the 43^rd Recce war diary records an A.A. (anti-aircraft) barrage over Dover at 2200 hours. (From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

22^nd January 1943 – the Battle of Buna-Gona in New Guinea concludes with the victory of Australian and US Allied Forces over the Japanese. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

23rd January 1943 – Allied troops enter Tripoli, the capital of Libya, marking the end of the Italian African Empire.

Rommel’s forces attack the French in the Fäid Pass, east of Sfax in Tunisia, and destroy more than half of the US forces that counter-attack. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

Posted on 18 January 2013 in Army life, Books, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

A far cry from Dorset - Monday 11th January

5731671 Tpr Williams, R.K

Mortar Tp HQ Sqdn 43^rd Recce regt.

Recce Corps Home Forces

Monday

My Darling Chotie,

So you’re in the Army at last…._ and from your letter things don’t appear to be too bad.

I should imagine by now you know all about innoculation….Just ignore it. Personally we always welcome it as it means 48 hrs in kip – that is TAB* of course, not ATT etc.

Northampton seems rather a far cry from Dorset, but you may be posted farther South of course. It’ll be the helluva way to go just for 48 hrs though.

You say the clobber seems stiff – and soft cloth at that….

I’ve just done an amazing thing – for me, or rather two amazing things – won two cross-countries inside a week! Shock nearly killed me. Had a forced route march today over ploughed fields. Half the troop fell out. I made it all right, but it left me with a swine of a headache. All those who fell out go on a charge automatically.

Expect you’re bored stiff reading all this tosh! Specially if the innoc. got
you down. We are always urged to get about and forget it, but I just give in and relax in bed.

It’ll be a change to write to you at another address….

Ramble, ramble….

Pretty chilly here, expect it’s the same with you. We pinch about ½ ton of coal a week from various sources.

Haven’t heard from Brinner for ages – and Eric needless to say has always failed to write. Brinner’s still somewhere in Essex I suppose.

Did you hear about Monica’s effort? Baby daughter – 9lb 4oz something. Helluva weight. Mother did tell me her name. I’ve forgotten I’m afraid.

Re. Xmas present. Is there anything you want? Or would you rather I send you the shekels? Don’t be afraid to let me know will you in your next epistle.

Met an Eire padre last night. Ex boxer from Dublin Varsity. Found quite a lot in common. Opera, Georgian Houses etc. Quite a lively argument about the Church. Had to admit we both had our own points….

Don’t forget to give me a lucid description of the Sarn’t-Major. Yes Ma-am….

Must close here, Darling.

Hope I get the address right.

All my love

Dicker

P.S. Don’t let ‘em get you down….

* Typhoid inoculation

Section Training continued for 43^rd Recce from 11^th to 15^th January 1943. On Saturday 16^ththere was Vehicle Maintenance and Recreational training and on 17^thChurch Parade. 43^rd Recce officers provided umpires for Exercise “Hammer 1” from 17^th to 19^thJanuary. (From the War Diary of the 43^rdReconnaissance Regiment held by the Archive and Reference Library, the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset.)

11^th January 1943 – Chotie again visited the dentist at Northampton.

Copy of Record

Dental Treatment Card – 13/1/43 Northampton

On 11^th January 1943 Chotie filled out a qualification form and was tested and interviewed on the 12^thJanuary:

Sheet 10A. (A.T.S.) - record copy in poor condition so written out in full.

QUALIFICATION FORM

1. Training Centre 1 2.Company 3 3.Date of intake 8^th Jan 1943

4. Surname (in block letters) CHALKLEY Army No 242328

5. Christian names BARBARA CHALKLEY 6. Home County DORSET

7. Date of birth 6^th Sept 1923 8. Height 5’2¼ 9. Spectacles NO

10. Married or single NO 11. Ages of children (if any) -

12. Schools (name and Place) Courthill School, Parkstone

13. Age on leaving full time school 15yrs 14. Standard or class 7^th(Elem.)

15. School Certificate, Higher leaving Certificate or Matriculation, Subjects;

16. Further training since school:

a) Evening classes (give place, subjects, No. of sessions in each)

Poole Technical College. Maths, Literature, Art. (*Thrice weekly. 1 session – 6mths.)

b) Full-time courses (give place, subjects, length of course, and certificate, diploma or degree obtained)

17. Your main job in civil life? Display Artist (Backgrounds, decorating etc.)

How long did you work at it? 3 yrs

What exactly did you do? Window Dressing

Name of employer,and nature of business Plummers Roddis Ltd. Drapers

Average wages £2 weekly

Other kinds of work you have tried

YOUR JOBS PERIOD FIRM AVERAGE WAGE

Display Work 1yr Beales & Co 27/6

(Trainee for 2 months. 6mts store, drapery etc.)

18. What work have you done outside your home since marriage (if married)?

19. If you have held a driving licence state for how long you have had it - and it you still have it -

20. Underline any of the following of which you have special knowledge or experience:

Typing Cooking Car repairs

Languages Catering Electrical Repairs

Residence abroad Handicrafts Photography

Nursing, First-aid Use of Sewing Machine Morse little

Household Management Use of Telephone

(Embroidery, sewing, Makes own clothes & underwear. Guides. Morse not good.)

21. Experience of organising, instructing, or taking charge of others:

a) in your work

b) in your leisure (e.g. as Guide Lieutenant, secretary of society)

c) at school (e.g. as captain or prefect) Prefect

22. State your chief spare time interests Reading, Music, Dressmaking.

23. A.T.S. Employment:

Your first preference Ack-Ack. – ‘spotting’

Your second preference Orderly – Equipment

Are you willing to be considered for operational work? (Ack-Ack) Yes

Date 11-Jan-43 Signature B.E.Chalkley

*(Comments in brackets and italics were added subsequently by assessor)

SUMMARY SHEET

1. TEST RESULTS

Name CHALKLEY B.E. No. W/242328

(To be filled in by Clerk or N.C.O.)

S.G.	Re-test	S.P.Test* 2	S.P.Test 3	S.P.Test 4	S.P.Test 5		AA-A	AA-B	AA-C	AA-D
49/1		26/2	34/3 mins	21/2	64/2	36/3 plus	√	-	√	√

ED

Spotter

VAT

Track

Tracer

R+

6

10.10.10

E./T.

0 98

Very steady

Educational

Standard

Medical Category

Height

Glasses Worn

5.

AWI

Visual Sh.

R. L.

6/6 6/6

5’2¼

No

2. INTERVIEW RECORD.

(To be filled in by Clerk or N.C.O.)

Main Occupation Window Dresser

E.R. 1 2 3

L 1 2 3

A 1 2 minus 3

M 1 2 minus 3

S 1 2 3

3. GENERAL REMARKS

These should relate to the Auxiliary’s experience and/or qualifications in civil life, her own views about her employment in the A.T.S., and a note of any special qualifications to be noted for immediate or future use in the service.

Very keen to be on a gun site. Test standards good. Would like stores as second choice. Although SP 23 one grade below standard recommend in view of other test scores.

4. RECOMMENDATIONS

First AA Suggest as D AD

Second Storewoman

S.Q.(i)

S.Q.(ii)

Selection Officer’s Signature Joan M Taylor Sub.

Potential N.C.O. Yes

Potential Officer

Date 12.1.43 Commandant’s Signature Pamela M. Fritton

St.Cmdr.

*SP Test = Selection of Personnel Test

On 12th January 1943

Chotie’s enrolment in the

Auxiliary Territorial Service was approved.

Chotie's enrolment form approval - see Chotie enrols in the ATS for the first part of this form.

Basic Training was an initiation into army life with an emphasis on drill, polishing, pressing, inspections, health and hygiene - nit inspections and treatment of the new recruits were de rigeur - as well as pregnancy and VD (venereal disease) tests and vaccinations. There was a lot of marching in new, heavy lace-up shoes and PT training in the gym. Army regulations had to be learned and the girls had to become accustomed to army life, living in freezing Nissen huts ‘heated’ by a central stove with one bucket of coal per day and queuing for meals at the cookhouse with your ‘irons’ – personal issues of cutlery. They slept on ATS 'biscuits' - three separate squares of straw mattress that you had to try to keep together and under you during the night.

During training there were assessments to assign girls to the many different branches of the service – the ATS covered everything from the Army Postal and Courier Service and the Royal School of Signals to the Ordnance Corps (checking and packing ammunition or managing supplies), driving or motorbiking and cooking as well as the famous Ack-Ack girls who worked alongside the gunners on the anti-aircraft sites.

(From ‘Girls in Khaki – a history of the ATS in the Second World War’ by Barbara Green, published by the History Press 2012)

For first-hand accounts of life in the A.T.S. Training Camp in Northampton see the People's War on the BBC website, an online archive of wartime memories contributed by members of the public and gathered by the BBC.

Gladys Shaw became Company Quartermaster at Talavera Camp and gives a vivid account of conditons at the camp for new recruits in “The ATS in wartime Northampton”. Doreen Myall, W/242400, also had to report for duty at the camp in January 1943:

“We were met at Northampton by army lorries, which took us to the centre. I do not remember too much of Northampton. It was a very cold January that year with snow on the ground for most of my three weeks training. I had chilblains on my feet and trying to break in new army shoes was very painful as there were parades, PE and marching every day. My first breakfast was kippers, not quite what I was used to at home but when you are hungry you eat. I did go into Northampton once to look around and marched one Sunday to Church Parade but cannot remember the name of the large Church we were in. Training was mainly learning the dos and don’ts and regulations of army life and being assessed as to where I would be posted.” (From “My Time in the ATS”contributed to 'WW2 People's War’ by David West.)

Hilda Pooler was sent to Nothampton for ATS Basic Training in April 1943:

“Reported to Talavera Camp, Northampton. Hundreds of girls and I only knew one, and she was sent in a different direction. What had I done! Talavera was a huge place and we stayed together like a flock of sheep. However, lots to do, piles of things to collect, getting tucks put into the uniform (I was small, so lots of tucks). The greatcoat buried me and was so heavy. We were told to work hard polishing our cap badge. I sat all one evening rubbing away, only to be reprimanded next morning for a non-shiny badge!”

“When we were eventually passed as ATS girls (uniforms fitting – knew our left foot from the right – remembered to always carry your knife, fork and spoon and mug – and pack all kit into a quite small kitbag) - we were off.”

The basic training routine was the same for all recruits at training camps across the country.

Doffy Brewer had arrived at Talavera Camp in September 1941 and wrote of the Basic Training then:

'If you survive it nothing in the way of discomfort, humiliation, culture-shock or fatigue that life can bring afterwards can be as bad.’

(From 'Millions like us: Women's Lives in the Second World War' by Virginia Nicholson, published by Penguin in 2012.)

12^th January 1943 – the Red Army launch Operation Spark at Leningrad (St Petersburg) to break the German encirclement south of Lake Ladoga. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

13^th January 1943 – the call-up for single girls in Britain is lowered to 19 (Chotie’s age). (From WW2-net Timelines.)

14^thJanuary 1943 – US President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill meet with the Allied joint staff under General Eisenhower at the Casablanca summit Conference. The British persuade the Americans to pursue the war in North Africa (which was going badly in Tunisia) and then launch Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. They also agree the ‘Combined Bomber Offensive’ with the US Eighth Air Force, which bombed by day, focusing on the destruction of the Luftwaffe and aircraft factories, while the British continued bombing cities by night. On 24^th January they demand unconditional surrender from Germany and Italy. (See On War chronology.)

15th January 1943 – the French Communist party reacts against the support for former French Vichy leaders in North Africa by announcing in London that it will ally its resistance with de Gaulle and the Free French.

16th January 1943 – Iraq enters the war against Germany, Italy and Japan. (From WW2-net Timelines.)

17th January 1943 – in an attempt to keep China in the war Britain and the United States give up their right to settlements claimed unfairly after the Opium Wars and Boxer Rebellion. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

18^th January 1943 – the Russians break through the German encirclement of Leningrad (St. Petersburg) opening up a corridor to bring relief to the city. However, the siege was not finally lifted until 27^th January 1944 – 900 days after it began in September 1941.

The first armed clash in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising succeeds in temporarily suspending deportations, although most of the Jews who fought against the round-up were killed. By the end of 1942 only 70,000 of the Polish Jews who had been forced into the Warsaw Ghetto remained – more than 3,000 had been deported to the extermination and hard labour camps.

Posted on 11 January 2013 in Army life, ATS, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Records, Sport, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

Called to Colours

On 8th January 1943 Chotie was ‘embodied’ into the

Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS)

at No1 Training Camp, Northampton

(Talavera Camp on the former Northampton Race Course)

The Auxiliary Territorial Service was brought into existence on 9^th September1938 as the women’s section of the army, complimenting the FANY (First Aid Nursing Yeomanry), which was by then a motor driving service. The ATS was initially part of the Territorial Army but on 10^th April 1941 was given full military status as the women’s service of the regular army, incorporating the FANY drivers.

When Chotie joined Jean Knox was the Senior Commander. Her work had improved the professional image of the ATS and smartened up the khaki uniform, which was to be worn at all times (including khaki underwear - the notorious ‘passion killer’ big knickers).

(From ‘Girls in Khaki – a history of the ATS in the Second World War’ by Barbara Green, published by the History Press 2012)

“George warned me about joining up but I was determined to fight for King and country, fancying myself in the Wrens* driving Naval officers around. Not to be, I finished up in the A.T.S. and suffered a month at Northampton training camp – food uneatable and cried myself to sleep for a week. So homesick. George came to see me and said I looked like a film star A.T.S. girl. Not true, as I heard him guffawing with some of his friends how terrible I looked.” (From ‘Chotie’s Story’.)

I remember my Mum saying she was dissuaded from joining the WRNS (which she wanted because of the more flattering uniform) by the Army recruiting officer who promised her special work on something “new, exciting and secret” if she asked to be on the Ack-Ack (anti-aircraft) spotting: radar. Chotie’s Daughter.

*WRNS – Women’s Royal Naval Service

9^th January 1943 – Chotie had a dental examination at Northampton.

Copy of Record Dental Treatment Card – 9/1/43 Northampton

10th January 1943 – the Soviet offensive, Operation Ring, begins to crush the remains of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad. Hitler had forbidden them to surrender. (From ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor, published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012)

Posted on 08 January 2013 in Army life, ATS, History, Records, Towns & Cities | Permalink | Comments (0)

"Just relax Lulubell" - Sunday 3rd January 1943

Address as usual

Sunday Eve

My Darling

Having been on the range all day – and a Sunday at that – I thought I’d better write you to revive my flagging spirits.

Well, I expect you’re getting just a bit worked up by now – just relax Lulubell…Things won’t be that bad – I hope. Is it the 7^th or 8^th you go? When mother wrote she said the 8^th.

I lent my pen to a colleague last night and the clumsy idiot promptly sat on it. Some mothers have awkward children. Consequently I have to write this with my reserve.

Hope you’ve got over Xmas by now. It took me some little time.

Have just read a very good book – have meant to read it for some time now, and fate delivered the thing to me when I most needed something to read. It’s called “The Bridge of San Luis Rey*” by an American Thornton River Wilder. It’s really rather brilliant. Published by Penguin. Have had very little to read lately, having read everything in the Unit Library.

Saw another Strip Tease last night – some woman called Arimand Banu who does her act with a 12ft python! Pretty horrible. Went with a bloke from this Squadron – comes from Soton – and plays the old “Warsaw”** like nobody’s business. When I asked him his opinion of it he replied in one word – TINSEL! Very sound bloke.

I won a five bob bet on the Bizerte – Tunis Show*** which I placed some two months ago – which cheered me up a little – not so much for the cash as for sheer vanity…

Well, Darling I must wish you all the best of luck on your entry into the Forces. I don’t intend to give you a sermon – I’ll spare you that – but be very careful won’t you? I know we’re not even engaged but you’re very very dear to me Chotie and I couldn’t bear thinking of anything happening to you.

Must close here as I owe letters to Brinner, Diller and Home.

God bless you Darling

Dicker

* A Pulitzer Prize winning novel set in Peru.

** The Warsaw piano concerto written by British composer Richard Addinsell for the film ‘Dangerous Moonlight’.

** refers to recent events in the North Africa campaigns Battle for Tunisia. Tunis and Bizerte are important deepwater ports.

43^rd Recce had Section Training every day from 4^th to 9^th January 1943. On the 4^th there was also a Regimental Cross Country run (see Dick’s next letter). The Divisional Commander visited the training on Tuesday 5^th January and from 7^thto 9^th January the Recce participated in the 43^rdDivision Exercise “Wyvern II”. On the 10^thJanuary there was a Regimental Loading Exercise.

5th January 1943 - the Japanese begin planned withdrawal from Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. The successful evacuation had been completed by 9^th February when the US Commander declared the island secure for the Allies and the campaign over. (From WW2-net Timelines and Chronology of World War II.)

Posted on 03 January 2013 in Army life, Books, Family, Friends & acquaintances, History, Letters from Dick, Music, Theatre & Ballet | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

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