Memoriesofanunknownsoldier

[Pages:215]MEMORIES OF AN UNKNOWN SOLDIER

Recollections of army service during the 2nd world war

By Neil Hogben

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a) Me photographed in Naples in March 1944

b) Me Photographed in January 1998 with poster commemorating the liberation of Narni

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FRONTISPIECE

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS _____________________________________________________ 4 PREFACE____________________________________________________________________ 5 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION __________________________________________ 6 1. VOYAGE INTO THE UNKNOWN____________________________________________ 7 2. CHATEAUDUN ____________________________________________________________ 13 3. ROBERTVILLE: THE MAILED FIST ADVENTURE BEGINS ____________________ 19 4. PIEDIMONTE D'ALIFE_____________________________________________________ 31 5. BAPTISM OF FIRE AT CASSINO____________________________________________ 35 7. PURSUIT PAST ROME_____________________________________________________ 57 8. THE LONG FIGHT BEGINS AT PERUGIA ____________________________________ 67 9. RESISTANCE STIFFENS AT AREZZO _______________________________________ 73 10. A BRIEF RESPITE BESIDE THE RIVER ARNO ______________________________ 81 11. THE LONG FIGHT TOWARDS FLORENCE__________________________________ 85 12. ANOTHER BRIEF RESPITE BESIDE THE RIVER ARNO______________________ 95 13. BACK TO CAMPAIGNING NORTH EAST OF FLORENCE ___________________ 101 14. HOSPITAL: BACK TO ROME _____________________________________________ 105 15. RETURNING TO UNIT NORTH OF FLORENCE _____________________________ 113 16. BACK TO THE FRONT BY THE SANTERNO RIVER ________________________ 119 17. WHIP TRACK: NEAR FONTANELICE _____________________________________ 125 18. MOVING TO THE ADRIATIC COAST AT PESARO __________________________ 135 19. REFIT IN PESARO ______________________________________________________ 143 20. THE LAST PUSH: NORTH FROM CESENA ________________________________ 151 21. THE WAR ENDS: NORTH FROM BONDENO THROUGH PADOVA___________ 161 22. ENTRY INTO AUSTRIA: KLAGENFURT ___________________________________ 167 23. TANZENBERG __________________________________________________________ 173 24. BLEIBURG _____________________________________________________________ 183 25. THE MAILED FIST ADVENTURE ENDS NEAR PADOVA ____________________ 189 26. HELPING SEND TROOPS HOME: O2E DETACHMENT NAPLES _____________ 193 27. SENDING TROOPS HOME: O2E DETACHMENT MILAN_____________________ 197 28. SENDING TROOPS HOME: O2E DETACHMENT VILLACH __________________ 203 TAILPIECE: Farewell to Uniform _____________________________________________ 211 POSTSCRIPT: Tank Action at Bondeno ______________________________________ 213

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

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No 19 Wireless Set (From Official Operating Manual) Mailed Fist Emblem of the 6th Armoured Division Sketch of Constantine by Lord Tedder Anti-tank and Tank a) M10 Self Propelled Anti-tank gun b) M4 Sherman Tank Gun in Harbour with Canvas Lean to. Track Changing Sketch from Deck of the Ascania at Bone Sketch from Inside of Tent at Piedimonte d'Alife Sketch Made During Heavy Shelling at Cassino Some Comrades in Arms a) Sergeant Bert Spanswick in front of No1 gun (Bedford) b) Arthur Lee and Wife Doris (taken about 1955) c) Harry Coppins (Lieutenant Tug Wilson's driver) Map of the Campaign of the 6th Armoured Division in Italy Photographs Taken at the 10th Convalescent Depot in Rome a) Fred Chappell (on left) and myself with a trooper from a tank regiment (name not now known) b) Me 1997 Press Cutting about Footballer Tom Finney Impression of Bridge in Scarperia Pass Whip Track a) Photographs from Near Fontanelice b) Clearing Snow from Whip Track: A Contemporary Sketch Wireless Messages as Recorded by Me in Gun a) 18th and 20th April 1945 b) 22nd April 1945 Guns on Tank Transporters (Sketch from Memory 20 years after) End of War Thanksgiving Cover of 8th Army Order of Service with Divisional and Corps Emblems Photographs of Horses at Bleiburg a) Horse Troop in Front of Stables b) Me on Sandy Copy of Last Page of my own Release Book Sketches from O2E Gazette (by me) a) Reception b) From Alamein Camp to Dover c) Soldier to Civilian Sample Clothing and Equipment Record a) Form H1157 page 1 b) Form H1157 page 2 Action at Bondeno:Map

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Tailpiece Postscript

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PREFACE

The title of these memoirs refers to my wartime self as an "unknown soldier". This expresses my strong sense that those long ago days were so totally different from the rest of my life that they were experienced by someone else. Although the account was written some 20 years after the war, it is based on notes made at the time. I should add moreover that the drama of the events had such an impact that my memory of them and of my thoughts and emotions remains surprisingly clear even to this day. It may be helpful to mention here that prior to my time overseas described in the following pages, I served for about a year in England during which I was trained as an artillery signaller. I was in fact called up to the army 4 months after leaving school, aged 19, in July 1942 and enlisted at Milton Barracks Gravesend on the 3rd of December of that year, where I underwent 6 weeks of basic infantry training. I was then posted to the 37th Signal training Regiment, Royal Artillery at Burniston Barracks in Scarborough for 6 months and thence after 6 weeks in an artillery regiment at Alford in Lincolnshire, to the Royal Artillery Grand Depot in Woolwich where the story begins. N.H. 1997

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PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

The level of interest in the original edition of this book prompted the printing of this second edition in which the opportunity has been taken to include the following new material: Figure 15a Some photographs from Fontanelice (Courtesy of Signora Maria Monti) POSTSCRIPT An account of a tank action at Bondeno reproduced from the regimental history of the Lothians and Border Horse. (Courtesy of Mr Kevin Fitzsimons) N.H. 2004

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1. VOYAGE INTO THE UNKNOWN

It all happened 20 years ago. To look back to those times is a strange and wistful feeling. Once it was a great adventure which stirred the imagination as it beckoned from a mysterious future. Then as I moved through those eventful years into a long unknown it was so intensely real. And now that reality can only be seen from a distance ; nothing can ever bring it closer. But that very distance casts for me a powerful spell. Some moments are remembered with such sharpness that it hurts to see how clear they are but how far away. Such a moment occurred on the 11th of November 1943. I was a young artillery man in a crowded mess hall at Woolwich barracks. It was the eve of our departure for an unknown port of embarkation. A mixture of brooding and noisy singing betrayed the nervous excitement of those present. Strange fancies of high seas and battles in far off lands mingled with thoughts of parting beneath the mock normality of a rousing song ('Roll me over in the Clover') which I can still hear ringing across the years from yesterday. A few stirred by the power of the moment stood on the tables and led the singing. It was this that imprinted the scene on my memory.

It was dark when we picked up our kit to march as draft serial REOFY to the station. Nobody sang as we swung through the almost deserted streets. We gave way to our thoughts. At each end of the column a lantern was carried. Those swinging lanterns I can also still see. The journey into active service abroad had begun. As I look back I know what lay ahead. Then I could not know. We didn't even know the port of embarkation let alone the destination overseas. A few days ago we had drawn tropical kit from the stores but without sun helmets. The previous draft had been given sun helmets and rumour said they were bound for India.

Somehow I could not quite take in the idea that I could actually be about to voyage into such distant lands almost certainly to be launched into the grim realities of front line service in a foreign field. This idea was so completely outside all my experience that I could only think of it with a vague tingling of excitement. But I remember that I was keenly aware that a sudden and inexorable change was about to take place in my life. That overnight the past twenty years would be left behind. Until a year ago school days and home life were the sum total of my existence. This life and all its familiar haunts was about to vanish for a time which stretched unpredictably ahead into the distance.

We boarded a special train which threaded its way by a devious route round to the main line to Glasgow. I remember little of the journey north except the last bit. It must have been near midnight as the train rolled along the banks of the Clyde and at this point my memory becomes quite clear again. I can still see the faces peering from the back windows of houses and waving, wishing luck to the boys on their way to the war. I thought of all the films I had seen with train loads of troops on their way to the front and felt vaguely heroic. As we approached Greenock we could see a convoy of

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ships standing far out in the Clyde and I felt an extraordinary excitement at the prospect of boarding a troopship. For months with endless delays I had known that I was due for embarkation but had never quite digested that it would actually happen. I had visions of long and boring formalities and even remembered stories of troops turned back at the last minute. But it all happened very quickly. The train pulled into a small station adjoining a quay. We lined up on the platform, picked up our kit and marched onto a waiting tender which was soon steaming out to one of the troopships. From the deck of the tender the Cameronian towering above us as she rode at anchor was an imposing sight. I was filled in that moment with a powerful sense of the drama that was beginning.

On board, wandering through a maze of passageways, clambering down steep ladders into a crowded stuffy hold I still remember clearly how suddenly I felt lonely and trapped, perhaps a little frightened as the reality of the situation replaced the glamour and heroism.

The oppressiveness and sense of claustrophobia as I found myself like a sardine among 300 others in the same hold was aggravated by the fact that the ventilation was not yet working. Confusion reigned. I could not think of sleeping though it was 3 o'clock in the morning. I wondered when we would get our next meal and when our life would begin to find some sort of pattern. Were we to be left to work out our own existence in this sweaty chaos?

The precise sequence of our shipboard life is no longer so sharply imprinted on my memory. I content myself with recording some of the impressions and events which have survived.

It must have been at quite an early stage, maybe even during the first memorable night that the loudspeaker system announced our destination which was Philippeville, a port in French North Africa. This caused a buzz of speculation about what might be in store for us. At this time the fighting in North Africa had ended and the Italian campaign was well under way. Fierce battles were raging round the monastery of Monte Cassino which the Germans had established as a crucial stronghold. So it seemed that we must be bound for some North African reinforcement camp in which to be prepared for despatch to units at the front in Italy.

I believe it was on the same occasion that we were issued with letter forms and told we could write home ( subject to censorship) to say that we were going abroad but not to mention our destination. I can remember how the writing of this letter caused a new and stark awareness of what I was leaving behind without any idea of returning. At this time the adventure had no foreseeable ending and it did not even occur to me to think about the chances of coming back. The prospect of the voyage to North Africa and what might await us there fired my imagination sufficiently however to dispel much of the nostalgia and homesickness.

But this mood of expectancy was considerably frustrated when we discovered that we were to remain in the Clyde for several days before beginning our voyage. We lay at anchor in fact for four days feeling like

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