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In a world that’s run amok … The story of John Archibald Fearon 1910 - 1987 gymnast & swimmer linguist soldier teacher and head-teacher secretary of the Jersey Animals’ Shelter interpreter and translator writer husband, father and grandfather First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Ernest Alexander (Alec) Fearon Retreat House 5 Skardon Place North Hill Plymouth Devon PL4 8HA United Kingdom Copyright © Ernest Alexander Fearon 2019 Printed by Short Run Press Limited 25 Bittern Road Exeter Devon EX2 7LW United Kingdom Contents Appendix 3: The 25-Pounder Field Gun .......... 87 Appendix 4: Some intelligence summaries ..... 89 Introduction ....................................................... 1 Appendix 5: John’s published articles & stories Early years ......................................................... 7 ........................................................................ 95 Oxford University ............................................ 12 Viewpoint by Ian Gordon: A Square Deal for Work in London ............................................... 16 Girls? ........................................................... 95 Marriage .......................................................... 17 The cold sea ................................................ 97 Dunkirk ............................................................ 18 Safety Catch .............................................. 100 Evacuation from Jersey ................................... 26 Light at the end of the tunnel ................... 102 Homeland defence .......................................... 27 North Africa ..................................................... 28 Admin duties ................................................... 29 Italy .................................................................. 29 Gunner & intelligence officer .......................... 35 Greece ............................................................. 43 Ruby ................................................................. 56 Sonia ................................................................ 60 Peacetime service in the army ........................ 68 Back to teaching .............................................. 72 Return to Athens ............................................. 75 A working retirement ...................................... 77 Appendix 1: The Gas Light and Coke Company ......................................................................... 81 Appendix 2: A potted history of the 4th Division during World War II ......................................... 85 Poseidon Do you remember still, my love, the temple on the hill where once we kissed and laughed and sang of love and joy and hope and no more need to kill? For war was done and fear was gone and blood no longer shed. So gently did you take my hand and lead me through the golden land of peace and sea and sunlit strand to help forget the dead. But now it's forty years along since we stood there alone when we were young and strong; fat tourists now the temple throng, and we the few who still survive, in a world that's run amok, grow old and weary as we strive to lift the burden from our sons of hate and fear and bombs and guns. So take my hand again, my love, and if the gods are kind we'll meet once more on the sunlit shore beyond the final door. Introduction talented all-rounder whose character, gift for languages, and abilities as a gymnast and Sources John’s poem ‘Poseidon’ on the previous page swimmer earned him a scholarship to Oxford Ministry of Defence for John’s service record. was written in 1985, before an operation for University. After graduation, marriage to Ruby, The National Archives to seek out the war cancer that he knew was the beginning of the children and a brief spell of teaching he seemed diaries, intelligence reports and other end. Poseidon is the Greek god of the sea; his set on a career in the gas industry which was documents which offer insights to life in 22nd expanding in London at that time. But World temple at Cape Sounion, about an hour's drive Field Regiment, Royal Artillery and 10th Infantry from Athens, was their favourite place when my War II and five years of service in the army took Brigade, units that were part of the 4th British parents, John and Sonia, were courting. They him elsewhere: to France, Belgium and the Infantry Division and in which he served during met in the summer of 1945 when the Jeep John beach at Dunkirk; to the south coast of England, World War II. was driving nearly knocked over a young woman waiting to oppose an expected invasion; to ‘The Fourth Division’: Hugh Williamson’s book, who stepped carelessly off a pavement in many parts of England and Scotland for training published in 1951 when memories were still and exercises in preparation for the offensive Athens. He was weary after 5 years of war. She fresh, telling the story of the 4th Division from had been swept up in the turmoil of the Russian operations that would begin when the tide of 1939 to 1945. revolution and then found herself living in war had turned; to deadly combat in North Athens under German and then Italian Africa and Italy; and finally to suppress a ‘Ubique’: Arthur Cheetham’s first-hand account of the life of a junior officer in a Royal Artillery occupation. communist revolution in Greece. field regiment during training and then through John’s profound, deeply moving and beautiful The circumstances of war led to his divorce from the North Africa and Italy campaigns. Ruby but also to a chance encounter with a poem encapsulates in a few short, simple lines Gunners at War: Brigadier Shelford Bidwell’s the human meaning of the story on the Greek medical student, Sonia, whom he would tactical study of the Royal Artillery. following pages, where I have tried to illuminate later marry in the Russian Orthodox Church in what he meant. The research into his life story Athens. He and Sonia set up home in Jersey, they ‘Royal Artillery Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations’ by Philip Jobson. has taken me on an interesting journey: through had a son, and John taught at Victoria College for the sources shown in the box at right; into two years before being drawn back to army life. ‘History of the Second World War’ by Basil documents and photographs from the family Fourteen years in the army were spent against Liddell Hart. archive; to my notes of conversations with my the backdrop of the Cold War and its possibility Hugh Sebag-Montefiore’s epic ‘Dunkirk: Fight to of nuclear conflict. He was posted with his family mother, Sonia; and to my half-brother Mike and the Last Man’ half-sister Anne-Marie for their recollections. to the British Army of the Rhine whose task within NATO was to deter a Soviet invasion of The online resources and collective memory of Born in Manchester and named after his Germany. There followed postings around veterans and their families in WW2Talk grandfathers, John Archibald Fearon was England and Scotland and finally to (http://ww2talk.com) brought up and schooled in Jersey from the age Fontainebleau in France where he led the large of seven. He developed into a fine young man: a 1 team of interpreters and translators who the family tree on the next two pages; some and the family again. Mike took me on a tour of enabled the many different nationalities in the background will also be helpful. the psychology laboratories; my abiding Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe memory of the labs was the smell of caged rats When Mike visited John, Sonia and me at (SHAPE) to conduct their business. and mice! Mike went on to become a statistician Craigihall, just north of Edinburgh, in 1958 he and an expert programmer in the computer On return to civilian life he spent the next eight was in the final act of a prolonged fight to be languages used for statistical analysis. He years teaching at Victoria College in Jersey, allowed to resign from the Navy. He had joined worked in this field for national and provincial quickly being promoted to Head of the Junior Dartmouth in 1952 at the age of 16 and become government in Canada, re-married and School. Family matters then took him and Sonia a Supply Officer, but Britain’s abandonment of continues as a freelance statistician to this day. back to Athens where he taught English as a Hungary when it was attacked by Russia in 1956 foreign language while they tried to enjoy the and our subsequent seizure of the Suez Canal Anne-Marie won a scholarship to a boarding Mediterranean way of life; but Greece was angered him so much that he decided to leave school in Carmarthen, which she hated, and suffering under a military dictatorship and there the Navy. In those days that was easier said than then to another near Westerham (Benenden was too much tension in the air, not least the done, and it wasn’t until September 1958 that perhaps) where she was happier and became possibility of war with Turkey, so they came Mike was free to chart his own course. Going to head girl. Another scholarship took her to St home again to Jersey. London, he worked as a clerk and at Smithfield Andrew’s University in 1957, but she dropped Meat Market while studying at night school to out after her second year and went her own way For their final ten years together, he and Sonia qualify for university, then graduated from for a while. She travelled, worked in the Middle enjoyed the pleasures of Jersey life, hosted University College London in 1963 with a degree East as a governess and was in France when family visits and toured the continent with their

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