World War II Resource Pack Image: Machine gunners of the 6th Battalion Cheshire Regiment from a painting by David Rowlands Produced by Cheshire Military Museum Page | 1 Contents Introduction Page 3 The Lost Drums Page 4 Cheshire Regiment Organisation Page 6 Infantry Divisional Organisation Page 6 Ranks in the Cheshire Regiment 1939-1945 Page 7 Extracts from the Report of ‘D’ Company, 4th Battalion Cheshire Regiment, May 1940 Page 8 Map: The Retirement of the 4th Battalion, 1940 Page 11 After the battle at Wormhoudt – The personal recollections of Private Joseph Humphreys Page 12 The Way to Dunkirk – extracts taken from the transcription of an interview of Major-General Peter Martin Page 14 A young lads thoughts on the siege of Malta 1940 – 1942 Page 17 Photograph: 1st Battalion on parade, Grand Harbour Valetta, Malta 1943 Page 19 Extracts from the War Diaries of Private Stanley Clifford Brooks, 4126142, 6th Battalion, Cheshire Regiment. Page 20 Map: North Africa Page 25 Photographs taken by A Barlow MM, 6th Battalion Page 31 Map: Italy Page 35 The Vickers Machine Gun Page 36 German propaganda leaflets, dropped in Italy Page 39 Action in the Salerno Beachhead – September 1943 Lieutenant J. K. Forgan, 6th Battalion Page 43 Map: Salerno Beachhead, September 1943 Page 44 D-Day 6 June 1944 – extracts from a transcription of a tape recording of the memories of Major-General Peter Martin Page 45 Map: Normandy landings Maj-Gen Martin’s D-Day Page 47 Extracts from the diary of Private J McCarthy, 1st Battalion Cheshire Regiment Page 48 Map: The Low Countries and the lower Rhine Page 52 Glossary Page 53 Page | 2 Introduction The Cheshire Military Museum Situated in the historic Castle area of Chester the museum displays artefacts relating to the soldiers of Cheshire and their families with particular emphasis on the Cheshire Regiment, Cheshire Yeomanry, 3rd Carabiniers (Prince of Wales’s Dragoon Guards), 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards and the Mercian Regiment. The archive of the Cheshire Regiment is also held here. The displays are interactive and suitable for all ages. The galleries are fully accessible. The museum is open 6 days a week (closed Wednesday) from 10 – 5pm (last entry 4pm). Admission charge applies. Please see the website for more details www.cheshiremilitarymuseum.co.uk or contact the Museum Officer; Caroline Chamberlain directly on 01244 327617 [email protected] This Resource Pack This collection of documents was originally compiled in 1997 by members of the museum staff and Peter Crook of Cheshire Education Services. It has been digitised and made available in this format in 2015 as part of the museums digitising programme. It is not intended to be a history of the Second World War or a history of the Cheshire Regiment during that conflict; it is a collection of personal impressions of the war recorded by a small number of individual soldiers. This pack is for personal and educational use only copying of the material for other purposes (without obtaining permission) is prohibited. Copyright is retained by Cheshire Military Museum A note on spelling Words have been spelled in this collection as they were spelled in the original sources – with the exception of place names which have been corrected where necessary for comprehension. Page | 3 Page | 4 The Lost Drums During the ‘phoney’ war of 1939-40 the 2nd (regular) and 4th (TA) Battalions of the Cheshire Regiment were deployed in France. The 2nd was ordered forward to stem the German advance on 10th May 1940 from the area around the village of Bersee. The stores not immediately required, including the drums, were left behind in the village. Events developed rapidly and the Battalion never got time to collect their kit before finding themselves back at Dunkirk in the evacuation of the BEF (British Expeditionary Force). The German Army neared the village on the 27th May. The village priest and one or two others took it upon themselves to prevent the drums falling into the hands of the Germans and hid them in various places. After D-Day, 6th June 1944 the 2nd Battalion retraced their steps in the advance across France to Belgium. As they approached the area of Bersee an officer recalling the drums of four years before went to see if he could find them. The Boer Drum carried by the Commanding Officers drummer was returned and is in the museum on display. The other however could not be located and it was assumed it had been discovered by the Germans. In late 1994 a visitor to the museum alerted us to a newspaper article which stated Monsieur Dutriez in Bersee France had in his possession a drum marked ’38 Battalions in World War I’. The Regiment sent a drummer and Officer to investigate and they returned with the drum (pictured on the previous page) which Monsieur Fernand Dutriez had rescued as a small boy in 1940. Today visitors to the museum can see the drum in our World War II gallery. Page | 5 Cheshire Regiment Organisation During the war the Regiment was organised as a Machine Gun Battalions each of which supported an Infantry Division. The organisation shown is that of 1940 – it changed a little during the war, for example; once carriers (light armoured tracked vehicles) were issued the gun crews dropped from 5 to 3 men for each gun. The Vickers Machine Gun could fire 0.303 inch Small Arms Ammunition to 4,800 yards. Infantry Divisional Organisation Page | 6 Ranks in the Cheshire Regiment 1939-1945 Page | 7 Extracts from the Report of ‘D’ Company, 4th Battalion Cheshire Regiment, May 1940 Background German forces attacked Poland on 1st September 1939. Britain and France had promised to help Poland and declared war on Germany on 3rd September. Just as in 1914, the British army went as the British Expeditionary Force to France and Belgium to help the Belgian and French armies in the event of a German attack. For seven months there was almost no military activity in Western Europe. This period was known as the ‘Phoney War’ or the ‘Sitzkrieg’. Of course, the German army and air force used this time to build up their strength and make plans for their attack. France had built a strong system of defence using reinforced concrete gun positions and deep tunnels along its border with Germany. This was the ‘Maginot Line’ (named after its designer). However, the Magniot Line stopped at the Belgium frontier. Therefore, since the German army would want to avoid the Maginot Line any German attack would almost certainly be made somewhere between the end of the Maginot Line and the North Sea coast. In May 1940, having already invaded Norway and Denmark, Germany launched a massive attack on Holland and Belgium with the intention of invading France from the north through Belgium. In that way the German army could get around the Maginot Line. The attack on France came through the Ardennes. This is the only hilly and heavily wooded area of Belgium and it was thought by the British and French Generals that it was unsuitable for tanks which the German army was likely to use in large numbers. By 14th May 1940 the German army was in France having experienced no difficulties in advancing through the Ardennes. At this time ‘D’ Company of the 4th Battalion was at Beerzel, 8 kilometres south of Brussels. On 16th May they were sent south east to Waterloo to help prevent the German advance. The commander of the BEF, General Lord Gort, realised that it was not strong enough to prevent the German advance. The German army had also broken through the French defences and was advancing rapidly westwards to the south of the BEF. Lord Gort ordered the BEF to retreat towards the channel coast to avoid being cut off and ‘D’ Company accordingly began its long journey westwards – though as the map [page 11] shows, by no means in a straight line. On 25th May Gort decided that the BEF should retreat to the sea at Dunkirk and on the 27th the British government ordered their evacuation by sea. In the meantime ‘D’ Company, having suffered some casualties from German attacks on the way, had reached the Channel coast at La Panne on 24th May. La Panne is 16 kilometres to the east of Dunkirk. However, on 27th they were ordered to leave La Panne via Dunkirk for Wormhoudt, 16 kilometres inland. The intention was to defend Wormhoudt and hold the German advance there. The following report gives an account of this action. Page | 8 May 27th …Platoons were in position by about 1900 hours…Machine gun positions were fair, but those on the West of Wormhoudt were much exposed and rather close to each other…Road blocks were flimsy…surrounding countryside was open and suitable for tanks…Anti tank guns appear scarce and were sited in exposed positions… These formed a single line around WORMHOUDT and were not sited in depth.. May 28th About 0700 hours parties of troops were observed by Company H.Q. about one mile to the North… About 0900 hours further troop movement was observed to the North, this time about 1000 yards away… S.A.A1. fire was opened immediately… From 0950 8 Platoon were fairly steadily engaged firing at… light vehicles advancing along road from ESQUELBEC … and at infantry advancing on their left front. During this action 8 Platoon had some casualties from mortar and S.A.A. fire and had two guns put out of action, their position being much exposed and during the morning ammunition could only be conveyed to them by means of a Bren Carrier2, this being done personally by Capt.