An End of War E-Book

Ken Tout

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 410

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011

Beschreibung

After D-Day in 1944 many British troops believed the war would be over by Christmas. The German Army in Normandy had been destroyed, but by Christmas the Allies were still fighting through Holland, whilst the Germans had reorganised and were fighting back. Ken Tout, using his own experiences on the frontline and interviews with many veterans, recounts how the last gasps of the German Army saw some of the fiercest and most fanatical fighting of the whole war. Major offensives include Hitler's last desperate attempt to reverse the tide of war in the Battle of the Bulge and the Western Allies' epic struggle to cross the Rhine. Also explored are the lesser known (but no less important) battles for the Hochwald and Reichwald, and the extraordinary journey of the Polish 1st Armoured Division from defeat and exile to final victory. This last year of war is filled with stories from the tragedy of whole groups of men being frozen to death in battle areas to the triumph of logistics, ingenuity, and bravery. Soldiers, who had lived for so long under the horrors of war that as they neared the end their desperate desire to survive grew ever stronger, speak of how these last battles took their toll on a wearied army. Fighting continued up to VE Day in May and some units were in action for days longer as confusion reigned about the enemy surrender. Even after the fighting had finished, the war was not over for these men who had to round up and guard German prisoners of war, and watch over thousands of displaced people. As the world reminds us today, war does not necessarily end when a ceasefire is declared.

Leseprobe

‘These are the researches published in the hope of preserving from decay the remembrance of what men have done… and of preventing the great and wonderful actions from losing their meed of glory.’

Herodotus, 440 BC

Front cover image: German SS troops double across a road in a staged photo after the destruction of an American convoy of jeeps and half-tracks in the Ardennes, 16 December 1944 Courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, EA 47962)

First published 2011

This paperback first published 2025

The History Press

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Gloucestershire, Gl50 3QB

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

© Ken Tout, 2011, 2025

The right of Ken Tout to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the Publishers.

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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 0 75246 397 1

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Maps

Prologue

1.   Bravest of the Brave

2.   When Hell Froze Over

3.   Unhappy New Year

4.   Those Fatal Forests

5.   De Hongerwinter

6.   Rhine Cruises – No Mod Cons

7.   Daleko do domu

8.   Now Who Dies Last?

9.   Victory! – or Further Strife?

10. Kriegsgefangengesellschaft

Epilogue

Glossary

Notes and References

Bibliography

About the Author

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book is intended as a collection of the everyday experiences of frontline soldiers, rather than as a work of military history supported by eyewitnesses. I therefore greatly appreciate and thank all those veterans who, directly or indirectly, contributed personal memories to the book and whose names are noted. Especially kind are those who agreed to allow the use of quotes from their own published memoirs where a particular incident seemed to fit into the narrative.

A number of friends helped in the search for new material and made my task easier at a time when the pool of veterans still able and willing to contribute is rapidly diminishing. Most of my books have started out from my own experiences, extended to those of comrades of my regiment, 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry (1NY), and then reaching out further, through 51st Highland Division, to other units. It is doubtful whether compiling another such book will be feasible in the second decade of the century.

Valued help came again from Canada, thanks to Shelagh Whitaker, Maj. Bob Bennett, Bud Jones, Capt. Tim Flowers, Terry Copp and, before his departure from this mortal scene, George Blackburn. Old Poland spoke through Capt. Zbigniew Mieczkowski and Jan Jarzembowski. Dutch help came from Ger Schinck, Anthony van Vugt and the Soeters family, Jan Wigard, Marius Heideveld, Bea Dekker and Hans Gootzen. On behalf of Germany, Hazel and Manfred Toon-Thorn were again able advisers. And from the USA, Col. Hal Steward and Gloria and Joe Solarz came to my rescue.

Eminent among sources in the UK was the Second World War Experience Centre, where director Cathy Pugh and volunteer Ernest Tate (like me a post-war KDG) found no request too burdensome. Capt. Ian Hammerton, David Fletcher, the late Bill Bellamy, Caroline at Aces High Gallery, Stan Hicken, and the late Rex Jackson were among those who helped me extend my contacts. Jo de Vries at The History Press was always encouraging, helpful, and patient; as was my wife Jai, in whose case the patience had to be inexhaustible. The book was written amid the shambles of packing up, removing from Essex and renovating our new abode in West Sussex, where I shamelessly found it impossible to handle a screwdriver and a keyboard at the same time.

MAPS

1. North-West Europe, January–May, 1945 (Tout)

2. Rivers Maas and Rhine, 1945 (Whitaker

3. Reichswald and Hochwald, 1945 (Hammerton)

PROLOGUE

Christmas is coming,

the goose is getting fat:

please put a penny

in the old man’s hat.

It was the familiar Christmas jingle, but instead of the old man’s hat it was a tank trooper’s beret which was collecting donations of the pretty Occupation Money banknotes. This was going to be the Christmas party of all Christmas parties.

Our tank squadron of 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry (1NY) was laagered in a group of recently liberated Dutch villages; the villagers ecstatically joyful after years of Nazi oppression. But many of the smaller children had never experienced a real Christmas with all the delights and celebrations, toys and sweets, presents and decorations, which we ourselves had so recently known as children.

When we liberated Vught our burly Regimental Sergeant-Major (RSM), George Jelley – boy soldier of the First World War and ‘uncle’ to the raw recruits – had driven his jeep into the town centre and found himself surrounded by excited civilians. A local father had hoisted his 6-year-old son into the jeep and onto George’s lap. George had produced a purple-wrapped bar of Duncan’s blended chocolate (the nearest to milk chocolate in wartime), and offered the bar to the boy. He had been astonished when the boy screamed, struggled and pushed the sweet away.

‘He has never seen chocolate’, explained the father. ‘Never in all his memory.’ It was only after George and the boy’s father had each chewed a piece of chocolate and twisted their faces into expressions of intense delight that the boy had deigned to savour the strange treat.1

Now all the village children would share such pleasures. Hastily scrawled (and mercifully uncensored) letters from troopers to mothers and female relatives demanded urgent parcels containing fruit cakes, sweets and children’s toys, which Post Corporal ‘Topper’ Billingham would chase at the divisional sorting office. Affable Cook Corporal Jack Aris, abetted by Harry Claridge and ‘Scotty’, now served reduced rations of dessert at the improvised field kitchen and announced that all the American ration canned yellow cling peaches would be reserved for the big party. Three troopers had already dressed up for the traditional Dutch Saint Nicholas ceremony. Father Christmas would be even more benevolent when played by our gruff, elderly Captain Bill Fox hidden behind a mountainous beard of Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) cotton wool.

Of course there were less joyful aspects to life in Christmas 1944. The war was still going on, and on, and on. Before D-Day, nearly a year ago, we had been paraded to be inspected by the then General Montgomery. Spit-and-polish parades may have been the daily bread of life for the Brigade of Guards, but for wartime conscripts endless and apparently irrelevant peace-time routines caused much moaning and groaning. Nevertheless, we had put our trousers under our mattresses to obtain good creases, blanco’d our webbing equipment, polished our boots and made ourselves look like real soldiers for an hour or two.

To many of us Montgomery appeared a funny little man with a strange, clipped style of speech. But he handed out free cigarettes so he was a good general. Telling us of the glory days he said that, all being well, the war could be over by Christmas. Subsequently not all went well and it was still not over as we prepared the Christmas parties for our generous Dutch hosts and their children.

We had fought through Normandy, the claustrophobic Bocage and the agoraphobic crests south of Caen. We had played a small part in the encirclement and disintegration of an entire German army, and had undertaken the heady race across France and Belgium. It had then seemed inevitable that the war would indeed be over by Christmas. The Germans would never be able to recover and resist, even at the infamous Siegfried Line. But somehow the enemy continued to pose problems in spite of the Allies’ overwhelming strength and it was not yet all over.

On the positive side, we had been told that we would have three weeks’ rest in these hospitable Dutch villages. Optimistic and beguiling rumours spread that new formations were coming over from Britain to take over the main thrust of the last battles. Had not the 15th/19th come over to replace our battered 2nd regiment? Had not the entire elite Scottish Lowland Division come directly to Holland to replace the Highland Jocks whom we had been supporting? Good news was triumphing over bad news.

Leave had commenced and usually came in the form of a 48 hour pass to Antwerp or Brussels. We heard that our squadron leader, David Bevan, had gone off to Paris for a day or two accompanied by the colonel and the brigadier. Sergeants and lesser ranks had won lotteries for leave to Antwerp or Brussels. Only skeleton crews remained in the squadron lines. As night drew on, most troopers were sat talking and smoking in Dutch houses or singing and laughing at an Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA) concert. Two male ‘troopers’ of another kind were performing vaudeville acts with a seductive female singer in the borrowed local community hall. Unlucky Tpr Brian Carpenter had drawn the short straw to go on prowler guard among the tanks. An officer and a corporal drowsed in the Orderly Room.

Brian Carpenter was not unduly perturbed about his guard duty. It was much more pleasant here than doing prowler guards in Normandy where showers of ‘Moaning Minnie’ mortar bombs were likely to descend at any hour of the night. Here he could plod for a little while or lean against a tank and think about his leave in Antwerp coming up in two days time. He could not hear the jokes of the comedians, but he could hear the laughter and imagine the old, hoary jokes told to and by servicemen throughout the ages. ‘Why did our colonel [name Forster] go to see the brigadier? Because he was forced-tuh … Forster, see?’

‘Prowler guard!’ A light flashed on in the squadron office and the duty officer’s black bulk showed in the doorway. ‘Prowler guard! Emergency! Stop the concert. All crews back to tanks. Pack up! Start up! Ready to move immediately. The Germans have broken through and are encircling us. Stop the concert. Cancel everything. Shift!’2

CHAPTER ONE

BRAVEST OF THE BRAVE

Wheresoever ye place us, ’twill be our endeavour to behave always as brave men.

Herodotus, 440 BC

An important theme which runs throughout this book is that some of the most bitter and costly fighting of the Second World War took place in the last months. This period needs to be written about more fully, and remembered.

It was a time when the determined German defences might well have been overwhelmed by the massed Allied armies and the road to Berlin opened without much more blood being spilt. It is an era which has largely escaped the attention of the influential Hollywood cinema moguls. Even for serious historians surveying the vast panorama of six years of total world war, it has often been relegated to a brief paragraph or a footnote. Ask a person in the street about El Alamein, D-Day, Dunkirk or ‘A Bridge too Far’, and a positive response might be expected. Ask about Reichswald or Hochwald and a blank stare results.

Some of these last battles were of minor strategic significance, but immensely important at a local level. Battle conditions were among the worst encountered anywhere. At battalion, company and individual level each action called for commitment as intense and sacrifice as horrific as at any time since September 1939. If this statement appears to be exaggerated then one simple fact underlines its truth. Four days and a few anonymous square miles of earth saw unsurpassed acts of heroism performed by the bravest of the brave.

In two world wars Canadian frontline soldiers had gained a high reputation for bravery. Since D-Day the Canadian Army in North-West Europe had been thrown again and again into virtually impossible missions and had responded with continuing valour at ground level. Over the whole of the war sixteen Canadians had been awarded the highest of honours, the Victoria Cross, ‘for Valour’. That might be said to represent rather less than three such awards per year. Now in the brief space of four days, two acts of outstanding self-sacrifice gained the award, and a third should also have been rewarded in the same way. These examples of exceptional service demonstrate the perilous situations in which those brave men found themselves.

Major Frederick Albert Tilston, Essex Scottish Regiment, led his company across flat, open countryside under constant enemy fire. Three-quarters of his men fell as casualties and he was also badly wounded in the hip. He continued to lead, crossing and re-crossing open ground to carry ammunition and organise platoons. Eventually he fell having lost one leg and with the other leg so badly damaged that it had to be amputated. In between losses of consciousness he shouted orders from a prone position, refusing to be evacuated until another officer could come up, be briefed and take over.1

Four days earlier and not far away, Sergeant Aubrey Cosens, the Queen’s Own Rifles of Canada, had displayed similar disregard for personal safety during an undertaking with rather different physical demands. Taking command of his platoon when it was reduced to four men he, like Tilston, had to cross open ground on foot under such intense fire that every step forward was something of a miracle. Finding one surviving tank from the initial attack, he climbed up and placed himself outside and in front of the turret, totally exposed to the enemy. From there he proceeded to direct the tank crew verbally and his surviving infantrymen via hand signals. After the tank had crashed into the first farm building, Cosens continued to lead his men into further buildings on foot. He was at last shot by a sniper having captured a vital objective, leaving many enemy dead and taking more than twenty prisoners.

In virtually the same place, the same day, and at almost the same time, Maj. David Rodgers performed similar acts of bravery. His citation for the Victoria Cross was approved at battalion, brigade, division, corps and army levels, but was left suspended beneath the strangely hesitant pen of Field Marshal Montgomery himself. There were surely very few examples of such bravery and heroism during the entire war.

To clearly understand the unique conditions which required this outstanding commitment, it is necessary to explain a little more about the history of those soldiers involved, the geography of the battleground and the supreme efficiency of the enemy.

Like so many Victoria Cross heroes, Fred Tilston was not the prototype ‘tough guy’ mercenary who is so often featured on the cinema or television screen, or depicted in the more lurid war novels.2 He has been described as a ‘mild-mannered, affable, 34-year-old University of Toronto Pharmacy graduate… not perhaps the firebrand the forces were looking for. For one thing, he was too old.’ He managed to join up by ‘adjusting his age backwards’.3 He had twice been wounded badly enough to be able to opt out of frontline service and take a ‘cushy’ job.

The Essex Scots had already rendered service which might be thought to excuse them from any further exposure to ferocious combat. They had suffered badly during the abortive landing at Dieppe in 1942, and in Normandy they had been thrown into the battles around Tilly-le-Campagne and the Verrieres Ridge; later described as the ‘worst fighting of the whole war’ by captured German SS troopers. As adjutant of the battalion at the time, Tilston would have been aware of this.4 The battalion ended the war with the highest casualties of any similar unit in the Canadian Army. Before the battalion could go into the action again, it had to be reconstructed by combining the relatively few remaining veterans with large numbers of raw recruits and transfers from other arms.

Little wonder then that, as adjutants were routinely ‘Left out of Battle’ (L.O.B.), Capt. Tilston felt that he was not getting involved in frontline action as much as he should, or as he would wish. For some time he had pestered his colonel for a move. At last, in the reconstruction of the battalion, he was promoted to major and given command of the lead company for the forthcoming battle. It was to be a very brief but remarkable command.

Whilst the immediate objective of Tilston’s company was a mundane border farm set well back over open country, it was an integral part of Germany’s great defence line set up to protect the Fatherland. Known in Britain as the Siegfried Line it had been the focus of many feeble jokes, such as the popular song ‘We’re going to hang out the washing on the Siegfried Line’. In fact it was a masterpiece of German planning, engineering and military efficiency. The Germans had already proven their ability to turn humble Normandy farmhouses into fiercely defended strong points. Here on the frontier, the defences were the result of longer planning and even greater determination to resist. Tilston’s farm was like the jutting barbican of some medieval fortress.

In amongst the normal farms and dwellings the German engineers had constructed specially designed linking pillboxes from thick, reinforced concrete. Capt. Ernest Egli, a REME (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) expert, had the opportunity to examine one such miniature fort. For siting guns there were three slits or embrasures (slits narrow on the outside and wider inside):

… each embrasure sited to cover together 360o. Each embrasure was made of steel 3” to 4” thick and mounted in concrete approximately 2 feet thick. Behind each one was a concrete room with a steel door leading into a passage with sleeping quarters in the centre of the pillbox. Each room contained a… fast firing m-g (machine-gun) on a mounting…. The outside walls and roof of the pillbox were covered with earth and grass sods for further protection and concealment. A belt of trip wire and mines circled each pillbox in a radius of 50 – 80 yards. Pillboxes were sited to support each other and between each two gun pillboxes was another for control.5

As Egli indicates, the ground in front of the pillboxes was treacherous for troops who were involved in many aspects of action: watching for enemy movement, firing, diving for cover, giving orders, liaising with comrades, checking the wounded and so on. But for every walking solider the great fear was of the anti-personnel mine. An anti-tank mine produced a massive explosion, but would not normally detonate under the pressure of a single human body. The more sensitively fused anti-personnel device generated a terrifying blast and a cloud of iron shards. Again Capt. Egli was an eyewitness:

I saw a group of men at the road verge. Suddenly there was an explosion and a column of debris shot up into the air, a typical land mine explosion. We drove up and saw a soldier with a foot blown off. He had fallen back with his injured leg in the air. You could see the white end of the splintered leg bone, with the sinew hanging down. He was quietly moaning to himself.

If circumstances permitted, the infantry could crawl forward and probe in the ground for mines. Men carrying mine detectors could clear the ground, but only in the absence of enemy gunfire. There were also specialist tanks with chains which beat the ground and set off hidden mines. However, on Tilston’s vital day there were neither mine-clearing tanks nor gun support tanks available because continual rain had turned the ground into a bog in which the tanks sank and were unable to get sufficient grip. The timing of the battle and the open nature of the area meant that a quick advance might be more successful than a very slow crawl with men down on their stomachs searching for mines.

As the preliminary artillery barrage ceased, Tilston’s company broke through a protective hedge and began to walk forward. The distance to travel was too far to permit even a jogging advance. The major followed his two forward platoons and for a while was able to control them in good order. Seeing one of the platoons held up by a machine-gun at close quarters, Tilston walked forward and threw a grenade, destroying the gun. In doing so he was hit in the ear and the hip. Gradually Essex Scots fell dead or wounded and the major found himself leading the advance. By now the enemy were counter-attacking and the Canadians had to switch quickly from attack to defence. After the counter-attack had been beaten off, they continued to advance. Ammunition was running low.

Reduced now to a few men from the two front platoons, Tilston had nobody to send back for more ammunition. So he walked across a hundred yards of exposed ground to obtain a supply of ammunition from a following platoon. Men were also searching fallen comrades to supplement their own stock of bullets. The crisis was exacerbated because the three signallers who were carrying the wireless sets had all been hit, rendering communication extremely problematic. Rescue services for the wounded at this forward point were limited, so Tilston also supervised the movement of fallen comrades into a captured enemy command post where a German medical orderly tended wounds.

Ammunition within the company was now virtually exhausted so, whilst his survivors lay firing off their final rounds at the slowly withdrawing enemy, the major set out on another quest for supplies from a neighbouring company. As he did so a shell landed at his feet and shattered both his legs. As he lay, between bouts of unconsciousness, he refused to be moved and instead gave himself a shot of morphine and waited for another officer to arrive. Only then, having briefed the new man, did he consent to be carried away. His physical condition was so bad that one of the stretcher-bearers pulled a blanket over his face, thinking he was dead. Fortunately the efficient military evacuation system, by aeroplane directly back to an English specialist hospital, saved his life against all the odds. The quiet, affable man had not been too old for the task in hand.

Fred Tilston’s experiences have been extremely well documented thanks to his own conversations in later days with Denis and Shelagh Whitaker. Sadly Sgt Aubrey Cosens did not survive to recount his actions. Much of what Tilston experienced would also have been true in Cosens’ case and need not be repeated. That being said, Cosens’ activities did require exceptional physical agility and mental determination, and deserve further explanation. It was also an example of how a low-ranking foot soldier could adapt to tank action in a way which was not regarded by higher authority as normal or desirable, nor was it detailed in training manuals. The Germans had perfected the tactic of integrating infantry with tanks; the Americans had gone some way in the same direction. However, the British landed in Normandy with a rigid distinction between infantry and armoured units, and very little training in the combination of the two. Canadians also tended to conform to the British system as dictated by Montgomery, within whose overall command the Canadians served.

Cosens, aged twenty-three, had a much tougher background than Tilston and had grown up and developed his physique in a wild forest region. This preparation was essential for his final acts of bravery. Cosens’ battalion, the Queen’s Own Rifles, aiming for a tiny hamlet called Mooshof, was quickly shattered by intense fire from well-placed strong points. Supporting tanks of the Canadian 1st Hussars were exposed to the heavier enemy guns. Sgt Cosens soon found himself without an officer and in charge of a pitiful force of four disenchanted survivors. Something spectacular was required to turn rout into achievement. Five men trying to walk the final yards towards steadily firing enemy machine-guns could expect to live for a only few seconds more.6

One Sherman tank, commanded by Sgt Andy Anderson, remained in action. Leaving his four survivors lying inert on the ground, Cosens ran through the visible patterns of tracer rounds to the tank. One of his riflemen described the enemy bullets as ‘just like bloody rain bouncing off that tank’. Jumping on to the tank, Cosens yelled at Anderson to advance. This required an equal amount of bravery and determination from the tank commander, putting himself and crew at grave risk and also endangering the last of the armoured support.

Now, instead of returning to the ground to present a lower profile and lead his men from there, Cosens remained on the tank and stood up outside the turret. Despite attracting enemy fire he was able to direct the tank commander’s aiming as well as encourage his riflemen by hand signals to follow behind the 30 ton armoured vehicle. This required Cosens’ unique blend of mental obduracy and physical agility.

Standing on the turret of a tank places a man’s eyes about ten feet above ground level. A ground level where nothing could move without being shot at. A tank commander would sometimes be closed down inside the turret and restricted to a periscope view of the battlefield or, more commonly, would only have his skull and eyes visible above the turret opening. Casualties among tank commanders were of a very high ratio. In one instance, the drain on officers and higher NCOs was such that a lance-corporal was left in command of a captain’s tank for three weeks before reinforcements could be found.7

How much more exposed, then, was a man standing outside the turret and firing his Sten gun at targets whilst waving on his comrades? A tank is not a car on a tarmac road and has an erratic rock and roll motion. Crossing ditches or mounting tree trunks can cause violent crashes. Boots slide dangerously on the armoured surface. When the massive turret swings to traverse at targets a man can be swept off and under the grinding tracks. No infantryman normally chooses to stand anywhere near the deafening, blazing muzzle flash of a large tank gun. Sharp, pointed and polished bullets, which can sometimes pass through a man’s body without causing fatal damage, are transformed when ricocheting off a tank’s armour into twisted, lethal slugs. At any time, riding on the turret requires at least one hand to grasp some odd projection of the tank for safety.

Sgt Cosens, the tank and the following foot soldiers all miraculously reached the first building. Over the last yards of advance, the very apparition of a small force manoeuvring in such an unexpected way may have caused the defenders to lose aim. The attackers were not behaving in the way in which an enemy marksman’s brain might automatically be calculating. Surprise is always a significant element in attack.

At the first farm building, Anderson commanded his driver to continue at full speed and his gunner to fire into the house. As the wall collapsed under the impact, Cosens jumped down, rushed through the door and led his men in a burst of fire; the enemy surrendered instantly. Very quickly the Canadians cleared the complex of buildings, taking many astonished and petrified prisoners. It was a moment of high triumph as Cosens ordered, ‘Take up defensive positions’. At that moment an unseen sniper, with time to concentrate, fired a shot and killed Cosens instantly.

Yet more evidence of extreme bravery was found only a mile away. Maj. David Rodgers, the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada, and like Tilston newly promoted, was clearing another farm complex of almost the same size in a manner strikingly similar to the attack by Tilston. Some time later, the fully authenticated and approved citations for three Victoria Cross awards lay waiting under the pen of the final authority, Montgomery. For no other apparent reason than a fear of devaluing the award, Montgomery signed off only two awards. On Rodgers’ document he scratched out Victoria Cross and amended it to ‘Immediate Award of the Distinguished Service Order’.8

These rare examples of extreme bravery and self-sacrifice were necessary in some of the bitterest fighting of the entire war. The attacking forces were not only facing an organised, experienced and skilled enemy, enjoying superior defences and weaponry, but an enemy inspired by the final defence of their homeland.

CHAPTER TWO

WHEN HELL FROZE OVER

The whole district has winters of exceeding rigour and those who dwell inside the trench make warlike expeditions on the ice.

Herodotus, 440 BC

After the disrupted ENSA concert and the cancelled Christmas parties for Dutch children, Brian Carpenter’s diminished squadron ‘stood to’ for an immediate march. And was promptly ‘stood down’.

The comedians and the female vocalist were instructed to gather their props and leave without so much as a cup of coffee or a ginever. Some Dutch people, who had been sharing in the concert, wandered bewildered back to their homes. Skeleton crews, shepherded from the concert hall or dragged from beds, did double work packing everyone’s gear, loading Sherman tanks, starting up the engines, testing the wireless set and turret traverse. A few abruptly awakened sergeants shouted and pointed whilst one or two puzzled lieutenants assumed sang froid and cantered about, tapping their bums with riding crops. A few moments later the order came through on the wireless or was shouted from the squadron office, ‘Switch off. Dismount. Unpack. Back to billets and get some kip.’

Regimental second-in-command, Major The Lord George Montague-Douglas-Scott, was summoned suddenly into the presence of the corps commander. Lord George, although a son of one of the largest landowners in Britain and linked by marriage to the royal family, had the professional soldier’s sense of trepidation when summoned to appear before such a solemn and exalted potentate. Anxiously he searched his conscience to uncover what misdemeanour he might have committed. But there was no time to meditate and, shouting for his jeep driver, he hurried to corps headquarters (HQ).

He was shown straight into a large conference room filled with imperious senior officers wearing red tabs. Maps were scattered on a large table. The general was speaking as he turned around. ‘This is an emergency. Von Rundstedt has broken through the Ardennes. The American line has collapsed. May 1940 all over again. Take this map reference. Go there. Recce in each direction. Report if it is a suitable place for a last long-stop before Brussels. Or for counter-attack. Most immediate. There and back as quickly…’ . And without waiting for a reply or salute the general continued issuing further orders to those about him.

At the correct map reference Lord George realised that he would not need to recce in each direction for he was standing ‘on a huge memorial mound which provided a magnificent OP [Observation Post] for artillery observers. The name on the map… Quatre Bras. Suddenly I knew that the X on my map was none other than the centre of the Battle of Waterloo.’ This was the place of Wellington’s great victory in 1815, and which condemned an earlier dictator to solitary confinement on a remote Atlantic island. For a moment Lord George imagined lining his tanks ‘turret up’ to the ridge and performing heroics to stave off the enemy hordes. But time did not permit delay and he turned from the historic names like La Belle Alliance and Hougoumont, his jeep roaring back towards corps HQ.1

Meanwhile, Brian Carpenter and the skeleton crews enjoyed a few hours sleep before shouting voices and banging tins woke them to further frantic action. Comrades were returning from leave on the Liberty trucks and were being pointed straight to the tanks in order to pack up again and make them ready to move. Some troopers found time to carry the prepared Christmas party delights to the house of the local doctor. At least the children’s Christmas would not be cancelled.

This time there was no revoking of orders. The long column of Sherman tanks was soon out on the road, shunting through other military and civilian traffic, held up where battle damage still closed off portions of the roads and frustrated by the continual concertina effect if one leading tank slowed down. They halted as harassed military policemen made instant decisions as to which urgent batch of traffic might have priority over several other convoys. All headed ominously south and east; towards an enemy as yet far away but already menacing because of the emotive names of von Rundstedt and the Ardennes. Was it not von Rundstedt who had commanded the new Blitz style of warfare and erupted from the sparsely defended Ardennes forests in 1940, surrounded the British Army and forced it, ignominiously if heroically, to evacuate the beaches of Dunkirk?

The convoy roared on. But this was no grand prix race and these were not the new German autobahns. This was a sluggish trundle of monstrous armoured vehicles and these were narrow Dutch lanes leading from long straggling village to long straggling village, shunt and stop, jolting and crashing, shunt and stop. The tank radios insisting, ‘Keep rolling! Claim priority’. That day Brian Carpenter noted a total distance, hard won at a cost of burned hands, sore elbows and a battered spine, of 86 miles in bitter cold to Quatre Bras. Next day another 86 miles.2 Riding in a similar artillery convoy, Capt. Jack Swaab noted, ‘77 miles, 65 the next’. As the convoys neared disputed or vacated territory the difficulties increased. Jack found that the next day took seven hours to complete a seemingly endless 40 miles.

Like so many people, the artillery captain found that Christmas 1944 had been cancelled:

XMAS DAY. Noon: The worst ever. Back into Belgium where the enemy is apparently penetrating around Liege. The situation is in fact pretty serious. We had Xmas dinner, a tree, and everything laid on but all has had to be scrapped now, though we are trying our best to get some kind of meal out to the Troops. Still, it’s no use grumbling. Heavy frost, sunshine and bitter cold. Tremendous welcome in Liege where we were the first British column into the city. 20.30 at Strivay: drive of 40 miles in icy weather.3

Capt. Hugh Clark of the 6th Airborne Division was rushing by truck from Bulford to Dover. He went via a troop ship to Calais; a transit camp overnight, where he caught impetigo from dirty blankets; on by lorry in freezing temperatures, and spent Christmas Eve billeted with a local family in a comfortable bed. Pressing on during Christmas Day the convoy was inundated with local women bringing out large cups of ersatz coffee, which tasted horrible but was most welcome:

Our lunch on Christmas Day was a piece of bread and cheese. After travelling through the night we arrived in the Ardennes at Givet at 06.00 hours on 26th December. The ground was covered in snow and the temperature was well below zero. We took over from the Americans and started to dig our defences into a very rocky hillside. I discovered that there was some advantage in suffering from impetigo. Everyone else had to shave out in the open in cold water but I had to report to the Medical Officer to have my razor sterilised and then shave in hot water before he applied gentian violet.4

Gordon Highlander Bill Robertson almost celebrated Christmas. The regimental cooks had done a marvellous job before Christmas Day, serving hard biscuits soaked in hot soup against the cold. Food stocks had been saved for the 25th. Christmas morning started ‘full of edible promise’. A truly traditional meal was served, despite losing some of its appeal in worn, scratched mess tins. It was enhanced by confections and good German cigars – source of origin not disclosed. No liquor was available and indeed in the 5th/7th Gordons the traditional tot of rum was never served to soldiers under the age of eighteen. Then ‘literally half way through our Christmas meal we were told to pack up and be ready to board TCVs in one hour’.5

Back in the columns of 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry, Don Foxley’s tank had been halted by a traffic jam; the ‘umpteenth of the day’. Whilst his commander walked up the road to find out the cause of the delay, Don served himself a scrumptious Christmas dinner, it being that time of day, which consisted of corned beef and hard biscuit. Sitting on the freezing front of the tank, as an alternative to the refrigerated rush of air entering the driver’s compartment, he thought, ‘at least I can sing myself a carol. Even von Rundstedt can’t object to that’. Avoiding ‘Holy Night’, he sang a verse of ‘Away in a Manger’, but quietly in case anyone should think he was becoming a psychiatric case.

One trooper who was definitely not singing Christmas carols was popular Wally Tarrant. He had been sitting in his driving compartment down in the front of the Sherman tank, patiently juggling the gears to maintain a difficult average speed of about 6 mph. His equanimity was shattered by a loud crash; both heard and felt. The tank slewed to one side, slid across the icy road and ploughed its way into a ditch. A link in the right-hand track had broken and the entire track under tension had snaked off; threatening any lurking human being with instant decapitation. This was the long, immensely heavy steel track which ran from a driving wheel, along the entire length of the Sherman, over a sprocket, and then back along the ground to form a moving roadway upon which the tank’s relatively small bogey wheels could roll. Simply to lift the track was a job for several men.

Wally had an on-call armoured recovery vehicle (ARV); a turretless tank equipped with a winch and cables to pull tanks out of this sort of situation. There was also the Light Aid Detachment (LAD) in a half-track, carrying skilled fitters who were able to repair most problems. Urgent wireless messages uncovered that in this thronged, blundering procession one rescue vehicle was far ahead and the other far behind. Wally’s tank was now impeding other vehicles. So the crew climbed out and found that, in addition to the normally hazardous task of repairing the track, they also had to dig into rapidly deepening snow. Wally’s mood was not improved as tank after tank crawled slowly by; a commander peering out of each turret and watching Wally struggle in the snow. Ribald and sarcastic shouts greeted Wally and his pals, the insults usually rounded off by a chirpy, ‘Happy Christmas’. Eventually the normally placid Wally reacted and bawled, ‘Bugger off!’ A sentiment not usually associated with yuletide carols.

A few tanks back, and wearing his recently awarded Military Medal ribbon, Tpr Rex Jackson saw something which he found disturbing in all this great demonstration of military might. In the mounded snow an elderly, bowed Belgian man was pushing a pram piled high with personal goods. Many civilians were moving away in a piteous procession from the oncoming, vengeful Germans. But each time the old man tried to cross the road the pram became stuck in the snow and he had to wait for another tank to go by. As the tank in front of Rex’s edged forward, the man made a further dash for the other side of the road. The pram wheels caught in the furrowed snow again and the huge, threshing tank track caught the pram and hurled it away, spilling clothes and bags all across the road. The old man staggered away and fell into the ditch. There was nothing Rex, a kind-hearted lad, could do. His own tank was crashing relentlessly forward, crunching under its 30 ton weight and whirling tracks anything which hindered its progress. Rex cursed the robotic stupidity of war.6

RSM George Jelley was using his faster and lighter jeep to dash ahead of the lumbering tanks. Unexpectedly he came into a long section of road which was totally deserted, except for a staff car. A staff captain waved him to a stop. Another tall figure wrapped in a great sheepskin coat and muffled by a long scarf approached George, looked at George’s arm badge and the silver horses on his lapels. ‘RSM Jelley, I believe?’ said the mysterious figure. ‘Whatever you are doing, I want you to stop here until relieved. Halt all traffic. Divert them along that side road. There are no defences ahead of us. The Americans have gone. Capt. McGregor will alert your colonel. Good man!’ And with a gesture of the hand the figure turned and headed back to the staff car.

Not a little puzzled, George beckoned to the staff captain. ‘But who shall I say…? What if some colonel or even a brigadier comes up and refuses to listen to me?’ The captain smiled, ‘It’s the privilege you’ve waited for all your life, sar’nt-major, to tell colonels and brigadiers what to do. Your orders are from the divisional commander himself, General Rennie. They don’t come much higher.’7

On another parallel road, one of George Jelley’s minions, Sgt Jack Pentelow, ordered his driver to slow down as he noticed what looked like a large airfield beyond the hedges. The map was indicating that the town of Florennes lay just beyond the far bend in the highway. Jack had moved up to take over the role of lead tank and, although there had been no sign or report of the enemy, he was proceeding with due discretion. His tank had been knocked out twice before and he did not wish a repetition of those horrific occasions. A tarmac road ran towards the airfield. A figure in strange uniform was running, leaping, almost gambolling down the road.

It was an American Air Force colonel who vaulted on to Jack’s tank and shouted over the engine noise, ‘Thank God, you’ve arrived. You’re the best thing I’ve seen since Texas.’

‘Are there any Germans in front?’ asked a worried Jack.

‘No sight of them, but we have been expecting them any time.’

Jack ordered his driver to switch off the engine and waved his troop corporal through to take the lead. He then listened to the story of the delighted American colonel. All ground troops, low-grade men from a newly arrived reinforcement unit, who should have been guarding the airfield, had simply disappeared, some of them leaving arms and equipment behind them. In despair and lacking any firm information about the enemy, the colonel had sent his pilots away in their Black Widow planes to a safer airfield. Before they went he had taken all the machine-guns out of their planes and, with the remaining air crew and ground staff, had mounted a thinly spaced and all too inadequate guard around the extensive field perimeter. Was he just too glad to see the Yeomanry? A very happy man now, he invited Jack Pentelow to share a Jack Daniels, which caused the English Jack to query, ‘Who the blazes is Jack Daniels?’ The Bourbon sour mash whiskey and its history of illegal stills were not yet familiar in local pubs around rural Raunds in Northamptonshire.8

It was not only isolated American Air Force colonels who were confused about what was happening. Hitler had ordered a final desperate attempt to cut off the British and Canadian armies in the north from the American and French armies in the south. If von Rundstedt’s men could reach Antwerp then another Dunkirk-type evacuation might be necessary. Hitler was relying on the sheer brute force of Blitzkrieg. His generals added some more subtle tactics to the plan. A German commando officer, Col Otto Skorzeny, was ordered to form a secret assault mission. This comprised American-English speaking soldiers, wearing American uniforms and travelling in American vehicles, infiltrating the rear areas once the American front lines had been shattered. There was even a suggestion that they might reach Paris and carry out high command assassinations.

Confusion was certainly rife as rumours spread that such disguised enemies were appearing everywhere. Fred Leary was driving his NY lorry in the area of Namur when he was stopped by military police and asked for identity papers. This was something which Fred had never previously encountered either in Normandy or on the long-distance supply runs from the beach depots to the Arnhem road. Not content with examining Fred’s pay-book the police asked further questions to ensure that he really was British, and also explained why it was necessary. Similar check points situated in Allied territory added to the volume of rumours about Skorzeny’s infiltrators.9

Sgt Bernard Upson, XXII Dragoons, had been demonstrating his flail tank, used for mine sweeping, to a new American division which was not equipped with that kind of vehicle. He was caught up in the panic. ‘The saboteurs infiltrated our area, all sorts of wild rumours were circulating – Germans dressed in civilian clothes, as nuns and priests. “Trigger-happy” GI patrols became even more trigger-happy than before.’ Upson was involved in a farcical incident which could have cost him his life. He was billeted on the top floor of a house and, during the night, needed to use the chamber pot. As it overflowed, in desperation he emptied it out of the window. It splashed a patrolling American soldier who immediately blasted the entire side of the house with automatic gunfire.10

Well away from the battle, Lieutenant Frank Gutteridge and a friend were on leave in Brussels. They were driving a captured BMW staff car. (Enemy vehicles were often used in this way.) Entering a car park full of American tanks, Frank and his friend suddenly found themselves surrounded by Americans pointing Tommy guns at them and accusing them of being infiltrators. After explaining themselves with some difficulty they realised that they were fortunate not to have been shot on sight.11

Soldiers in units flanking the breached American defences were also dismayed by the sight of retreating allies. Canadian soldier Wilf Abdallah remembered a scary moment:

In this barn, matey gets up to go to the john when he hollers, ‘Holy shit! C’mon take a look’. This army walking this way up the road single file, and when you see the army doing that, you know something’s wrong. Next thing this American Sergeant-Major come along. He says, ‘Guys take it easy, lay low. You’re cut off, three sides’. And we, ‘Where’s the closest enemy?’ And he, ‘About 100 yards that way’. Well we were somewhat scared and we pretty well hit the deck. It took about three days before we got out of there.12

Stan Whitehouse with 1st Black Watch, 51st Highland Division, realised that his unit was taking over from American soldiers. ‘A ragged column of about sixty GIs came shuffling towards us’. Stan expected the usual banter to be exchanged between the two forces. ‘The sullen GIs trudged wearily past us, faces swathed in scarves and balaclavas and buried in greatcoats’. When Sgt McKenzie stopped the American sergeant and asked where the enemy was, the American replied, ‘Gee, Sarge, I truthfully don’t know. My guys are so shattered I couldn’t ask them to shove out on patrol.’13

It wasn’t only Skorzeny who was causing confusion. The BBC newsreader also added to worries. Capt. E.A. Egli had parked in Dinant when the driver of his wireless truck rushed up in panic, relaying the latest news from the BBC that German advanced elements were already in possession of Dinant. Egli was only reassured when he looked up at the citadel on a high rock face and saw that it was the Belgian flag flying from the flag pole, and not a swastika.14 Egli later saw advancing tanks spinning ‘like curling stones on ice’.

Even without Skorzeny the German breakthrough was enough to amaze and shock most opponents, although they might have been encouraged to learn about the negative opinion held by German commanders. Advancing with the Waffen SS, Manfred Thorn was involved in the initial strike:

The weather was the worst it could be. It rained, it snowed, was icy cold and foggy and the whole operation was to be held as secret as possible. This weather was a blessing as far as air attacks were concerned, but when one had guard duty the cold kept you awake. We used the protection of forests – Blanken and Schmidtheim where all tracks had to be disguised. No fires were to be lit, no loud conversation and there was definitely no singing.

This account contradicts many descriptions of storm troopers singing martial songs as they attacked. What Manfred did not know, and the same applied to Eisenhower and Montgomery, was that von Rundstedt himself did not believe the plan could succeed. He possessed neither the armour nor the manpower for such a huge undertaking. Later he said, ‘not one soldier believed reaching Antwerp was feasible. It was however impossible to protest, for Hitler would not listen.’15