Deasy, William Roy (Oral history)

British NCO served with 101 Anti-Aircraft Z Bty, Royal Artillery in GB, 1940-1941; served with Glider Pilot in GB and North West Europe, 1942-1944; POW in Germany, 1944-1945

REEL 1 Background in Plymouth, 1920-1940: family; education; employment; reaction to declaration of Second World War, 3/9/1939. Recollections of period as lance bombardier with 101 Anti-Aircraft Z Bty, Royal Artillery in GB, 1940-1942: background to joining unit at Havant after basic training, 8/1940; in action at Sully near Cardiff, 3/1941; method of operating rocket batteries; contact with Duncan Sandys; visit by Winston Churchill, 1941; accident with loosely packed cordite; move to experimental establishment at Aberporth, 1942. Aspects of period of training with Glider Pilot Regt in GB, 1942-1944: reasons for volunteering for unit, 10/1942; basic training at Tilshead; character of flying training; reasons for missing D-Day operations. REEL 2 Continues: false alarms for operations between 6/1944-9/1944. Aspects of operations as staff sergeant during Operation Market Garden, Arnhem, 9/1944: take off, 17/9/1944; load carried; nervousness about tail dropping off; landing in potato field; loss of good luck ring and immediate wounding; opinion of his landing. Aspects of period as POW in Netherlands and Germany, 1944- 1945: his capture by Germans; execution of guard who opened fire on POWs; march to Apeldoorn; transfer to Sagan POW Camp; living conditions at Sagan; march westwards from camp; liberation by Russian Army at Muhlberg; return to GB, 5/1945.