Lakeman, Ernest Kenneth (Oral history)

British NCO served with Royal Corps of Signals attached to I Corps in GB and North West Europe, 1944-1945; served with 2nd Air Support Signals in Palestine and Greece, 1945-1946

REEL 1 Background in Plympton and Plymouth, GB, 1922-1939: family; education; employment; reaction to declaration of Second World War, 3/9/1939. Aspects of period as civilian in Penzance, GB, 1939-1941: German Air Force attacks on Penzance including damage to Penzance Railway Station; disruption to rail services; sight of Royal Navy minesweeper being blown up in Mounts Bay; attempt to volunteer for Royal Navy, 1939. Aspects of enlistment and training with Royal Corps of Signals in GB, 1941: reason for enlistment in Royal Corps of Signals, 6/1941; basic training at Ossett; nature of discipline during basic training; effeminate recruit who failed to finish basic training; contrast in attitude on part of NCOs in civilian dress and uniform; allocation to wireless operator training; degree of movement between signal units; wireless operator training at No 3 Operator Training Battalion at Huddersfield. Aspects of period with Royal Corps of Signals attached to Headquarters, I Corps in GB, 1942-1944: posting to Headquarters, I Corps at Doncaster, 1/1942: narrow escape from being sent to Singapore, Malaya, 2/1942. REEL 2 Continues: role in deception work by transmitting false signals to Germans; accidental blacking out of Chesterfield during exercise; effects of endurance trial he was involved in; attitude towards progress of Second World War; contrast in impact of radio broadcasts by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and William Joyce 'Lord Haw Haw'; amphibious training in Scotland; role as principle detachment operator to Commander Royal Engineers with I Corps Royal Engineers Signals Section; character of Brigadier Campbell; deception of Germans through signal transmissions; story relating to motor cycle accident at Frimley Green, 1944; problems of seeing wife in 1944; move to isolation camp at Grays, 31/5/1944; anchoring of Landing Ship Tank (LST) in Thames Estuary, 6/1944; need for reliability among signalmen; story of signalman who prised open crate containing white crosses bound for Normandy, France; nature of security; seasickness off Deal, 5/6/1944. Recollections of operations as NCO with Headquarters I Corps on Juno Beach, Normandy, France, D-Day, 6/6/1944: landings on Juno Beach; move inland; opinion of beach masters and Corps of Military Police. REEL 3 Continues: opinion of organisation on Juno Beach; German artillery fire; opinion of Canadian Army unit's work in initial twenty four hours. Recollections of operations as NCO with Royal Corps of Signals attached to I Corps Signals in Normandy, France, 6/1944-8/1944: work of Salvation Army on Normandy bridgehead, 6/1944; story of Sherman Flail Tank driver blown up near Douvres-la-Délivrande; German resistance of radio headquarters near Douvres-la-Délivrande, 6/1944; work of Brigadier Campbell, 6/1944-8/1944; low degree of contact with civilians; opinion of German forces; account by French civilians of German soldiers in Normandy; weather conditions; sight of Allied bombing of Caen; rescue of United States Army Air Force airman shot down on raid on Caen; reasons for physical collapse; mother's present of apples; driving into minefield and capture of German prisoners of war in Le Havre, 9/1944; attitude of French civilians to Allied bombing of Le Havre. Recollections of operations with 1st Corps in North West Europe, 1944-1945: push in Belgium, 9/1944. REEL 4 Continues: reception in Liège and Antwerp, Belgium; treatment of collaborators and reaction of Allied troops; weather conditions near Breda and s'Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, winter 1944-1945; friends he made amongst Dutch civilians; story he learnt about resistance in one Dutch village. Recollections of period as NCO with Royal Corps of Signals attached to Headquarters, I Corps Signals in Germany, 1945: occupation of Münster, 1945; orders he gave to Herr Berlin and his staff to get telephone exchange in Münster Hospital working twenty four hours a day, 4/1945; sight of survivors from Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, Germany, 4/1945; sight of defendants during Lüneburg war cimes trials; sight of devastation of Hamm and overhead railway at Wuppertal; question of non-fraternisation with German civilians; opinion of Soviet delegation at Lüneburg, 5/1945; reaction to being ordered to Far East, 7/1945; posting to 2nd Air Support Signals in GB, 7/1945. REEL 5 Continues: Recollections of period as NCO with Royal Corps of Signals attached to 2nd Air Support Signals in Palestine, 1945-1946: postings in Palestine, 1945; narrow escape from explosion at King David Hotel, Jerusalem; reaction to having to serve in Palestine after volunteering for duration of Second World War; reaction to Jewish refugees being turned back from ports. Recollections of period as NCO with 2nd Air Support Signals in Greece, 1946: move to Greece, 1946; move of detachment from Athens to Salonika; encounter with survivor of Dachau Concentration Camp; lack of hostility from Greek people; discovery of British War Graves Commission cemetery and personnel who looked after it, Salonika, 1946; attitude to having served in Second World War.