Description
Object description
British private served with 2nd Bn Royal Fusiliers in North Africa and Italy, 1943-1944
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Norwood and Catford, London, 1924-1942: social circumstances; education; sporting activities; outbreak of war, 3/9/1939; work as office boy and clerk, 1939-1940; use of Tower of London as air raid shelter at work; Anderson shelter; German air raids; move of office after German bombing raid to Wisborough Green, rationing; service with Local Defence Volunteers, Wisborough Green, 1940-1941; period training with Home Guard, Bromley Road Drill Hall, Catford, 1941-1942, including weapons training, exercises and patrols; work book-keeping for family butchers, 1940-1942; question of volunteering; call up, 11/1942. Recollections of training with General Service Corps, Maidstone Barracks, 11/1942-12/1942: question of assignment to infantry; barrack rooms.
REEL 2 Continues: drill; PT; weapons training including Bren gun, firing rifle in gas mask and hand grenades; food rations; relationship with recruits and instructors; question of swearing. Period with Queens Royal Regt at Invicta Lines Camp, Maidstone, 12/1942-3/1943: question of specialist training; training as driver-mechanic on Bedford lorry; exercises; training as fireman; guard duties; hut accommodation; visits to Maidstone; preparing for kit inspections. Recollections of period with 11th Bn Royal Fusiliers in GB, 3/1943-11/1943: reception as draft on arrival at Arlesford; hut accommodation; route march and foot inspections.
REEL 3 Continues: bayonet training; irrelevance of driver training; tactical exercises and live firing at Studland Bay; firing rifle from hip during advance; opinion of Thompson machine gun; relationship with ORs; story of 'strike' over quality of food rations; leave; boat training for crossing rivers; exercise landing from assault craft on Isle of Wight; move to Niton; coastal patrols; stories of climbing cliffs using toggle rope and live firing exercise with Bren gun; billets; move to Winchester; assault course; move to Lancaster; canteen; story illustrating treatment given to Non Combatant Corps.
REEL 4 Continues: bayonet training. Conditions during voyage with draft aboard Homeric to Algiers, Algeria, ca 11/1943. Period with 2nd Bn, Royal Fusiliers in Algiers and Egypt, 11/1943-2/1944: first impressions of Algiers; seasickness during landing exercises from assault craft in Bitter Lakes; problems using Bangalore torpedo to get through barbed wire. Voyage aboard Sobieski to Naples, Italy, 2/1944. Recollections of operations in Italy, 2/1944-5/1944: first impressions; move into mountains in front of Monte Cassino; situation; sangars; food rations.
REEL 5 Continues: ration parties; compo food rations and cooking arrangements; latrines; uniform; effect of cold conditions; evacuation by South African stretcher bearers with attack of trench fever; medical treatment at field dressing station; return to unit; question of German sniper and mortar fire; accidental casualty; rest period at B Echelon; move onto Aqua Fondata mountain; occupying one man sangars; story of occupying outpost sangar including German mortar fire and bringing down mortar fire on German patrol. Recollections of operations in Cassino sector, 4/1944-5/1944: devastation; water filled craters in No Man's Land in front of Point 40; German rifle grenade fire; German shell fire.
REEL 6 Continues: German shell and mortar fire; reputation of Monte Camino sector; story of ballroom dancing demonstration interrupted by German shell fire; silence observed during move into Point 40 in front of Hangman's Hill; clearing corpses; personal morale; German defiant display of swastikas on Hangman's Hill, 1/5/1944; German shell and mortar fire; story of acting as guide during relief and coming under fire whilst trying to regain unit; problems following tapes during journey out of front line. Account of attack across Rapido River towards Route 5, 11/5/1944-13/5/1944: prior briefing; period concealed behind Mount Troccio; following tank across Rapido bridge.
REEL 7 Continues: success in crossing Rapido bridge despite tank stopping to avoiding running over corpses; taking cover from German shellfire; advance across fields; contacts with neighbouring Black Watch; fighting order; narrowness of German slit trench; German POWs; absence of officers and NCOs; renewal of advance towards Route 6;leg wound and difficulty in stopping bleeding; evacuation to Rapido bridge; question of German fire on bridge; second n to Rapido bridge; question of German fire on bridge; second head wound; use of German POWs as stretcher bearers across bridge and effect of nebelwerfer fire; medical assessment at field dressing station; evacuation to casualty clearing station; evacuation by train to Bari. Period at 92nd Field Hospital, Royal Army Medical Corps, Bari, ca 5/1944-8/1944; reception; unsympathetic treatment over bleeding onto bed; X-Ray results.
REEL 8 Continues: prior train journey; eye and leg operations; penicillin treatment; stories of mistreatment from nurse; state of leg and second operation; problems with massage treatment. Period at No 11 Convalescent Camp, Barletta, 8/1944: unsympathetic initial assessment by doctor; electrical muscle stimulator; question of return to active service; state of leg on being sent back to unit. Aspects of period with Z Coy, 2nd Bn, RFs in Gothic Line sector, ca 8/1944-10/1944: state of unit; reinforcement drafts.
REEL 9 Continues: interview with medical officer; move into static front line positions; story of attack, 13/9/1944, including difficulty in organising someone fit enough to carry PIAT, story illustrating inexperience of officer, death of officer blown up Schu mine, carrying wounded Black Watch officer to dressing station, report as missing, re-joining unit and debriefing; story of attack on Cesena, 10/1944, including following tanks, personal morale, German shell fire and evacuation with shell shock. Period in hospital, ca 10/1944: medical treatment; discovery of leg wound; state of psychiatric patients; symptoms and question of return to active service. Period as clerk at Unit Maintenance Inspectorate, Naples, 1944-1945: duties.
REEL 10 Continues: contacts with Lord de Clifford. Review of postings as clerk in Italy and Trieste, 1945-1946. Demobilisation, 5/1947. Post-war career: work as commissioner and telex operator; question of disability pension; treatment for psychiatric symptoms and leg injury.