Family Members, World War 2, Etcetera...

Quite a few as most people have.

Both my grandads were in reserved professions, one was a shipwright in Devonport and the other a master baker with his own shop. The first tried to lie about his age to get in the RAF but they didn't believe him and so ended up manning rocket batteries in Staddiscombe. The second became a special policeman.

My great uncle was on the Arctic Convoys, he was tough as old boots, even until his last days he could drink anyone I know under the table.

Some of my great grandparents served in WWI too though I'm not sure of details, my brother when he went to Afghan was given a silver matchbox cover by my gran that my great grandad had when he survived the Somme.
 
My grandfather was a Captain in the Royal Artillery & served in Burma and the far east. He told very few tales of his service - aside from having a crown fitted by a German POW dentist which only fell out in the 90's, and once having to defend a gun position with direct fire from the artillery pieces (think barrell horizontal and using open sights).

After the war he became one of the Army's first helicopter pilots and was the army test pilot at the Airbourne Forces Experimental Establishment at Beaulieu and then the Aeroplane & Armament Experimantal Establishment at Boscome Down. He later became a test and display pilot for Bristol Helicopter and later Westlands when they took over Bristol.
 
Not sure about one side of my family, but one of my grandads was in the RAF during WW2. He died when I was 7, so what I've been told has come from my gran and uncles (2 eldest sons).
He spent most of his childhood life in Germany and was held captive with his parents during WW1. He then spent a lot of time traveling around Germany as a salesman in the time leading up to WW2. Spending so much time there, he became fluent in German. It was a specific German dialect which was unusual for foreigners to speak, and he surprised many people when they found out he was English. Because of this ability, he entered the RAF in 1938 as an intelligence officer. When Rudolf Hess parachuted into Scotland, he was involved in his interrogation. Later on he was transferred to RAF Bomber Command HQ and was part of the planning of Operation Millennium, the bombing raid on Cologne. Towards the end of the war, he was promoted to Air Commodore and posted to Lord Mountbatten’s South East Asia Command. He lost a very good friend who was captured and beheaded by the Japanese. Is it ironic that he never forgave the Japanese for what they did, yet he was involved with the bombing of Cologne?
 
My Great Uncle manned the top gun in a Lancaster that was shot down over Belgium, where he now rests. He was 19 at the time, and was the older Brother to my Grandmother. She has been over there many times but not found his grave until the last few years, where she was passing through a village and found someone who remembered a Lancaster crashing very nearby. They rushed to help the crew but they were far beyond saving, so were laid to rest in a local civilian cemetery. She told me that through her whole life she looked up to him as an older sibling - as that is how she knew him when he was alive - but seeing his name on a stone with the date of his death brought it firmly home to he was essentially still just a boy.

After a divorce with my Grandfather, this same Grandmother went on to remarry a Royal Marine who served in the Second World War. He lied about his age to join the service and he has a huge collection of stories. He was involved in the Normandy landings, going ashore earlier than the main landing force to destroy gun emplacements. They were told they would only be in the area a few days but ended up staying for over 2 months. He also served in Burma, there are a lot of stories there I have forgotten which I mean to ask him about. The most memorable story of his is where he underwent selection for a particularly special mission. The selection process consisted of many things but his hurdle proved to be part of it where candidates had to travel from the south coast to the north with next to no possessions and no money, with a list of strange items to collect on the way. The hair of a particular breed of horse and the signature of a specific Landlady are examples I remember. He ended up sneaking on board a train, and didn't get many of the items required so subsequently failed to be selected for the mission. To this day he is very disappointed that he failed the selection, but I'm quite glad as if he had succeeded he would've most likely been among the Commandos that died taking part in Operation Frankton, which has a film adaptation titled the Cockleshell Heroes and was one of the things that sparked the formation of the Special Boat Section.
 
Last edited:
My grandad was in the navy in the second world war. He was on two ships that go blown up by German U boats. The first was, I believe, the HMS Hermione and he was one of only four survivors.

I don't have any details about the second ship he was on.
 
In fact, I've just found an interview with my Great Uncle talking about his time during the war and on HMS Curacoa if anybody is interested. Its about an hour but its an extremely interesting interview. Found out from that he was a loader on one of the guns behind the funnel (AA cruiser). His ship got bombed before Dunkirk and then he was there to collect troops while the Curacoa was in the dockyard to get fixed from the bomb blast.

Imperial War Museum interview from their archives:

http://m.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80015884 - Reel 1 - Here he explains his life on board up including up to the sinking and how he escape from the ship after the Queen Mary hit her.

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80015884 - Reel 2 - post Curacoa - rescue and time spent drifting in the sea holding onto a rope net.

 
Last edited:
My grand dad fought in both WW1 and WW2. He nearly made it too, but was killed by a U boat on the trip home. Did quite a bit of research on him and he would have had some great stories to tell.

My other grand dad was a pilot, and I think he may actually still be alive. Him and my gran must had what you might call a fleeting romance lol. My mum exchanged letters with him and her half-siblings a few times but I don't think she had the courage to meet him.

My step-grand dad also served in WW2.
 
Last edited:
cyber69 said:
I inhertited my grandad's and great grandad's war medals and one of them is in it's own box apart from the others. My great grandad won it for valor when he went over the top of the trench and rescued a wounded officer.

An uncle fought against the Japanese in hand to hand fighting in Burma - he never talked about his experiances with anyone to my knowledge such was the ferosity and savagery of the fighting.

My other Grandad was a desert rat and went about servicing all the artillery guns all over the middle east.
Click to expand...

One of my grandfathers was a desert rat too. I'm not entirely sure what he did, but I believe he was eventually discharged because a bomb hit his truck flipping it and burning his head and face quite badly. His hair never recovered! I think he was a general infantryman and driver.

My grandmother who is 90 now worked in the army post place, so she would add little notes to people she knew onto the letters hah!

My other grandfather was too young to go to war at the time.

My other grandmother was a child in Belgium when the Germans came through. We think she may be Jewish, but also there seems to be mounting evidence that she was, in fact, Catholic. I think she was persecuted fairly badly and will never speak about it or her childhood. The only real story that I've heard is that she was strafed by a German aircraft.
 
Last edited:
One of my grandads was a copper, so wasn't called up. The other, who was young enough to only be called up right at the end of the war, never saw fighting, but went to Italy, where he was a bodyguard to Field Marshall Kesselring during the war crime trials in Venice. He taught my grandad how to play chess.
 
I honestly don't know much about my grandparents involvement in the wars at all, and my parents know just as much as I do, which is only the basics. Stuff like the Second World War was just not talked about it seems, which to be honest is all very understandable. Who *would* want to remember.

As far as I know, my grandad on my mothers side was possibly in artillery, or part of a unit attached. I seem to have a memory of my grandma getting out some of his old medals and telling me that he got one for bravery after chucking either an enemy grenade or enemy unexploded shell out of the artilllery pit he was in. I only know this through grandma, grandad had died just shortly after I was born. If anyone could look this up, it'd be brilliant, pretty sure his name was Dennis Dade, from West Street, Burnley. As for my grandma, I believe she was in the ATS, as a radio operator or something like that? Definately something to do with comms. She died in 2009, so can't ask her now.

On my dad's side, I believe they were both too old to enlist, or that they were allowed to keep on working their farm.
 
Last edited:
My grandad served in the Navy as a submariner, a torpedoman on HMS Rover

Some of the stories he had were awesome, it sounded extremely scary at times with depth charges shaking the sub and being shot at with torpedoes. Truly frightening but awe inspiring.

I miss my grandad.
 
My grandad was a navy signalman in the Pacific. I don't know which vessel, but I do know he was given his "final meal" as the allies were preparing for the invasion of Japan, and his ship was in the first wave that were facing certain doom. The Japanese surrendered mere hours before they were set to invade.
 
My grandfather served in the RAF during WW2, he repaired the bodywork of our fighters and bombers. As far as I know he served in France, North Africa and Italy, he was due to serve in Germany near the end of the war but was recalled to England after he was offered another job in the RAF as a clerk. I've seen a few of his medals and thankfully he's still around today at the ripe old age of 91. I live with my grandparents so I'm lucky enough to be able to have a good old chinwag with him about what life was like back then.

Unfortunately he's not in fantastic health physically, but mentally he's as sharp as he's always been and will happily sit there with me and recall events from over 70 years ago whereas I can barely remember what I did last week. :D
 
I lived with both my Gran and Grandad when I was 7. My Grandad passed away when I was 10 however he did tell me LOTS of stories about the War (WWII). My Gran used to go mad at him for telling me these stories as she was always worried about losing him during the war and any memory of the war should kept just that. A memory.

One particular yarn was when he was based in a some barracks somewhere in France. I think it was a makeshift barracks of some kind. One night he was on watch with 2 others and were sat smoking on a bench outside. Iirc it was a cool, cloudless night in the late summer early autumn.

Grandad and the two other men were chatting and every now and then a slight tap/small banging noise was heard. They ignored it but it carried on and slightly different noises where added to the night too. They started to get a little worried and got into cover. One went to get an officer type person to let him know. After a few minutes the whole barracks was awake and quietly they all got their guns and surrounded the noise, which by now was known to becoming from the area where a gate was into the compound and housed the parking for jeeps and vans etc. After a few minutes of shouting "show yourself" etc. my grandad and one other went over to the noise and then they found out what it was.

All guns trained on them for cover etc. and all it was, was little twigs, acorns (or some other type of seed from the trees) and leaves falling onto the jeeps metal and also onto the floor. This made the variety of sounds they could hear.

My Grandad said it was the worse night of his life. not knowing what it was or whether or not they were surrounded by Germans etc.

I cant imagine what must have gone through the heads of these brave men and women during those times.

My Grandad told it better than I just did. I was riveted to him that night telling me. Awesome story. :-)
 
My granddad was born in the Polish town of Bydgoszcz. He had several extended family members who were Jewish (he wasn't), who didn't survive the Holocaust. He didn't like to tell his story, what I do know has been pieced together from bits and bobs he told various people, including myself - I would have loved to have heard the whole story from him while he was alive but he really clammed up whenever I asked him about it.

He joined the Polish army at the age of 15 (lied about his age) and was on patrol with them in Southrn Poland at the age of ~18 when his group was overpowered by a group of German soldiers. They were loaded into vans to be sent to a "work camp". At one point when the vans had stopped for some reason, a German soldier who must have possibly not had as strong feelings that he was doing the right thing, told them to escape if they ever got a chance. That chance did come and 3 or 4 of them successfully managed to escape. (The vans were, as it happens, bound for Auschwitz-Birkenau - they were about 15 miles from it when they managed to escape).

My granddad smuggled himself on board a freight train bound for France along with two Italian men (who he said he got on very well with, even though they didn't understand each other :)). They joined the French Resistance before eventually going their separate ways. He told an amusing tale of coming face to face with a German soldier who was all by himself, as was my granddad. They both stared at each other with their guns pointed at each other, before both turning in the other direction and running off :)

Eventually making his way through France, he made it to the UK where he joined the British Army. The rest, as they say, is history - he arrived in the UK in 1944 and spent the rest of the war fighting back in France, before settling down again in Britain. He didn't want to go back to Poland to live, it was like a third world country after the war and constantly in battles between Germany and Russia. He supported the family he'd left behind (parents and 9 siblings - he was the only one who 'got away') and still went back for visits, but became a British citizen and made a life and home here.

I miss him a heck of a lot. :)
 
Last edited:
Both my granddads worked as mechanics on Spitfires, so did not see any action.
But in WW1 both my Great G-Dads were injured in 1914 and were pensioned out.
 
My great grandad fought in WW1. He was bought up in Chelsea and when the war broke out, he and his brother signed up, in order to get away from their father, who was a drunk and used to beat them up.
I think he was in the Durham light infantry, and was a machine gunner at the Somme.
The machine gun positions were forward most of the tranches and in order to keep the coolant from freezing, they had to fire sporadic bursts now and again. This gave away their position, and a german officer killed the two other men in the trench and shot my great grandad six times. He managed to crawl out into what he thought was the English line, but it wasnt, he was in the german line. He was captured and quickly escaped. None of his 6 wounds ever got seen by a doctor.
after the war he met a woman from Notts and moved to the midlands, he died in 1992 at the age of 92.
My grandad (his son) fought in India in WW2 and is still alive today aged 90 :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom