The big landing

THE officers, warrant officers and NCOs spent a lot of time in meetings. Then we were all mustered on deck. That was when we were told that this was the invasion and what was expected.

The CO said that not much opposition was expected. That caused a lot of laughter from the veterans.

We were to advance inland and we weren't to stop for anyone or anything, not even wounded men. There were others coming behind us who were trained to deal with them.

"Whatever happens, don't stop advancing," we were told. "We go in at first light tomorrow."

The atmosphere on the ship changed. There was still the same camaraderie amongst the men, but it was quieter and the men were more careful with their speech. I didn't hear a single swear word.

None of them teased the padre now. There was none of, "Here comes the padre, count your money lads."

He moved amongst the men talking quietly. Some of the battle-hardened men asked to see him privately. Cards and crown and anchor boards were pushed to one side. The men were almost gentle with each other. They were preparing for the following day.

"Have you had a shower?" one of them asked me. "Make sure you do."

I wasn't keen on showers. They were salt water and the soap didn't lather but I did what I was told.

"Make sure you wear clean underclothes and socks. You'll be less likely to get infection in if you're wounded."

"Don't ever think of taking risks. A dead hero is no use to anyone."

We assembled on deck at 03.30 hours. Ammunition for rifles and light machine guns was distributed. Grenades were issued and primed with four second fuses, two grenades to each man. Each man had a No 75 Hawkins anti-tank grenade to fasten to his belt.

We had packs on our backs as well as bags containing our gas masks.

Corporal Stevenson checked that I was all right. He took my gas mask out and threw it overboard and filled the bag with more ammunition."That'll be more use to you than a gas mask," he said.

It was pitch dark. There were no lights on board yet the soldiers moved round with confidence. Dawn was beginning to break as we climbed into the landing craft ready to be lowered to the sea.

The waves were running high and I wasn't the only one who was beginning to wish that I hadn't eaten such a hearty breakfast. Until that moment, everything had happened in complete silence.

As we left the mother ship bound for Gold Beach, Red King section, the naval guns started up.

You cannot see out of a landing craft, the sides are too high, but you can hear and no word in the vocabulary can describe the noise that morning, the whistle and explosions of the shells, the roar of the rockets as they left the rocket ships, the sound of the waves and men shouting through megaphones, planes screaming overhead, appearing and disappearing within seconds.

We did not talk, nobody would have heard us against that noise. I wasn't frightened, just very excited. Men around me were being sick and the scuppers were full of vomit. I don't think I had ever felt so ill in my life.

Then there was a grinding sound and the craft hit the beach. The ramp dropped down almost immediately and the men left in two lines. The craft was slipping back into the sea very slowly.

I was behind the sergeant when the marine put his arm in front of me. "Hold on a minute, son," he said and the engines started and ran up on to the sand. I don't know what happened to the sergeant. He disappeared. I reckoned the ramp must have run over him. He couldn't have got out of the way with all his kit.

Then I was moving forward on to the French beaches. There was a landing craft coming in beside us with an officer at the front with a megaphone reciting Henry the V's speech at Agincourt. "Once more into the breach dear friends..." Planes were screaming overhead and the naval guns were booming so that they echoed inside my head.

I was running over the sand. It's strange how one's mind works because I was thinking of the days I had spent on the beach as a child. I was sure the sergeant had been killed and it worried me.

The beach was full of action. Men seemed to be running in all directions. The beach master was shouting through his megaphone. Then I saw the corporal signalling for us to make for the sea wall. I couldn't hear him in all that din but I understood the signals.

I reached the sea wall and leaned against it to regain my breath. Other soldiers were doing the same. That was when I realised that some of our men were absent.

Looking back, I saw men lying on the sand. That gave me a shock. I hadn't realised we were being shot at. We had not heard the shots, not with all that noise.

I started to look round and I could hardly believe the sight in front of me. It was a hive of activity in every direction. Men were filing off landing craft and advancing up the beaches. LCTs (Landing Craft Tanks) were on the tide line with their ramps open like huge gaping mouths.

Tanks were beginning to trundle up the beaches. They had skirts on them to stop the water getting into the exhaust pipes which they dropped as they came on to the sand.

Flail tanks were already at work clearing the beaches of mines. One poor devil trod on a mine as he ran up the beach and was blown to smithereens. Soldiers coming up behind him simply stepped over what had been a living being a few moments before.

We had been lucky. The tide had carried us over the obstacles that the Germans had built in the water. The Canadians further along the beach had not been so lucky.

Rommel's spaghetti, the angle iron traps, were exposed and men had been caught on them. The waves were washing over them and lifting them up so that they seemed to be dancing in the water, but the faces that looked at us were dead.

Aeroplanes were overhead, wave after wave of them and out at sea were the ships. It was difficult to see the horizon because they were so close together they seemed to be fastened and the smoke blurred their outlines.

A sergeant was gasping at us. "Over the wall, over the wall."

We couldn't hear what he was saying but it was obvious that he wanted us to move. A soldier carrying a sten gun scrambled up the wall and I followed. We ran across the road and down the other side into scrub land on the other side.

Paths were worn between the undergrowth and we started along one of them in single file. It seemed strangely peaceful after the frenetic activity on the beaches. That was when I saw my first Germans. There were ponds and marshy areas amongst the scrub and there were banks that crossed them.

These two Germans started walking along the banks carrying a gun in two parts. They stopped when they saw us and then they started to run. Everyone fired at them. Our platoon fired from the hip. The Germans were quite dead when we walked past them.

I hated the Germans. It's hard for people to understand those feelings today. I didn't know anything about concentration camps or forced labour, but I did know what the Nazis stood for and what they had done to other countries such as Poland and Russia and Holland.

I didn't hate the Germans as individuals, I hated what they stood for.

We were still making our way through the scrub but the Germans had woken up. We came under fire from small arms as well as mortar fire. Some men were wounded but it was the mines that caused the damage.

Men were killed when they trod on one, others when a bomb landed in a minefield and caused sympathetic explosions. Men following on behind stopped just long enough to put the fallen man's rifle in the ground beside him.

If he was dead, they would put his helmet on top of the gun. He had no further use for it. If he was wounded, only the rifle would stand up beside him. That made it easier for the stretcher bearers to get to those that they could help more quickly.

We had reached the village of Brecy by nightfall, some way short of our objective. Corporal Stevenson told us to dig in near some farm buildings.

The corporal told me to dig in, in front of the farm gates and shoot at anything that moved. I wouldn't have slept anyway. I was tired but I was full of adrenaline. I hadn't eaten all day. I hadn't even taken my water bottle out. I'd drunk from streams or water butts, not a very sensible thing to do, but when you're fighting, you don't think of sensible things.

Taken from D-Day: The Battle For Europe, by Molly Burkett and Dick Bowen. Part of the Once Upon A Wartime series, it is published by Barny Books and costs £9.99. For a copy, send £10 to Barny Books, Hough on the Hill, Grantham, Lincs, NG32 2BB. All profits go to the Royal British Legion

Also out now from Barny Books is the airforce story for D-Day, called A Bomber Raid: Mailly Le Camp.

The navy book is taking longer to complete: anyone with memories is invited to contact Barny Books at the address above.

Updated: 08:39 Monday, June 07, 2004