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I joined the Army on the 8th April 1935, and I was stationed in Dover. In March 1936 I was sent to Egypt. After three months in Egypt I went to Palestine. Israel now. I was stationed at a place called Janin, the name comes out now and then when there’s trouble in Israel, it’s round Janin, and that’s on the West Bank. Then from there I came back home, had a month’s leave, and was sent to India, on the North West Frontier, at a place called Nowshira. After serving in India for two or three years, I had a draft to Malta, which was heaven, it was fun there, beautiful! I was in Malta when the Second World War started. But the Italians didn’t declare war, they were the nearest to us. Until the Germans overran France, the Italians thought, ah, we must get in on the act, otherwise we won’t have anything left on show (?) So they declared war on the British as well. On the first morning they declared war, they attacked Malta, and they attacked it with three Savoya (?)S79s, bombers, three-engined bombers, escorted by CR42 biplanes. And I don’t know if you know the history of Malta, but the British only had three little biplanes to go up against this Armada. The Italians never had too much of (patting sound) this and one of their planes got shot down in the first raid. They didn’t come for a few hours, they stayed back. But anyway, they plucked up courage, and, if you know the history all around Tripoli, and places like that, belonged to the Italians and the Germans wanted to get access to it as well so they came down through Italy then across to Tripoli in Tunisia. That’s when our trouble started, in Malta. We got bombed, nearly out of existence for about three years. In the end, not much food, for the Maltese, not much food…..

After the desert war had finished my battalion went back to Egypt and down the Suez Canal, the Bitter Lakes, and we did training on LCAs, that’s Landing Craft Assault for infantry landing on enemy coasts. From there we did three landings in 11 months: Sicily, Italy. And after I’d been abroad for six years I was sent home to do the landing in Normandy, and we landed on Gold Beach and I belonged to the 231 Assault Brigade. Well, after much slogging out in the apple orchards of Normandy, we beat the Germans (the Yanks did most of the encircling movements) and I finished up at a place called Elst in Holland.

In the meantime, before that, before the invasion of Normandy, I was on a live firing exercise with King George VI, Churchill, Eisenhower and Montgomery in Studland Bay, Dorset; and as a result of that I’ve been back there. I had a request for me to return there two or three years ago. It was then that the War Office decided to send a lady down to see me, and now my service is in the Imperial War Museum, and as a result, from Montgomery, I had a commendation for “Outstanding Service and Devotion to Duty�

Here I am, three weeks time if I live that long, I shall be 90!

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