Sword Beach to Bremen., A Veterans tale. Sapper

Sapper,

I've noticed you have visited the Google Map data set where I tried to map your wartime travels. Have they been of any use to you? any glaring corrections needed? Thanks! Hope you're doing well!

Very best regards
- JR

 

Hi JR I tried some of the Google earth, but then My computer lost everything off the hard disc. No back up !
Cheers.
hope you are well mate
Sapper

 

Hi John. Overall the most respected weapon was the 88MM gun. Much respected. As to others? That largely depended o where and when.Our traditional enemies were the 12 SS panzer Hitler Jugend Hitler youth. Tough as old boots.

Their machine guns were respected for their high rate of fire. But now and again you would come up against a particularly tough lot, like the German Paras. They made life very uncomfortable indeed.

Mines were scattered, so that the enemy was the chief worry. The Sappers picked up a quarter of a million mines in Holland.
The nebelwerfer was a terror weapon, the "Moaning Minnie" AS it was designed to strike fear into the hearts of the soldiers. It did not do that ..The Cacophony of sound only serve to warn you the missiles were on the way.

The most frustrating was our inability to identify where the small arms fire coming from...That applies to both sides.
Cheers Sapper

 

Thanks for the reply, I can only imagine trying to locate fire when everyone around you is firing also. The 88 was a hi velocity weapon, was there a audible warning before a round hit in an artillary barage? (lobbing rounds in) I imagine if it was direct fire you would get the first explosion before the sound?

 

The last hundredth of a second of a high velocity round could be heard. Just before it arrived. hard to describe the noise other than a spinning rush of sound.
I am not sure but I think an 88 got me on the road between Overloon and Venraij

 

Sapper, sorry to hear about the computer crash. Let me know if the GE maps are anywhere close to reality. I'll be glad to edit as required, and would love your comments.

VBR,
- JR

 

Thank you Sapper for all your stories, reading all of your postings is very interesting and I appreciate what you have done for your country! Sorry to hear that your computer crashed.

 

Pleased all is well Brian i love to read your stuff even if it's a simple comment. Hope you are enjoying the sun but not those pesky thunder flys.

You have mentioned in the past about Germans surendering and you simply
de armed them and lit a fag put their hands on their head and pointed the direction etc. I have a couple of questions. 1st were some divisions or age groups keener to surrender than others? And when you took a gun of the enemy did you have to hand it in or keep for yourself?

 

Hi.
It made no difference in age or from where they came. When the time came to give up.. That was it. The SS stuck i out the longest but they were just as glad in the end Though they all maintained their fanatic ways.

Almost without exception, the Enemy that surrendered never carried a weapon, they had been dumped some time before. It would stretch an infantry mans willingness to accept a surrender by an enemy carrying a gun. There Were too many reports of the enemy with a white flag surrendering only for a mate to jump u out the ditch and cut everyone down

Cheers
Sapper

 

Hi sir, it is nice to meet you

So your saying that the SS surrendered to try to gun you guys down?

 

I never witnessed this stunt But my old friend the late Ted Brown Western Desert Sicily and Italy Holland did He lost mates when a German popped up and killed his section There after they made the enemy approach them while they stayed down.
Sapper

 

From my Fathers memoirs fighting in the Reichswald Forest;

"........I lost one of my boys on the first day. There were three Germans wearing SS uniform coming in under a white flag. Two were supporting the centre one who was bandaged and wounded. I sent out a young lad, (he had only been with us three days) to bring them in. When he reached them the wounded German stood up and shot my boy between the eyes. He was just eighteen years of age. We emptied our guns into those Germans. We would be reluctant to honour a white flag again........"

 

Very chilling indeed guess you would only let it happen once and remember for next time.

 

Hi Brian,

Similar incidents happened to the Americans and the Military Intelligence section circulated this information to the troops. The material can be found somewhere in LoneSentry.com. Essentially it was what you described. One German soldier would wave a white flag whilst an ambusher waited with a machine pistol or hand grenade.

Funny that you mentioned P.O.W.s were often sent away to the rear unguarded. In an account of a Yank tanker, folks in his battalion refused to be burdened by surrendering Germans and told them to go away.

 

The trouble with escorting POWs, was the enemies shelling just behind the lines. You would have to take them back through, then return later "Bugger that for a game of soldiers"

 

And they managed to escaped??

 

If you are speaking to me Mark 4,

No, the Wehrmacht troops he saw were hungry, demoralized and confused. The tankers were too busy chasing the German units that could still fight to be bothered with P.O.W.s so they told the Germans to beat it and just go away. One tankers shook his fist and shouted a stream of obscenities to the effect of if you try to surrender to me one more time I will shoot you. Upon his the German soldiers hurriedly walked down the road to find more friendly Americans to surrender to.

 

I would like to tip my hat to Sapper. Cheers. Thanks.

 

Hi Poppy, I am never quite sure how I Should answer when folk kindly pay me compliments !
The best thing is a simple Thank you I suppose Cheers,
Sapper

 

Let me introduce you to the "Compo" time bomb.
The highly dangerous tinned bacon...... Treat as a booby trap !

One of the half decent things out of our "Compo" packs, was the tinned bacon. It was a long slice right down the side of a side of bacon,. from top to bottom That was rolled up really tight, with greaseproof paper in between.

It was cooked by immersing in a cauldron of boiling water. When removed...You were faced with a lethal tin. Scalding hot....full of high pressure. The drill to open it, was to face the tin away from you and pierce it with your commando knife...

Where upon a lethal jet of scalding hot water and fat would jet out for a considerable distance. If it caught you..... TROUBLE, you would be scalded. But then you were faced with another danger... take the tightly rolled bacon out, and be specially careful not to eat the greaseproof paper as it chokes you.

What did it taste like? Bloody lovely.... If you avoided the scalding jet of boiling fat, steam and water.

The joys of the "14 man compo pack"