by Thomas Wood
It was here though that I discovered that not only was I good at reading maps, I was pretty good at communications too, becoming adept at operating the No. 9 high frequency radio set that I had been gifted. The only issue with it was that it was far too big to sit in the tank, and so it was placed in the hull of the tank, down by the driver’s seat, which meant I had to lie in the weirdest position possible, almost like a diver heading for the water, just so that I could use the thing.
I also discovered that I was a fantastic machine gunner, I could fire with almost marksmanship accuracy, whether we were stationary, or perhaps more importantly, while we were on the move.
Such was my skill and dexterity of combining all these things in together, I was duly promoted to a First Lieutenant, on the very same day that we were notified that we were to be shipped to France.
No one had really seen it coming; of course war had been declared and that it would only be a matter of time before we would be dispatched somewhere, but no one around me seemed to believe that we would be part of the initial force to be going. We were to join together with another tank battalion and fight alongside them as much as possible when the time came.
The buzz and hubbub that echoed around the camp for days afterwards was immense, men with paperwork and clipboards all flying around from one office to another, as they organised transport for as many of our tanks as possible, as well as the crews to go with them.
Once we had made our journey over to France, the CO of the battalion approached me and invited me to his office. As we marched our way over there he asked me several questions, but I couldn’t help but wonder what on earth I had done wrong.
“Your father fought in the last war, am I right in saying that Alf?”
“Yes Sir, that’s right, Royal West Kent’s.”
“Good, good.”
We entered his office where he sat me down and offered me something to drink. He poured himself something and sat down, pulling his chair away from his desk so it was just me and him chatting, no desk to increase the formalities.
“I hear you like reading maps Lieutenant.”
“Yes, Sir, I suppose I do.”
“Are you any good?”
“I suppose so, Sir. Why’s that?”
“How would you like a little bit more responsibility in the regiment? I’m talking full regimental responsibility here, not just the 4th.”
He knew I would, I was an ambitious young man, with a father behind me who was so keen for me to reach the heights of Brigadier that it was probably a letter from him to the CO that meant we were having this conversation.
“Absolutely, Sir.”
“Right, well, it means switching crew and a few other things, but this is the gist of it.”
He started off asking me if I knew what a Reconnaissance officer was and what it entailed, before he heavily indicated that this was very much a hands-on role, one that would take great courage and may have disastrous consequences if I were to shy away from my new duties.
I would now have a new tank, as well as three others to be in charge of, as well as a new crew that, just like me, had been specially selected for this job.
“It is the job of the Recce officer and his men, to go ahead of the regiment, to scout the area for the enemy and radio in their whereabouts. They are to then head back to the main body of the regiment, before guiding them in to battle and engaging the enemy. It is not an easy task, in the heat of the moment it is, of course, very difficult to plot where you are and what the route shall be, so I need someone who is an expert in getting lost and finding his way out again.”
“That’s me then Sir,” I said with a grin. My grin was fortunately met with a broad smile of his own, which morphed the shape of his moustache to match the contortions of his mouth.
“Right then Lieutenant Lewis, you are now the new Reconnaissance officer for the Regiment. Well done.” He held out a hand to shake mine before adding, “You really will be right in the thick of it all, you know that don’t you?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Good. Now get out, I’ve got some arrangements to make.”
I felt ecstatic as I left his office and marched back towards my billet, here I was, only just twenty-one and I would be responsible for so much and I was getting just what I wanted, right in the thick of it and playing to my strengths. I couldn’t wait to be able to tell my Dad.
A large proportion of my time in France was spent driving around in my tank, reporting on the movement of our own troops for practice, as we couldn’t see any enemy troops whatsoever. In fact, as far as we knew, they were all still back in Berlin, tucked up nicely in their beds while we knackered ourselves on exercises and drill.
As winter approached, our focus quite quickly switched from trying to hone our skills in reconnaissance and battle tactics, to quite simply trying to keep warm. Inside the tanks, we were quite lucky, as simply idling the engine meant that the tank was warm enough to cook a chicken on for Sunday dinner.
I felt sorry for the poor souls who were dug in along the border, hastily built defensive positions that meant there was no source of warmth for them other than a barrel hastily lit to cluster round. The only problem for them was the light discipline on the line, which meant it was near impossible to actually get a fire going in one.
Fortunately for them, they were only in the line for a short while, before being rotated out, where I was sure that most of them managed to find a lovely warm bed back in the French towns where they were stationed.
We spent longer on the line, compared to our infantry counterparts, purely because there were fewer of us than them. I didn’t begrudge them though, I knew that the longer I was in the line meant that there was more chance of action if it ever did come. After months of waiting and freezing however, we all wondered if this war would ever actually heat up, in more ways than one.
“The Boer War,” piped up my driver, Ted Holloway on one midnight patrol.
“The South African one,” I retorted, confused about yet another conversation that he had the knack of starting halfway through, without having previously included anyone else.
“No, this war. That’s what it is. The Bore War. I’m so bored. When’s it actually going to kick off?”
“Will it kick off?” my gunner, Trooper Alan Clarke chimed in.
I tried not to bite, I didn’t like debating with these two as to whether we’ll see any action and if we did, how well we would do. The truth was that I was worried. Not because I thought we weren’t good enough in ourselves, but because I was certain that the Germans were probably better equipped than us and, when the time came, we would struggle to match their prowess.
“Oh, it’ll come.” I said, “you won’t need to worry about that.”
We all jumped up in a start as the tank was rapped on from the outside; drawing my revolver, I nervously poked my head out the commander’s turret.
“Monsieur?” A small girl was standing at the side of the tank, clutching at a basket of bread and other weird and wonderful things that I had never seen before.
I hopped out of the tank, clutching some of the local French currency in my sweaty palm.
“Quels sont ceux-ci?” I pointed at a weird looking, pastry type thing that seemed to be the main bulk of her wares.
“Un Croissant, monsieur,” she replied timidly. I took some and offered my palm out to her to take the necessary coins. Surprisingly, she left me some as change.
“Of course, he speaks French as well,” said Ted, mockingly, “Is there anything that this bloke can’t do?”
“Brigadier in no time,” chuckled Clarke.
“If you don’t want one you only have to say,” I responded, which was met with sudden apologies and laughter.
3
As we began zipping our way through the French countryside, I couldn’t help but feel an incredible excitement at finally being able to put all my skills to good use, all those hours of deliberately getting lost and trying to find my way
home, all those days spent poring over maps till I thought I knew the area like the back of my hand.
Ever since I’d been made reconnaissance officer, I had taken my job a little bit more seriously. Whereas before I had been in charge of a small section of tanks, now I was in charge of finding the enemy, going ahead of everyone else to try and actively seek them out. Even if we were in a defensive manoeuvre at the moment, I felt like I was spearheading an offensive, in my own way.
The Germans had smashed the silence of Ted’s “Bore War,” and within hours, we had been on the move in an attempt to meet the enemy armour that was charging its way through our defences to the north.
Our tank tracks squealed menacingly as we glided through abandoned fields and villages where shutters were immediately snapped shut at the sound of us. I thought about those people for a fleeting second and wondered whether or not they would be alive in a few days’ time. Ever since news of the German advance through Belgium had been received, every man and his dog knew that we were going to be on the back foot. No one had really been expecting it and according to some, we were under the overall command of the French, so our commanders were at no real liberty to order us where to go. Our trust in the French had waned at the sight of their lack of enthusiasm as they manned the defences on their very own border.
Ill-discipline was rife among them, and the amount of wine that was consumed while on watch, meant they struggled to lift their rifles up, never mind getting them into a decent firing position. They had no regard whatsoever for their superiors and it seemed that the officers themselves had completely given up and spent most of their days smoking, drinking and reading.
We knew that an almighty battle was about to break out, and I was not naïve enough to think that we would be able to avoid the small towns and villages that so many people lived in. I hoped that they all had cellars that they could duck into at a moment’s notice, or that they had somewhere completely out of the way to get to as soon as possible. It must have been a horrible situation for them, their homes and livelihoods on the frontline once again, probably only just having rebuilt their lives after the first war. Still, in the same fleeting second, I knew I wouldn’t hesitate to order artillery on a house that suddenly found itself to be occupied by a German machine gun team or a butcher’s that was home to a sniper.
We idled for a moment, before shutting down our engines for a break. By my calculations, we were still around twenty minutes away, according to our latest intelligence, so it would be good to let the engines, and the boys, cool down slightly before what could be a very hairy journey back. We hopped out, to take on some water, and I began to marvel at the silence that embraced our surroundings. There was no noise, it was eerie, and I thought about how my father had often spoken of the silence just before he had gone over the top.
I shut my eyes and imagined what it was like, the silence that seemed unbreakable, shattered by the shrill, piercing shriek of an officer’s whistle, the starting pistol for men’s howls and the screams of artillery, the rattling machine guns and the thudding mortars. My eyes shot open at the image in my mind.
“Weapons ready please boys,” all of them ducking momentarily into their cabs and handing each other weapons. I had not been this nervous in a long time; I was worried that they would just appear out of a hedgerow at any moment, and we had got so used to a quiet war that we all thought that an eruption was about as likely as Neville Chamberlain himself hopping out of the nearest tank.
I rested myself on the side of my tank, the Light Tank Mark VI. It was vastly different to the Matilda that I had got so used to in previous months but being in charge of reconnaissance meant that a change of tank was in order. The Matilda was far too slow for what I would need it for; finding the enemy, then running away very fast. The Mark VI was ideal; it was lightweight and well-built, but most importantly of all, it was quick. With top speeds around thirty-five miles an hour, it meant that I should have more than enough speed to outrun a German Panzer.
It was all made to measure, with each panel being slotted together so perfectly that nothing would be able to get through, like the molten lead that managed to seep through tanks in the First War. It wasn’t spacious, but for the most part it wasn’t uncomfortable either, except when it began to get really warm when they ran for hours, or if we were going over particularly arduous terrain.
It housed my driver, who sat down at the front next to the engine compartment, my gunner, who was up in the turret where I was, and me, who also used the radio that was in as our fourth crew member.
It was quite a funny looking thing, especially as the guns on it weren’t nearly big enough to actually cause any damage to a German Panzer. We had two machine guns, a .50inch Vickers machine gun and a .303 machine gun, both of which were obviously no use if we were caught up in a situation with a Panzer that had a 2.5inch gun mounted on it. So, not only did we have to outrun the tank itself, we also had to outrun the projectile it fired at us.
Despite its shortcomings in a modern battle, I loved it, I thought it was brilliant. It was probably because it was my first command, all four of these little tanks that had stopped were mine, all under my control as my recce unit. I was immensely proud.
I continued to study my map with my NCOs that commanded the other tanks, deliberating the best route to take and making sure that all of our position fixes matched up with each other’s. After a few more sips of water, I gave the order to mount up again and begin to start moving.
Clarke and I hopped into our tank, but there was no sign of Ted for some time. The other tanks began to blow out of their exhausts as they got their engines back into action, idling as they impatiently waited for the commander to get his tank going too. But still, there was no sign of Ted.
Just as I began to get really concerned, and before I sent out a search party, a figure came crashing through the undergrowth to our right.
“Sorry, Sir! I was caught incredibly short!”
I immediately got on the radio, “Hello all Tangos, this is Tango One. Sorry about that, Red’s leaving us a trail for if we get lost later on. Over.” I didn’t get any responses but knew that everyone would be passing the message on to their respective crews, and the laughter would almost drown out the sound of their engines.
“Okay then, Red, let’s get her going, shall we?” It had taken me a while to get used to calling Ted Holloway ‘Red,’ probably because it was so close to his real name that it felt almost pointless using a nickname for him.
He had a shocking streak of red hair around the outskirts of his fringe, the rest of it looking like it had been dyed a darker pigment, but he had run out as he had got to the edges, hence the name ‘Red.’
Red was a brilliant chap, he was incredibly popular amongst the regiment, he was one of those blokes who knew absolutely everyone and could push it further with people than others ever could. He had a mischievous grin etched on his face permanently and was more than happy to help whenever the opportunity had arisen. I had chosen him as my driver specifically because, despite the outward appearance of being an immature young lad, as soon as he sat in the cockpit of the tank, he became one of the most professional soldiers that I had ever met.
Clarkey was good too, I had chosen him as he was an excellent shot and it was almost out of a selfish desire to be the best tank that I had picked him as my gunner. In the army, it is always good to keep discipline by maintaining a divide between an officer and his men, the problem with being in a tank for most hours of the day, means that you are so close to one another, you spend so much time getting to know the ins and outs of each other’s minds, that it becomes impossible. Both Red and Clarke were considered close friends of mine, even if I did have to pretend to be elusive with them when we were back at barracks or around other officers. I was almost certain that most other tank officers behaved in the exact same manner as I did.
As we jerked our way off our standing point, I began to get very twitchy all of a sudden. Our intelligence ha
d the enemy group as being a little over sixty minutes east of our position around twelve hours before. If they had bucked their ideas up this morning, shortly after we had set off, we would be in sight of them in a little over twenty minutes, if I had calculated everything correctly.
“Hello, all Tangos, this is Tango One. We are approaching the border with Belgium. Eyes peeled commanders. Check your horizons. Over.”
This was the issue with my job as recce officer, the uncertainty that would always fester in me would always linger, it was our job to find the enemy and plot a route. Where would they be? Would they be on the move or had they stopped? Could they be around the corner? Or just on the crest of this hill?
The likelihood of us running into a whole battalion of heavily armoured tanks was so high, that it almost didn’t bear thinking about. I was certain that if we all had given it too much thought, we would have turned back already.
I glanced down at my map once again. I had a vague idea of where we were right now, but as we were rolling over empty fields and unpopulated countryside, there was very little by way of landmarks to be able to pin down where we actually were specifically. I hoped that the other commanders were plotting their routes and that they had a similar idea of where they thought we were.
I looked ahead on the map, at where I had proposed we should go. We would continue heading east until we hit Courtrai, at which point we would fall back within radio range and ask headquarters what our next move should be. But I was anticipating finding the Germans way before that.
The map showed that in approximately five miles, the terrain would slowly rise, before becoming much steeper, followed by a drop off of about ten feet. We would hold there for a moment and take on some more fluids and cool down, all the while observing across the fields and roads that we could see.
I found that my finger was running over the map, across our planned retreat, hoping that as soon as we saw them, that we would still be within range of headquarters so that we could tell them immediately. My palms grew sweatier as I ran the back of my hand over my forehead.
