An Englishman at War

by James Holland

  In action he had undaunted courage and always showed initiative and complete disregard for his own personal safety. At times he appeared even to be somewhat foolhardy – maybe on account of his short-sightedness, which compelled him to wear large, thick-lensed glasses. I regret that he was not spared to know that he was mentioned-in-despatches for outstanding service.

  At the end of the desert campaign he wrote a book about the Regiment and the fighting in North Africa, which he asked me to read and write a Foreword to, and I readily agreed to this request. He disguised all personalities with fictitious names and described with cynical detail (for the most part with accuracy), various personalities in the Regiment, including some unkind and unjustified allusions to certain officers who had been killed. These I insisted he should omit for the sake of next-of-kin who would certainly hear about and read the book and find such references most hurtful.

  In the original text he described my dancing as being ‘deplorable’, to which I objected, pointing out that he had never seen my efforts on the dance floor and that I considered myself well above the average, and as a result of my protest he agreed to alter the text.

  Keith Douglas was as good as his word, and by the time Alamein to Zem Zem was published, Stanley’s dancing had been upgraded to ‘competent’ in the ‘restrained English style’. It says much about Stanley, however, that what he objected to was the description of his dancing when some of the other comments Douglas made about him might, on the face of it, have seemed more hurtful.

  Padre Leslie Skinner claimed that Douglas had had premonitions of his death, although John Semken remembers him talking about wanting to be part of the invasion so that he could then write about it. ‘He wasn’t proposing to write about it hereafter, was he?’ says John. Stuart Hills, a new troop commander in C Squadron who had been befriended by Douglas, thinks it was inevitable that, after several years of war, those who had survived until then would harbour fears of approaching death. Certainly the returning odds pointed towards it. ‘I was a little nervous,’ Hills noted, ‘but I had the advantage of simply not knowing how awful war could be.’ Whatever Stanley believed were his chances of coming through, he never noted them down. Perhaps he did not wish to tempt Fate . . .

  During the afternoon of 9 June the remainder of the brigade moved up and the 4/7th Dragoon Guards took over our position on Point 103, which we were delighted to hand over, and the Regiment retired a couple of miles to reorganize. Each day was extremely long, as dawn broke at approximately 04.30 hours when leaguer had to be broken, and the tank wireless sets had to be ‘netted in’ to the control set in the colonel’s tank, and at night, by the time the tank and ration replenishment and various order groups were completed midnight had passed, which did not leave many hours for sleep.

  The whole of Headquarters Squadron, consisting of all the supply vehicles under command of Roger Sutton-Nelthorpe and the Reconnaissance Troop under Patrick McCraith, had now been landed and had come up to within a few miles of the Regiment.

  Our respite was not for long, for on the next day, 10 June, the Regiment moved forward once again on to Point 103. My squadron was placed on the left flank to support the infantry, who were anticipating a counter-attack, which our tank fire frustrated, and accounted for approximately 40 Germans; in the meantime the 24th Lancers attacked and captured St Pierre, supporting the infantry. B Squadron was detailed to spend the night in the village as the 24th Lancers were withdrawn, while A and C Squadrons spent a sleepless night in the outskirts anticipating a counter-attack, which I am glad to say never eventuated.

  June 11 I shall long remember and proved a very sad day for the Regiment and especially for myself. The position round Point 103 – St Pierre and Fontenay – was still fluid and unhealthy, the country was extremely difficult and unpleasant for tanks, and the enemy, reinforced with tanks and men, started infiltrating back. A Squadron went once again up to Point 103 to keep observation on the main Juvigny–Fontenay road, while C Squadron under Stephen Mitchell moved south to attack the high ground south of the village. B Squadron remained in reserve with Regimental Headquarters in the village.

  At midday, in answer to an urgent call on the air from John Hanson-Lawson, I returned to Regimental Headquarters and was told by John that ‘Robin Hood’, the CO’s tank, had received a direct hit from a heavy shell, which had instantly killed Major Michael Laycock (who had been acting colonel since Colonel Anderson had been wounded on D-Day), Captain George Jones, the adjutant, and Lieutenant Laurence Head, the intelligence officer, and that Patrick McCraith, the Recce Troop leader and Sergeant Towers, the signal sergeant, had both been wounded. Three senior officers killed and one officer and one sergeant wounded by the same shell, and all from Regimental Headquarters. This was indeed a shattering blow.

  Michael Laycock had joined the Regiment as a Yeomanry officer soon after leaving Eton and so often he had told me that his great ambition was to command the Regiment in which his father, Sir Joseph Laycock, had served both in the Boer and the 1914–18 wars. No doubt his ambition would have been fulfilled had he lived. Having served with him since I joined the Regiment in 1939, I can claim to have been one of his best friends in the Regiment. His manner was abrupt and sometimes rude, and his temper, which he often lost, was fiendish, and this, with his dark and swarthy complexion, caused him to be nicknamed ‘Black Michael’ by men in the Regiment. But beneath this superficial exterior, he had a great, kind heart and a simple, serious and most lovable nature. He had the courage of a lion and would never issue an unpleasant order in battle that he himself would not be prepared to carry out. His family, knowing our friendship and my great regard for Michael, kindly sent me his wrist-watch, which I wear today and shall treasure always.

  The army career of George Jones had been quite remarkable – in fact he was an outstanding personality. The younger son of the head woodsman at Wiseton, the Laycock estate in Nottinghamshire, he had joined the Yeomanry as a trooper a few years prior to the war. When war started he was troop corporal to 2 Troop, C Squadron, under Michael Gold, when the Regiment was a horse cavalry unit. A few weeks before the Regiment embarked from England for the Middle East at the end of 1939, he was sent on a course, from which he returned with such an excellent report that he was immediately promoted to sergeant, and soon after became C Squadron sergeant major. During our early days in the Middle East he attended a cadet course in Cairo, which gave him a commission, and he returned to the Regiment at our request to command a troop as a second lieutenant. He fought with us throughout the desert as an officer and died at St Pierre on 11 June 1944, holding the rank of captain and adjutant to Michael Laycock, younger son of the owner of the Wiseton estate. His pleasing appearance, courteous manner and delightful nature endeared him to his brother officers, and after having been commissioned he immediately won and retained the admiration and respect of all those with whom he had served as an OR – other rank – a most difficult attainment. In spite of only having had a village-school education he was quick to learn and possessed great intelligence and a faculty for teaching others what he knew. In battle he was completely imperturbable. Out of battle he was unobtrusively efficient – he was, in fact, if I may use the phrase, ‘one of the World’s Great Englishmen’. Michael and George were buried beside each other in the orchard at St Pierre.

  At 5 o’clock that afternoon the enemy counter-attacked St Pierre and Point 103, and endeavoured to work around the flank and, as a result of this movement, a nasty threat developed to the echelons (i.e. the brigade supply vehicles); with Brigade Headquarters they experienced some very unpleasant shelling, which created something of a flap, and most of the soft-skinned vehicles had to make a hasty retreat. However Roger Sutton-Nelthorpe, Headquarters Squadron leader, decided not to move our regimental echelon, and no vehicle was hit. Our brigadier, Craycroft, was wounded by this shelling and had to be evacuated. He took command of the 8th Armoured on our return from the Middle East. Lawrence Biddle, his brigade major, was also put out o
f action. Lawrence and I had been commissioned together from the Inns of Court to the Regiment in October 1939; Brigade Headquarters had claimed his services in the desert. It was not surprising as he had a brilliant legal brain – and a lovely sense of humour.

  The counter-attack against St Pierre had been checked and the whole Regiment had concentrated in and around the village supporting the Durham Light Infantry. Being the senior squadron leader I took control of the Regiment, feeling utterly dejected and shocked by the deaths of Michael, George, Keith and Lawrence Head – furthermore extremely worried about Stephen Mitchell, commander of C Squadron, whose tank had been brewed up earlier in the day, and of whom nothing had been heard since.

  One incident brought us some comic relief. John Hanson-Lawson, Peter Seleri, second-in-command of B Squadron, and I were having a discussion on the back of my tank regarding the reorganization of Regimental Headquarters, with half a bottle of whisky beside us. A very sudden and sharp spell of enemy ‘stonking’ put an end to all discussion, and I suggested that we should adjourn to our tanks until I recalled them when things were quieter. Soon afterwards, in between mortar-bursts, I distinctly heard the noise of somebody stealthily climbing up onto the back of my tank and immediately jumped to the conclusion that a German sniper had infiltrated through our lines and was in the act of throwing a grenade into the turret of my tank. I seized my revolver and looked over the top of my turret and, to my astonishment, I saw Peter Seleri halfway up the side of the tank, with his arm outstretched, surreptitiously straining for the whisky bottle, which, in my haste to take cover, I had left on the back of the tank. When he saw me he quickly withdrew the tell-tale arm and, covered with confusion, having been caught in the act, said, ‘Did I leave my map case on the back of your tank?’

  ‘I don’t think so, Peter,’ I replied, ‘but do take the bottle of whisky.’

  ‘Thanks a lot.’ Grabbing the bottle by the neck, he scrambled off the tank and beetled back to his own, dodging the mortar shells that were falling in the orchard.

  He reminded me so much of Mr Pickwick, with his portly figure, protruding blue eyes and bristling fair moustache.

  All squadrons spent that night in St Pierre in a very tight and compact circle with what remained of the infantry, anticipating a night attack. After midnight, much to our great delight, Stephen Mitchell with his crew walked into leaguer. They had all managed to bale out without injury from the ‘brewed-up’ tank and had taken shelter in an old barn. Practically surrounded by German Infantry, they were compelled to wait until dark before they could rejoin the Regiment. None of them appeared worse for their experience. Nobody slept that night, but no attack came. Padre Skinner, our Methodist minister, carried out sterling work during those days, burying the dead and extricating the wounded and dead from ‘brewed-up’ tanks, sometimes a most difficult and sordid job. The padre was a short, dark man with a very pronounced North Country accent, which advertised his Yorkshire descent of which he was extremely proud, and he always exuded energy and humour.

  I shall always remember the opening words of the first service which he found time to conduct after landing in Normandy. He said, ‘There are no atheists in a slit trench.’ He continued by telling us that the day before he was compelled to dive very smartly into a slit trench during an unpleasant spell of shelling and found himself with four others, all endeavouring to make themselves extremely small. Some of the shells fell uncomfortably close and when he looked for the reaction on the part of his companions he saw only too clearly that each one was praying silently and fervently to some god, obviously for deliverance from their temporary and exceedingly unhealthy predicament. He compared this occasion to his visit one Sunday evening before the invasion to the NAAFI crammed with singing and beer-laden men, where he listened to a couple of men swapping stories, the brunt of which ridiculed the religion to which we all turn when frightened or near to death. There is a great deal in what he said.

  Padre Leslie Skinner.

  The next day, 12 June, we were given a ‘holding role’ for our immediate front; at the same time we protected the left flank of the 7th Armoured Division, which had recently landed as a ‘follow-up’ division and was to attack Tilly-sur-Seulles. A Squadron again operated in the neighbourhood of Point 103, with which we had all become so very familiar. We received a nasty shock in finding that some German Tiger and Panther tanks had, during the night, worked their way through a gap in our lines into the thickly wooded area around Point 102. It was extremely difficult to engage and after a game of hide-and-seek in the woods they slipped away down a sunken lane, but Squadron Sergeant Major Hutchinson had his 17-pounder tank knocked out at very short range; fortunately he himself escaped injury.

  That evening the whole Regiment drew back to the Bayeux area to replenish and re-equip, and during the days of 13 and 14 June we were given time to reorganize and rest, which we sorely needed. Since landing on D-Day we had been continually in action and were very short of sleep. Even so the Regiment was placed at an hour’s notice to move to support the 7th Armoured Division, if needed, which attacked Villers-Bocage on the 14th. Their attack misfired and the Regimental Headquarters and leading squadron of the Armoured Regiment – the County of London Yeomanry – were cut off and captured when the enemy counter-attacked with tanks and infantry. I am glad to say that we were not called upon.

  Villers-Bocage has become one of the most mythologized episodes of the Normandy campaign. The British were desperate to try to envelop and then isolate the key town of Caen and, on 13 June, pushed forward to the south-west of the city to the village of Villers-Bocage and, due to the urgency of pressing on, arrived there without the normal reconnaissance. Unknown to the County of London Yeomanry, who had received a rapturous reception from the inhabitants, they had been spotted by Tiger tanks of the 101st SS Heavy Tank Battalion, commanded by the tank ace Michael Wittmann. In a matter of minutes Wittmann personally knocked out around 13 tanks of varying kinds and a similar number of other vehicles. However, his tank was disabled and later, as the Germans counter-attacked, they lost much the same number of men and tanks. The Battle of Villers-Bocage was hardly the British disgrace it has often been painted, but as the German defence was hardening, it marked the last chance for a quick dash to take Caen. The Germans, like the British, understood the importance of this key city in Normandy and were determined to defend it until the last.

  On 15 June the brigade commander told me that I had been appointed to command the Regiment, which gave me a great thrill and was indeed a great honour. The casualties among the commanding officers of the Regiment since the Battle of Alamein had been high. We had lost Flash Kellett, Donny Player and Michael Laycock, killed, and D’Arcy Anderson wounded.

  Stephen Mitchell left C Squadron to become my second-in-command and I appointed Terry Leinster my adjutant. He was a pre-war member of the Yeomanry who had returned to the Regiment with a commission. My squadron leaders were John Semken, A Squadron, John Hanson-Lawson, B Squadron, and Peter Seleri, C Squadron, and of course Roger Sutton-Nelthorpe remained Headquarters Squadron leader commanding the echelons. Since Patrick McCraith had been wounded at St Pierre, Ian McKay had taken command of the Recce Troop.

  Strictly speaking, Stephen Mitchell was the most senior officer after Michael Laycock, and on this basis should have taken command. It appears he was reluctant to do so, however, although very happy to be second-in-command under Stanley, his great friend. ‘Those two were like Flanagan and Allen,’ says John Semken. ‘Always chipping each other along, always laughing.’

  The following day, 16 June, the Regiment moved to Aurailles to assist 69 Brigade, and B Squadron had a difficult day supporting the 7th Green Howards; as so often happened, they experienced the greatest difficulty in maintaining contact with the attacking infantry in the extremely enclosed country. This problem was never satisfactorily solved: when the infantry went to ground during an attack all contact between tanks and infantry was lost. The solution must be found in some sh
ape of wireless communication between the tank troop commander and the infantry company commander. Certain experiments were tried but never developed.

  Between the 17th and the 20th the brigade was placed under command of the 49th Division, which had recently arrived, and we supported 147 Brigade of that Division. Some very unpleasant fighting took place around Cristot, Chouain and particularly on the high ground covered by the beautiful woods of Le Parc de Boislonde, which A Squadron was instrumental in capturing and which was subjected to very heavy mortaring and shelling. The Duke of Wellingtons, with whom we were holding this high ground, took a bad hammering and retreated without orders, leaving its anti-tank guns and equipment, some of which were captured in a counter-attack. For a day the Regiment felt very naked in this thickly wooded country without infantry protection. During this period Denis Elmore, a very young troop leader who had just arrived with the Regiment, John Bethell-Fox and Sergeants Rush and Harding, all of A Squadron, were wounded, John for the third time. Sergeant Bill Bartle, the Recce Troop sergeant, carried out a recce on foot and positioned himself at the edge of the wood with a pea-lead (i.e. communication line) back to his tank. No trace of him has ever been found, in spite of an intensive search when the battle moved forward. I presume that he must have been caught by a direct hit from a heavy shell. Sergeant Bartle had been with the Regiment since the beginning of the war. We called him ‘Old Bill Bartle’ because of his striking similarity to the caricature of ‘Old Bill’ of the 1914–18 war. He invariably clutched a foul-smelling pipe between his teeth, he wore a heavy dark moustache and the edge of his tin hat balanced on the bridge of his nose. Nothing ever ruffled him and he was loved by all.

  All the fighting up to this date had taken place in a limited area on an immediate front, progress had been slow and we had not been able to break out. Owing to the continual bad weather the build-up of troops and sappers from England had fallen behind schedule, and at one time the supply position looked serious. The country around Point 103 and Le Parc de Boislonde we traversed continually and knew every inch of the ground. In one of the narrow rides through the Boislonde, continually used by our tanks, a German private had been killed and his body protruded over the edge of the ride. Every time that a tank passed along this ride his arm was crushed by the tracks until nothing remained except a congealed mass of blood and bone. Never shall I be able to obliterate this picture from my mind.