We were conducted around by a young German Jewess, an inmate of Belsen, good-looking, intelligent and speaking perfect English. With her family she had been interned for publishing subversive literature. Her parents had been killed and she had been moved to Belsen, a camp she described as meaning slow but certain extermination. To my question how it was that she appeared so healthy in comparison to the other inmates, she replied that, being a musician, she had managed to join the Belsen orchestra, which entertained the German guards, and as a result extra food was allowed. ‘Music,’ she said, ‘has saved my life by enabling me to keep my self-respect. In Belsen the loss of self-respect hastens the loss of your life.’
Towards the end of June, Stanley also visited Berlin with Derrick Warwick and spent a couple of nights with Myles Hildyard, who was now on the staff of 7th Armoured Division and gave them a tour of the ruins of the German capital. They visited Hitler’s bunker, the remains of the Reich Chancellory (where Stanley managed to smuggle a silver vase past the Russian guards), and also the Air Ministry. Here Stanley picked up a number of photographs of Göring and other prominent Nazis – souvenirs that have survived.
In July, the Regiment moved to Einbeck and provided guard duty to General Horrocks; it was considered a notable honour. Yet while they were there Stanley received the news that the Regiment was to lose its tanks. Thus, at the end of September, they returned to Hannover as a dismounted regiment. The break-up of the Regiment was to follow soon after: on 2 February 1946, Field Marshal Montgomery wrote personally to Stanley to tell him the Sherwood Rangers were to be ‘dispersed’. This took place on 1 March 1946.
Stanley’s career with the Regiment was finally over. The Sherwood Rangers had left England in 1939 with their horses, sabres and little idea about modern soldiering, and had finished the war as one of the finest armoured units in the British Army. It was quite a journey for a local yeomanry outfit; there cannot have been many regiments that saw more action than they did throughout the whole of the war or were engaged in so many major battles. They were the first to enter Bayeux after D-Day, the first British troops into Germany, and during their time in north-west Europe they supported every single British infantry division and three American divisions, and were often specifically asked for by other formations. Between 1939 and 1945, the Sherwood Rangers amassed an astonishing 30 battle honours, 16 under Stanley’s command, more than any other single unit in the entire British Army. And he was in the thick of it for all 30, collecting a Distinguished Service Order, two Military Crosses and a Silver Star, as well as being Mentioned in Despatches four times.
So ended my six years’ soldiering with the Nottinghamshire (Sherwood Rangers) Yeomanry [noted Stanley], comprising many moments of unforgettable thrills, intense fright and utter boredom. Six years is a considerable slice from a man’s life and much valuable time had been wasted, but I have seen more of the world, I have made and lost many friends and I have discovered that there can be no greater comradeship, sincere unselfishness and spontaneous humour than that created through sharing danger and discomfort, thrills and happiness.
Pictures of Göring ‘liberated’ from Hitler’s Chancellery.
Einbeck, July 1945.
On one memorable day during the war, while I was endeavouring to make myself very small in a slit trench during a particularly unpleasant spell of shelling, feeling very wet, cold and frightened, I made three resolutions, which I determined to keep after the war – should I survive. First, never to be bored; second, never to be frightened again; and third, when slowly submerging into a steaming hot bath to say, ‘Thank God for this Hot Bath – Amen.’
With the war finally over and the Sherwood Rangers disbanded, Stanley left the army and returned to South Africa, taking Stuart Hills with him; following in his father’s footsteps, he worked for Consolidated Goldfields. Having had the best part of ten years out there, in which he worked and played hard, and established the Staggerers Cricket Club, he returned to England and took a job with stockbrokers Hoare & Co.
It was during this time that he met Cynthia Smith-Dorrien, already twice married and widowed once; she was worldly, glamorous and spoke four languages. They married in 1959, not in the smarter part of London where they had spent much time but at Stockwell in south London, at the church of Stanley’s former padre, Leslie Skinner. Not long after, they bought a large house near Wye, in Kent, called Spring Grove, once owned by Joseph Conrad. In 1960, their daughter, Sara Jane, was born, followed by a son, David, two years later.
It seems that stockbroking never really suited Stanley. After a life of war, adventure and life as an expatriate, the commute from Kent every day to his City job must have seemed somewhat mundane, although he appears to have embraced it with his usual optimism. In the sixties, Hoare merged into Hoare Govett and Stanley left. A new venture beckoned: in 1965, David’s pre-preparatory school closed and it occurred to the Christophersons that their large family home could offer a new business opportunity. While they lived in one half, the other became a new pre-preparatory school.
For the rest of his life, Stanley lived and worked at home, became a pillar of the local church and community, travelled and raised his children. He was greatly liked by all who knew him. ‘He was so positive,’ says his daughter, Sara Jane, ‘that I never had the impression he found life mundane although you might expect him to have done so. He was naturally such an optimist that you felt, with him, that every day was a day to be enjoyed.’ He died, as charming and affable as ever, in 1990, but with Sara Jane and David knowing, or understanding, little about his remarkable wartime career. Like so many of his generation, it was something he mentioned only very rarely and even then it was usually to recount some amusing mishap.
Sara Jane and David knew more about their mother’s war: that she had joined the ATS, had gone out to the Middle East and driven ambulances on the front line in the desert before being sent back to Cairo and becoming a driver for the general staff. There she had met Peter Smith-Dorrien, later blown up in the attack on the King David’s Hotel in 1946.
The terrible things Stanley had witnessed, the appalling losses, the huge responsibilities he had borne, were never mentioned.
At Stanley’s memorial service, the church at Wye was full to bursting – people had come from far and wide to pay their respects. ‘That, for me,’ says Sara Jane, ‘was really the first time I became aware of what an extraordinary hero he was to the men who knew him and served with him. There was an incredible atmosphere among the congregation – they were really saying goodbye to a hero.’
Neither had the children ever been shown his large collection of photographs and film reels from the war. It was only some years later, when David began reading through his father’s diaries, letters and papers that he learned the extent of Stanley’s life with the Sherwood Rangers. He began going to veterans’ gatherings and even to the dedication of a Sherman tank at Gheel. ‘I was always treated with a certain regard,’ says David, ‘yet I felt something of a bystander, looking on a world in which my father had been so involved.’ As far as David had been concerned, his father was a man who was great fun, to whom he was very close, and with whom he laughed a great deal; a man who was always far more interested in other people than himself and who never lost his modesty or understated way of life. At the end of his life, he was driving around in an old Mini and still smoking his beloved pipe with Player’s Three Nuns tobacco.
To David and Sara Jane, he was a father, not a soldier or war hero. ‘I’ve met a part of Daddy through his diaries,’ says David, ‘that I never knew during his lifetime and it’s such a juxtaposition with the man I knew and loved.’
There were, though, dark periods, when Stanley would retreat. At the time, Sara Jane and David had little understanding of why. It makes a lot more sense now. Of all those officers in the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry who had headed off to war with their chargers back in 1939, only two were still with the Regiment on VE Day. One was Roger Sutton-Nelthorpe, and the other w
as Stanley. Every single other officer had either been killed, wounded or moved on or, like John Semken, had finally cracked under the strain in the final months of the war. Few today appreciate the huge casualties among those fighting at the front: while it is true that there were fewer British troops at the sharp end in the Second World War compared with the First, the rate of casualties was as high and often even worse. For tank crews, the chance of not being hit was almost nil; survival was usually down to luck.
There are few wartime veterans of the Sherwood Rangers left. Of those I spoke to, two had been officers and two other ranks, but it was striking how all four had nothing but praise for Stanley, as a person and as a commander. ‘Stanley was a very, very wonderful man,’ said John Semken, almost the moment we sat down to speak. ‘How that man wrote all those letters of condolence without tearing his heart out, I just don’t know, because he was a very sensitive man. Every commander does feel the casualties – you did suffer very deeply. The Regiment had a very, very rough passage.’
One of the Sherwood Rangers’ misfortunes was be part of an independent brigade. This mattered less in North Africa, but by the time of the Normandy invasion, when manpower was becoming such an issue for the British, it mattered a great deal more. ‘The curse of it was,’ says John Semken, ‘that the Regiment was used as an armoured brigade, usually in support of the infantry. This was why Stanley worked such a lot, because every battle that XXX Corps fought, we were sent off to support the infantry. We were simply never at rest.’ The result, John Semken points out, was that Stanley was hardly running his own regiment but, rather, acting as a temporary supply agent in which he was always outranked by the brigadier or general to whom the Regiment was attached.
John says that at one point during the Normandy campaign, the doctor told the brigadier the Regiment was suffering from exhaustion and was no longer fit to fight. They were stood down for a day, then went straight back into action. ‘I was called into conference with Stanley, who was as bright as a button and said, “Well, chaps, we’ve just got to do another Balaclava charge and then we’ll pull out.”’ After the attack, they pulled into a field beside a medium artillery regiment and slept the rest of the night and the following day. ‘We heard not a thing from all the guns firing repeatedly.’
There is no doubt that Stanley depended on all his friends in the Regiment and when any died he took the loss personally. His closest friend was unquestionably Stephen Mitchell, with whom he had been together since joining the Regiment in 1939. After taking command, it was to Stephen that Stanley turned for solace and comfort; new officers were coming into the Regiment so rapidly by this stage that it was hard to get to know any of them really well. When Stephen left the Regiment at the end of 1944, it must have been a big blow. Thereafter, says John Semken, ‘he lived through this, completely isolated, coping with all these bloody infantry generals and brigadiers’ on his own. His task was to keep the Regiment going in the face of horrendous losses, despite demands on it that were beyond what should reasonably have been expected. Somehow, he managed to continue to lead by example, to appear unceasingly cheerful and optimistic, and still write far too many letters of condolence to grieving wives, parents and families. The only real shoulder he had to lean on was that of the padre, Leslie Skinner – they would drink and write the letters together – and his faith, which was deep and a great source of comfort.
Stanley, 1946.
When Stanley died in 1990, Cynthia and the family were inundated with letters from his former wartime friends and colleagues. Reading them now, it is notable how highly he was regarded. Most mention his kindness, his leadership, his cheerfulness, even in times of great strain and difficulty. Dick Coleman wrote of his ‘infectious good cheer’, Mike Howden of his ‘thoughtfulness and steady cheerfulness at all times’. To Basil Ringrose, he was ‘a truly remarkable man and will always be remembered by the Regiment’. ‘I know from experience,’ wrote Derrick Warwick, ‘how much the Regiment owes to his courage and leadership as squadron leader and as CO.’ Julius Neave, an adjutant in 8th Armoured Brigade, said simply, ‘He was a hero to us all.’
A short while after, in March that year, a memorial service was held at Nijmegen for General James Gavin, former commander of the 82nd Airborne, who had also recently died, and for Stanley. David Render, one of Stanley’s troop leaders, wrote to Cynthia afterwards: ‘Although initially it was set up for Gen. Gavin, I can assure you that more than half of it was for that No. 1 Sherwood Ranger, dear Stanley Christopherson.’
The annual summer camp was the highlight of the Yeomanry regiment’s year. With their polished riding boots and Sam Brown belts, the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry, here at Welbeck in August 1939, belonged to an earlier era. In a world of landed estates, hunting and playing cricket, they were enthusiastic amateur soldiers totally ill-prepared for war.
The Sherwood Rangers began their war by being posted to Palestine along with their horses. They were soon involved in a cavalry charge, sabres drawn, against Arab insurrectionists.
Arthur Cranley (left) and Roger Sutton-Nelthorpe (right) in Palestine, where the SRY were based throughout 1940. Arthur Cranley was later captured at Villers-Bocage in Normandy in June 1944.
Emerging after a dip in the sea. There was not much to enjoy during their time in Tobruk, but the cool waters of the Mediterranean were a small consolation, particularly with the lack of sanitation and the gradually rising temperatures.
Near their gun position, sandbagged behind. From left to right: unknown, Mike Laycock, Jack Whiting and Scottie Myles.
Tobruk. Stanley sits in the centre.
Stanley with just a towel and a tin hat. No matter how awful it was at Tobruk, at least they could swim in the sea.
Sergeant Hutchinson and Trooper Butler.
Some of A Battery at Tobruk. Stanley is on the far left at the back, holding his cine camera.
Stephen Mitchell – Stanley’s greatest and most enduring friend in the Sherwood Rangers.
Scottie Myles in a towel with Stanley saluting. Tobruk was a brutal posting. Repeatedly bombed and shelled and cut off entirely except from the sea, they lived in harsh conditions under constant danger. Keeping a sense of humour and optimism was essential.
In the spring of 1942 the Sherwood Rangers were, at long last, mechanized, and Stanley took over command of A Squadron, about which he was thrilled. Stanley is seated in front of one of the squadron’s fast, light Crusader tanks.
General Montgomery (right) arrived to take command of Eighth Army in August, just as the Sherwood Rangers were deployed for action for the first time as an armoured regiment.
Britain invested much in wheeled tank transporters, which not only saved wear and tear but also enabled many broken-down tanks to be removed quickly from the battlefield and repaired.
A wrecked Junkers 88 bomber. During the Alamein battles, large numbers of Luftwaffe and Italian aircraft were destroyed by a resurgent Desert Air Force and bombers from RAF Middle East.
A destroyed Italian M11/39 tank and the much-feared German 88mm anti-tank gun.
Sherwood Rangers pause to look at a damaged 50mm anti-tank gun in the aftermath of the victory at Alamein.
A knocked-out Italian M11/39 tank. Italian tanks were more numerous than German models in North Africa, and for the most part were inferior to those used in the Eighth Army.
A long column of German and Italian prisoners captured at Alamein.
One of the most significant prisoners taken at Alamein, as witnessed by Stanley, was General Ritter von Thoma, commander of the Deutsches Afrika Korps, here jumping down from a scout car.
Sherwood Rangers clamber over a destroyed Panzer Mk III. It was understandably fascinating to have a good look at captured enemy war materiel.
Colonel Flash Kellett (left) and Major Donny Player. These two men were the beating heart of the Sherwood Rangers in the first half of the war. In many ways they belonged to a different era and yet both were forward-thinking, dynamic and strove to make
the regiment as fine a fighting force as any in the Eighth Army. The affection for these fearless warriors ran deep among the men.
D-Day, 6 June 1944. Landing craft line up on Gold Beach amid a clutter of anti-invasion obstacles.
Montgomery’s message issued to all the men of the invasion force. Stanley kept his, along with a large number of other written souvenirs.
A knocked-out Jagdpanther near St Pierre in Normandy. German tanks had grown in size since the early days in the Western Desert, but British artillery, air power and the 17-pounder- equipped Sherman Fireflies could all defeat both Panther and Tiger tanks. St Pierre was a terrible battle for the Sherwood Rangers and it was where Stanley was suddenly thrust into command of the Regiment.
An Englishman at War Page 50