A vast armada of ships swelled the waters of every port and harbour and buffeted for space with thousands of ‘things’ that floated like the huge artificial harbours called Mulberries.
Restless confined men played cards and thought of women and beer and home and argued about invasion dates.
In great concentrations of armoured equipment the sound of bagpipes could be heard as Highland units, destined to be the spearhead in France, practised for the final piping of troops into battle.
On 2nd June the ships had begun loading and by the early hours of 5th June every craft was crammed and some had already set off, the tin-hatted men down below jampacked tightly, lumpy with equipment and guns clashing against each other. By four a.m. the recall went out by broadcasts from the shore for their return because the weather had worsened. Fog closed in but the civilian population could hear the continuous thunder high above them in the darkness as thousands of RAF and American Air Force night bombers set out to bombard the coastal batteries commanding the landing beaches to be assaulted.
In the landing craft the packed troops tried to get some sleep while a ferocious gale made the vessels roll and heave and plunge and smack waves against thin plates. Men vomited and had to remain in their vomit, and the stench mixed with silent fear and tobacco and khaki sweat.
On 6th June, General Eisenhower’s order of the day was read by commanders to all troops:
‘Soldiers, sailors and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force, you are about to embark on the great crusade towards which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you.
‘In company with our brave allies and brothers-in-arms on other fronts you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe and security for ourselves in a free world.
‘Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well-trained, well equipped and battle-hardened. He will fight savagely but this is the year 1944. Much has happened since the Nazi triumph of 1940-1. The United Nations have inflicted upon the Germans great defeats in open battle man to man. Our air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the air and their capacity to wage war on the ground.
‘Our home fronts have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions of war and placed at our disposal great reserves of trained fighting men.
‘The tide has turned. The free men of the world are marching together to victory.
‘Good luck, and let us all beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.’
In a creaky old destroyer in a channel choked with ships, Alec Jackson said:
‘To hell with the whole thing! Just let me get back to Glasgow, mate!’
It was around seven in the morning and smudgy battleships and cruisers were steaming up and down drenching the shores of France with thunderous broadsides that killed French women and children as well as German men. Holiday houses and hotels gushed with fire.
Nearer the sea’s edge spurts of flame shot up from the beaches in high snake-like ripples. Guns flashed and yellow cordite smoke curled into the air.
Invasion craft crawled down the ships’ davits like beetles, and headed towards the shore in long untidy lines. Inside them the backs of men heaved as they vomited while bursts of spray broke over the sides and the craft smacked and lurched about. They tried to draw strength from the fact that everything had been meticulously planned; they had been trained for months for what was to come and there were officers to tell them where to go and what to do. They did not realise then how plans could go wrong, how orders could become impossible to fulfil and how quickly officers could get shot.
Sometimes when orders were given and blindly obeyed in true military fashion the men fared no better than in the American Sector of the beach code-named Omaha. There, tank-landing craft dropped their ramps in unexpectedly deep and stormy water and, at exactly the correct time ordered, the first tank moved forward to drop like a stone and never be seen again. Commanders in the second, third and fourth tanks in each craft watched the first tanks and crews disappear and drown. They had orders to launch, however, and they launched. One by one they vanished beneath the waves without trace.
Within two or three minutes twenty-seven of the thirty-two tanks were at the bottom of the Channel and nearly one hundred and fifty men were drowned.
Only one commander away at the western end of the beach decided conditions were not favourable and waited until he could go right in and land his tanks on the shore.
In the crush of naval craft of all types incidents like those at Omaha went unnoticed.
Men were waiting silently in landing-crafts, ears alert for the thudding of shells, hands clutching rifles. The wallowing of the craft eased as they approached shallower water and gently nosed through a mass of debris until an explosive jar lurched everyone forward.
Now they had arrived. Ex-office clerks and bricklayers, and shopkeepers and toolfitters and students were sharing the same apprehension. Now ramps crashed down, leaving them naked to machine-gun bullets that twisted them into grotesque ballet dancers and spattered the sea with scarlet. Now mothers’ sons became butcher-meat caught up on barbed wire, became flotsam, became beach litter with faces buried in sand, became mere objects robbed of human dignity, rumps poking in the air.
Wave upon wave of men were spewed out to trample over the dead and dying to get a foothold in France.
Beyond the beaches glider-planes crashed and glider-planes landed and paratroopers speckled the earth with white and desperately shouted the rallying cries they had been taught.
‘Able—Able!’
‘Baker—Baker!’
‘Charlie—Charlie!’
They were not surprised at being lost or confused. They had been told before setting out:
‘Do not be daunted if chaos reigns. It undoubtedly will.’
On HMS Donaldson Alec felt he had been plunged into the centre of a maelstrom of hell. Noise was incredible and continuous. German shore batteries duelled with the ships. The whole shoreline flashed with white from the big guns, plumes of smoke curled high in the air and blood-red flames rampaged out then shrank under billowing clouds of dirty smoke.
Above, a constant umbrella of bombers and fighters darkened the sky. The air groaned and throbbed with the engines of the heavy bombers, and fighters streaked noisily underneath them.
Alec shaded his eyes with his hands and peered back towards home. He had never seen so many aircraft in his life. He wondered where they were all coming from. Britain was a small island and there were limits to what it could hold. Surely there could never have been enough ground space for all these planes to take off. Yet they kept being tossed skywards. They were still zooming over.
His tired eyes, gritty and bloodshot, trailed after one massive formation as it roared above him and away across France. He saw some of the planes explode in the high distance like red cherries and others dive down, charcoaling the sky with black lines.
‘Poor bastards!’ he muttered.
Never before in his life had he felt so disgusted, so sick to his guts.
‘What am I doing here?’ he asked himself.
Suddenly the whole thing seemed like a horrible charade.
The padre had led them in prayer before it began and asked for God’s blessing. The German padres would no doubt have asked the same God the same thing. It was ludicrous.
He remembered Madge telling him about some Quaker set Catriona had got to know. Apparently that lot believed there was a bit of God in every man. He remembered how Madge had joked about it.
‘A bit of the devil in you, more like!’
Now his normally good-natured mind twisted with sarcasm.
‘Well, if there’s a bit of God in every man, mate, this day man’s being bloody disrespectful to his Maker.’
Thinking of Madge brought memories of his childr
en crowding in.
Since he had been in the Navy they had grown away from him. They were like strangers. More and more his thoughts turned to them as they had been before when they were all at home and carefree and happy together. As ships turned broadside on and belched destruction towards the shore he saw his children through the sheet of flame. They had polished faces, white bibs, and sat at the kitchen table. They were singing and banging time with their spoons. Above the bedlam of war he heard their reedy voices:
‘It’s a long way to Tipperary,
It’s a long way to go.
It’s a long way to Tipperary,
To the sweetest girl I know.
Goodbye Piccadilly,
Farewell Leicester Square –
It’s a long, long way to Tipperary,
But my heart’s right there.’
Chapter 11
‘How can I ever repay you, Julie?’ Catriona longed to cling to her friend and weep tears of thankfulness on her shoulder but she kept emotion in check.
She was always uncertain of Julie’s reactions. Julie had a perky brusqueness that seemed to repel displays of affection as if they were a weakness or an embarrassment she had no patience for. Yet at times she gave the impression of being a bouncing time bomb of emotions herself.
No use embracing or kissing Madge in an attempt to show gratitude either. She had already tried that and Madge had knocked her roughly aside with one of her big hearty laughs.
‘For God’s sake, hen, grow up. Stop acting so stupid!’
Julie shrugged and lit a cigarette. ‘What have I done except give you a few old cups and plates and a couple of chairs?’
‘And all the other things. Both of you have been absolutely marvellous. Gosh, I can hardly believe it. A place of my very own.’ She closed her eyes with the relief of it. ‘I can do what I like, come and go as I like, please myself about everything.’
‘What an imagination!’ Madge laughed. ‘You’re a scream, hen. You’ve spent all your savings on the deposit for a wee room and kitchen that’s really your man’s and you’re having to share it with two weans and an old man. Still, you’re lucky to get the place. Houses aren’t so easy to come by nowadays. And you’re not so crowded as me, eh?’
‘Yes, no harm to your new house, Catriona.’ Julie strolled over to the window puffing smoke as she went. ‘But better you than me living here.’
Catriona’s small face tightened with anxiety.
‘Why? What’s wrong with the place? Byres Road’s supposed to be a good district, isn’t it? I know this isn’t the best building in the road, but there’s a lovely view. You can see the Botanic Gardens.’
‘It’s too near my mother-in-law, that’s why.’ Julie’s green eyes suddenly twinkled with mischief. ‘Just think, she’ll probably pass here every day going for her messages. Maybe one day a bus’ll get her crossing Great Western Road.’
‘Julie! Don’t tempt Providence by saying things like that!’
Madge tucked a straggle of hair behind one ear, shifted her pregnant belly to a more comfortable position and gave a toothy grin.
‘Is she an old cow, hen?’
‘Tairaibly Kailvainsaide, yew know!’ Julie rolled her eyes. ‘Tairaibly refained and all that. She nearly died when she found out about me. She thinks I’m dirt because I come from the Gorbals. I told her straight. I’m as good as you and better, pal. Reggie told her as well. You ought to have heard him. Reggie’s loyal and all that. He’s fond of his mother but, as he says, now that we’re married his wife comes first. He’d do anything for me.’ She gave a long sigh. ‘He’s so handsome too. Isn’t he, Catriona?’
‘Tall and broad-shouldered with marvellous blue eyes and blond hair,’ Catriona enthused, happy to have found a way to be of service to Julie.
Madge stretched her big frame out on one of the chairs.
‘Aye, they’re all great lads at first. I remember when I used to think my man was marvellous.’
Julie coloured with the sudden intensity of her feelings.
‘But Reggie is marvellous! He really is! He’s the nicest, most wonderful person I’ve ever met. He’s such a gentleman and so well educated. He’s been to the university, hasn’t he, Catriona? Yet there’s no side about him at all. My dad and him got on like a house on fire. One time he took my dad out and bought him a drink. I’m not kidding you, everybody in the Gorbals met Reggie that day. Dad was so proud he was stopping strangers in the street and showing Reggie off.’
Madge grinned and scratched the side of her breast, making it swing and wobble about.
‘Och, well, the best of luck to you, hen. You’re only a’ wee lassie yet! I just hope you’ll never be trauchled with a squad of weans in your wee place in the Gorbals the way I am in Springburn. I hope to God my crowd aren’t ruining the Botanic Gardens across there just now. I’ll murder them wee middens one of these days. They never pay a blind bit of notice to a thing I say.’
‘Oh, no!’ Julie sent a confident stream of smoke darting from full pursed lips. ‘Reggie and I are only going to have two children, one of each sex. We’ve got everything planned.’
Madge spluttered out a howl of derisive laughter. Catriona giggled before she could stop herself and immediately felt guilty and hastened to make amends.
‘We know what you mean, Julie.’
‘Well, what are you laughing at? What’s so funny?’
‘We’re a lot of bloody mugs, aren’t we?’ Madge remarked quite pleasantly. ‘We’re that easy conned.’
Julie’s eyes lit with anger.
‘What do you mean, conned? Nobody cons me.’
‘What Madge means is …’ Catriona began, but Madge interrupted.
‘Things don’t turn out the way we bloody well plan, that’s what I mean. If you don’t keep your eye on that good-looking fella of yours, hen, the chances are some other lassie’ll be having a squad of weans to him as well as you.’
Julie’s brows and her voice pushed high.
‘My Reggie? You don’t know him. He’s so sincere and sensitive. A perfect gentleman. Isn’t he, Catriona?’
‘Oh, gosh, yes!’
‘I knew all I needed to know about my man the first time I looked at him.’
‘Well, hen, I’m sorry to be such a wet blanket but I still say you’re just a wee lassie and you’ve a lot to learn. If you ask me, men are all the same - selfish, randy buggers. That’s all they care about. All they want is to enjoy themselves. If you ask me, hen, you’ll be trauchled with a dozen weans before you’re done.’
‘I’m not asking you. I know my man!’ The hand that stubbed at her cigarette trembled. ‘He’s not selfish. But if he ever does decide that he wants more children, that’s OK with me, pal. If my man wants a dozen kids, that’s OK with me. Whatever my man wants is OK with me!’
Madge’s freckled face spread into a smile and she hauled herself up.
‘Well, the best of British luck to you, hen. I’d better go and round up my dirty wee middens while there’s still some of the Botanic Gardens left. God, my varicose veins are killing me.’ She laughed. ‘I’ve piles now as well! They’re some other things you’re liable to get that you didn’t plan for. Och, there I go again. It’s a shame, isn’t it! Don’t pay any attention to me. The trouble with me is I’ve got such a rotten bugger for a man. Honest to God I hate that dirty midden.’
An awkward silence followed as she struggled into the grey swagger coat she had made herself out of an old army blanket to save clothing coupons.
Catriona felt guilty and ashamed at the mere mention of Alec and she miserably lowered her head.
‘And he’d better not say a word to me about his book money when he comes back or he’ll get this down his throat.’ Madge brandished a red fist. ‘I had to keep dibbling into it to pay the doctor for the weans and all the things he said they were needing. That house of ours is that damp it gives them coughs and God knows all what, poor wee sods, and what with this new one … See, if Alec says anything a
bout me not managing right with the money …’
‘Madge, what are you getting all upset about?’ Surprised, Catriona looked up. ‘Alec’s not the type to get on to you about money, is he? You’ve never said anything about him being like that before.’
‘Maybe it’s my conscience bothering me.’ She sent a great gust of hilarity to the ceiling. ‘I’ve spent all the bugger’s money. Serves him bloody well right! Well, I’ll away, Catriona. I’ll see you next week, hen. Cheerio, Julie. Come over to Springburn with Catriona any time and visit me. Talk about the Gorbals being slummy. My God, you’ve seen nothing until you’ve seen Cowlairs Pend!’
‘The Gorbals isn’t slummy,’ Julie snapped back ‘There’s plenty of clean, hardworking folk in the Gorbals.’
‘You’ll get a clean, hardworking fist in your eye if you’re not careful, hen.’
‘Send my two across when you’re in the Gardens, Madge,’ Catriona hastily intervened. ‘It’s long past Andrew’s bedtime. He’ll probably take ages getting used to sleeping in the kitchen with me talking and moving about.’
‘Och, well, my crowd have survived sleeping in the kitchen so I suppose yours will as well.’
The word ‘survived’ brought the night of the air-raid rushing back and she wanted to cry out with the agony of losing baby Robert. Instead she smiled at Madge as she saw her to the door and said:
‘As long as they’ve got a bed, that’s the main thing.’
‘Aye,’ Madge agreed. ‘And a roof over their heads. Poor wee buggers, they’re entitled to that. I’m glad you managed to get a place, hen. In a real posh part as well! My God, you’re fairly coming up in the world, eh? I’d give my right arm to live here but I’m having a hard enough job paying the rent for the dump I’m in.’ Her freckled face split wide open with laughter and she gave Catriona a nudge before leaving. ‘You’ll have to tell me who owns some of the buildings around here so’s I can try giving him the wink!’
Back in the kitchen, Julie rolled her eyes.
‘What a character!’
‘She’s terribly kind. Too kind, in fact; that’s half Madge’s trouble. Look at the stuff she’s given me - sheets and pots and pans and dear knows what all. Not to mention the bag of messages she brought today to give me a good start, as she says. She can’t afford any of it, you know. It’s terrible! You saw me fighting with her, trying to make her take at least some of the stuff back, but she just laughed and wouldn’t listen.
The Breadmakers Saga Page 46