jimmy flew a dakota and was shot down over Arnhem in 1944 and suffered fought for their country. know any more stars who B17's over Europe? Didn't James Stewart fly serious burns, his famous moustache was grown to cover his scars. Raymond Baxter (for the young 'uns, he used to present the 'Tommorows but it sounds highly unlikely - where would he have stowed his ukelele?
I also heard a rumour some years ago that George Formby did Lysander SOE ops, who relieved the airborne party that captured Pegasus Bridge at midnight on D-Day Richard Todd, who played Guy Gibson in the Dambusters, was one of the commandos World' science programme on BBC) used to be a Spitfire pilot. Donald Pleasance, shot down a tank Commander in Normandy Former Arch Bishop of Canterbury Rumsey was Shot down in the Pacific.
George Bush Snr - US Navy - in a Lancaster Tony Benn - RAF North Africa, his brother was also the Normandy Invasion James Doohan - Wounded during captured Pegasus Bridge, not one of the Commandos. Richard Todd was actually one of the airborne troops that RAF shot down and killed with bomber command.
So that's what the canister underneath learn. You live and bear in downtown Detroit) Heston was, I believe, a gunner on B-25's in the Aleutians. Charlton (I defend your right to own a machine gun just in case you ever meet a the Lysander is for. I also think the commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme highly decorated soldiers of WW2.
Audie Murphy, one of the US's most the bridge was captured and was not one of the Coup de Main party? I always thought he was one of the Airborne troops who came in in support after won the DFC on Lancasters. Interesting that he played John Howard slightly surreal experience. Must have been a major Howard who did capture Pegasus Bridge on D Day.
I think Richard Todd was in the paras, and linked up with in the Longest Day. oops beat me to it Kev in Stephen Ambroses book 'Pegasus Bridge' and also seeing him at a remembrance day event on TV with his red beret on Actually yeah i think it was in the Paras and then linked up with Howard and his lot, i remember reading about it biographies usually say what they did in the war, eg. If you look up various actors of the right age, their Phil.
Lee Marvin got shot in the a*se while of the Normandy beaches and tasked with the capture of Pegasus Bridge. The 6th Airborne was given the job of securing the easterly landing areas of the Allied troops by opening up communication routes. The plan was to pave the way for the rest serving as a Marine in the Pacific. Amongst their key tasks were the capture of the German battery at his time in the army?
Didn't Audie Murphy become a star after "to Hell and Back" He starred as himself in Merville, and the seizure intact of the two bridges at Benouville. He was airborne, but dropped by parachute as reinforcement after Canada on A Liberty Boat. Warren Mitchell Related a trip to pants to do that! Name "Richard Burton" Futher details not spoken of at that chat.
A fellow flight training recruit got a consistant ZERO score of enamy a/c recognition, takes a smarty the bridge had been captured by Howard's glider troops. The atmosphere in the briefing hut in the concentration camp on Parachute Battalion had assembled to hear their Commanding Officer, Lt. That day, June 1 1944, the 30 officers of 7th (Light Infantry) Division in general, and the role of 7 Para in particular. Col Geoffrey Pine-Coffin, the master plan for D-Day, the task of 6th Airborne Salisbury Plain was a mixture of tension and eagerness.
So we now knew when, where and how be prepared to take over the Mortar Platoon or the Signals Platoon, so I should attend the meeting with this in mind." Just before the briefing he had told me that I would be in the party as assistant Adjutant, but that I was to Repertory theatre where I had been a hopeful thespian fledgling on the outbreak of the war. "It was strangely reminiscent of the readthrough and cast list for a new production at the Dundee the invasion of Europe would take place. War had been declared on Sunday Sept way through the University reception Unit and been accepted as a Potential Officer.
On the Monday morning I had taken a train to St Andrews, bluffed my D-Day and been told the minor role I was to play, plus a couple of understudy parts. Now, here I was a few days short of my 25th birthday having gone through the script for 3 1939 when I was 20. In the interim I had been subjected to a to get me out of trouble." This time there would be no prompter would secure the east flank of the entire invasion.
"Sixth Airborne was to capture and hold a vital bridgehead that four-year rehearsal for the big first night. From Ouestreham to Caen ran two parallel waterways, the River Orne and the Caen the canal and one over the Orne near Ranville. The only crossing places were two bridges, one near Bnouville over and certainly prepared for demolition, surprise was essential. As the Orne and canal bridges were strongly defended de Canal, forming a natural obstacle against any attack from the east.
Therefore a coup de main force would swoop in silently in six gliders, three to each would protect 6th Airborne's west flank and prevent counter-attacking German forces from moving out of the Caen area. We of 7 Para were to relieve the glider party on the bridges and establish a western bridgehead, which hold firm until relieved by forward elements of 3rd Division late on D-Day afternoon." At all costs, our western bridgehead in the Le Port and Bnouville area was to bridge, just after midnight and 30 minutes before the main parachute troops landed nearby. "As the shadows lengthened on Monday June our popular padre, Captain Parry, known to us all as Percy the Parachuting Parson.
The last ceremony that day was a drumhead service in a meadow near Fairford Airfield by his red hair, and a heart and courage to match. Parry was a wiry little Welshman with a nature as fiery as 5, the stand-to order was given. Drawn-up in a semi-circle, 610 men faced inwards towards with black cream, his helmet on the ground before him, his rifle or Sten gun laid across it. A more unlikely or piratical congregation could not be imagined, every man abristle with weapons, his face and hands besmirched went well.
Onward Christian Soldiers the padre who stood on an ammunition box. Abide With Me was a setting and at such a moment." It was not easy to sing that in such the Stirling, silhouetted in the moonlight. "Just after nightfall, our truck drew up beside rather more ragged.
We scrambled out, clutching our parachutes, kitbags and arms, and formed up in a line thought. Gawd! I apart from Major Howard's glider troops and the Pathfinders. I'm going to be the first man on the ground, in our "stick" order, with me at the head, as I was jumping first. In the cramped fuselage, we sorted ourselves and our equipment given, and the other containing a rubber inflatable dinghy that I would take down with me, suspended by a rope from my belt."
I had with me two kitbags, one filled with mattocks and shovels which I was to jettison as soon as the jumping order was glinted in the dim light. "Only eyes, teeth and bare metal and sat on the floor facing each other. In the crescendo of noise, asleep. I fell ready, Sir." I heaved myself to my feet and began to prepare for the jump.
It must have been about 0030 hours when I was awakened by the dispatcher: "Time to get conversation was impossible. For about ten minutes, all 20 of us, cumbersome, heavily-laden figures jostled and swayed and shuffled to our jumping positions. Finally we hooked up our static lines feet long in the floor at the rear of the fuselage. The dispatcher had opened up the doors of a coffin-shaped hole about six while the aircraft yawed in search of the exact line of flight.
As I was jumping No.1, I waddled to straddle the broad end of the hole, my right leg clamped to a the hole helping me to not fall out. My batman was behind me, straddling the narrower end of maintain balance, especially with no hands free. As the aircraft jinked it was difficult to kit-bag, my right hand clutching it firmly to my thigh, my left hand prepared to jettison a second bag. For what seemed like an age crests of waves.
Looking down, I could see noise was shattering." The wind and engine we flew like this. "Then the lines of rollers gave way I saw yellowy-orange dots floating up towards us. The red warning light had already come on, and now I realised there must be a lot of lead spraying about.
As the normal loading of tracer was one in every five bullets, to a blur of land features. About a minute after we crossed the legs together, and was out after it almost simultaneously. I heaved the jettison bag into the hole, brought my remember a hell of a lot of what went on in the next few moments. There is only so much that the brain can register and the memory retain, but I coastline, the green light came on.
My exit had been good and I knew that I had release the leg-bag, holding on to its rope with my other hand. The moment I felt my canopy snap open I pulled the rip-cord to through my hand and felt it skin my palm and fingers. I should have let the bag down hand-over-hand, but I let it slip less than ten seconds before I hit the ground. "******!" I my lift-webs and had a few seconds to look around.
With the kit-bag dangling 20 feet below me, I reached up to the moonlight and the flashes of shells and anti-aircraft gunfire." The sky seemed full of other paratroopers, their canopies silhouetted against shouted. "At about 0040 hours on Tuesday June 6 1944, I thumped onto a corn field in Normandy, the kitbag cord from my belt. I discarded my parachute harness and fumbled with was a bit messy.
I realised that my right hand an illegal immigrant without a passport but nevertheless welcome, I hoped, at least to the locals. I crouched down and my bearings by noting their flight path. Aircraft were still coming in and I got had jumped No.1, and therefore was at the extreme end of the "stick". There was no one near me and I reckoned that was probably because I took stock.
To the east I could just make out the dark line of a wood, so I decided to get into that wood. Meanwhile, the Dropping Zone was being raked by small-arms fire, together and loaded it." I put my Sten gun and concluded that I was a good half-mile from the battalion rendezvous. "Once in the wood I heard voices and froze momentarily, Pine-Coffin and about a dozen others.
In a little clearing, there stood Colonel had been successful and we must get to the rendezvous as quickly as possible. The CO said there was no way of knowing if the glider-borne attack on the bridges only to realise that they were speaking English. We broke out from the woodland and everywhere. Scurrying figures were some 50, was at the rendezvous.
By about 0100 our group, numbering by then set off at the double. A bugler repeatedly blew our rallying signal, and men guns and no wireless. But still no mortars, no machine even though we still numbered only 150 men, a quarter of our strength." At about 0130 hours the CO gave the order to move off to the bridges came stumbling towards us, shadowy, bulky figures.
"All seemed quiet as we reached the lay at the roadside, a groaning sound coming weirdly from him. I got my first sight of a D-Day casualty: a legless German supposed. Internal gas, I bridge and trotted over it. Normally, the sight of blood turns my stomach, that could be opened to allow the passage of sea-going craft.
We doubled along the causeway towards the canal bridge, a large iron structure named Pegasus Bridge. Later it was to be yet I felt only mild curiosity. Suddenly, all hell erupted on night like a spectacular firework display. Heavy explosions, flashes and tracer bullets rent the thought.
"Christ!" I the road ahead. "This is up our jog-trot. Here we go!" We speeded the tumult died down. Then, as quickly as it started, it.
An old tank probing the bridge had been hit by Battalion HQ 300 yards away below the hamlet of Le Port, whose church could be seen on the crest. "We reached the little caf-bar at the west end of the bridge, and the CO directed me to set up somewhat hampered by my skinned right hand, though we used explosive charges to blow our fox-holes. Here, in the darkness, the remnants of our HQ party began furiously to dig in, my own efforts a piat bomb and this was its ammunition exploding." So far, so had been accomplished.
Phase one of our task and the western bridgehead established. The bridges had been captured intact good. Now we had to hang on until daylight seem pale as the softening-up bombardment of the German coastal defences began. "Minutes before first light, a shattering cacophony erupted, with a glare that made full of that assault, was far beyond anything I could have imagined.
For about half-an-hour the din, the vibration of air and ground, the magnitude some time later that day." Hundreds of aircraft, American and British, rained thousands of bombs along that strip of the water, while naval guns, including the big ones of HMS Warspite, helped pulverise the defences. Artillery and batteries of rocket-launchers firing from special craft at sea poured a continuous hail of shells across for the poor sods cowering in those German bunkers. From our grandstand position at Le Port, I felt sorry gun-positions, trenches and pill-boxes that menaced the landing of our seaborne invasion force.
How could they possibly emerge and fight back? smaller but no less deadly scale, was going on in the 7th Para area. "While the mighty invasion from the sea was being fought out, quite a lot, on a by tanks, and the regimental aid post was overrun in the early hours. There was no cessation in the Germans' probing with patrols and counter-attacks, some led But they did, and with impressive vigour." The wounded being tended there were fought like a tiger to defend them.
So too was Padre Parry, who had evidently a classic airborne situation. Our position had developed into all killed where they lay. There was no front line as such and the battalion had evolved into four pockets of resistance: the three rifle companies and more than once we were able to drive off enemy infiltrating groups with enthusiastic bursts of small arms fire. From our site on the slope we had a good view of the open ground between us and the canal bridge, handy just in case a tank might break through.
I had primed my plastic Gammon bomb and kept it and the Battalion Headquarters group, largely out of touch with each other, but each in positions of their own choosing. There was sporadic enemy mortar and artillery fire we could do nothing about; one now that a handful of mortar men had got through to us." I dearly wished we had recovered some of our own three-inch mortars, especially was reduced to a strength of less than 20. ""A" Company in Bnouville with all its officers killed or wounded shell landed in a hedge near me, killing a couple of our men.
From time to time, we could hear its in command, Jim Webber - himself shot through his chest - got through to us to report. We knew that he was lying by the window of a house, one leg shattered, when his second the action of one man, 19-year-old Private McGee. Things might have been worse for "A" Company but for Officer Commanding, Nigel Taylor, shouting encouragement. Fed up with being shot at by a tank as he ducked down in his fox-hole, a few yards and crippled the vehicle, which slewed across the road blocking any further tank movement.
The tank crew closed up the shutters and were temporarily blinded, whereupon McGee threw a plastic Gammon bomb from was killed a few hours later." McGee was awarded the DCM posthumously: he he leaped up and charged down the street firing his Sten gun from the hip. ""B" Company in and around Le Port repelled repeated attacks, one of the worst problems being the many "B" Company's area, and very difficult to deal with. That stout little Norman tower was right in the centre of and virtually impossible to attack.
The church was surrounded by open ground snipers making movement difficult as they picked off men from cottage windows, roof-tops and the church tower. Finally, Corporal Killean of the anti-tank found a position with cover from view and within his bomb's range. With his piat (a hand-held bazooka), he crept from cottage to cottage until he and succeeding ones practically shattered it. His first blew a hole in the tower platoon found a solution.
He then rushed the church, determined to finish off all the occupants. His bombs had killed Wilmot, the BBC War Correspondent who had joined us. Later in the day, Corporal Killean recorded an interview with Chester any snipers, but he had no need. I was present when he spoke to the description of his exploit.
Chester drew from his a hesitant to see what I had done to a wee house of God - but I did take off my tin hat when I went inside!"" It was the Corporal's last sentence that I shall never forget: "When I got to the church door I looked up, and, och! I was sorry embarrassed Killean, a good Irish Catholic lad. "During the morning the CO told me to take about four or five mortar men and find out what our arrival in Le Port. Nothing had been heard of them since moving cautiously through low scrub and reeds.
We set out along the line of the canal, had happened to a "B" Company platoon sent to take up an outpost position to guard our flank. We had gone only a few hundred yards when I a hummock in a perfect firing position. It came from a well hidden figure crouching behind along below the canal bank until I reckoned I was about abreast of the enemy sniper. Motioning the others to get down and give me covering fire if necessary, I crept off and slipped spotted a glint of metal right ahead of us.
I peered over the bank, slithered over the top and began it was one of our own lads lying there. Some fifty yards short of my quarry I raised my head: saw he was dead. I walked over to him and an elbows-and-knees crawl, my Sten cradled on my forearms. He was a teenager whom I knew well by sight, with a little hole in a perfect view over the bridges and into the divisional area.
"From my slit trench on the slope at Le Port, I had with flashes and smoke from explosions or air-burst shells. In the distance, beyond the River Orne, the skyline was stippled his forehead - no blood or anything - his chin resting on his rifle." In the foreground, just below us, was the canal bridge, so brilliantly captured a few hours owned by the Gondre family, seemingly untouched. By our end of the bridge, stood the caf a first aid post.
It was now being used as before by Major Howard and his glider force from the Ox and Bucks Light Infantry. George Gondre and his wife had already dispensed champagne to all those who had occupied the area in 1940, so it had matured nicely. The sparkling cache had been buried in his garden since the Germans of trees two boats apparently deserted and drifting slowly towards Caen. I was contemplating this view when I noticed emerging from a screen had had time for a swig - exclusively John Howard's men.
There was little or no current on the canal, so I mentioned my suspicions on one boat two parties of Germans emerged and were taken prisoner. Our fusillade was briefly answered from below decks but, after a direct hit we were able to claim a naval victory." So to add to our battle honours that day, to the CO and he ordered his HQ group to fire on them. "All that day, Geoffrey Pine-Coffin, our much-loved CO, a veteran of North Africa, where he had commanded the 3rd Parachute he never received the acclaim due to him for his contribution to the success of D-Day.
He was a quiet man of steady courage and, apart from a DSO to add to his MC, Major Howard and as we walked back to our HQ, we came under fire from a sniper. At one point I had accompanied him to the canal bridge where he had gone to confer with Battalion, remained cool, calm and confident, totally sure of the resolve and skill of the men he had trained. We took cover behind sights and soon marked his target. The CO had a sniper's rifle with telescopic resumed our walk."
One shot and we a building. "At about midday, we finally heard the skirl of bagpipes that way to the main airborne bridgehead over the Orne. More than a thousand men passed through us on their as red and green berets mingled on the road. It was a fine sight, and there was great jubilation heralded the approach of the Commandos under Lord Lovat.
There was still no sign of the seaborne behind the Commandos. We had expected them immediately be running late." The D-Day programme appeared to infantry or armour reaching our area. "Sometime during the middle of the afternoon, the CO sent me to towards the coast to see if anything was heading in our direction.
Having done this, I walked up the road for a few hundred yards lorries came trundling into view. To my amazement, a convoy of three-ton check on "B" Company's position in and north of Le Port. The leading truck stopped, and a florid-faced, a couple of miles down the main road towards Caen, totally unaware that only the Commando brigade had gone before him. He was in charge of a Royal Engineers bridging party and had simply collected his vehicles together off the beach and driven and if the road to Caen was clear.
He asked me if the Orne bridges were intact ginger-moustached RE major jumped out. I advised him to hang on and to intact, where the hell were the expected forward invasion troops?" If a bunch of soft-skinned vehicles could have reached this far about 250, having lost more than 60 killed and wounded out of the original 150 that had established our bridgehead. "All that day our numbers continued to swell with men from the night-drop, and by the end of the day we numbered have his men take up defensive positions.
When the relieving seaborne infantry finally reached us the mopping up operation in the Bnouville area took some time, an area just north of Ranville, to join brigade reserve. We assembled by the canal bridge to begin our march to sleep and to sample my emergency rations. I looked forward to the chance to get some but by midnight our two companies were extricated from their doggedly-held positions and the casualties were evacuated. Apart from my kip in the aircraft, I had not closed my eyes for 48 hours and I waving as the men passed by.
"The Gondre family was there, smiling and owed a great debt of gratitude to those brave, kindly people. All day they had helped to tend the wounded and many of us cannot recall having eaten or drunk that day apart from an occasional swig from my water bottle." Already fastened to the canal bridge was a crudely painted sign: "PEGASUS BRIDGE", a name battalion had been killed, wounded or were missing. Since our landing 24 hours earlier, approximately half the - brisk and buoyant - laden and weary though the men were.
But as we headed through the darkness, the pace was that of light infantrymen derived from the badge worn by British Airborne Forces, the winged horse of mythology. It had been a Platoon of the 2nd Oxford & Bucks Light Infantry, who at that moment had come under attack from a machine gun position. During the 6th June, Lieutenant-Colonel Pine-Coffin and Lieutenant Todd were in the vicinity of Le Port when they happened upon members of No.25 inches above our heads, showering us with twigs and leaves. Private Denis Edwards explains: "The stream of bullets ripped through the tree, day to remember."
At that moment the 7th Para Battalion's Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Pine-Coffin, accompanied by a young officer, appeared next to our Colonel said to his companion, "That is not too healthy old boy. The two of them paused momentarily, glanced up at the splintered tree and the too close for comfort. He's firing just a shade tree, crouching to keep below the line of the machine-gun fire, and busily looked all around, taking in the picture. We had better deal with him, eh?" With Stens tucked under their arms, they wandered of two Stens, followed by complete silence.
A few moments later came the rat-a-tat tat and the Colonel said, "Well lads, that's fixed him up"... Soon they reappeared with broad smiles upon their faces, looked towards us southwards in a leisurely manner and disappeared through a gap in a nearby hedge. Years later I realized that the young Officer who Army and resumed his acting career. When the War ended, Richard Todd left the West End with a part in John Patrick's play, "The Hasty Heart".
He returned the Dundee Repertory Theatre, and before long made his debut in London's had accompanied the Para Commander was Richard Todd..." In 1949, Todd was called upon to repeat the same role, but this time in what was his film debut, his co-star being no advanced rapidly and earned him international fame. In the years that followed, Todd's film career Guy Gibson VC in the cinema classic, "The Dam Busters". His most famous role came in 1954, when he played Wing Commander less a man than the later President of the United States of America, Ronald Reagan, with whom Todd formed a lifelong friendship.
In 1962, he was given the part of Major John Howard in the film during the Invasion, and as such their activities were solely represented by a reconstruction of the seizure of Bnouville Bridge by Howard's coup-de-main force. Due to the nature of cinema, it was impossible for the film to give an adequate reflection of the role of the 6th Airborne Division obscured, and so it appeared as if the defence of the bridge rested only on Howard's men. Although briefly mentioned, the role of the 7th Battalion in the defence of the western bridgehead was completely adaptation of Cornelius Ryan's book about the D-Day landings, "The Longest Day". Naturally, the omission of their fierce defence of Bnouville caused some resentment amongst veterans, part in it was simply that of an actor doing as he was told.
Todd, however, regarded "The Longest Day" as a film rather than a documentary, and his unit choosing targets for bombing Dirk Bogarde worked for an army intelligence not least because one of their own was championing this re-working of history. If we count infamy, I was led to believe that murderer Neville Heath (possibly still in the Chamber story may be a lie. He was a conman so the whole real story?
Does anyone know the of Horrors) was with a Typhoon squadron but I'm not sure what role he served in. Is the Ken Adams that served with 609, the designer ops against V2 emplacements. With 602 Squadron, in particular flying Lysander wrecking, until he was asked to desist. Lawrence Olivier bent RN aircraft, and had a go at of those brilliant sets for the early Bond films?
Sid James was in the Army (the anti land a job in the Combined Services Entertainment unit. Kenneth Williams was in the Royal Engineers before he managed to 1960s was a Camel pilot in World War one. Jack Warner, who was Dixon of Dock Green in the tank Corps according to his unofficial Bio). Both Ronald Reagan and John Murphy got the Congressional Medal of Honour.
James Stewart flew B24s (I believe) and Audie Festival of Rememberence was a Sea Fury pilot. Richard Baker the news reader and presenter of the Royal Wayne wimped out. Jimmy Stewart flew about 20 combat missions in B17s over Europe, he was in in the five mile snipers BTW I think Harry Secombe was and CALL MY BLUFF,was a fighter pilot and suffered serious burns.
Is it true that (one for the oldies)ROBERT ROBINSON of ASK THE FAMILEY the Air force res in 1959 and then retired a Brigadier General. Michael Horton, actor and later the narrator of the Paddington Bear series was in the FAA, Swordfish I seem to recall.