March Past! Memoir of a Commando Leader from Lofoten to Dieppe & D-Day

March Past! Memoir of a Commando Leader from Lofoten to Dieppe & D-Day

written by Lord Simon Frazer and published by Frontline Books - £25 -

Hardback - Pages 400

At the outbreak of war in 1940, Simon Frazer, the 15th Lord Lovat and a former

Guards officer, was mobilized from the reserve list to join the Lovat Scouts, the

British Army’s first sniper unit that had been formed by his father during the Boer

War. The following year he volunteered for one of the new Commando units then

being created.

Lovat was personally involved in the training of the Commando troops on the West coast of Scotland. He was eventually attached to, and led, No.4 Commando. On 3 March 1941, Nos. 3 and 4 Commando launched a raid on the German-occupied Lofoten Islands. In this successful attack, Operation Claymore, the commandos destroyed fish-oil factories, petrol dumps, and even eleven ships. They also seized encryption equipment and codebooks, as well as captured 216 German troops.

Promoted to temporary major, Lovat led 100 men of No.4 Commando and a 50-man detachment from the Canadian Carleton and York Regiment in a raid on the French coastal village of Hardelot in April 1942. For this action he was awarded the Military Cross on 7 July that year.

Lord Lovat was involved in further raids against the German-held French coast, most notably Dieppe, during which No.4 Commando destroyed the coastal battery at Varengeville-sur-Mer in a text-book commando attack. This resulted in Lovat being awarded the DSO.

Such was the effect the Commando raids had on German morale, Lovat had 100,000 Reichmarks placed on his head, dead or alive.

Promoted to brigadier, Lovat formed the 1st Special Service Brigade (later the 1st Commando Brigade) which stormed ashore on D-Day to secure the eastern flank of the attacking forces. In this, he famously instructed his personal piper, Bill Millin, to pipe the commandos and himself ashore, in defiance of specific orders not to allow such an action in battle. In the subsequent fighting Lovat was seriously wounded, effectively ending his active career.

March Past! Is a book about Simon Frazer, the 15th Lord Lovat who would become on of

the original men who help set up and train young Commando soldiers based up in Scotland.

In fact if you read those old Commando comic books as a kid, Lord Lovat was one of those

men the comic books could have been based upon. His career, where he fought, what he did

and achieved were feats of heroes. This book is based upon his memoirs and they have

been put together in a great way that shows the real portrayal of a real hero who achieved

some astounding feats in WWII. The other thing that stood out was this was a man who was

blessed with being from a ‘higher’ position, and yet he was one of those men who mixed well

with his fellow soldiers, he was one of the guys. A really good book put together well and

really sells the story of a real hero.

The Steep Atlantick Stream

The Steep Atlantick Stream written by Robert Harling and published by

Seaforth Publishing - £14.99 - Hardback - Pages 232

First published in 1946, this atmospheric memoir of the Battle of the Atlantic offers one of

the most original accounts of war at sea aboard a corvette, escorting convoys in both the

North and South Atlantic. The author, an RNVR lieutenant, experienced the terrors of

U-boat attacks and the hardships of autumn gales as well as the relief of shore runs in

ports as far apart as Halifax and Freetown.

The narrative begins with Harling’s voyage from the Clyde to New York on the Queen Mary (or QM, as she was known during her martial career), on route to join a newly-built corvette in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He was to be her First Lieutenant, and his service at sea started in the spring of 1941, just as the battle of the Atlantic was entering its most crucial stage. During the first east-bound convoy he was to experience attacks by U-boats, the loss of merchant vessels and a steep learning curve as the ship’s crew struggled to live in the harsh wartime conditions. Later that summer they made return voyages to Iceland where runs ashore offered some solace from dangerous days at sea. Time was also spent in the South Atlantic with voyages to Freetown and Lagos, before a short interlude when he experienced the excitement of fighting with Coastal Forces. The corvette subsequently returned to escorting convoys from Halifax to Europe.

His narrative is both serious and humorous, and his picture of wartime Britain, his descriptions of being buffeted by great storm-tossed seas in the ‘cockleshell corvettes’, and the recounting of grim losses are all too real and authentic. His story ends as he leaves his ship after a violent cold developed into pneumonia, and soon afterwards he hears the heart-breaking news of her loss, along with the captain and half the crew, after being torpedoed. He is left to ponder on the many tombless dead consigned by the war to the Steep Atlantick Stream.

This is a small book but reflects the small world of these ships that the sailors had to live in. A story about a small corvette having to join forces with other likely crews to help face down the threat of U-boats in the Atlantic in WW2. This book is written by the crewman on board and conveys the ups and downs of being at sea during the lively times and the down times. This book was first published in 1946, but the book holds up well and I really enjoyed the camaraderie and humour within the book.

Sniper on the Ypres Salient

Sniper on the Ypres Salient written by Sue Boase and published by

Pen & Sword Books - £22 - Hardback - Pages 224

Just after midnight on 22 April 1916 on the Western Front, a sergeant from the 15th

(1st London) Royal Welsh Fusiliers came sliding and stumbling along the dark, mud-filled

trench towards the four men, huddled together and soaked-through, in the shallow dugout.

He was clutching his postbag in which there were four parcels for one of them, William

McCrae, whose twentieth birthday fell on this day.

A hand-written account by William, my grandfather, was found in my mother’s papers, long after his death. This book describes a year of his time fighting in the First World War, from December 1915 to December 1916.

Two months after his birthday, he was marching towards the Somme, where he was to act as a runner during the key Welsh engagement in the Battle of Mametz Wood. Later, he went on to volunteer and train as a sniper. He continued in this role for over a year, becoming a lance corporal in the 38th Divisional Sniping Company while fighting on the Ypres Salient. His words emphasise the key role snipers played in the collecting of intelligence about the enemy, through close observation and careful reporting.

His account stops abruptly in mid-sentence, just at the point where he indicates he is about to reveal more to us about ‘a new, interesting part of the line to be manned by us Snipers’.

Piecing together clues from his sketches, maps and photos, and this book paints a picture of Williams’ time during the rest of the war. In 1917 he returned to England to train as a temporary officer in the 18th Officer Cadet Battalion at Prior Park, Bath. He came back to the Western Front as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Duke of Wellington’s (West Riding) Regiment, where he was seconded to the 1/5 Lancashire Fusiliers until the end of the war. During this time, it is likely that his interest and experience as a sniper continued, with evidence that he may have taught at one of the Sniping Schools set up across France.

Sniper on the Ypres Salient is a very admirable, fascinating and decent book,

impressive that the author Sue Boase, granddaughter of William McCrae, who

started his story/WWI as a runner at The Somme, he would then go on to

become a sniper and this book follows a year in his life. Being a sniper he

would have been a well-trained, patient and observant person and this comes

out in the book as there is lots of detail and the book clearly shows how

observant he was as the great detail comes out as he has a lot of say and

needed too as his intelligence would help support future plans and attacks.

The book is written in little chunks like you would get in a diary, but the

information is always of interest, and you really do get an idea of what life

was like as a sniper in those conditions. Excellent work by Sue Boase, and a

thoroughly good read. I also loved the glossary at the back of the book along

with the huge links of websites in the sources section too.

Eyewitness at Dieppe - The Only First-Hand Account of WWII's Most Disastrous Raid

Eyewitness at Dieppe - The Only First-Hand Account of WWII's Most Disastrous

Raid written by Ross Reyburn and published by Pen & Sword Books - £20 -

Hardcover - Pages 192

In August 1942, Allied forces mounted an attack on the German-held port of Dieppe; titled Operation Jubilee, it represented a rehearsal for invasion. The amphibious attack saw over 6,000 infantrymen, predominantly Canadian, put ashore, tasked with destroying German structures and gathering intelligence.

The doomed raid was an abject failure and became Canada’s worst military disaster.

Eyewitness at Dieppe is a long-overdue reissue of New Zealand-born writer Wallace Reyburn’s dramatic account of the raid. He was with the first soldiers clambering ashore, and aboard the last ship returning to England after six hours of carnage.

Awarded an OBE as the only war correspondent to witness the street fighting first-hand, Reyburn was fortunate not to be numbered among Dieppe’s dead, suffering just a minor wound inflicted by mortar shell fragments. His book, Rehearsal for Invasion was a wartime bestseller.

Accompanied by freelance journalist Ross Reyburn’s new foreword on his father’s account, this new edition tells us more about Wallace’s intriguing life and details the shortcomings of his father’s book, dictated by wartime censorship corrected in the post-war years through a withering condemnation of raid’s mastermind Lord Mountbatten.

Eyewitness to Dieppe is another very good book as it gives the first-hand opinions of someone who was there to experience the attack. The book is put together by Ross Reyburn, the son of journalist or war correspondent Wallace Reyburn, it’s put together using his written accounts at the time, his opinions about how things went and in quite a few parts he gives his take on certain events that happened. It is good to have accounts of what happened but it should be remembered that Wallace Reyburn wrote his accounts whilst in the thick of the action so his opinions are of what he experienced at the time, where we have since learned some of the events might have been slightly different when you look at all the information as a whole. Reyburn is quite rightly proud of the way the predominantly Canadian troops behaved and fought, but when you look at the action as a whole there were big mistakes made by those in charge, something Rayburn is not afraid to talk about in the book.

Ross Reyburn has done a good job of putting this book together and it’s nice to read an

account of someone on the ground, interesting to see how another side of a story can

differ from another. A very good book and I enjoyed this more personal account of an event.

The Final Curtain: Burma 1941-45 Veteran’s Stories

The Final Curtain: Burma 1941-45 Veteran’s Stories written by Jeremy Archer and

published by Pen & Sword Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 312

The Final Curtain: Burma 1941-1945 comprises interviews with some of the very few

surviving veterans of this most arduous of campaigns. In their own words, soldiers, sailors

and airmen now aged between 95 and 101 vividly recount the experiences that they

endured more than seventy-five years ago. This is oral history at its best, from officers and

men of 14th Army, which comprised some 100,000 British and other Commonwealth

personnel, 340,000 from the Sub-Continent and 90,000 East and West Africans. The

interviewees include individuals from all these groups. Their accounts cover the retreat

from Burma, the Chindit operations behind Japanese lines, the hard-fought struggle in the

Arakan, the crucial battles at Kohima and Imphal, and the final advance to Rangoon,

culminating in a decisive victory.

The veterans featured in this fascinating collection include a Primus (Archbishop) of the Scottish Episcopal Church, a former Chairman of Manchester City Football Club, and the Principal of the Accra Polytechnic in Ghana as well as two career Army officers. Regardless of their post-war achievements, all the contributors share the distinction of having served in a hugely demanding and ultimately victorious campaign against a merciless enemy. Their accounts make for inspiring and unforgettable reading.

Burma, one of the hardest types of battlefield to fight in due to the heat, terrain and jungle conditions. This book The Final Curtain: Burma is a fantastic book where the reader hears from a good number of allied servicemen who fought in connection with Burma, these stories come from men who served in all branches of the armed forces. I call this book fantastic because it is a book containing stories from the men involved, their experiences, thoughts and the events that happened to them. This is so important because it is first-hand experiences, such a valuable resource in history. The author Jeremy Archer has done a great job in getting these stories and putting them together in such an easy-to-read manner, the maps in the book are good and there is a good number of photos throughout. I would certainly recommend this book highlighting such an important part of WWII.

Diary of a Wartime Naval Constructor

Diary of a Wartime Naval Constructor written by Sir Stanley Goodall published

by Seaforth Publishing - £25 - Hardback - Pages 272

One of the most significant warship designers of the twentieth century, Sir Stanley

Goodall rose through the ranks of the Royal Corps of Naval Constructors to

become its head in 1936. The Corps was responsible for every aspect of the design

and construction of British warships, and its head, the Director of Naval Construction,

was the principal technical advisor to the Board of Admiralty. Although Goodall was

succeeded in this post in January 1944, he remained the Assistant Controller Warship

Production until October 1945 so was probably the single most influential figure in

British naval technical matters during the war years.

His private diary was never intended for publication – indeed it seems to have been a vehicle for venting some of his professional frustrations – so his opinions are candid and unrestrained. His criticisms of many in the Admiralty and the shipyards are enlightening, and taken as a whole the diary provides new and unique insights into a wartime construction programme that built nearly a thousand major warships and a myriad of landing craft and coastal forces.

Dr Ian Buxton, a well-known authority on British shipbuilding, has edited the entries covering Goodall’s war years, identifying the various personalities and ships referred to (sometimes cryptically), while setting out the context in a number of introductory essays. As an insider’s view of a complex process, this book offers every warship enthusiast much new material and a novel perspective on an apparently familiar subject.

This I have to say was a very interesting read about an aspect of working during the war we hear very little about. Written in a diary format which I think wasn’t written to be published has allowed the writer the chance, to be honest, and say it as he saw things. What we want from a diary is for the person to be honest as this gives the truth about how that person feels and some of the real pressure being felt in certain circumstances. It seems that there are a lot of frustrations trying to run, organise and make everything technical that needs doing, gets done exactly. A number of people, organisations and businesses come in for criticism, which in most cases is quite justified, the pressure of having to achieve certain things and targets seemed enormous. Now I really like diaries so I found this a cracking read, some might find this a little dry but if you want an all-round picture of how parts of a war are run, you’ll enjoy this book. I would happily recommend this book.