Attention!
Cette vidéo est disponible en anglais seulement.
Attention!
Cette vidéo contient des scènes au contenu graphique qui pourraient choquer, et est réservée à un auditoire averti.
Description
The first attempt to carry out a landing at Dieppe is aborted. Eventually, the landing operation is launched.
Transcription
Interviewer: Was there a first, an abortive attempt to go first?
Yes, there was an abortive attempt and it was called off because the Germans had come over and they had bombed one of the ships off the Isle of White. And they cancelled it and give us all a leave and told everybody not to talk.
Interviewer: What do you think happened, do you think anybody talked?
Well when we landed there, we were supposed to meet a tired pioneer battalion of Germans resting from the Russian front. That's who we were supposed to meet. Well, I don't know but boy they sure weren't tired. We ran into SS, and one of the biggest artillery barrages you could think of and their field of fire was, they had the beaches covered where we were and they just wiped everybody out.
Interviewer: After the thirty days leave, after the first abortive attempt where did you re-congregate?
Ok, after the first attempt we came back Arndle(sp) and we started into training again and I just forget how long after the first abortive attempt that they remounted it. But I can remember one day, I was out with Norma here and we were out in the town and an MP came up to me and told me to get back to the base and so instead of going back to the base, what did I .. we jumped on a bus and went to the show, didn't we? You wouldn't let me get on the train. But anyway, we went to a show and the next morning when I got up they loaded us on trucks and we're in a convoy. And I'm sitting in the back of the truck, and when I noticed looking at the truck behind me that all the insignia had been taken off it. So the guys are saying "Hey, something's up". You know there's no insignia on the truck. Like our insignia was 56 the RHLI. So next thing we know we're into South Hampton. They take us in, the gates clang shut, we go aboard ship and they tell us to go down below decks. So we sat down there till, the only reason you could go up, if you go up on deck, but you had to put overalls on and only if you're on a work party and they needed you on deck, other than that you stayed below. So we stayed down below until Lord Louis Mountbatten came aboard, and he came down and gathered us all and told a joke and then told us we were going to Dieppe.