a bit of luck in the trenches and we have all benefitted

[britfrog 180]

I received an email today fromt the war graves commission that amongst other things informed me that a little known officer in the first war named JR Tolkein was at the front  in a brigade HQ ,as luck would have it he contracted tick fever nowadays called Limes disease, and was evacuated out and sent to a sanitorium to recover. the following day the hQ ,where he worked, received a direct hit from a large artillery shell killing virtually everyone inside.

the luck of catching tick fever (which can frequently be fatal if not treated with strong antibiotics which didnt exist back then ) saved and  enabled Tolkein to start writing books one of which was Lord of the Rings

Now

not a lot of people know that!!!

[ddavid 149]

A friend of mine had to go to the psychiatrist because he dreamed he was Gollum, and kept waking his wife up in the night, with shouts of: "My Precious! what's he got in his pocketses, ...", so forth.

Turned out he thought he was Tolkien, in his sleep...

And a Merry Christmas to you, Nigel!

Cheers - Dai.

[J G 927]

My grandfather fought in the trenches at Ypres. He was a tall man at 6 feet 1 inch and was in the Royal Fusiliers. One day he went to latrines and while he was away an officer from the Guards came into his regiments section of the line and took every man over 6 feet for the Guards.

The next day the Guards went over the top and every man taken from his regiment was killed.

Strange to think that I am only here because of the timing of my grandads bowel movements.

[hurricanemk1c 195]

Think it was my great-great-grandad that fought at Paschendale. Came from Jersey, trained in Ireland (Newbridge, about 25 miles from here, and in Co. Cork) and survived (luckily for me!). I know one of my ancestors died at Monte Casino on 26th February 1944 (again, I think) whilst another ancestor was there as a Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineer.

 

Amazing how history inter-wines!

[britfrog 180]

My grandad was training to be a chemist, however as the war progressed and fatalities mounted he thought he would join up rather than be called up that way he may have some choice. , As luck would have it he saw an advert in the birmingham evening mail ,from the royal navy calling for volunteers to start a new hitherto unknown branch of the navy. Knowing that life in the trenches was pretty well a one way ticket. he and 50 others became the first radio officers in the royal navy, he was posted onto a destroyer and served at the battle of Jutland despite their ship getting quite a pasting he had many a tale to tell which one day may be read here on mutleys

Happily he survived it all. many didnt

[hifly 925]

My Grandfather lost two brothers and a leg in WW1. I have a transcript of an Imperial War Museum recording of his experiences in the trenches and when back home on leave. Surprisingly while on leave he felt alienated and was desperate to get back to the camaraderie of the trenches.

 

My parents met in WW2, I wonder how many of us of a certain age owe our existence to a certain Mr Hitler.

[MartinW 0]

Well, like Nigel's story, another one from Birmingham.

 

As a young lad, my father was listening to the radio one day when it was announced that the government were to setup a Home Guard. Enthused by the prospect of a Home Guard, he immediately ran a few yards down the road to the police station and demanded that they sign him up. The policeman in question was bemused of course, as the announcement was but a few minutes old, but he took his name down anyway. Thus, my father was one of the first, if not the first to join the Home Guard.

 

His adventures in the Home Guard included testing US weapons that had been sent over to help the war effort. I remember him telling me how they were given the task of unpacking and preparing crates full of weapons, one of which was a BAR. [browning Automatic Rifle] They tested it in a cellar and almost deafened themselves.

 

During a  bombing raid on Birmingham, an incendiary device fell through the roof of the BSA factory. My father and his friend, on duty that night, kicked a door in to put out the flames... and were promptly disciplined for damaging property. Other exploits at the BSA factory included firing a Bren gun from the roof, at the bombers I presume.

 

His scariest incident though must have been the night he was riding his bike through an air raid. A piece of shrapnel from a nearby detonation bounced of his helmet and knocked him off his bike.  Luckily for us, the helmet saved his life.

 

 

 

 

 

[hurricanemk1c 195]

I really do owe my existance to Mr. Hitler - my great-grandmother was evacuated from Jersey in 1940. Have some great stories from my grandfathers about the Cold War, including causing various incidents whilst stationed on Gibraltar!

[J G 927]

WW2 didn't impact our family much.  My Grandfather was an ARP warden and my dad a school boy.  They lived in Wimbledon and saw a fair amount of bombing and there were a couple of incidents that were narrow escapes and just plain wierd.

 

Whilst playing on Wimbledon Common a Doodle Bug hit a clearing that he and his mates were playing in.  There were trenches dug around the edge of the clearing for folks to take cover in if caught out in the open during a raid.  Dad and his mates took cover in one of the trenches when they heard a Doodle Bug's engine stop.  The V1 blast showered them with earth and part of the fuel tank of the weapon landed next to my dad.  On the other side of the clearing dad had noticed a Canadian soldier and his girlfriend before the blast, afterwords there was no sign of them. on investigation, it turned out that they had taken cover itn a trench but as they wer nearer the impact point they had been almost covered with earth.  Dad and his mates dug them out and they were both OK.

 

A couple of weird incidents were:

 

A near miss completely destroyed the windows in the back of my dads home. downstairs there was glass everywhere, but upstairs there was none to be seen. There was a chest of draws under the window, and it was only after the top draw was opened that they found the glass. it was completely pulverized but all in the draw.  The only explanation for this is that the blast opened the draws and the subsequent rush of air into the explosion center caused the draws to close again. 

 

One day when returning from school, my dad came home to find the front door on the roof.  Work that one out.

 

In WW1 my grand parents did not have anything spectacular associated with them except the my maternal grandfather was gassed soon after he arrived at the front and didn't recover until the end of the war. My paternal grandfather was promoted to Sargent three times and yes that meant he was stripped of his rank twice.

 

My wife's side were more posh and were officers. Her grandfather won the MC twice in the space of a month or so:

 

 

 

[Destin65 1]

I don't have a great deal of war stories despite being a war vet, haha. I was lucky, we were far behind the lines as I was a crew chief on F-15s. But I do remember very well that very first mission we sent up. We had been on high alert a few days and everything prepped, the full real deal loaded on the planes, triggers cocked and only needing pilots. Up to this point everything felt just like the dozens of other simulated wargames we had taken part in. But then the pilot arrives, he's going over the plane with a fine tooth comb, and I'm following checking as we double, sometimes triple-check everything. He's satisfied and heads up the ladder. I follow up and help him get strapped in and settled down when he suddenly just lets out a sigh and then looks at me. I mean, looking at me intently, in the eyes, looking me over and curiously I ask him if there is anything wrong. He explained it was his first war, that he always wondered what it felt like, that all the training can only do so much and it hit him as he was thinking about his family that my face would be the last face he may ever see again and that he wanted to remember it and hoped to see me again in 8 hours or so. I almost fell off the ladder. That's when it hit me, wow, this is real, people are gonna die on all sides. I was confident I would not but I suddenly felt overwhelming empathy for the pilot and my anxiety skyrocketed from 10 to 10,000 in a few seconds.

[Destin65 1]

Was thinking of the Tolkien thing. I'm sure Pink Floyd fans should know that stuff from The Wall and The Final Cut were all pretty much autobiographical stories of Waters and/or his family. His father died at Anzio in 1944 and the train scene in the film version of the album that shows the kid at the station as all the soldiers disembark to their waiting families, how his dad never got off... that was also true, he actually went through that. That's gotta be horrible for a child to experience! And that certainly explains the torment and emotion that comes out in the music related to it all.

[MartinW 0]

A near miss completely destroyed the windows in the back of my dads home. downstairs there was glass everywhere, but upstairs there was none to be seen. There was a chest of draws under the window, and it was only after the top draw was opened that they found the glass. it was completely pulverized but all in the draw. The only explanation for this is that the blast opened the draws and the subsequent rush of air into the explosion center caused the draws to close again.

My dad lived in Sparkbrook I think it was, or Sparkhill, one or the other, in Birmingham. I remember him telling me how he used to have to put both feet against the Anderson Shelter door, so the shockwaves from the bombs wouldn't blow the door open.

And then there was the time he and his friend, while in the Home Guard, had to guard a German time bomb until the bomb disposal guys got there... and it was ticking.