Description
Alan King was too young to join the regular army, so he joined the Home Guard. The Home Guard needed a means of internal communication, so that was Alan, the emergency messenger unit; boys on bicycles!
Alan was then was called up in December 1942 and joined the East Yeomanry, 27th Armoured Division.
D-Day: Alan arrived on Juno Beach on LST (Landing Ship, Tank) 3204 just after 7.00 am as part of the initial assault in a Sherman tank. Four tanks managed to get on the beach.
On D-Day+3: Alan was ordered to Pegasus Bridge to take out the Panzer tanks on the other side of the bridge. Alan was to battle his way through France, Belgium, Holland and over the river Rhine into Germany. Only half of the 600 men with whom he had trained remained.
After the war Alan worked as an engineer in Suffolk until he retired. Alan married Nora and had three children.
Print taken from the book ‘A TIME TO FIGHT Living and Remembering WWII’
