Description
Bill Pendell was born in 1921 and joined the Royal Signals 11thArmoured Division.
On June the 6th 1945, he landed on Gold Beach, Normandy. It was Bill’s job to explore enemy troop movements and positions. He was always on his own, with only had a Sten gun as a weapon, but he hardly used it otherwise he would of betrayed his position.
He remembers on one occasion whilst driving his armoured scout car near the front lines and was blown up, not by the Germans but by the Americans!
When the German troops deployed their Ardennes offensive on December 16th, Bill was involved in protecting the bridges in the area to bring the Germans to a stand. Then on March 8th 1945, he marched into Germany after the first Allied troops managed to cross the Rhine river.
He was given the unpleasant task of liberating the concentration camp at Bergan-Belsen on April 15th 1945, but very rarely does he talk about it.
Print taken from the book ‘A TIME TO FIGHT Living and Remembering WWII’
