Description
Ron was born in 1918 and received his call-up papers four days before his twenty-first birthday.
In August 1940 he found himself on a troop ship to Egypt. While on the ship he was recruited as an electrician and classed as crew, as they were short of staff and received better food and a nice cabin. He set up No. 1 Base Workshop at Alexander Docks and repaired everything from tanks to wristwatches – you name it, he fixed it. Ron then went on to maintain radio equipment on tanks so that the troops could get out of Tobruk as the Germans advanced.
Ron then joined the 79th Armoured Division, which had amphibious tanks and flamethrowers.
Ron went over on D-Day+2 and pushed on to Caen, then on to Arras to set up a workshop in a former German HQ.
From Arras he went up to Belgium and through Holland. Ron then modified the nineteen wireless tank sets for direction finding to cross the Rhine. Into Belsen and then Lüneburg to set up another workshop.
On Friday 4 May 1945 Ron witnessed the signing of the terms for surrender. On 7 May the unconditional surrender to Allied armies of Britain, America and the Soviet Russia was signed.
Ron came home and got his old job back again as an engineer with the Post Office.
Print taken from the book ‘A TIME TO FIGHT Living and Remembering WWII’
