Author Topic: birmingham war years  (Read 10080 times)

tramp

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #11 on: April 25, 2009, 06:46:46 PM »
Phil posted photos of the part of Studley St that was heavily bombed, so it was all change for the family, and I was born in "Studley St North", aka Ombersley Rd.  When dad came back on leave after being wounded, he went to Studley St first and was shocked before finding out the good news.  Later, he went to his parents' home, it wasn't there either, but they'd been inside when it went up.   He went back to the war two weeks later...I was conceived in that fortnight, so I've obviously always been glad that he was wounded in Tobruk.

Steve

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #12 on: April 25, 2009, 08:33:04 PM »
Tramp, my Uncle Harold, Mum's younger brother was in the first big push to Tobruk. He was a Despatch Rider in the Queen's own 7th Hussars. They were attached to the 7th Armoured Corps, so he too would have had a little badge with a desert rat on it. His mob were then sent to Burma to help the retreat but he was sick or wounded, put in hospital in Rangoon which was then bombed by the Japanese. The family never found out exactly what happened to him.
  The photo I'm told was taken in Cairo. I know the bike is aBSA M20 500cc sidevalve. I think he may have not long arrived there as he doesn't have a tan, and I know that these bikes were fitted with a large sand air filter which sat on the fuel tank with a pipe down to the carb, a rear lobe of the tank removed to accomodate it.
  Naturally I was never to meet him, I came along in 45. Harold was MIA in April 1942 aged just 19.
  Here's to all that went through that awful time.
                                                                        Steve
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

roy one

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #13 on: April 25, 2009, 09:13:59 PM »
hi steve i think the rats got there name when Rommel was on the move from  Alexandria to  Benghazi and Rommel's lot opened up heavy bombardment to try and blast away in so that he did not have to go in the salt flats and i think it was in late 42 to 43 but our lot held for 3 nights and four days they dug in and when the bombardments was over they come out of there holes when some one shouted come on you desert rats and that's how they got there name i may be wrong on the dates it may be 41 to 42  but ill ask a friend of mine his dad was a rat
each day is a blessing and I bless each day when it comes

Phil

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #14 on: April 25, 2009, 09:53:35 PM »
Birmingham Bull Ring after an air raid on the 9th of April 1941. This was only the tip of the iceberg of Birmingham's suffering.

Phil
Phil died in 2020. RIP.

roy one

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #15 on: April 25, 2009, 09:57:02 PM »
looks like pimms got a hit phil
each day is a blessing and I bless each day when it comes

tramp

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #16 on: April 26, 2009, 01:37:42 AM »
Steve,

Your uncle's war was very much   like my dad's.  He was LRDG, wounded in Tobruk, shipped to UK and went to Burma, was MIA, found by Hill tribe , taken away and saved.  The war had been over about 4 months before the tribe knew, took him down to a 'road' and eventually got an army truck to stop - dad's uniform was long gone and all he had was dog-tags.  He was also hospitalised in Rangoon and they kept him there long enough for complete recovery to avoid possibility of disability pension (war was over) and he came home to nothing there was me and I still recall a wooden boat with a removable cabin, over a foot and a half long, white above the w/l and green below with my name on the stern and both sides of the bow - I had it for a very short time - mom was shacked up with a bloke - had been since just before dad went MIA (granddad told me years later) so dad didn't hang about - his 2 brothers were killed in WWII, one navy one RAF and his parents in the bombing.  I was 3 and I didn't see him for 12 years.

tramp

tramp

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #17 on: April 26, 2009, 01:49:13 AM »
Roy,

Rommel's advance was finally stopped at the Battle of Alam Halfa.  The jerboa (the desert rat) was first used as the 7th Armoured Div badge in 1940 ( I think)- anyway it replaced a white circle on a red square.  It was Churchill who said that any man who fought in the desert had the right to be called 'a desert rat'.   Tobruk held out like a thorn in Rommel's side for ages and they called themselves the ''rats of Tobruk'' - it was an LRDG supply point, and dad was evacuated through it after being wounded the first time. The LRDG had the scorpion as a beret badge (nobody had a hat!).

tramp

tramp

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #18 on: April 26, 2009, 02:09:50 AM »
Phil,

What a good photo of some of the terrible damage that night - and yet I was told that everyone later said thank God it wasn't St Martins or the Markets that got it.

Brum suffered because it was such a massive producer of weapons, munitions, vehicles etc and was the key road, rail and water transport interchange, and also had a million walking targets.

tramp

tramp

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #19 on: April 26, 2009, 02:17:31 AM »
Steve,

Sorry, I was on the phone when I was trying to reply to you and my post isn't too clear.  Dad made the boat in hospital in Rangoon.  He had no one to look after me and a single man never got custody in those days.  He knew about his parents' deaths but not his brothers before he got back to UK.

tramp

frederick

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #20 on: April 26, 2009, 11:06:42 AM »
Roy,
my new found family their farther was over in Africa for 5 years he was lucky enough to return home after all that,  he was a sergeant major would your friend now of him his name Frederick Hodgkins.
Failure to Prepare is to Prepare to Fail

Phil

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Re: birmingham war years
« Reply #21 on: April 26, 2009, 11:11:25 AM »
Something that annoys me is, whenever people mention war bombing in the Midlands they straight away start talking about Coventry.

Birmingham was the second most heavily bombed city after London with a loss of 2200 lives and countless injured.

tramp
The day before the photo I posted was taken; they had just removed the Burne Jones stained glass window from the south transept of St Martins. That night all the rest were blown out by the nearby bomb blast.

Phil
Phil died in 2020. RIP.


 

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