RARE Royal Marines Commando Medals - Dunkirk and 41 Cdo KOREA, Palestine & Suez

“It was May 1940 and here I was in the Royal Marine Barracks, Chatham, debating whether I had enough cash for a run ashore, when the bugle call ‘Alarm to Arms’ followed by two ‘Gs’ rang out. As part of a force known as ‘B Force,’ I reported with about eighty officers and men on the main parade ground. After being issued with food, arms and ammunition we were packed in two buses and, with a police escort, we left barracks at about 1800 hours, under the command of Capt De Courtice. We proceeded to Dover, where we arrived shortly after eight o'clock. We did not know our ultimate destination, but Dover Castle was a good spot to see the huge fires burning in Northern France. Putting two and two together it was not hard to guess where we were bound. A short three hours marked the length of our stay in Dover before we again piled into the trucks and were taken to the Dockyard and aboard HMS Verity. Still we knew not what was happening, but after half an hour steaming and within sight of the French Coast we were told ‘Calais.’ Our job was to be covering party for a Naval demolition party, whose aim was to blow up bridges to hinder the German thrust and enable the sorely-tried BEF to reach Dunkirk and evacuation. What happened to the Navy boys, we did not know, but it was decided that we join the remnants of the British, French and Belgian troops at the Citadel and there make a stand. Calais was deserted and had been bombed time and time again, leaving it one huge area of burning buildings, smashed railroads, streets that were at times impassable owing to the great piles of rubble - to put it mildly 'Calais was no more.’

Here and there, though several people could be seen working as if nothing had happened, others just idled the time away. In one street we passed a chemist's shop which had been hit. Passing the shop we noticed a vapour which seemed to hit us and, thinking it was gas, we donned our gas-masks in a hurry and dashed away as fast as we could before taking them off. All the time we took to reach the Citadel we were being sniped by fifth columnists hidden in bombed buildings, dockyard cranes and any other high vantage point. In the dock station stood a Red Cross train which had been gunned earlier and bodies were strewn everywhere. One of our first jobs was to act as stretcher parties to hundreds of wounded soldiers who were being attended by our Sick Berth Staff. They did a fine job in circumstances that seemed impossible. The Doctor and SBAs were later taken prisoner; they preferred to look after their patients though they could have left and been safe. Our stay in the Citadel was for quite a few hours and the defence sections were spaced out around the Fort alongside French and Belgian troops. From the Citadel walls we could see the Germans and their Armoured Divisions many miles away. I thought to myself, ‘Well, goodbye England,’ for we could hardly perceive how we were going to get out. After the Area Commander, General Nicholson, refused the Germans' offer of surrender, the ‘Jerry’ heavy guns opened up and Stukas came down to do their worst. It was hell while it lasted. Eventually, an order came through to get to the coast and to England the best way we could. We formed into little groups and made our way to the dock station through a hail of bullets from fifth columnists. Zig-zagging across the main square and under covering fire from a few personnel of the Artists Rifles we made it without casualties, but, in regrouping, found that three other parties were missing. It was learned after the war that they had unfortunately blundered straight into the Germans. Meanwhile, we survivors, consisting of about twenty-one NCOs and men, got to the beaches and found desolation everywhere. We could see the cliffs of Dover and wondered if we would ever make it. Thanks to the Navy we did. The beaches were as crowded as Margate in the holiday season, with soldiers of Britain, France and Belgium. It looked a hopeless job, but two men volunteered to swim out to some Belgian fishing boats and see if they could bring them alongside. Off they went, and the remainder got to the end of the jetty and waited. In an hour or so a Naval Auxiliary Motor Yacht, the Condor, came alongside, and grounded on an ebbing tide. The two volunteers had managed to persuade the Captain to come in for us. By this time we were joined by wounded, whom we cared for as best we could, knowing that it would be hours before the tide came in and refloated Condor. We had to devise a means of getting help for the wounded of whom there were about a dozen. Sgt East spotted an Aldis Lamp on board with which he flashed a message out to sea. It was picked up by an MTB. In a few minutes we could hear the engines of the craft as she sped towards us and soon she reached alongside the furthest point of the jetty, during a raid by some seventy odd dive-bombers, which had complete supremacy of the skies. Their bombing was indiscriminate. The men on the beaches, who could only fire back with rifles, and civilians, were in their hundreds awaiting evacuation to England, just 22 miles across the water. Meanwhile, we got the wounded aboard the MTB and, being detailed to look after the men, a dozen of us got aboard and away we went. The remainder returned a few hours after on the Condor when she refloated. We arrived at Dover after doing a steady 40 knots and went alongside Prince of Wales Pier and disembarked. Reporting to the Naval Base we were given a hot meal, drinks, cigarettes and sent by train to Chatham, where we arrived back safely in barracks which we had left a little over forty-eight hours earlier. In this short time much had happened, it seemed a life-time to me and we had lost over sixty officers and men in killed, wounded and prisoners of war. We had done our little bit in the ‘Last days of Calais.’ 

BARNSLEY, AW, CH/X1649, MNE, UN KOREA, 14/11/1953, 41 IND CDO 9/51 - 1/52

BARNSLEY, AW, CH/X1649, MNE, KOREA MEDAL, 14/11/1953, 41 IND CDO 9/51 - 1/52

BARNSLEY, AW, CH/X1649, MNE, NGSM W/C PALESTINE 1945-1948, 22/10/1951         42 CDO RM 2/5/1948 - 30/6/1948