Stories

Our thanks to Danny Alton Reynolds for sharing this story with us.

Ted was born 1^st May 1922 in the Calais area of France to an English father and French mother who had met in WW1. They lived in France until 1928/9 when the family moved to England to a place called Brierly Hill in the black country area.

Ted was the second son of what was to become a family of 10 children. Coming from a large, fairly poor family in a working-class industrial area, 8 year old Ted found school pretty tough, with his French accent and being quite short in height, he had to deal with bullying, he quickly learned how to stick up for himself. Not academically gifted Ted left school at 13 and became a trainee moulder in a local foundry, when not at school or work Ted would have to help the family by selling his mums home-made toffee apples in the street, (a job he hated).

In 1938, aged 16 years old, Ted (against his mums wishes) decided to escape his "seemingly" boring life of poverty and limited prospects and joined the army. Being too young to enlist, Ted falsely added 2 years to his age and was initially enlisted to the Dorset Regiment, but within a few months he transferred to the Somerset Light Infantry who were embarking for India. Ted's platoon commander was a young Lt John Waddy.

After the declaration of War and 2 boring years of sentry duties and training most of the men wanted to get involved with the real fighting when there was a call for volunteers for a new unit, initially called the Army Air Corps Commando and then the 11^th SAS the unit was finally to be called the 151 Parachute Battalion.

Originally planned to be 1 Battalion under the command of Lt Col Gough the unit was expanded to include 3 battalions and support. As it was now a Brigade, Lt Col Gough was promoted to Brigadier and the Brigade became the 50^th Indian Parachute Brigade with the 151 being British, the 152 being Gurkha and the 153 being Indian, the 151 commanded by Lt Col Martin Linsey who in earlier years was a polar explorer.

The original qualification of the volunteers were that they had to be serving soldiers and have a secondary skill, Teds secondary skill was that he could operate a steam train. " I couldn't find any reference that he ever drove a train" 2000 men volunteered from across British forces in the far east with only 80 selected initially including Ted and Lt Waddy.

Col Linsey's vision was to create an elitist force of highly trained, super fit and aggressive in attack unit that could parachute in the front of battle. With the battalion up to strength serious training began with weapons and physical fitness, on one occasion the battalion had to complete a 60 mile route march with full kit in the hot Indian climate and in competition with the other 2 battalions the 151 were the only ones to finish.

Parachute training was never fully completed in India due to the lack of aeroplanes, " they only had the use of 2 old Vickers Valencia bi-planes" the Indian made chutes were very suspect with several fatalities and many injuries.

'B' Company (Ted's unit) were called out in an emergency, being the closest and only troops available, to control an unruly and violent mob of Indian congress demonstrators numbering over 4000 protestors and successfully held the line until re-enforcements arrived.

In 1942 the battalion were separated from 50^th Indian brigade and were ordered to travel to Egypt in secrecy, (to confuse German Intelligence) and were renumbered the 156 Battalion.

On arrival the 156 became the nucleus of a new 4^th Brigade, many of the officers and men were due leave and others transferred to create the new battalions, volunteers from the Africa corps and other units joined the new brigade creating the 10^th and 11^th battalions and bringing the 156 up to strength as well as brigade support units. The battalion also had a new commanding officer Lt Col Richard de Voeux and the brigade also, with Brigadier Hacket.

The battalion and "forming" brigade were allocated a desert area called Kabrit to set up camp, close to other special forces units including 1st SAS, well away from main army units. After one unsuccessful operation with high losses the SAS tried to recruit some of the newly arrived 156. The new commanders decided that moving the brigade to Palestine which had better training areas and a potentially more suitable parachute training facility.

Training, both physical, parachute and weapons continued, some men getting bored and wanting back to their old units in the hope of getting into action. In late 42 The Parachute Regiment being officially formed, the red beret issued and a standard para cap badge. Many of the men hated the red beret initially as they believed it stood out too much and made them a target for snipers. Many exercises took place and friendly competitions with inter units including the American airborne after the brigade had transferred back to Egypt in 43.

Interesting to note is that prior to the Parachute regiment being formed many of the parachute men would wear their old regiment cap badges or the army air corps cap badge.

The men in the right hand picture show, far right, the para wings with black back ground on right breast with man on left showing para wings on shoulder. In Africa it was standardised that wings had to be worn on shoulder.

After the defeat of the Italians and most Germans in North Africa the 4^th Brigade was moved to Tripoli by ship on an operation with the division to take Taranto harbour in Italy.

Operation Slapstick was launched, travelling by ship and having been strafed en route the 4^th brigade minus the 11^th landed virtually unopposed in Taranto the Italians having surrendered, the 156 pushing inland faced a stubborn unit of German paras and in several actions with casualties on both sides finally forced the enemy to retreat.

After the brigade was relieved with regular troops, they were embarked back to the UK. Initially billeted in Rutland spread out in several villages, the 156 Col wanted the units to be closer together and moved the battalion to Melton, Staveley Lodge, Ted and B coy to Newport Lodge stables, The Spinney and Scalford Hall stables the main billets.

Following months of endless training, exercises, VIP visits, (The King or Monty) and stand-too's for operations that never came, Ted along with others were bored.

At each operational Stand-too, kit, ammo, rations, and emergency sovereigns were issued, these were to be returned if operation cancelled, several gold sovereigns disappeared at these times.

One of Teds mates died during a river crossing exercise at the Swans Nest Lido off Saxby Road, his name was Lawrence French who my younger brother was named after. It was also around this time that Ted met his future wife, Mary. At last, it looked like the latest operation was a go, Market Garden.

Last range practice, including shooting up the weather vanes atop the stables of Staveley Lodge and Newport Lodge, sadly only Newport remaining, with the bullet holed weather vane, the men knowing, that so close to an operation there would be no punishment.

Off to Saltby Aerodrome, delays due to weather and finally take of several hours late. Flak relatively light although, still taking out a few aircraft and wounding a few more Paras inside. The men were told it should be a quick fight, maybe already over by the time they landed on the second drop.

What a surprise! Being shot at as they descended, some enemy in the woods firing at them on the ground when making their ways to the pre-planned form up points, changes to original objectives and an enemy much larger, better equipped, better trained and organised than expected.

Ted, like many of his buddies, faced death, injury or capture constantly over the next 8 days, they were only expected to hold for 2 or 3 days with ammunition and food by the third day in very short supply, drinking water was also hard to come by.

Under constant bombardment and attack, the Paras and other elements were taking severe casualties, the dead, wounded and captured depleting the strength of the units.

German armour being the greatest threat, the Paras not fully equipped to fight tanks, and sniper fire continually harassing, wounding and killing with a focus on Officers and NCOs. Ted, like so many others, had several close shaves with death or injury and was one of the few to escape across the river without physical injury on Operation Berlin. Ted managed to get on the last boat across the river.

607 men from the 156 Battalion, flew to Arnhem, 22 returned in operation Berlin. There were several further successful operations to bring back evaders and escapees over the next month or two.

On arrival back at Newport Lodge stables, Ted found himself in a room with empty beds being the only one from his platoon to get back at that time. Ted was also overwhelmed with many wives and girlfriends, asking if loved ones were alive or dead.

The battalion had captured an Italian artillery piece in Taranto and brought it back to Staveley Lodge. It was decided due to the high level of casualties that the 4^th Brigade was no longer effective as a fighting unit and was to be disbanded with the surviving men transferred to other Para battalions, Ted was transferred to 1 Para until demobbed at the end of the war.

The Italian artillery gun disappeared from Staveley lodge with rumours it ended up in one of the local villages as a memorial.

Many of the men who returned suffered what is now known as PTSD, Ted included and it stayed with them for years after. All of the men who fought at Arnhem had a story to tell, some like my Dads passed down, some lost to time and some never to leave the battlefields of Arnhem.

Thanks to John O'Reilly whose book from Delhi to Arnhem helped fill in the many gaps Teds war.