Since D Day when the Regiment, the 4th/7th Royal Dragoon Guards had landed in their Duplex Drive amphibious tanks at 0720 hours on the 6th June 1944 4th Troop ‘B’ Squadron comprising three tanks had lost one tank which had sunk on that day and four more that had been destroyed by enemy action. Nine crew members had been killed, three wounded and two captured by the enemy. The bad luck which had dominated the Troop since D-Day did not end with the attack on Tripsrath, Germany on the 19th November 1944. The Troop ceased to exist for the remainder of the hostilities
We arrived at a complex of farm buildings on high ground overlooking Tripsrath and parked near the house. It was late, miserable with heavy rain, muddy underfoot, pitch dark but we made the most of it by lighting the petrol stove in the turret for warmth and to brew tea. The petrol stove was inches from the ammunition in the racks around the turret. The driver was very despondent, fed up with having to take all the responsibility, saying he wouldn’t lift a finger to help anyone. Next day regardless of his own safety he made a valiant attempt to rescue me.
The Germans were shelling the area with their ‘Nebelwerfers’ - ‘Moaning Minnies’ - rocket launchers, which were screaming overhead. A night attack was expected from Tripsrath so we dug a trench a little distance away from the house roofing it with a door. We waited with the ‘Browning’ machine gun taken from the turret mounting. All night we heard the German tanks taking up positions.
At first light, the two surviving tanks, ours and the Troop Leaders following (the Sergeant’s tank had been knocked out at Oostham) started to move off down the hill just as the German gunners had found the range of the farm which was now being demolished under the exploding ‘Nebelwerfers’.
We entered the rubble strewn deserted street, turned right, stopped next to a row of terrace houses and opened fire on the enemy in a building further up the road in a house on the left.
The Troop Leader’s tank parked close behind, too close and not giving cover from the rear, also exposing the tank to a side road on the left.
As we concentrated on the action in front the tank behind was ambushed from the road to the left, going up in flames, badly wounding the gunner. The crew carried him into the yard behind the terrace house where he died.
My friend, Buster, one of the crew in the disabled tank, baled out and knowing that we had a spare seat - our co-driver had taken the place of Ken the gunner who had been shot and wounded the previous day - dropped into our co-driver seat followed by a burst of machine gun fire which took away the periscope. I realised trouble was brewing and hastily removed
my cumbersome tank suit in order to make a quick exit when the time came, as it surely would do.
Our previous tank commander, the Second Lieutenant, had been transferred to the transport echelon. The command of our tank had been taken over by an elderly Corporal. As we were firing at the house in front, “Bale out” came over the intercom. Behind us motoring up the road was an enemy SP (self-propelled gun) which the corporal had spotted when he turned round to look at the Troop Leader’s tank.
Then there was an explosion. I ducked under the gun, waiting whilst the Corporal spent precious time untangling himself from the radio lead. With my right leg being bent up to get out I felt my left leg being hit. I hauled myself out, standing on top of the turret with the lower part of my leg waving backwards and forwards - through my mind I had visions of holding a kicking rabbit by the ears - I wondered how I was going to get down from the tank. My next course of action was decided for me when a passing German infantryman shot me in the back. This pushed me off the top of the tank and I fell beside the track. As I lay there, with the enemy on the other side of the tank, the driver rushed out of the doorway of the terrace house where he had taken refuge to pull me into the house. A grenade was thrown at him wounding him in the leg. With difficulty I got into the house and was helped onto a bed on the ground floor front room by the Corporal and Buster. The other member of the crew had also been wounded by the grenade. My boot was lying sideways on the bed. With a piece of a parachute that I was using as a scarf I put a tourniquet around my thigh and tightened it to stop the bleeding with a 38 revolver. I slipped the revolver I had on me, a small German pistol, under the bed in case I was captured. The Germans were not very kind to those prisoners they found with any of their equipment.
The infantry were at the back of the house in the garden. Buster went out in considerable danger and located the Platoon Leader who had a tube of morphine, this did wonders.
The tank was well alight by the door of the house setting the window frames on fire, but the burning tank prevented the German infantry from coming into the house.
After a time when the situation was easier, it was decided that the Corporal would get the two wounded crewmembers to a Field Dressing Station. Buster would remain and look after me. It was still early in the morning, around 0730 hours; stretcher-bearers collected me at 0730 hours in the evening. It was a long day.
Over the bed was a wooden crucifix and by the bed a large chest of drawers the contents of which Buster used to clean up the blood coming out of my mouth due to the chest wound. He made periodic sorties out of the house to see if he could get me away before the evening. During the whole long day he remained calm, coping with me, a burning building and with infantry engaging the enemy from the rear of the building. At no time did I believe that I would not be able to get out of my predicament.
The Corporal returned in the evening as he promised with stretcher-bearers and loaded me on to a Bren gun carrier, which took me out of Tripsrath, still surrounded by the enemy. The Germans were past masters in giving way in the centre and then attacking from the flanks. We had fallen into this trap.
This was the third tank Buster had baled out from. He was fitting a new periscope, under fire, in the co-driver’s hatch when our tank was hit.
On the Saturday at the end of that week the Squadron Leader's office realised I was not available to return to England for my commission as had been arranged so they gave Buster 15 minutes to pack and he went instead.
After being commissioned he applied to get back into a tank regiment but was posted to motorised infantry instead and sent to Greece to the civil war there. My survival was due to him.
So out of the 15 crewmembers who set out from England for D Day by November 19th 1944 the total casualties for 4th Troop were 10 killed, 7 wounded and 2 captuerd by the Germans. 7 tanks were destroyed. The Troop Leader, wounded, was awarded the Military Cross and the Troop Sergeant, killed in action, the Military Medal.
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