A Remarkable Coincidence

A Remarkable Coincidence

A few days before the commencement of the evacuation of troops from Dunkirk, I was with 9 casualty Clearing Station R.A.M.C. — a Teritorial Army Unit which I had joined in 1938 in Leicester as a Sergeant Dispenser. (I am a qualified Pharmacist) We were at Hondschute on the Franco-Belgian border.

That evening, my brother Horace, who had also joined a T.A Searchlight Unit in our home-town city of Leicester, to my amazement turned up on a bicycle. His detachment, in which he was also a Sergeant had abandoned their searchlights and been converted to infantry, in which role they were guarding a bridge over the nearby La Bassee Canal, with rifles and Bren guns, to stop the German Panzers!

The English caretaker of a local WW1 cemetery, contacting them, had said that the
9 C.C.S. were just down the road — and my brother asked leave of his officer to contact me, briefly.

We had a warm, short re-union and I showed him a small photograph of our first-born son, who I had never seen.

After getting our patients away to Dunkirk and embarked, the unit, because of lack of transport set off on foot, in open order, for Dunkirk, being attacked by Stukas all the way.

After a day and night on the beach, under attack, wading into the sea, I was picked up by a rowing boat and transferred to a mine-sweeper, getting safely to Dover and, after a spell in a Wiltshire transit camp, on leave to Leicester. Where I was able to tell our family of our meeting.

The family had no news of my brother until September, when he was notified as a prisoner-of-war. Surviving, after the war, he told us of his capture at Calais, escape on the march and re-capture after ‘living-wild’ for a month.

He is still alive and lives in Ashby-De-La-Zouche.

322230 Major (Q.M.) R.A.M.C (Ret’d)
Kenneth C. Ward

Caton House Care Home
Epsom Grove
Bletchley
MK3 5NR

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