Old war pictures
Discussion
I was at my grandads today and my father started to look for an old picture he remebered been taken, turns out my grandad during the war he took a load of pictures of seemingly random things, I have a stack on my desk which contains about 100 pictures of tanks, gliders, bridges, buildings...
I've scanned two in just now, the first is slightly amusing given todays attitude to speeding, the second, well I don't think too many candid pictures of the Reichstag at July 1945 exist?
The sign says "Speeding, Check it, HELL isn't full YET"
Over the next month or so I'll be scanning the rest in, just wanted to share with you the find with you!
I've scanned two in just now, the first is slightly amusing given todays attitude to speeding, the second, well I don't think too many candid pictures of the Reichstag at July 1945 exist?
The sign says "Speeding, Check it, HELL isn't full YET"
Over the next month or so I'll be scanning the rest in, just wanted to share with you the find with you!
Speaking to my grandma, it would appear that I'm not going to have much luck finding out anything more about the pictures - my grandad doesn't really talk about the war.
He was in the REMEs (sp?) and was attached to the Desert Rats 7th battalion by all accounts. He helped destroy tanks and so forth at the retreat of Dunkirk, managed the guns up in the Lochs in the west Coast of Scotland and on the Forth Rail Bridge. He then went across on D-Day and worked across Europe as an Engineer, it's this later stage most of the images appear to be from.
There are numerous stories that my father has told me such as grandad, as a sergant, putting stones in the flour grenades and attacking the Poles, and subsequently getting demoted. Leaving his rifle in his truck on D-Day and upon questioning saying "there's enough dead officers, I'll use one of theirs". It is also said that when he was up in the Lochs, he was called back to base "drop everything" style, so he did and left a huge mound of gravel at the shoreshide to a loch, 40 years later he was touring the area with my grandma and managed to find the same pile of gravel. Then of course he used to do the Laundry run on a Saturday as he could take all the other soldiers into town and recieve half a weekly wage in bus-fares, or buy and sell Whisky...
Seems to have been quite a character in his day, it's a crying shame he's now going blind, is nigh on completely deaf and finds it difficult to move around due to war wounds to his knee's. Still, he's still got that glint in his eyes and manages to wind my grandma up something rotten!
As I say I'll scan these images in over the next month or so and either make a gallery in my site or make a new section for them... I'll put a few more on tonight however.
He was in the REMEs (sp?) and was attached to the Desert Rats 7th battalion by all accounts. He helped destroy tanks and so forth at the retreat of Dunkirk, managed the guns up in the Lochs in the west Coast of Scotland and on the Forth Rail Bridge. He then went across on D-Day and worked across Europe as an Engineer, it's this later stage most of the images appear to be from.
There are numerous stories that my father has told me such as grandad, as a sergant, putting stones in the flour grenades and attacking the Poles, and subsequently getting demoted. Leaving his rifle in his truck on D-Day and upon questioning saying "there's enough dead officers, I'll use one of theirs". It is also said that when he was up in the Lochs, he was called back to base "drop everything" style, so he did and left a huge mound of gravel at the shoreshide to a loch, 40 years later he was touring the area with my grandma and managed to find the same pile of gravel. Then of course he used to do the Laundry run on a Saturday as he could take all the other soldiers into town and recieve half a weekly wage in bus-fares, or buy and sell Whisky...
Seems to have been quite a character in his day, it's a crying shame he's now going blind, is nigh on completely deaf and finds it difficult to move around due to war wounds to his knee's. Still, he's still got that glint in his eyes and manages to wind my grandma up something rotten!
As I say I'll scan these images in over the next month or so and either make a gallery in my site or make a new section for them... I'll put a few more on tonight however.
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