A soldier's desert war experience
ON Christmas Day 1942, carols, presents, Christmas trees and cake were the last thing George Brown and the other troops from the British Army's Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment had on their minds.
Stuck in the blistering heat of the African desert, where however hard they tried they couldn't get the sand out of their uniforms or hair, the troops weren't even aware it was December 25.
Their hands were covered in sores from digging and rations were scarce, with each man given half a tin of bully beef, a packet of biscuits and two pints of water; the daily diet for the past year.
The weather was far removed as possible from that back home, with temperatures reaching 110F.
The soldiers were focused on the task in hand; to go forward to Tmimi and set up camp. So they must have thought they were dreaming when they arrived to find a makeshift kitchen and cooking smells wafting towards them.
"We were going there to defend the Air Force and the landing ground," said George, now 88.
"We got to this place with about three hours of light left and, to our surprise, the troop headquarters had got there first and were doing some cooking in the open air."
Officers told the troops they could have Christmas dinner before taking up gun positions.
"We didn't know it was Christmas Day until they told us," said George, who was born in Moulton and now lives in Brafield-on-the-Green. "We all got lined up and didn't know what was going on until they said, 'You can have Christmas dinner'."
The troops were served a soya sausage for their festive meal.
"They gave us all one of these soya sausages in our Dixie cans (carried by troops and used for boiling water and cooking].
But George didn't eat his feast: "I had the sausage on my fork and was looking at it, thinking how lovely it was going to be, when I felt a flap across my face.
"It was a hawk and it had come down and taken my Christmas dinner up into the air.
"When I went back and asked if there were any more, I was told there was only one for each man."
But things were about to get worse. The troops dug their gun pits after midnight and the next morning experienced the biggest raid they had ever had from German Stuka bombers and Bf109 fighter planes. As the battle raged around him, George was firing at the enemy flying overhead.
"I was getting quite near to one of the fighter planes when it went behind an ammunition truck," he said. "I misjudged things and fired two shells in the direction of the aircraft, but blew up the truck. It went up in flames and two men sheltering underneath were killed."
George had volunteered to join the army in March 1940 but always carried photographs of Elsie, his childhood sweetheart, who he had married in 1935 and his two daughters Sylvia and Rita.
After the war, he worked for 36 years in the preparation room at Manfield's boot and shoe factory , followed by 13 years as caretaker at Weston Favell Upper and Boothville Middle schools.
But memories of his wartime experience and his lost dinner have stayed with George.
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