KRRC on SWORD

Discussion in 'NW Europe' started by zola1, Jun 13, 2013.

  1. zola1

    zola1 Member

    Hi All,

    Firstly I may be in the wrong area here, please advise and i will repost,
    My Uncle Frank sadly passed away recently and i have inherited his regular army Certificate of Service and medals (please see pictures enclosed), i am beginng a research project on his Army service and hope to fill in some details :-

    WW2 Medals Frank 60 Regt Kings Royal Rifles.jpg

    Franks handwriitten note ref D-Day unsure.jpg

    I had sat and chatted with him over his Army days and he recalled that he was at Sword Beach on D-Day, now if you take a look at his handwitten note he has his army no and a reference to D-Day with the "60 Regt KRRC"....(wrong year i now but he was well into his eighties)..does anyone have any thoughts on if the this is accurate ?..eg were the KRRC on Sword Beach on D-Day. If yes are any references on archives/books etc that are available ? basically i'd like to track his units progress across the span of the remainder of the period 1944-45, war diaries etc.

    The second part of the note is Aug 1945 T/14436643 CPL Wiltshire 3 Coy RASC Far East and Berlin, were his unit in Berlin at the end of the war and then transferred to the Far East, or am i way off here.

    Any pointers of thoughts would be much appreciated.

    Kind Regards

    Derrick
     
  2. Trux

    Trux 21 AG

    Derrick,

    Old soldiers seldom get things completely wrong but often do get the detail wrong. Sometimes they knew little about where they were or why. Of course the veteran members of this forum are all highly educated and very literate.

    My brother in law always said he was a staff car driver at Montgomery's 21 Army Group Headquarters. When I was able to trace his unit I found he was in fact at HQ SHAEF at Versailles.

    I can find no mention of a battalion of the Kings Royal Rifle Corps landing on Sword on D Day. The 12th battalion was part of 8 Armoured Brigade which did land its armoured regiments on Gold Beach on D Day. I do not think that this battalion actually landed on D Day, but did so shortly afterwards.

    4 Armoured Brigade had 2 Battalion KRRC as its motor battalion. The brigade did not land on D Day but its armoured regiments landed on D+1.

    So 2 and 12 battalions KRRC are possibilities, but not on Sword on D Day.

    Mike
     
  3. zola1

    zola1 Member

    Hi Mike,

    Thank you for your reply, i think the best way forward is to get a copy of Franks service/casualty record from the records office at Glasgow, i'm unsure of the what the term "60 Regt" means that he wrote down, would that be a corp within the division ? any thoughts on this detail.

    Or do you think a bit of research on the breakdown of the two battalions mentioned here would be worth pursuing ?

    So 2 and 12 battalions KRRC are possibilities, but not on Sword on D Day.

    Derrick
     
  4. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    KRRC were the old 60th Regiment of Foot.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King%27s_Royal_Rifle_Corps

    They often refered to themselves as that even when they had been the KRRC for many years.

    Moved these posts to own thread to keep the other one for old photos of the beach.
     
    ritsonvaljos likes this.
  5. ritsonvaljos

    ritsonvaljos Senior Member

    The 2nd Bn, (60th Rifles) KRRC landed in Normandy with the 4th Armoured Brigade on 7 June 1944 (D + 1). However, depending on the time of disembarkation, for some of the some of the Landing Craft the embarkation in the UK will likely have been on 6 June. ​

    Personally I suspect Uncle Frank's 'memory' is not all that far out - just a slight slip of the pen when writing it down. If you have a look inside his service and pay book you may have already enough information in there to work out where he was more or less day-to-day while in N.W. Europe.​
    If you want any help on this, why not scan the relevant pages from this document and post it to your thread? All being well you will get a fairly quick and accurate interpretation of your what your uncle did in this period of the war. ​
    In the meantime, the following link will take you to the relevant page about the KRRC in NW Europe in 1944: ​
    Good lick!​
     
  6. chrisgrove

    chrisgrove Senior Member

    Should you wish to get those medals remounted and spruced up, please note that the Defence Medal is back to front; Kings head should be showing.

    Chris
     
  7. sapper

    sapper WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Sword landings were East Yorks and South Lancs and the Suffolks. All preceeded by the Sappers who went first to prepare the way
     
  8. zola1

    zola1 Member

    Thank you all for you help, here are some pictures....

    Frank KRRC 001.jpg

    Found this note that Frank wrote, this confirms what Owen noted the reference to KRRC...60th of the foot, i have wrote to the records office in Glasgow to hopefully get Franks service record.

    Inside of Cert of Service is a bit confusing :-

    Cert of Service 001.jpg

    ....its got an amendment to enlistment, any thoughts of why this occurs ?..

    got a lot of photos, very random locations lots to research...sadly none of d-day but that was always a very long shot...here is a shot of Frank, the cap badge is not that clear ! does anyone recognise it ? the wreckage ? any thoughts ?

    frank army 001.jpg



    Derrick
     
    Owen likes this.
  9. Drew5233

    Drew5233 #FuturePilot 1940 Obsessive

    These are the two battalion war diaries covering 1944-45.

    WO 171/1327 2 King's Royal Rifle Corps1944 Jan.- Dec.
    WO 171/5212 2 King's Royal Rifle Corps1945 Jan.-July
    WO 171/1328 12 King's Royal Rifle Corps1944 Jan.- Dec.
    WO 171/5213 12 King's Royal Rifle Corps1945 Jan.-Dec
     
  10. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    Can you rescan just the photo of him in beret in doorway so we get a better look at cap badge.

    I do like the brewed up Comet tank photo.
     
  11. Trux

    Trux 21 AG

    Zola,

    I suspected that we were either looking at two different people or one who had served in the war and then re enlisted after the war since there are two service numbers. The latter seems to be the case. He seems to have been in the KRRC, presumably demobbed after the war and then reenlisted in 1947 in the RASC. The last medal has a Malaya clasp so he was in Germany and then Malaya. The medal shows our own dear Queen so it must be in the 1950s. His discharge seems to have been 1969 so he was a regular for 22 years.

    Mike
     
  12. zola1

    zola1 Member

    thanks Drew, very helpful, i need to get to Kew and do some reading !
     
  13. sapper

    sapper WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    With respect I don't think this unit
    it was anywhere near sword beach
    Sapper
     
  14. Hello Derrick,

    As Owen says the tank wreck is an A34 Comet, arguably the best British tank that was used in combat during WW2. The registration number 13ZR72 is definitely post WW2, which might explain why it looks like it was used as a range target: not the best tank around anymore!

    You can post all the photos you want, with all the highly informed people on this forum you might get a few identifications.

    Michel
     
  15. ritsonvaljos

    ritsonvaljos Senior Member

    Also with respect Brian, according to the KRRC Association the 2nd Bn landed in Normandy:

    "The 2nd Battalion, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel W. Heathcoat-Amory, landed with the 4th Armoured Brigade in Normandy on 7th June, with motor companies under the command of armoured regiments, each regiment supporting one of the three brigades of the 51st (Highland) Division. The Battalion was continually in action, mostly with motor companies under their armoured regiments, the Brigade supporting various infantry divisions in turn."

    During WW2 I believe 2nd Bn KRRC had re-joined 4th Armoured Brigade in September 1943 and left in May 1945. I also understand that units of this brigade landed on Sword Beach from the early hours of 7 June 1944 - presumably at least some of these units embarked in the UK on 6 June in readiness for the crossing.

    On D-Day itself (6 June) the 'Beach Groups' also landed very early. Their job was to organise the beaches and establish reception posts for personnel, transport, provisions and armoured vehicles. Possibly these fellows came ashore around the same time as you and your mates did?
     
  16. zola1

    zola1 Member

    Hello Michel,

    Thank you for the info, As his service cert suggests he reenlisted in 1947 in the RASC, there are numerous photos of locations in the desert (the tank was a innteresting one)....mainly his fellow soliders out and about everyday life really, i'll post them soon..... Frank was a lovely uncle and was a quite proud man like many of his generation, i'd like to remember his service of his country with pride.

    I have contacted Glasgow about getting his service record, hopefully it'll prove that his was in Normandy 44 with the KRRC/2nd Bn, (60th Rifles).... he was'nt the kind of guy to exaggerate,i firmly belive he was there. What a thought eh,,,a 19 year old young man, who'd never left Essex, along with all who served, heroes all of them in my mind.


    Hello Guys,

    I bow to your superior knowledge on the detail, please don't let me start any arguments (service record should help with this ?)......Would the records at Kew have all the info you mention ?.eg.if i can locate the unit Frank was in then the record of where they were hopefully is mentioned in it or?

    What kind of numbers of men would have been in the 2nd Btn ?....he wrote "inf" on various bits of paper, so it points towards infantry, would they have been in small squads or ?

    Thank you all.

    Derrick
     
  17. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    service records will tell you what units he was in & when.
    Then we can start looking at where they were via war diaries, regimental histories etc.

    Yes, they were Infantry, a Motor Battalion .
    Here's 2 links to explain what one is .
    http://ww2talk.com/forums/topic/23759-motor-battalion-and-machine-gun-units/

    http://www.bayonetstrength.150m.com/British/Motor/british_motor_battalion%201943%20to%201945.htm
     
  18. Trux

    Trux 21 AG

    Thank you Owen for posting a link to my Trux section on Rifle Battalions. I would like to say that I am far too shy and modest to do it myself but the truth is I have not worked out how to post links.

    Mike
     
  19. zola1

    zola1 Member

    Excellent links with great detail, well done & thank you, i will have a through read to get an idea of what it entailed to be part of it all.

    Derrick
     
  20. Trux

    Trux 21 AG

    Following on from Sapper and Ritsonvaljos:

    I don't think that 2 KRRC landed on Sword. I can not yet find exactly where and when they did land but:

    4 Armoured Brigade was scheduled to land one armoured regiment group on D+1 on Mike Beach, which is on Juno.
    Two more armoured regiment groups were scheduled to land on D+2 also on Mike Beach.
    Mike Beach had plenty of capacity and it is unlikely that they would divert to Sword.

    What is not clear is when they actually landed since there were considerable delays in landing on D+1. However if they were landing from LCTs, which did not suffer the same delays, and since they would have a high priority, they probably landed more or less on schedule.

    Also it is not clear if the KRRC landed at the same time.

    Mike (not the beach).
     

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