19th Field Regiment RA, Italy, 1944 - copy war diary request

Mod edit: some posts moved over from Royal Artillery Museum - Sitrep Mar 2020 to here, in order to avoid more duplication/confusion.


Hello, I’m helping a dear friend whose father served with 19th Field Regiment, RA at Anzio in 44/45. I am trying to obtain the war diaries for this unit but, having problems getting hold of them, short of a very long trip to the National Archives.
Thank you in advance for your help

 

Mary,

Not the best place for your topic to get help. This thread is about the RA Museum that might be.

There is thread for the RA: Royal Artillery

 

I’m helping a dear friend whose father served with 19th Field Regiment at Anzio and, I’m trying to obtain the war diaries.
I’ve tried British Army War Diary Copying service but, they don’t hold the diaries so, I’m hoping someone here might be able to assist.

many thanks

 

As numerous regimental museums hold war diaries for the various units, I assumed the Royal Artillery museum might well do the same. Obviously not in this case

 

Some relevant history of that time is on: 19TH FIELD REGIMENT ROYAL ARTILLERY – Italy Star Association 1943-1945

Unable to find anything really useful about the 19th Field, let alone them being at Anzio on this website.

 

Thank you. I have the war diary WO reference numbers but, Kew is a very long trip for me.
If I can’t obtain the war diaries without going to Kew, I will just compile a brief overview of their movements, although, I think that won’t be anything new to him as he and his father returned to Anzio a few years back.

 

Actually the RA Museum is a great place to start because they may have a DRAMA report for the regiment that you are researching.
I think its often better to start with this report before getting copies of all or some of the War Diaries.

See my notes here: Sergeant ACK-ACK: Royal Artillery Museum: DRAMA Reports

 

Steve,

I think your DRAMA report was posted in 2019, everything I can find online states the RA Museum is closed, as it simply does not have a home! Whether the Archives are accessible by staff is unclear, until Mary asks the current address: info@royalartillerymuseum.com

They now have a different Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/TheRAMCollection

 

Yes that's true David, but they were already closed in 2019. I think they must still have a nice lady working in an office somewhere with access to their archive.
They were very helpful when I enquired using the email address in my post. Sometimes the DRAMA report contains very little info, in which case they will tell you not to waste your money. However, in my case it was certainly worthwhile.
Also note that it is a multi-source report, so may contain a few gems not in the Regimental War Diary.

 

Just been searching back through my emails and thought this extract from the RA Museum may be of interest:-

Records at the Royal Artillery Museum Archive


Many of our records had to be kept in deep storage following our move from Woolwich in 2016. We have recently transferred these to a new storage facility near Larkhill. There is still a fair bit of location listing to carry out, to make things easy to find, so it will be a few weeks before everything is fully available. However do feel free to ask us about them. In the meantime the following are already available at the Archive & Library at Larkhill:

• Battery Digests of Service (peace-time details of the activities of individual Batteries, c.1890-1939)
• Annual Historical Returns (as with the Digests of Service, but c.1945 onwards, and also includes details for Regiments)
• Part of the WWI War Diary collection
• Part of the ‘MD’ collection (personal papers of former Gunners)
• Part of the ‘AL’ collection (photos and photograph albums)
• Gun Handbooks
• Gun Training Pamphlets
• Gunner Magazine (1919-2016)
• Royal Artillery Journal (c.1860 – 2014)
• Royal Artillery News (1899-1970)
• Royal Artillery Distribution List (1868-1938)
• Regimental ‘Blue’ Officers’ Lists (early copies, from 1904)
• WWII Tracer Cards (on microfilm)
• Establishment Lists

 

I am afraid that the 19th Field Regiment RA is something of an enigma. They were during WW2 part of the 1st Infantry Division alongside 2nd Field Regiment RA and 67th Field Regiment RA (TA). I have come across people who have tried to research them but they run into difficulties as apparently their War Diaries, when they got to read them, give sparse detail of their actions. Larkhill has proven to be of little use due to the failure of planning permission for the new RA Museum. As far as I am aware everything is in deep storage at the National Archives Kew.

There are people on this site who visit Kew who might get sight of or obtain copies of War Diaries.

1st (British) Infantry Division each Artillery Field Regiment Directly supported an Infantry Brigade.
Each Battery in the Regiment supported an Infantry Battalion. The Battery Commander was in close contact with the Infantry Battalion Commander often sharing his Battalion HQ or Observation Post.

19th Field Regiment RA supported
3rd Infantry Brigade consisting of:
1st Battalion, Duke of Wellington's Regiment 1st Battalion, King's Shropshire Light Infantry 2nd Battalion, Sherwood Foresters

I could give you a general synopsis of the 19th activities as everywhere the 1st Infantry Div went so did the 67th but at Anzio 67th were placed under 5th Division on 10th Feb to 24th March, whilst supporting the American 36th Combat Engineers Regiment (US) so moved back closer to the beach away from the 2nd and 19th Regiments so I wouldn't have their locations.
There is a book often available online called Ubique by AM Chatham MC a Major in 2nd Field another The Eyes and Ears of the Regiment by Richard Whitfield of 446 Bty 67th Field Regt but they only mention the 19th in passing.

I have found this very frustrating as I have a neighbour now aged 90 who was in the 19th post war but we have found little about them. Modern publications call them The Scottish Gunners with no references to WW2.

There is a little information on 19 Field Regiment RA - The Royal Artillery 1939-45 which explains part of the difficulty.
However I am not sure of the June 44 reference as I don't think they went over to SP 105mm Priests after Anzio, as their next move after Rome was Florence and the Apennines. Followed by Palestine in 1945.
In 1950 they were a 25 pdr Field Gun Regiment in Dortmund where my neighbour drove a Quad. They later went to Korea.

If you get stuck just drop me a line and I will see what I can extract from my notes.

 

I agree with the reference to the M7 Priest and have removed it from the page. Having checked through my references I cannot find anything about M7's for 19 Field, however there is a reference to 19 Field Regiment Royal Canadian Artillery having M7's in June 1944. I must presume that either myself or my primary reference must have mistakenly read RCA as RA.
Thanks for pointing this out. I try to be accurate but with over 1,500 pages on the site it is easy to miss something. I will always welcome corrections to my site.
Derek

 

Instead of searching with 19th Field I dropped the 'th' and that had some extra hits. Scrolling through there is:

From: Battle of Britain London Monument - Sgt. G L Gould

Another death at Anzio, Gunner Robert Claude Webb, with a short history appears on: Penclawdd War Memorial – WWWMP.Wales

Then another via a church site and then CWGC: War Memorial Holy Trinity Church - Ardington - TracesOfWar.com and Gunner William Alfred King | War Casualty Details 1614392 | CWGC

A Kiwi serving as a Major with them via Oliver Charles Hay Burton | New Zealand War Graves Project and Major Oliver Charles Hay Burton | War Casualty Details 44804 | CWGC

Even their CO @ Anzio was killed: via Winchester College at War – WWII – Memorial At Peninsula and Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Edmond Hubert Hamilton | War Casualty Details 39334 | CWGC

They served with 1st Division:

And the source cites under Bibliography:

From: 1st Division 1939-1945

A Major Ian Derek Lacon Moir was killed on Gothic Ridge, 20/9/1944. Via: Moir, Ian Derek Lacon (1916-1944) and Major Ian Derek Lacon Moir | War Casualty Details 100378 | CWGC

Searching the CWGC database will give you an idea of how their war went and possibly enable the journey across Italy.

Regarding Uncle Target's comment above:

Is it possible that the RHQ @ Anzio was hit, i.e. when the CO was killed and the war diaries were destroyed? Though he is the only regmt member who died that day. Hence the sparse detail of their actions.

Ancestry refers to a Thomas Hucker, a Lance Serg (j) eant with the 19th, being awarded the Military Medal 1943-1944. Perhaps his citation can be found?

 

Thanks for the above. I find #15 very useful as it possibly gives the reason for both Capt Jupp MC and Lt France MC being transferred from the 67th to the 19th Field Regiment as Casualty Replacements. Both being holders of the MC the Regular Army 19th Field Regt no doubt felt the award within their ranks very desirable. They were also a proven capable team who could carry out more senior duties. Jupp had been Adjutant in the 67th prior to his appointment to command C Troop and France a GPO alongside Bill Beadle who by this time was CPO 266 Bty under Major DCL Shepherd MC who was also awarded the MC in the same action.

Capt Jupp MC was promoted to Major and later Cas evacuated shot in the knee when visiting an OP.
Back in the UK he became a member of the Army Selection Board and post war, a High Court Judge.
Lt France became a Captain and disappeared despite much research. He was a close friend of Lt Bill Beadle who I have written much about.
Capt Jupp was their troop Commander and close friend. Lt France got his MC at Banana Ridge, Medjez el Bab Tunisia 1943.

Photos: Newspaper cutting Obituary of Kenneth Jupp.
Lt France "wounded" at Anzio. He had something of a sharp wiitt. He is listed on 266 Battery Next of Kin list as living in Cumbria and was probably posted to the Regiment as a Reserve post Dunkirk. I can find no evidence of his attendance at any reunions. Kenneth Jupp attended several and journeyed to Dunkirk with the Veterans Association.

 

With the current lack of War Diary information one way to put together the Regiments activities is to follow up the odd facts placing them in chronological order, so that over a period of time a storyline emerges.
To this end I have had a quick look at #15 by Davidbfpo
One comment in my study notes came to mind: Between the 19th and 20th September 19 Field Regt lost two OP (Observation Post) parties while in direct support of 66 Brigade, nothing more was said about this. The Regiment put out several Observation Parties in relays as it took so much time for one to go out and come back in the mountains. However there was no defined defensive line and people got lost or inadvertently bumped into the enemy. The Germans were putting out heavily armed fighting patrols to look for the advancing Allied troops. The War Diary just might reveal the cause and effect. If indeed the Diaries were lost at Anzio this event being three months or so later should be available.
The background is the advance to the Gothic Line north of Florence where Major Ian Derek Lacon Moir is buried . He was killed on Gothic Ridge, 20/9/1944. This is an obscure location but must lie somewhere in the area of Cassaglia on the high peaks of the Apennines overlooking Arrow Route as it passes through the Lamone Valley. I have a few photos from the album of Peter Mennell MBE and David Shepherd MC of 67th Field Regt taken in this area together with a description written by Major David Shepherd MC.

Of course there is something desperately subtle about our present type of war. It lacks the heat and temper of big battles as we had at Anzio and in Africa. It is a cold and clumsy slogging as much against nature as anything and one feels much more the loss of ones friends and you feel like helpless insects in the mountains fighting more against an evil spirit than a human enemy. The actual technicalities of mountain warfare and the physical effort I am now used to. The wet and wind are hellish. Imagine sleeping out with at the most one wet blanket at 3000 feet on an exposed hill still in pouring rain. Yet one does it and one’s work and cooks one’s food and revels in every moment of sunlight and survives and soon forgets misery. It has its compensations ironically. I have never seen such views in my life. For example, the sun is setting and so just catching the peaks and hills and there a long slope – the remainder of the hills lying like corpses in their dark shrouds and away beyond the plain of Lombardy, its cities lit in turn as they become caught in the patches of sunlight. That magically materialises them from the indistinguishable mist of evening. And behind again, a hundred miles away, the majestic barrier of the Dolomites. At dawn too it is unbelievable to watch the view come to life as the sun creeps up………..
Excerpt from my book "Too Close for Comfort".
Photos and my sketch map of Arrow Route below.