Fear is the Foe

Discussion in 'NW Europe' started by Wapen, May 14, 2021.

  1. Wapen

    Wapen Well-Known Member

    Hi All,

    Anyone read this? I'm having trouble. Goch, February 45 pp173-175, Whitehouse names three men killed who don't appear on the CWGC site for any BW bn. I've no problem with old soldiers remembering with advantages, but I have to be extra careful in case he's wrong about other things too. Any opinion or gossip welcome. Cheers.
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  2. AB64

    AB64 Senior Member

    I've read it and thought it was a good book (but that was maybe 10+ years ago), has he maybe just changed names in case family are reading? does he describe the deaths in detail?
     
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  3. AB64

    AB64 Senior Member

    Just had a look and it talks about one of them being an alcoholic and another's wife having left him for a Canadian, so its possible he thought naming them directly may reflect badly on them or their their families
     
  4. stolpi

    stolpi Well-Known Member

    I read the book while researching on the Highland Div operations in the Ardennes and noticed that it tends at times to be fictitious; to say the least. Highland veterans, I met at the time, warned me not to use the book.
     
    Last edited: Jun 7, 2021
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  5. Wapen

    Wapen Well-Known Member

    Cheers Guys,
    I'll be wary.
     
  6. Giberville

    Giberville Junior Member

    I have read this book, and always rated it for it's honesty in describing the terror and fear of infantry combat - with thoughts of 'doing a bunk' or getting LOB as courage ran out. It's a long time since I read it but it sits on my bookshelf and perhaps I should read again. I wonder if the author is still alive?
     
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  7. Wapen

    Wapen Well-Known Member

    I enjoyed it too, and the sentiments ring true, but his detailed recall of conversations suggests some creative blank-filling. It's not a drama really but I have to flag concern if I use it for work.
     
  8. Old Git

    Old Git Harmless Curmudgeon

    The problem with veteran accounts, especially so long after the events in question, is that they do tend to be heavily influenced by all that they've since read, or seen, about those events. No-one lives a bubble and the vagaries of time can distort memories and stuff we've seen, been told can influence how those memories are recalled. Bill Close's classic 'A View from the Turret' suffers from a heavy unit bias, to the point that one at least one occasion he completely excludes the RE from a story and accords all the glory to 3RTR, and that needs to be taken into account when quoting it, (as do a lot of other 3 RTR accounts, i.e. Delaforce etc.). Pip Robert's memoirs seem, in many places, to a re-hashing of Taurus Pursuant. A lot of stuff that appears over the years are simple re-packaging of previous official histories with a leavening of memories that may, or may not, be 100% accurate. It's really not possible to quote very many of them without some sort of caveat.
     
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  9. Wapen

    Wapen Well-Known Member

    Agreed! One of my Old Boys told me a story as if he was there but I later found he was on leave when it happened. It was almost a direct quote from the regt history he'd learned by heart, I guess becasue mates died there and he felt he owed them. Got to love 'em but be wary of memory. Then I've actions where the tank regt story is completely at odds with the inf - tanks talk about a walkover becasue they were stuck behind mines or craters and didn't see or hear the inf and sappers taking heavy cas. I've found bias within units too - the IO writes the diary and has a man crush on OC "A" (or "A" has the only working radio) so everyone else gets a supporting role. Just got to be cautious.
     
    Old Git likes this.
  10. JDKR

    JDKR Member

    How true. In 2012 I accompanied my father on what was to be his last visit to Arnhem, where he fought as a platoon commander in C Company, 2nd Battalion the Parachute Regiment. With us was Marcel Anker, a friend of the family and a well-known expert on the battle and author. While we were walking part of the route taken by C Company, my father mentioned that he had seen Major General Kussin's body and his ambushed car, and it took some patient persuasion on Marcel's part to convince him that C Company had not been on the road where Kussin was ambushed as this was the 3rd Battalion's route. My father had obviously seen photos of the Kussin ambush and over time had come to believe that he had seen it.
     
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  11. Old Git

    Old Git Harmless Curmudgeon

    Another thing to be wary of is how the shifting political landscape can distort family narratives. I'm Irish and have always been told a family story of how my maternal grandfather was invalided home from the Western front in 1915, with frostbite in his feet. As the family narrative goes he then became involved with the IRB and was one of the few 'Patriots' outside of Dublin to take part in the Rising in 1916. Sounds great but his military records clearly show that he was with the Skins on the Western front til late in 1917/18. Clearly after Partition some people felt the need to distort the family history to explain away the families involvement with the British army, i.e. he only joined the British Army so he could get the necessary military training to rise up in revolt. It's complete horseshit (and completely at odds with what he told me when I was a kid) but there are some who, even when confronted with the irrefutable evidence, refuse to believe it!
     
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  12. Wapen

    Wapen Well-Known Member

    Beautiful! My Dad landed on D+1 in a MTB that drove straight up the beach. Except that he very very very probably didn't. I think he told us a story as kids when my brother had a model MTB and we put the two together to make a sexier story. Or he made it up - he wasn't averse to a bit of infotainment, the lovely old bugger. Unless anyone here knows different and there really was a MTB full of 8 Corps staff / hangers-on driven up the beach - I'd love it to be true.
    Our family Easter Rising story has a British uncle outside the post office shooting in, Irish uncle inside shooting out. I've not had the courage to test that one yet.
     
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