Roy Wardle W/O operator with SOE

Hi, I am the great nephew of Roy Wardle and have in my possession a memoir he wrote down in the mid 2000's of his life in the British army in ww2, Mostly around his time in the SOE as a wireless operator. I don't feel that i have permission to publish this memoir and can no longer ask for permission, it is also typed and cannot easily be scanned, running to 55 pages, but i would be very happy to look through it for any information anyone may be looking for on people who he worked with or mentioned.

He mostly appears to have worked with Basil Irwin in Italy and the Balkans on operation Savanah 2. But other names mentioned include

But some names mentioned include Jock Campbell, Maj Basil Donaldson, S/Sgt Stan Brandreth, Steve Serda (interpreter), pl Dicky Lincoln, George Diklic, Ted Howe, Dr. Dafoe, George Armstrong, Stormy Fairweather, lt Lowell b. Steere, Capt D Ryder, Maj R Keene, Stan Dutton, George Reffold, Maj Henneker.

 

How interesting to know he was with Basil Irwin. Somewhere I have a copy of Irwin's report and will check it to see if your great uncle is in it - if so I will edit this comment.

Best wishes,

Vitellino

Edit: Have just checked Irwin's account of the Genesse Mission in Italy in the spring of 1945 and the wireless operator he names is 2383121 Cpl.W.G.Denley Royal Sigs.

 

David,

In the long term I would ask you consider donating the memoir to a suitable institution. The Imperial War Museum has a large private papers collection; likewise the National Army Museum. If he was an Army man, the Intelligence Corps Museum. I very much doubt there is a SOE Museum - though two places with links appear when searching: Beaulieu and Tempsford (training school and dispatch airfield respectively).

It would be a shame if a first-hand account was not widely available. What is the wider families view? There is no copyright and possibly not specifically mentioned in his Will - so it would be a decision for you alone or with others..

Jedburgh, our resident SOE expert, will be alerted to your post; he only checks in irregularly. So, I will alert him next.

 

This would have been from early 1943 in Italy. Their time together in Yugoslavia was from 29th Feb 1943 to October 1943 listed as Operation Savanna 2. Irwin called him Bob throughout this time.

 

Sorry, I just checked again and this was 1944. His dates do tend to bounce around a little.

 

This forum would be ideal to post and set the information for the long term interest. Donated items to museums quite likely will be archived and possibly never resurface.

 

I am very interested in Wardle's memoir. In fact, for a while I tried to track down a copy. We had some contact after 'The Parachute Ward,' my biography of Colin Dafoe, was published and again shortly before Wardle died in 2020. Dafoe was a Canadian surgeon who parachuted into eastern Bosnia in 1944. My understanding is Irwin, Wardle et al left that area from an improvised airfield in Osmaci, where many of Dafoe's Partisan patients were also evacuated.

Are you in contact with Wardle's children? I'd be interested to know if you can share the manuscript with me for research purposes. I'm in Ottawa.

 

Hi, I have discussed with my mother, his niece, and she agrees that we should make the memoir available here. We only have a paper copy and in many places the first letter on each line is missing. But it is still easily readable. My thoughts are to scan the pages. In and use character recognition to turn it back in to digital text and correct any missing words. I may just upload a file to start with of the scanned pages but I am unsure on file size limits on this forum.

 

Hi David. A PDF scan of the memoir would be ideal. That's as close to the original source as we're likely to see. Appreciate anything you can do to share it.

 

Hi David, I am wondering if you made any progress with Roy's memoir. I'd very much like to read it. If I can help in any way, let me know.

 

Jeff,

David W. has not logged in since his last post, just over a year ago.

You could try a PM to him to ask for an update.