Veterans Interview - Ken Curry - 19 August 2003

I was with a three-inch mortar crew, I was # 1 on the mortar, there were 7 of us. They loaded us on a TLC on a mother ship, there was a Bren gun carrier and an armoured car, and we had a little buggy made of motorcycle tire wheels and it carried 30 mortar bombs, and when we were coming into shore we were supposed to land in darkness, but some of the convoy, not our part, ran into a German convoy which slowed us up.

It was a little sea battle going on there and when we finally hit the shore the sun was coming up and it was a just day like today.

Well, they dropped the ramp of the TLC that we were on, the Bren gun carrier and the armoured car went off and the Bren gun carrier took a direct hit. And we came off behind it and we were by the side of it, and our Sergeant, Sgt Bennet, he said - we were next to "C" Coy - and they were supposed to help us with this buggy with the bombs, and our mortar, the base plate and you know, it was too much for like me and my two men to carry, but when they come off the boat they took a direct burst of machine gun fire and it wiped out almost the "C" Coy headquarters.

And we didn't have no people to help us, and Sgt Bennett he went forward to scout to see if there was any low part in the wall where we could get this mortar over, we had to go over the wall and up to these German barracks, and was gonna meet one of the tanks up there and they were gonna go through the barracks, and as they knocked down the wooden buildings we were to set up some high explosive shrapnel and kill them as they run out.

But like I say we never got that far. But Sgt Bennett when he got up to scout the wall, he all of a sudden he fell down and rolled over on his back and me and my number two man, we went up to him and he'd been shot through the leg, and his leg was broken.

And we put a bandage on it, and we came back to the mortar and we set up the mortar, and we started to fire the mortar into the town. I mean, we didn't have no specific target, but jeez, we couldn't move, we lost four of our men, and the ammunition carriers and there was just the three of us left, there was me, I set the sights and my buddy he dropped the bombs, and my other buddy, he set the caps off the fuses.

But we managed to get rid of all our bombs, and there was a tank right beside us, and the stones had disabled the treads, and one tread was right off, but he kept firing his gun and it was deafening. It was firing for hours, and I get a pension for the damage it did to my ears.

And the funny thing was, I was at a convention, and I was telling the story about how I was laying next to this # 10 tank and it was firing and firing, and firing, and how every time it fired it raised me up from the sand, because I was right next to it. And I couldn't figure what the guy was firing at, because on the mortars we fired over the buildings, and kept our fingers crossed.

Anyway, at this convention, this guy says what was the number of the tank, and I said # 10 and he said, well I was the guy firing the gun.

And I says, you were! I says what were you firing at? He says, nothing, I was trying to get rid of the ammunition. He said we seen you guys out there and all the dead guys, and all the heavy fire, and he says, we didn't want to get out of the tank, but if we'd taken a hit we'd of exploded. All I wanted to do was get rid of them shells quick.

So anyway, I found out about that, but anyway, beside the point. As I say, we had our Sgt wounded, he wasn't too bad and we fired our bombs, and then the Fusiliers Mont Royal came in. We waved them off but they come in anyway. And as soon as they hit the shore we got all the stuff back at us again. And they just knocked them all to hell.

Anyway, we were hunkered down there, and just taking cover, we couldn't do anything, we were out of bombs, we weren't loaded down with ammunition in the first place, and finally, I think about noon, an aircraft went right across and laid down a smoke screen, and we retired. Anyway, I'm laying there, and we got Herb, the three of us and Tom, and we took Herb and he had a wound in his leg, and he was in between us and how it missed me I don't know, because he was in between us and he got hit in the leg and he was in between me and my buddy, Tommy Lillicrop, and we got a hold of him and just then, we had a major, laying there, an officer, and a guy came down and he had four German prisoners, and he gave them to me, and I got them, I made them pick up this Major, and Tommy got a hold of Herb, a buddy and we went to this ALC and put them aboard and we went to get aboard and the Coxswain, he said we're full of wounded, any able-bodied get off, and I took the four Germans and got on this big tank landing craft and it was just backing out astern and as it was going out it was sinking. And I just buzzed these Germans off, and they jumped in the water and I jumped in the water, with Tommy and we started swimming out. So we swam for quite a while but we had these Mae Wests tied to our chests and they were sort of retarding our swimming, and so we tied 'em to our ankles so we could make more time, and both of us were swimming, and there were these little plinks all around us in the water, and as silly as it was, I was thinking, jeez, there's little fish here! Until it went in my mind there was bullets shooting at us, don't move!

So we were swimming under water, so we, we swam quite a way out and then Tommy says to me, look, I'm not gonna go any further, I'm gonna go to a buoy that he seen, we saw these guys hanging on to the buoy, and I said, no I'm gonna keep going, and we're getting clear but we're not making too much movement, because they spotted us from the shore. So anyway, I turn around later and seen them taking guys off that buoy, and I was sorry I didn't go with Tommy, but later on they hit that boat and he was killed, if he'd a come with me he'd be here today. Anyway, his relatives are coming today and I don't know if they knew that story.

Well, it ended, I was in the water for about six hours, and the tide took me, like down to the east of Dieppe which was high cliffs, and I come in on the shore. I couldn't stand, and I had a chocolate ration which I ate, and I was in my underwear, I shucked everything I had, my revolver, and everything, and as soon as I could walk, I looked down, way down, and I could see an opening in the cliffs, and thought, gee if I could get down there I could get into a French town and they'd hide me out. So I'm walking down there and a lot of dead guys floating in their mae wests, and I'm looking at some of them because my brother was with me, he was in the Mortar Platoon but in a different detachment, and I was hoping I didn't find him and I didn't, but I couldn't help looking. Well, anyway, I got to the gully and when I got there, this German pops up behind a rock and I think if I'd a been in uniform he'd a shot me but I was just in my underwear, and I put my hands up and he took me up through the gully, and it was full of Germans. So they kept me up there taking pictures I guess for oh, about an hour and they took me to an old factory where they been accumulating some of our guys and when I walked in I seen a fella I knew and I said have you seen my brother Norm, and he said, yes, he's here and I said is he OK and he said yes. So I weaved my way through a bunch of wounded guys and there's my brother laying there, in his underwear too, he'd been in the water a long time, fast asleep, and I woke him up and he said, oh Ken, they told me you were dead, and I said, no I'm OK, Norm and he said are you wounded, and I said no, but then he seen the blood on my back and a bullet had creased my back and I didn't know until the day after when it started to burn.

What was going through my mind? I don't know. The night before I had been to a theatre and now I was a prisoner of war. I'm sitting there and wondering what comes next.

I don't think I was scared, I was too exhausted and hungry to be scared. But of course, the ordeal was just starting, you know, we thought we'd be given half-decent treatment, but hell, they never give us any food for a couple of days and when they did give us some it was very little. And then when they did give us some it was very little, and then they started to give cigarettes and food to the French Canadians, it was propaganda-wise, but the Regiment de Maisonneuve, they shared it with us, they were pretty good guys,. And anyway, they kept us there for quite some weeks and they interrogated us, and they gave us some Dutch clogs to walk in which crippled my feet and a French uniform, riding breeches and a tunic and they took us and loaded us in these box cars, wounded and everything and took us up to Germany, Stalag 8 V, and when I went into the Stalag an English chap who had been captured at Dunkirk ran out, and he gave me a tin of rolled oats and condensed milk, and when we stopped they had little blowers they used to take shavings of wood in and fast heat it and they showed me how to cook it and I thought I'd died and gone to heaven and I cooked this porridge and this whole can of condensed milk. And, after about a week, I came down with dysentery like you wouldn't believe, and I was in hospital there for a while and then I recovered and they sent me out to a working party in a sugar factory, and I could tell you stories all week long.

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