Sinews of War

The Logistical Battle to Keep the 53rd Welsh Division on the Move During Operation Overlord

A.D. Bolland

• Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781473868564
• eBook ISBN: 9781473868588
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

A fascinating account of the feat of logistics which it took to supply of the hard fighting 53rd Welsh division from Normandy to Hamburg. A limited run Divisional publication out of print since the 50s with a new introduction and overview of the actions of the Division.

THE REST OF THE TEAM

“’Tis the sublime of man, our noontide majesty, to know ourselves parts and proportions of one wondrous whole!”

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE: Religious Musings.

ONE MONTH IN THE LIFE OF THE SAPPER OPERATION “VERITABLE”

SUMMARY OF MAJOR R.E. WORK DURING PERIOD 8th FEBRUARY – 8th MARCH, 1945

1. BRIDGING

12 Bridges constructed – 111 x 3 ton loads (800 ft. run bridge or 350 tons of bridging equipment).

“It is strange men cannot praise the bridge they go over, or be thankful for favours they have had.”

ROGER NORTH: Examen.

2. ROAD REPAIRS

3,200 tons brick rubble loaded and placed by hand 1,000x3 ton loads.

200 yards Corduroy road	40x3 ton loads.
	1,040

3. MINE CLEARANCE

54 miles of road and verges checked for mines – Countless mines lifted.

4. BULLDOZERS

5 Bulldozers averaged 6 hours per day for 26 days – 780 Bulldozer hours. 20 major eraters filled.

Folding Boat Bridge (Escaut Canal)

“Don’t cross the bridge till you come to it, Is a proverb old, and of excellent wit.”

– LONGFELLOW:
The Golden Legend

High Level Bailey Bridge (Dusseldorf)

“The Rhine, the Rhine, the German Rhine! Who guards today my stream divine?.”

SCHNECKENBURGER:
Die Wacht am Rhein

5. WATERPOINTS

9 Waterpoints established.

450,000 gallons water filtered, chlorinated and delivered.

“When they are thirsty, fools would fain have drink.”

SHAKESPEARE: Love’s Labour Lost.

11 FIELD SECURITY SECTION

“Our Watchworld is Security.”

WILLIAM PITT.

Never designed or equipped to operate as a self-contained unit, without drivers or an Army Cook, the small section of 1 Officer and 12 N.C.Os. nevertheless worked from Normandy to Hamburg independently of any other headquarters or Unit.

In the course of the section’s activities, which were designed to protect the entire Division from spies, saboteurs and subversive influences, the following figures are worthy of note:

158	Security Targets searched, two of which had to be de-booby-trapped, hundreds of documents sorted and removed.
21	safes opened with high explosive.
200	“collaborators” handed over to respective national authorities.
419	detailed interrogations carried out in French, Dutch, Flemish, German, Spanish, Russian, Danish and Norwegian.
374	persons arrested and sent to internment.
2	sabotage dumps discovered.
7	spies complete with radio transmitting sets and
3	saboteurs extracted from the thousands of refugees who were cursorily examined.

The registration of some 30,000 civilians organised and supervised.

THE DIVISIONAL PROVOST COMPANY

“Policeman are soldiers who act alone; soldiers are policemen who act in unison.”

HERBERT SPENCER: Social Statics.

The vanguard of the Division to land in Normandy shortly after D Day included a small band of Military Police headed by the A.P.M. Theirs was the task of paving the way for an easy landing and concentration of 17,000 men with their vehicles and stores in an area so congested that there was hardly room to swing even the proverbial cat! Thanks to perfect traffic control and first-class signing of routes by this small band of men the Division landed easily and in a remarkably short time was settled in its appointed concentration area with very few “strays” to be rounded tip.

In the early days of the campaign, the Provost Company with its 3 Officers and 109 Other Ranks, like the rest of the Division, began to feel its feet, suffer casualties, and generally settle down to the business of war for which it had so patiently trained and waited for five long years. Its tasks were varied: always there was traffic and movement which required close supervision – and who will forget that solitary pointsman who used to stand on the dusty cross-roads of shattered Cheux? – but in addition there were prisoners of war to be counted, searched and guarded in cages of capacity varying from 10 to 1,200; there were refugees to be escorted and directed to their nearest Civil Affairs Post; Security Duties at headquarters; anti-looting patrols; fifth-columnist scares to be investigated.

After the German débâcle in the Falaise Pocket, and the subsequent breakout to the Seine, life for the Military Policeman became a kaleidoscope of movement – “Sector Controls” leap-frogging ahead of each other, many times going ahead with nothing between themselves and the enemy – (a fact which did not come to light until later!) – keeping the Division’s axis sign-posted so that it was almost an impossibility for anyone to lose his way. The familiar Divisional signs can still be seen along scores of roads in France and Belgium – souvenirs of the Road to Victory.

And so to Antwerp, with its patrolling to ensure that the “liberation” was not carried out too literally, to Lommel, Eindhoven, Nijmegen, ’s Hertogenbosch, Weert, the Wessem Canal, the Ardennes, the Reichswald, the Rhine crossing, and the pursuit across the Westphalian plains and on to Hamburg. Summarised as they are, these movements seem small, but each one, be it river crossing, slow advance on icebound or impassable roads, forest penetration, or rapid advance in open country, each was a distinct Operation for the Provost Company, each with its individual and peculiar “headache” or “snag”, which, however serious, had to be overcome if the victories gained by our fighting troops were to be exploited to the full.

Although this book is not intended to cover the period following VE Day, it may perhaps interest you to have some idea of the tasks which face the Military Policeman in an occupied country. In Hamburg, for instance,“Riot Squads” and “Vice Squads” were organised to supplement the German Police, their main tasks being to stop looting by civilians of wine and food stores: occasionally there were gangs of youths to be rounded up or war criminals to be unearthed – all this was, of course, in addition to the normal requirements of the Military Police to patrol the city by day and night, to set up information posts, to sign routes through and in the city, and so on.

In ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• ILLUSTRATIONS
• APPENDICES MAPS AND GRAPHS
• Dedication
• PUBLISHERS’ NOTE
• FOREWORD
• Operation “Overlord”
• The Road to Victory
• Roll Along Covered Wagon
• 1098 and All That
• Keeping the Wheels Turning
• The Rest of the Team
• Paying the Cost
• Lest We Forget