213766 L/Cpl. John Alcock British Army 2nd Battalion Coldstream Guards from:Goole My father John Alcock was sent to a place near Wakefield after Dunkirk where the 2 Battalion the Coldstream Guards were being reformed and regrouped. My mother who lived on a farm near Goole cycled all the way to Wakefield to see him. She was able to speak to him through a wire fence.
After landing at Dover after Dunkirk he spent one night in a warehouse on the docks. He told that men were screaming and shouting in their sleep.
Dad took part in the last battalion sized parachute drop in 1956 at Suez. He was their RSM and he dropped on bonfire night. He had joined the 2 SAS after the Battle of Longstop Hill in North Africa. In 1945 he was awarded the Croix de Gueure after he and his four man team blew up a German troop train near Benestroff in Alsace Lorraine. He escaped by passing into the American third army front lines. He did this by capturing one of their front line outpost.
|