The Wartime Memories Project - The Second War

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209247 William Griffith James British Army 145 Coy. Royal Army Service Corps from:Port Talbot I lost my father, William James back in 1977 due to Leukaemia, some say his time held in a Japanese POW camp had something to do with it, as to the way they were treated and tortured in so many ways. I was always interested in what his war service history involved, but he never spoke about it, broke down on occasions, watching a war film on tv, so I never pushed the fact. I remember my mother telling me some years back about him being in a Japanese POW camp and the attrocities that went on at that time. Also that he was a tank driver, drove shermans mostly plus he was a motorcycle despatch rider for a short time. and I found a Gurkahs knife in his bottom drawer and remember him saying that they were the best and ultimate fighting men, amazing soldiers to fight with when he was in Burma. That's the only info I have so far, apart from 7 photos, only 1 of them with any info on the rear which was as follows : WG James, no.68701, 145 Coy RASC, 6 DTC (or that might be DTE or DT@) Barnard Castle, County Durham. Might make sense to someone out there or the photos might ring a bell? I've recently been told that the T32871 Tank in one of the photos is a Valentine mk2 and that the white red white painted marks on the turret means that they were on Operation Crusader in 1941 out in North Africa, Egypt or Libya so that might make the regiment the 8th Royal Tank Regiment but with the back of the photo saying " 145 Coy Rasc wouldn't that be the Royal Armed Service Corps which fought with the Chindits in 1942? I know there was alot of regiments made up for special forces like I think I saw somwhere while surfin that the 145 R.A.S.C. were changed to the 21st Tank Brigade. I'm sure with time the info will raise its head, it means a lot to me and my family, with my children already interested in what, why, which, when, where and wanting to know how all these brave soldiers from all around the world helped the world to be a better place right now. Hugh James Add to this record.  Related Content: Burma & India Campaign 145th Coy, Royal Army Service Corps Can you help us to add to our records? Add a record to our website. The names and stories on this website have been submitted by their relatives and friends. If your relations are not listed please add their names so that others can read about them Did you or your relatives live through the Second World War? Do you have any photos, newspaper clippings, postcards or letters from that period? Have you researched the names on your local or war memorial? Were you or your relative evacuated? Did an air raid affect your area? If so please let us know. Help us to build a database of information on those who served both at home and abroad so that future generations may learn of their sacrifice. Contact us. Celebrate your own Family History Celebrate by honouring members of your family who served in the Secomd World War both in the forces and at home. We love to hear about the soldiers, but also remember the many who served in support roles, nurses, doctors, land army, muntions workers etc. Please use our Family History resources to find out more about your relatives. Then please send in a short article, with a photo if possible, so that they can be remembered on these pages.

The free section of the Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers. We have been helping people find out more about their relatives wartime experiences since 1999 by recording and preserving recollections, documents, photographs and small items. The website is paid for out of our own pockets, library subscriptions and from donations made by visitors. The popularity of the site means that it is far exceeding available resources and we currently have a huge backlog of submissions. If you are enjoying the site, please consider making a donation, however small to help with the costs of keeping the site running. Hosted by: The Wartime Memories Project Website is archived for preservation by the British Library Copyright MCMXCIX - MMXXIV - All Rights Reserved We do not permit the use of any content from this website for the training of LLMs or for use in Generative AI, it also may not be scraped for the purpose of creating other websites.