The Wartime Memories Project - The Second War

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261939 Drv. Norman Dobson British Army 101st Coy. Royal Army Service Corps from:Blackhall, Co. Durham Norman Dobson had been a delivery van driver for a grocer before the war. In April 1941, at 19 years of age, he joined the RASC and trained at different locations across England. He talked of how they were taught to waterproof the engine of their Bedford QL troop carriers and how, as soon as they landed in France, they had to remove the waterproofing to allow the engines to breathe. The tank barrels had to be carried in a certain position in order not to be stressed by the poor suspension of the vehicles. In June 1944, he was transporting tank barrels to the front and bringing back injured soldiers to first aid stations through Arromanches, Brussels, and Nijmegen. Like other returning soldiers he bought back souvenirs. We have a group photograph of A Platoon 68 men in four rows, along with his 4 WWII medals. In 1946, he was lucky to get his old job back at the grocer’s business. Once, one of the staff made tea during a break and asked Norman how he took his tea. Norman said 'I don't know'. 'Why not?' asked the grocer. 'Because in the Army, they just throw tea leaves, sugar, milk, and boiling water into a large container. You just take whatever comes out from the tap. There's no choice’, he replied. Norman went on to become a coal miner at Blackhall colliery for the rest of his working life. The pit face is 1.5 miles out under the sea at Blackhall. T. A. Scully Add to this record.  Related Content: 101st General Transport Coy, Royal Army Service Corps D Day and the Battle of Normandy 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.