This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this site you agree to accept cookies.
If you enjoy this siteplease consider making a donation.
Site Home
WW2 Home
Add Stories
WW2 Search
Library
Help & FAQs
WW2 Features
Airfields
Allied Army
Allied Air Forces
Allied Navy
Axis Forces
Home Front
Battles
Prisoners of War
Allied Ships
Women at War
Those Who Served
Day-by-Day
Library
The Great War
Submissions
Add Stories
Time Capsule
TWMP on Facebook
Childrens Bookshop
FAQ's
Help & FAQs
Glossary
Volunteering
Contact us
News
Bookshop
About
204750Sgt. Augustus Keen
British Army Black Watch
from:Woodside Road, St Annes, Bristol
My Father, Gus Keen, was a pre-war Territorial and became full time in 1938. Initially in the Artillery he was seconded north to a Training Camp on the racecourse at Troon, attached to the Black Watch. Because he was an experienced driver, rare in the 1930's, he quickly rose through the ranks and became a small arms and drill instructor.My mother never let him forget how she could hear him shouting at new recruits across the barrack square (she always said it was a mile, but I doubt it) and how on one occasion she wheeled my brother, in his pram, right up to him on the parade ground to tell him not to shout so much!
He was promoted Sergeant Major and transferred to Northern Ireland with an Ack Ack unit where he became a Spotter. His job was to go up in a Lysander aircraft, fly over Liverpool,Cardiff or Bristol- wherever the raid was coming in- and tell the gunners on the ground what height the bombers were at to set their fuses to the reuired height. On one occasion the plane ran out of fuel and they landed in a field near RAF Locking, Weston-super-Mare, and had to walk to the air station to request fuel. The Duty Officer asked my father if he wanted to go back with the 19 year old pilot or make other arrangements. He went back to N Ireland by train and ferry! He never liked flying after that and after the war never went in an aeroplane again.
Although never wounded, he played football for his regiment and had to have his cartliage removed, for which he received a war pension until his death in 1999. As a small boy in the 1950's I can remember his silver topped cane which he used when he became an Acting RSM with the Black Watch towards the end of the war. This site certainly prompts some good old memories.
Related Content:
Can you help us to add to our records?
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.
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:
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.