Island Life Magazine Ltd August/September 2008 | Page 56

life

THE ISLAND AT WAR 1939 - 1945

Photo Left:
Island (B) company of the
23rd (P.O.) Batt. Hants
Home Guard. outside the
Hare and Hounds

Photo Right: p57
Eric and Morris
Reeves with their
father Frederick,
served on the Island
contingent of the
Post Office Home
Guard

the Calbourne LDV his
commanding officer was
Captain Lee (who looked very
like Captain Mannering in
‘Dad’s Army’) and the platoon
trained and held their parades
in the courtyard at nearby
Westover Manor.
Bill wore an armband and
was issued with a .303 rifle.
“Most of the village men were
used to guns,” Bill says. “We’d
been together at school and
we used to meet in The Sun at
Calbourne before we went on
duty guarding the ammunition
dumps in Lynch Lane and the
searchlight at Calbourne.”
Bill was earning between eight
and ten shillings for a 40 hour
week and did an eight hour
guard duty at night in the
Home Guard for five years.
A million armbands
stencilled with ‘LDV’ had
already been manufactured
when Churchill wrote to
Anthony Eden, “I don’t think
much of the name Local
Defence Volunteers for your
very large new force.” He
thought the title ‘Home Guard’
would be more suitable and
in July the Local Defence
Volunteers’ name was changed
to ‘Home Guard’.

56

By the winter of 1940-41
most of the Home Guard
were wearin g battledress.
Volunteers were also entitled
to steel helmets, service
respirators, greatcoats. leather
gaiters, boots, leather belts and
haversacks (the leather belts
were often left overnight in a
full chamber pot to get rid of
the ‘newness’).
The arms situation had
improved and in January, 41
American rifles were issued
to ‘C’ (Shanklin) Company.
The rifles had been heavily
greased and stored in boxes for
over 20 years so a voluntary
fatigue party of 24 men were
detailed to wash the exterior
of the rifles with paraffin to
remove the grease. The rifles
were then put in the ovens at
a local bakery and heated to a
temperature to melt the grease.
Fortunately, this drastic use
of the ovens didn’t affect the
quality of the bread!
An anonymous gift of £100
enabled the Company to buy a
second-hand Ford V8 Saloon
to be used as an ambulance.
The money also paid for
Messrs. Margham of Newport
to fit it with an ambulance

body capable of taking four
stretcher cases. Wooden seats
were fitted to the sides so that
when the stretcher supports
were flat, the ambulance could
be used for carrying stores or
passengers.
Peter Ferguson was
seventeen when he joined the
Home Guard in1944. His
unit guarded the waterworks
at Carisbrooke and his girl
friend Christine, the future
Mrs Ferguson, remembers
taking him a flask of coffee at
the gate.
John Gurney Champion
was also too young for
military service when the war
started. He was in a platoon
responsible for a Bombard, or
Spigot Mortar, inside the gates
of the Priory at Carisbrooke.
The Spigot Mortar’s accuracy
was doubtful – General de
Gaulle was almost killed at
its first demonstration – and
due to its insensitive impact
fuse, its bomb could not be
guaranteed to explode on
hitting a vehicle. John says
if they had fired their Spigot
Mortar it would have shot
down the Whitcombe Road.
He was also on duty at a

chalk pit on the Calbourne
Road where the platoon
guarded a radar station on the
downs. John remembers the
other men smoking in the hut
they used for sleeping when
they were off guard. “The air
inside was fuggy so I slept in
a hammock slung between two
trees in Damp’s Copse and
when we finished at dawn, I
gathered mushrooms in the
field.”
In the autumn of 1942 he
was called up and in 1943
he was commissioned in the
Hampshire Regiment. Before
the war John was articled to
his father’s firm of solicitors
and when his father became
seriously ill, the army gave
him six months compassionate
leave to work in the office
and he returned to the Home
Guard as an officer.
Little is still known today
about the Auxiliary Units,
specially trained highly secret
units aimed at resisting the
expected German invasion
following the fall of France.
The units were concealed
within the Home Guard and
the men chosen for the job had
to have a good local knowledge

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