Breakfast at Babs

Of the six two man canoes that had been brought to the French coast by HMS Tuna on the 7th December, only five had been launched because one canoe was damaged getting off the submarine. Two canoes were lost during the first phase when making their way to the river mouth – they encountered unexpectedly heavy seas and a strong tidal race. The three remaining canoes made their way up the Gironde estuary to the harbour basin of Bordeaux. As they lay up in hiding during the first day one pair of crew were discovered and captured by the Germans.

The remaining two crews continued in their journey upstream for the following four nights, making slower progress than expected because of a strong ebb tide. Each day they hid up in the undergrowth beside the river as the Germans mounted a search for them. The attack was postponed until the night of 11th/12th December. On that night Major Hasler and Marine Bill Sparks in canoe ‘Catfish’ and Corporal A. F. Laver and Marine W. H. Mills in canoe ‘Crayfish’ made the attack they had been planning for the past few months. Bill Sparks later described the events:

We approached the basin of Bordeaux. Lights shone from the jetties; so much illumination alarmed us. We paddled up the middle of the stream, inspecting the targets as we passed silently by. There were several ships moored in a row, which was very thoughtful of the Germans, making our targets so readily accessible.

The first was a tanker. Next we found a cargo-liner. Then another cargo ship but with a tanker moored alongside. Then another cargo ship, just beyond that we saw another ship which was impossible to identify because, lying alongside and obscuring our view, was a sperrbrecher, a smaller craft, no bigger than a frigate.

We were lucky. We could have arrived to discover that the harbour was empty; there had been no way to knowing how many ships we would find until this moment, and we were satisfied. We chose four targets.

We turned back towards the cargo ship and pulled up alongside. Her hull shrouded us in darkness. We could hear the crew singing. I wondered what they’d be singing in a few hours’ time. It proved an easy target. I attached my magnet-holder to the hull to prevent the tide from carrying us away.

The Major placed the first mine on the six-foot rod and lowered it into the water, placing the mine on her stern. He detached the rod, having felt the limpet mine clamp itself to the hull. I released my magnetic holder and the tide slowly swept us along, so we could place another mine amidships and a third on her bows.

Then we came to the ship with the sperrbrecher moored to it. I clamped the holder to the hull and Blondie planted a mine.

Suddenly we were bathed in light. I looked up and saw the silhouette of a German sentry leaning over the side, shining his torch on us. We froze, hardly daring to breathe. A succession of split-second thoughts raced through my mind; what do we do if he challenges us? Do we answer? Just ignore him? If we ignore him, will he sound the alarm?

I quickly realized the best course of action was to hang onto the side of the ship. We were still well camouflaged, but the cockpit cover was open so I could hand Blondie the limpets.

I cautiously leant forward, bending right across the cockpit so that my camouflaged back would conceal it. It may have been only seconds – it seemed like minutes – that we waited, but I began to think that we could sit there no longer. I gently eased the magnetic holder off, allowing the tide to carry us along the side of the ship.

The Germans appeared to be taken in by their camouflage and they went on to attach their limpet mines. Six ships were badly damaged as consequence of their attack. The four men then made their some way down river before sinking their canoes. They then set off on foot across occupied France in separate pairs. Laver and Mills were caught by the Germans two days later.

Hasler and Sparks eventually met up with the French Resistance whose members helped them to escape to Spain, where they arrived after walking over the Pyrrenees in February 1943. They arrived back in Britain in April.

The Frankton Memorial at Point de Grave near Bordeaux

All the surviving members of the crews who had been captured by the Germans were executed by them under the Commando Order.

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"In Flanders Fields" is a war poem in the form of a rondeau, written during the First World War by Canadian physician Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae.

He was inspired to write it on May 3, 1915, after presiding over the funeral of friend and fellow soldier Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, who died in the Second Battle of Ypres.

According to legend, fellow soldiers retrieved the poem after McCrae, initially dissatisfied with his work, discarded it. "In Flanders Fields" was first published on December 8 of that year in the London magazine Punch.

McCrae fought in the Second Battle of Ypres in the Flanders region of Belgium, where the German army launched one of the first chemical attacks in the history of war. They attacked French positions north of the Canadians with chlorine gas on April 22, 1915 but were unable to break through the Canadian line, which held for over two weeks. In a letter written to his mother, McCrae described the battle as a "nightmare",For seventeen days and seventeen nights none of us have had our clothes off, nor our boots even, except occasionally. In all that time while I was awake, gunfire and rifle fire never ceased for sixty seconds.... And behind it all was the constant background of the sights of the dead, the wounded, the maimed, and a terrible anxiety lest the line should give way.— McCrae

"In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, flyScarce heard amid the guns below.We are the Dead. Short days agoWe lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.Take up our quarrel with the foe:To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who dieWe shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields."

At 7.17 pm on December 7, 1942, His Majesty’s Submarine Tuna surfaced off the coast of Occupied France near the mouth of the River Gironde. The forerunners of the Special Boat Service were on their first mission. The plan was to launch two-man canoes that would travel up river and plant limpet mines on shipping in Bordeaux harbour.

The group of men who would become known as the ‘Cockleshell Heroes’ had prepared for their mission in great secrecy with some very demanding training. Operation Frankton did not begin well. Of the six canoes planned to launch one was damaged getting off the submarine and could not take part. Of the five double man crews that set off one was lost very soon in the unexpectedly rough seas. Then another canoe went missing.

Royal Marine William Sparks was in a canoe with Major Herbert ‘Blondie’ Hasler, the commander of the operation, they went back to look for the missing canoe. They found the boat, which had capsized, with its crew Sheard and Moffat clinging to it. Sparks describes subsequent events:

"The men in the water grabbed at our canoes, blue lips trembling.

I tried to turn the canoe over, as Blondie told me, but it was full of water and impossible to refloat. ‘Very well,’ he said grimly, ‘you’ll have to scuttle her.’

We managed to retrieve some of the mines and shared them out between the two other crews. Then I took my clasp-knife and began to slash open the sides of canoe. Within seconds Conger had sunk.

It was around two in the morning and we were falling behind schedule. The orders had been plain; no man’s jeopardy should put the mission in peril. The Major was having to make swift decisions, and I could see that he was tormented. He could not just leave the two men there to fend for themselves in the freezing water. They would die for sure.

The beach, we knew, would be infested with the enemy and to try to reach it in order to save Sheard and Moffat would result in almost certain capture or death.

He decided to tow the two men in as close to the beach as possible. ‘Hang on,’ he told them.

The weight of the men in tow made the going slow, but at last we were approaching the mouth of the estuary. The revolving beams from the lighthouse swept over us, illuminating us with each revolution. At any moment we might be sighted and fired upon. But no shots came. Now the tide gave us a helping hand, carrying us round the Pointe de Grave and into the Gironde. Only twenty minutes had passed since we had found Sheard and Moffat – it seemed like hours – and both men were weak with exhaustion and shivering with cold.

Time was against us. The tide would soon be turning and we would be swept back into the bay. The Major had to make a terrible decision. He ordered us to raft up.

‘I’m sorry, but this is as close to the beach as we dare go,’ he told Sheard and Moffat. ‘From here you will have to swim the rest of the way.’

He knew that they would be lucky just to make it to the beach in that cold sea; they were already frozen through. But he tried to sound optimistic. ‘I wish we could take you further, but if we’re all caught the operation will be at an end, and none of us want that. Get yourselves ashore, make your escape overland as best you can.’

‘It’s all right, sir,’ said Sheard. ‘We understand.’

The two lads reached up to shake hands with us and wish us luck."

Corporal C. J. Sheard and Marine D. Moffatt from the capsized canoe Conger are believed to have reached the beach, they did not drown but died of hypothermia. The other men would press on with their ill fated mission.

At dawn on 20 November 1917, the British Third Army launched an attack towards Cambrai using innovative methods that were to become a common feature of the fighting on the Western Front in 1918.

The assault utilised the largest number of tanks yet assembled. It used an artillery barrage that was not previously registered, aiming to return an element of surprise to the battlefield. But ultimately, early British gains were largely retaken by German counter-attacks.

The attack began with significant gains on the opening day through a combination of effective artillery fire, infantry tactics and tanks. British forces made advances of around 5 miles, taking a number of villages. But by the end of the first day, over half of the tanks were out of action.

As the battle continued, British progress slowed amidst intense fighting. By 28 November the British had reached a position on the crest of Bourlon Ridge, where they held a salient. Two days later German forces launched a counter-offensive, utilising intensive artillery fire and infantry tactics that made use of infiltrating ‘storm’ troops. After more intense fighting, British forces retreated from their salient position, only leaving them with the gains they had made around the villages of Havrincourt, Ribécourt and Flesquières.

The Battle of Cambrai ultimately had little strategic impact on the fighting on the Western Front. Yet in the tactical methods used by both sides it was a precursor to the fighting of 1918 and also pointed the way towards more sophisticated combined arms tactics and armoured warfare.

Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS (1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain. His defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 put him in the first rank of Britain's military heroes.

Wellington died at Walmer Castle in Deal on 14 September 1852. This was his residence as Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. Walmer Castle was said to have been his favourite residence. He was found to be unwell on that morning and was aided from his military campaign bed (the same one he used throughout his historic military career) and seated in his chair where he died. His death was recorded as being due to the aftereffects of a stroke culminating in a series of seizures. He was aged 83.

Although in life he hated travelling by rail (after witnessing the death of William Huskisson, one of the first railway accident casualties), his body was then taken by train to London, where he was given a state funeral—one of only a handful of British subjects to be honoured in that way (other examples are Lord Nelson and Winston Churchill)—and the last heraldic state funeral to be held in Britain. The funeral took place on 18 November 1852.

At his funeral there was hardly any space to stand because of the number of people attending, and the effusive praise given him in Tennyson's "Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington" attests to his stature at the time of his death. He was buried in a sarcophagus of luxulyanite in St Paul's Cathedral next to Lord Nelson.

A bronze memorial was sculpted by Alfred Stevens, and features two intricate supports: "Truth tearing the tongue out of the mouth of False-hood", and "Valour trampling Cowardice underfoot". Stevens did not live to see it placed in its home under one of the great arches of the Cathedral.