John Charles Duckworth was born on the 4th June 1922 as a roman catholic he was a shop assistant before WWII and joined the Royal Marine service as a reservist 1* on the 1st May 1941 at 18 years 11 months he was given the Plymouth number ply/x103522 this was at Exmouth , He was only 5 ft 6 inches tall with brown hair blues eyes
Initially he was signed up as a clerk on the 14th September 1941 after basic training and was employed in this roll for about 2 years 2 months when he was accepted for the Royal Marine Commandos on the 1st August 1943 at Dorchester Dorset in the 46th RMC where he stayed until they where disbanded in 1946.
They moved to Troon and Irvin where intensive training began on the 15th October 1943 and joined the 4th Special Service brigade they saw no action before The 7th June 1944 as the small raids where cancelled as unit level training had started for the invasion of Europe He took part in the Normandy campaign landing in Normandy on the 7th June 1944 AT Arromanches " France " in A troop 46th RMC saw service in Normandy for a staggering 12 weeks be with only 1 day of rest during this period and saw some very heavy fighting during these weeks .
During the attack on St Leger Du Bosq on the 20th August 1944 he was wounded the location of the wound and its severity is not at present know "I am trying to research this bit with a friends help " I think this may have been a minor wound as hes not hospitalized or taken to a casualty clearing station or discharged but is shown in his records for this date.
For his service during WWII he was awarded the 1939-45 star , France and German star , defence and war medals in 1994 he was given the Normandy jubilee medal with cert by France for his service in Normandy in 1944 in October 1944 they moved back to the UK " IOW " Where they prepared for the crossing of the Rhine that followed in 1945 tacking part in this and the further campaigns in Germany he remained unscathed for the remainder of the war in 1945 after the war in Europe had ended he was with the Holding Operation Commando from November 44 till February 1946 11th from left to right top row or 4th from right sitting on the floor not sure which one as they look very much like him.
May he now rest in peace and not be forgotten!
1* The Admiralty during WWII only signed every one on as reservist this way they did not have to pay pensions out during or after the war to them .
|
Filename |
IMG_1613.JPG |
Download
|
Description |
|
Filesize |
978 Kbytes
|
Downloaded: |
641 time(s) |
This message was edited 7 times. Last update was at 03/04/2016 18:32:56
|