further photos for 3965 Cpl George Edgar Hilditch

as previous post only allowed 3 photos here are more photos from Public Services Directorate - India

Regards David Brown

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 03/09/2020 19:23:16

Some of these photos are in our 44RM Commando Gallery being in the collection of a veteran from that Commando. The link below will take you there. If you register on the Gallery (separate to the Forum) you will then be able to add a comment to any photo where you spot George.

http://gallery.commandoveterans.org/cdoGallery/v/units/Royal+Marine+Commando+Units/44+RM+Cdo_001/

Thank you Pete for the reply We have viewed the gallery for 44 RM Commando, but have unfortunately been unable to find any of George.
We have requested his service record from the MOD, and have just received the book "44 (R.M.) Commando: Achnacarry to the Arakan" by Tony McKenzie which should fill some of the gaps.
Thanks again

Hi David

I have added the photo you sent of Cpl Hilditch to the 44RM Commando gallery (see link below). If you provide me his date and place of birth and date of death I will include that.

http://gallery.commandoveterans.org/cdoGallery/v/units/Royal+Marine+Commando+Units/44+RM+Cdo_001/

Thank you for adding George to the gallery, sorry he is not in uniform. As yet the only photo we have of him in uniform is in a group shot of 40th MG Instructors 06.02.43 to 03.04.43. Does that mean he would have been transferred from 40RM to 44RM after this, presumably a training course of some sort.

To answer your question he was born in Haslington near Crewe, Cheshire on Nov 20th 1917 and died in Connah's Quay, Deeside, Clwyd on 22nd Sep 1987.

Hi David thank you for the information which I will add. The photo of the 40th Machine Gun Instructors is one of Royal Marines, rather than RM Commandos. In WW2 unlike today not all Royal Marines were Commandos. As to exactly what the RM Unit referred to was I am not certain. It could be a Course title or even perhaps a Machine Gun Company of the RM Division. That all changed in August 1943 when an additional five RM Commando units were raised to join the two that had been in existence since 1942, and the Army Commandos who had been in existence since 1940. You could ask the Royal Marines Historical Society who can be contacted here: [email protected]

Are you able to scan the original image of the machine gun instructors at a high resolution and send it to me via my email address below. The current copy blurs somewhat when enlarged. That way you will avoid the image size restriction on the Forum.

The MG instructors course number is probably the 40th course run by the small arms school. Browndown camp.
The Corps would have run machine gun cadres similar to today?s Marines, Paras and Infantry do. These guys were then used to command and teach on gun groups for support and sustained fire.

Considering there were 80,000 RM in WW2 in varying units it would make sense to train members of different units in this skill.