Charles (Charlie to his comrades) Murrell kept detailed diaries of
his service with the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards throughout the Second World War
as Guardsman (later Sergeant).
This book starts on 10th May 1940 with the Blitzkrieg on Arras and the retreat to Dunkirk. The Dunkirk beaches and his own undignified
evacuation are described in some detail and occasional humour.
The second part begins on 20th June 1944 when the 1st Battalion Welsh
Guards set sail for Normandy and they take part
in the Battle for Caen with engagements at Cheux, Cagny and
Colombelles and thence to the Bocage country with a particularly bloody fight at
Montchamp.
The final element covers the race for and liberation of Brussels, a
fiercely fought engagement at Hechtel – Operation Market-Garden, Nijmegen and
the ‘Island’, winter in Belgium and The Netherlands and the Rhineland
Battle.
As a member of the Intelligence Section, the Author was aware of the
‘big picture.’ Very observant he has a literary style or ability unusual in a
ranker. He often writes in his trench whilst under mortar or shell fire and one
experiences the fear that he (and millions of others) felt. He describes several
near death experiences and the casualties and deaths of his comrades and other
horrors of war, sometimes in graphic detail. There are descriptions of
hair-raising motor-cycle rides, the fanaticism of the SS, the sadness of
lettering crosses of his dead comrades, the ecstatic receptions in liberated
villages and towns, culminating in the liberation of Brussels, the uneasy
relationship with American troops, the importance of alcohol in his (and others)
war and the joy of returning to England.
The many sketches are an important accessory to the
journals.
