A D Bolland - Sinews of War

Normandy Road

Where dust and damnd oblivion is the tomb of honourd bones indeed.

S HAKESPEARE :
Alls Well That Ends Well

T EAM SPIRIT The story of the administration of the 53 rd (Welsh) Division during Operation Overlord was privately printed in Germany whilst the Division formed part of the British Army of the Rhine with the object of recording the detailed story of the Divisional Administration during its advance from the Normandy beachhead to the shores of the Baltic.

The original book had a limited edition which was circulated among members of the Division.

Such a story, full of facts and statistics of value to the historian and military student, is one which is of considerable interest and, although the story of one single division, it covers nearly every phase of military operations a beachhead build-up following an assault landing advance opposed crossings attack.

Here is a wealth of detailed information which gives some conception of the magnitude of administration of an army in the field. Here is The School Solution for the student on which to base his appreciation of administrative problems.

This edition contains certain modifications, and certain domestic details applicable only to the 53 rd Division have been omitted. These omissions do not, however, detract from the main story. The facts are here in this up-to-date record of a divisions administrative activities in a theatre of operations.

T his book tells the story of the administration of an Infantry Division of some 17,000 men which landed on the beaches of Normandy in June, 1944, and fought throughout the campaign in North-West Europe until reaching Hamburg in May, 1945. It tells, amongst other things, how these men were supplied with arms, ammunition, vehicles, food and petrol, how they were kept in action during those ten months, how many prisoners they took and how many of them became casualties. In brief, it tells you many of the facts which, although such an important part of a modern mechanised formation, are not normally recorded and published.

As the story of one Division only, it does not mention the achievements of those who were employed on the hundreds of miles of Lines of Communications, supplying the 21 st Army Group as a whole, for these would make a far larger volume it merely deals with those administrative services who, deployed within sound of the enemys guns, bore on their battle-dress the same Divisional Sign as the men they were supplying. Perhaps the facts and figures which you will read in the following pages will give you some idea of the magnificent work done by these men behind the lines in their difficult and unspectacular task of providing the fighting troops with all that they required.

The book is humbly dedicated to the soldiers of the Royal Armoured Corps, the Royal Regiment of Artillery and the Infantry of the Line, for they were the backbone of the Divisional Team, and we will never forget it. Their battles cannot be covered in a few pages: they will be recorded for all time in Battle Honours and Regimental Histories. As Horace wrote in one of his odes Posterity shall hear of those battles.

In presenting this book to you I, as one who was privileged to serve for six years in a first-class team, and who is now searching for that same team spirit in civilian life, would like to offer my thanks to Captain B. St. C. Rutherford, who provided all the photographs, to Cpl. J. C. Ogle, who drew all the sketches, and above all, to the officers, noncommissioned officers and men of the 53 rd Welsh Division who made this story so well worth telling.

A.D.B.

August, 1946.

F rom Arromanches to Hamburg we travelled together in just over ten months of hard, almost non-stop, operations. The battles we fought during those ten months of Operation Overlord will be recorded in history, and remain for us all a vivid memory of a period which we shall remember with pride for the rest of our lives.

Our object now is to present a few facts about the backroom activities of the Services of the 53 rd Welsh Division, and as we pay tribute to their faithful work so also do we pay tribute to the Royal Army Medical Corps and the Royal Corps of Signals who, unheralded and unsung, have faithfully formed such an important part of the Divisional team.