Ron Levett's memories of his time in the British Liberation Army during World War II.

Ron Levett, born in Alfriston, East Sussex, enlisted in 1943 and joined the Royal Armoured Corps. After completing his training as a Driver Operator he was sent to Belgium to join the British Liberation Army, where he was posted to the Royal Scots Grays and then to the Regimental Headquarters (RHQ) signals troop. After the liberation of Germany he was based in Münster, where he met his German fiancée Ruth, then on to Lüneburg.

The rule at this time was that servicemen were not allowed to marry German nationals. In the summer of 1947 the ban was lifted but applications had to be made to the Commanding Officer by filling out a long form.

After quite a long wait my application was granted and Ruth and I made arrangements to get married. Her relatives could not get permission to travel, so Don Porter agreed to give the bride away. I found that we had to go through a civil ceremony at the Standesampt, or Registry Office in Lüneburg, and then go on to the church for the religious service.

We used the Johanneskirche, or St. John's, which was the garrison church. It was a rather quiet wedding. Ruth could not obtain a white wedding dress, so she married in a blue costume. A girlfriend of a mate of mine, who was also expecting to get married soon after us, acted as bridesmaid.

We all went off to the NAAFI afterwards for the wedding breakfast. I had managed to find a room to rent from an elderly widow situated near to the barracks. The problem was that we were not allowed to sleep out of barracks so I found myself as a newlywed having to report back to barracks at 2359 hrs every night and sleep in the barrack room.

The army at that time frowned on marriage to German girls and made everything as difficult as possible. Since Ruth was now a British citizen by marriage, she was allowed Army rations. I was also allowed my rations, so they were delivered once a week by unit transport to the house where we were quartered.

We had no refrigerator and since it was now high summer we had quite a job keeping meat and other perishables fresh. We found that we had to eat things up rather quickly at the beginning of the week and eat out at the NAAFI towards the end.

I was given two weeks leave and travel warrants for Ruth and myself. The compartments on the train for married families were much more comfortable than the normal troop trains and we enjoyed a very nice journey to England.

My family made Ruth welcome and she enjoyed shopping in Eastbourne, finding things like Nivea cream, which had been unobtainable in Germany since the beginning of the war, even though it was originally a German product.

There was a scheme in the Army whereby anyone who had served more than three years overseas could opt for a home posting. I think now, that if I had not got married, I would have signed on as a regular soldier, but in the circumstances, I would elect to take the 'Python' option, as the scheme was known.

I was given a posting to the RAC depot in Barnard Castle, to the barracks where I had joined the draft before going overseas. I had signed on for an extra year and had nearly a year to serve. Ruth came home to Alfriston and lived with my family until I could organise somewhere for us to live.

Before leaving for the UK I went to see the Orderly Room Corporal, who was a friend of mine, and persuaded him to let me have a handful of rail warrants to take to England with me. These were not required in Germany and the office had a lot to spare. I found them very useful later on.

The winter of 1947 was one of the most bitter that most people could remember. There was an acute shortage of fuel. Even the army was having the same problem. The old joke white-washing the coal tip actually was true. It is impossible to take coal from the pile without making a black mark on the tip.

Our beds in the barrack room consisted of a wooden frame with cross boarding to support the mattress. Anyone who wanted to go out in the evening stood quite a chance, on coming in late, of finding that his bed boards had been burnt in the round iron stove which was the sole means of heating the room.

There was another disused camp about six miles from the main camp and the practice of squatting was prevalent at the time. It was decided to place a 24 hr guard on the camp to keep out the squatters. It was a fairly easy job so it didn't worry me when I was selected as Guard Commander.

I had twelve men detailed for the guard, providing four sentries at night. In the morning six men were relieved and returned to barracks. The remaining six made up two sentries for the rest of the day. Fortunately, the cookhouse were not informed about the fact that we only needed six men's rations for the daytime, so we had double rations during the day.

I had a phone call from the Barnard Castle police during the evening to say that a car had been stolen in the town and could we keep a lookout for it. In the morning one of my sentries came in and told me that there was a car standing just down the road from our front gate. I sent a spare man to check the car's number plate only to find that it was the missing car. It had been standing there all night!

Ron Levett, 2001