Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A fine Second World War Coastal Forces D.S.C. group of four awarded to Lieutenant-Commander A. S. Bennett, Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, a gallant M.L. Flotilla C.O. who distinguished himself off Normandy and in the amphibious landings at Walcheren in November 1944, when he was wounded in the neck - chapters of active service modestly recounted in his published memoir Tide Time

Distinguished Service Cross, G.VI.R., hallmarks for London 1943, the reverse officially dated ‘1945’, in its Garrard & Co. case of issue; 1939-45 Star; Atlantic Star, clasp, France and Germany; War Medal 1939-45, M.I.D. oak leaf, these in their original addressed card forwarding box, good very fine and better (4) £1800-2200

D.S.C. London Gazette 3 April 1945. The original recommendation states:

‘Lieutenant-Commander Bennett was Flotilla Officer, 20th M.L. Flotilla, attached to the Support Squadron Eastern Flank, throughout the build-up period in Sword Area off Normandy from 24 June 1944 until the fall of Le Havre in September. During this time the enemy subjected the Squadron to every form of attack, including more or less, constant shelling, and the waters were heavily mined. A defence line on the Eastern Flank was manned nightly by the Squadron as a protection against shipping in the anchorages. This imposed considerable physical and mental strain on the officers and men concerned. Lieutenant-Commander Bennett had much to do with the co-operation which existed between his Coastal Forces’ craft and the Combined Operations vessels, and it was largely due to this efficient co-operation that not a single explosive motor boat was able to penetrate the defence line.

At Walcheren, Lieutenant-Commander Bennett was the Commanding Officer of M.L. 146, which early on came under fire from the enemy batteries. Though wounded in the neck, Lieutenant-Commander Bennett completed his function and continued to command his M.L.

Throughout the time I have known him, this officer has constantly displayed cheerful courage and confidence under all conditions of enemy action and bad weather. His example has been of the greatest value to other young officers.’

Arthur Scrivener Bennett was a pre-war member of the Royal Naval Volunteer Supplementary Reserve and was called-up in September 1939 when, in common with many other officers of the “Wavy Navy”, he undertook his training at H.M.S. King Alfred in Hove. Appointed to the command of a drifter on his graduation, he spent several months patrolling off the east coast of Scotland, but, in the fullness of time, was delighted to receive a summons from the Captain M.L’s Staff, Portsmouth, the beginning of a distinguished career in Coastal Forces.

Subsequent commands included M.Ls 1031, 269 and 485 but, much to his frustration, he was for a long time employed on “working-up” new crews at St. Christopher at Fort William. In early 1944, however, Bennett was advanced to Lieutenant-Commander and assumed command of the 20th Motor Launch Flotilla in M.L. 594, under the auspices of Combined Operations - for the Normandy Landings were now high on Coastal Forces’ agenda.

Normandy

Of events on D-Day and beyond, Bennett modestly states:

‘The craft that packed the Solent began to put to sea. It was dark when we sailed out through the Needles Channel, still dancing attendance on Bulolo and the L.S.I.-landing ships infantry-carrying our assault craft in davits. Planes droned overhead. All through the night we were overtaking slower craft, and some of the smaller ones were making heavy weather of it. Then just before dawn the L.S.Is brought up and lowered away. We stood off and hoisted a dim blue light. The L.C.As formed up astern, and we moved off at a steady four knots, creeping in towards the shore.

We were keyed up-tense-silent. It was beginning to come light. Presently the First Lieutenant emerged from the wheelhouse, where he and the navigator had been busy on the charts. He gazed around, then grinned and made to drop below.

"What's bitten you, Number One?"

"I was just thinking, sir, of old Jerry ashore there coming out for a stretch and a yawn, then suddenly catching sight of all us lot. “Christ!"

"Hundreds an' thousands of 'em!" added the cockney Signalman.

"Bet his old eyes don't half pop out," said the Coxswain.

We began to chuckle. Then we roared with laughter, prolonging that blessed sense of relief until we clung helpless to the wings of the bridge. In some mysterious fashion the joke spread to the gun's crews; steel helmets met in conclave, then tilted back in a burst of guffaws.

Soon we were taking station in the L.C.Ts with A.V.R.Es aboard-tanks fitted with every device for easing the path of our assault forces. The air bombardment was on. Then came broadsides from the battleships. It was light now, and the coast loomed up. Self-propelled guns in L.C.Ts opened up as they came in. L.C.Fs and L.C.Gs (flakboats and gunboats) joined in with close-support fire. We started a programme of music over the loud-hailer. Then up went the rockets from the rocketeers on either bow, obliterating the quiet, unpretentious beach of Le Hamel. Shortly afterwards the L.C.Rs on the flanks fired. Their rockets soared lazily into the sky, and it seemed they could never reach the beach. Yet they did, and up went more smoke and dust. The uplift to morale was tremendous, for nothing could possibly survive on the beaches, so it seemed to us.

Our L.C.As deployed.

"Ten feet," sung out the navigating officer as he watched the echo-sounder. “Shoaling all the time, sir."

Shells dropped close ahead.

We made it to the flotilla officers; All yours. Good luck. The L.C.As revved up. We stopped and they came on past, the troops in good heart, squatting on their haunches, with netting over their steel helmets.

"Aren't you coming in with us?" one of them shouted.

We grinned and gave them a cheer. The L.C.As scurried for the shore, with white wakes showing up for all the world like rabbits' scuts. We watched them beach with a curious mixture of elation and anti-climax. The next L.C.As came in, followed by a wave of landing craft. The Baie de la Seine at least was ours.

During the days that followed we maintained ourselves as best we could, scrounging stores, chasing mail, picking up cases of American K rations out of the water, maintaining A./S. patrol by day, making smoke by night during each inevitable air attack, taking in landing craft to the beaches, salvaging derelicts, passing orders, escorting craft halfway across the Channel, dodging the weather as best we could, dragging our anchor in the poor holding ground, and all the time growing more and more weary and unkempt ... ’

Bennett continues:

‘One night we lay astern of an L.C.G. The nightly flap was over. For an hour or more we stood around on the bridge.

At last I broke the silence. “Go on, Number One. Turn in for a couple of hours."

The First Lieutenant bestirred himself. “I’m all right, sir. Why don't you take a spell?"

Another ten minutes passed. All was quiet. Against my better judgement I allowed myself to be persuaded and went aft to the wardroom and lay down on the settee.

Suddenly I woke to a terrific clatter from the twin Oerlikons directly overhead, and found myself on the deck entangled in the dark with the tablecloth. I groped my way to the doorway, and, still completely bewildered, fought with the double blackout curtains, finally to emerge in the flat with the night turned to day. I grabbed my steel helmet and crept on deck. Strings of flares hung in the sky; I felt as naked as the day I was born.

A string of bombs came whistling down. Ducking and crawling past the Oerlikons, I made my way to the bridge, my knees as weak as water, and there I propped myself in my corner, while the First Lieutenant carried on with his job of fire control. One by one the flares went out. The racket died down. Then he turned to me with a rueful smile.

"Sorry, sir, but I didn't have a chance to call you out. Jerry properly caught us on the hop."

It was fully half an hour before I recovered my wits. Thereafter on Trout Line, I never left the bridge; one experience was enough of that terrifying, unnerving, paralytic fear that saps all strength from the body and stifles initiative and thought.

Those patrols were seldom dull.’

Bennett was mentioned in despatches (London Gazette 13 March 1945 refers), the recommendation stating:

‘As Senior Officer of a Flotilla of M.Ls on the Eastern Flank for some time Lieutenant-Commander Bennett has shown a consistently high standard of cheerful leadership under trying conditions. During an attack by Human Torpedoes on 8 July, M.L. 594 under Bennett’s command sighted, engaged and sank a Human Torpedo.’

Walcheren

Of events off Walcheren, by which stage Bennett had removed his command to M.L. 147, he writes in similarly modest terms:

‘Ours was the job of marking the route through the minefields. The night was uneventful, dark and quiet. M.Ls anchored in predetermined positions and hung out dimmed blue lights. Then we turned inwards towards West Kapelle. Morning came, with hardly a ripple on the water; sand dunes and tower and houses stood out with incredible clarity.

The first of the assault craft began to turn in as we prepared to take up our own position about five miles off shore. We dropped anchor. Almost immediately came flashes from West Kapelle, followed by the whine of shells. The Domburg batteries opened up too, and we lay there like a sitting duck, for we could do nothing but watch for the flashes and keep our fingers crossed. We were straddled time and again until orders came to withdraw.

It was then I got hit. A near miss off the port bow peppered us with shell fragments, and I found myself lying on deck looking at my toes, unable to move. There was no pain; I remember no sensation at all-just complete paralysis. At last, to my unutterable joy, after what seemed an eternity, I found I could wriggle my toes ... and fingers ... and then life came surging back. I scrambled up. Only my neck felt dead.

By this time the shore batteries had our range. It could only be a matter of minutes before we were hit. Weighing by hand was too slow, and we decided to slip. As we went astern and the cable ran out, I thought of Cul Bay.

"How's it fastened to the clench, Number One?"

"With a lashing, sir, I think."

We never saw the end go. Had there been a shackle it would still have gone.

The story of the assault on Walcheren is well known; how the Support Squadron engaged the batteries, drew their fire, and was cut to pieces; how the attack was pressed home and the Commandos landed; how the Scheldt was swept and the port of Antwerp opened to Allied shipping. All this is history, but I saw little of it, for I took passage back to Ostend aboard M.L. 146, whose bridge had been smashed and Chris Cookson, the commanding officer, killed with three of his crew in a gallant attempt to mark the shoals off West Kapelle. I woke in hospital at Ostend ... After a few days at Ostend, and three weeks at Haslar, where an abortive attempt was made to get the fragment of the shell out of my neck, I went back to the Flotilla in command of M.L. 146, now just completing refit at Portland. She was a first-class ship in every way. The Coxswain was highly efficient; so, too, was the hefty young First Lieutenant, who had distinguished himself at Walcheren, and who still retained an inordinate schoolboy appetite for jam tarts. The mess deck was crowded but the spirit among the crew was magnificent. M.L. 146 was a happy ship.’
 
Bennett was awarded the D.S.C., which insignia he received at a Buckingham Palace investiture held on 11 December 1945, when his wife and young daughter Elizabeth were in attendance.
 
Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including letters of recommendation from the London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London) (5), 1927-28, including none from the future Head of S.O.E., Hugh Dalton; his Admiralty letter of appointment for the rank of Temporary Lieutenant, dated 27 April 1940; ship’s “flimsies” (4); wartime Naval signals / messages regarding his promotions and appointments (5); his Watchkeeper’s Certificate, dated 4 March 1942; further wartime correspondence, including letters from the maker’s of M.Ls 146 and 594, and Captain J. O. Farquharson, R.N.; his National Registration Identity Card, dated 31 October 1945; four original photographs and a water colour of M.L. 146 in Ostend harbour; and copies of the recipient’s books, Tide Time and Us Bargemen, A Story of Life on the Sailing Barge Henry, the last including a picture of Henry’s saloon with M.L. 146’s wooden crest on display.