British & Commonwealth Military Badge Forum - NZ Anti-Tank Battery (Britain 1939)

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NZ Anti-Tank Battery (Britain 1939)

The Kiwi men listed below enlisted in England in 1939-1940 .
They were the first lot of anti-tank gunners that NZ had trained up in WW2.

Quote:

From "Weekly News" 27 March 1940

New Zealanders who enlisted in England for War service; Members of Anti-Tank Battery.
(Group photo)
The battery has been training for some time at Aldershot and a report last
week stated that it would leave for Egypt soon.

ACLAND M D
ALCOCK S B
ALLEN J T
ALLEY W V
ALLUM R W
ALSTON D V
AMOORE G W
ATKINSON A C
BAGLEY F K
BAIRD R D
BAKER D
BARCLAY W C
BEATTIE D
BEERE D J
BELLRINGER T C
BIDWILL E R W
BLOW E H
BOOTH E
BORROWS F
BROWN C V
BROWNSCOMBE E O
BRUNSDEN F E
BURBOROUGH F J
CAMPION H J
CARMODY V I
CLARK P
COOMBE D C
COOTE C
CORBYN E A F C
CUTBUSH W I
DALGETY W S
DENYER R J
DUFF C J
DUPIN H S
EDGAR D G
EDGAR R M
FOWLER A C
FRANCIS B W
FROMERTON H J
FULLARTON J H
GARCIA J
GAULD L
GILMORE R J
GRAY J D
GREEN J A
GRIMSEY C O
GRUNDY W
HALL H
HALL-KENNEDY J H
HENNESSEY D C
HILL C
HITCHIN M K
HOPE J W
INNES N F
JARVIS L
JOB A J
KENNEDY J M
KERSHAW F C
KINGSTON A R
KINNIBURGH K
KORNER K
LEONARD N A
MACKENZIE D C
MALONE W B
MARTIN O
MATHIAS F B
McBRYDE C B
McDONALD W M
McINTYRE P
McINTYRE T A A
McLENNAN D W
MESS D V
MILLENS J T
MURPHY E O
MURPHY J A
MURPHY W E
NAYLOR T
NIVEN M G
NORRIS J A
OAKLEY F J
OWEN D E
PARKS C H
PATTERSON D B
PEES A G
PEES R G
PETERS R J
PHILLIPS L
PLANE G E
POLHILL F F E
PUNTER S F
PRICE F W
REIDY J C
RESPINGER A E
RITCH J R
RITCHARDSON J N
ROWORTH J F T
SANDERS E
SAUNDERS E I
SHEAT W G
SHEPHERD S A A
SIMCOCK K R
SIMPSON C R
SLOAN R G
SMITH H K
SMITH O M
SMITH W S
SPONG A T
STARK R C
STEPHENS R W
STOBIE R
STODDART H C
STRANG D N
SUNLEY H N
THOMAS R F
THOMPSON B
THORPY F T
TITLEY K
TRAIL R J
TRISTRAM H J
TROBRIDGE S J
VAUGHAN T
WARREN R E
WATKINS O G
WELLS I M
WESTON H J
WHITE K J
WHITE R F J
WHITEHORN F J H
WILKINS H F C
WILLIAMS J
WILLIAMS M H
WILSON H R
YOUNG R A

Also included in the battery but were not present for the photo:
W A BIDWELL, J S CHISHOLM, G S DANNIELL, M E KNIGHT, J F N LINDUP, W
F MONK, J PAVEY,D N SHUTTE

I have no idea what insignia these Kiwis , who interrupted their OE to sign up , wore while in training , nor how many stayed with the Gunners , and how many moved across to other NZ units .

But , given the sketchy details we have to work with sometimes , this may be of assistance in one way or another .

Quote:

The first instalment of the 7th Anti-Tank enlisted in England.
As in the First World War, New Zealanders there were allowed, if they wished, to join the NZEF. Since no anti-tank guns had reached New Zealand and no anti-tank gunners could be properly trained there, it proved convenient to accept the volunteers in England for training as such. They were therefore formed into the New Zealand Anti-Tank Battery, later numbered the 34th, under Major C. S. J. Duff.
After a very thorough training at Aldershot, this battery of individualists with remarkably varied backgrounds and experiences, attracting much attention and gaining much publicity for New Zealand, sent an advanced party to Egypt early in April and arrived there itself on Anzac Day.
The journey across the English Channel to Cherbourg, then across France by train (three weeks before the Wehrmacht struck), then from Marseilles through the Mediterranean in HMT Devonshire, calling at Malta, was brief but interesting and might have been much more so had it been delayed a few weeks.
Joining the 4th Field at Maadi Camp, the newcomers attracted interest because of their low army numbers: the 146 other ranks were numbered from 501 upwards and the handful of officers from 999 downwards.

Unusual talents or interests soon took many members of this battery to other units or services.
Four of them became foundation members of the Kiwi Entertainment Unit (the Kiwi Concert Party), which survived the war unofficially by many years.
Four more joined the first Long Range Patrol, which blossomed into the Long Range Desert Group.
One became Freyberg's draughtsman; another became his cook.
One, Peter McIntyre, became the official New Zealand war artist.
One was soon supervising a large engineering project in the Sudan, and so on;
but an earnest core of anti-tankers remained.

http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/schol...Arti-c1-2.html

cheers ,
Jock

My avatar to the left is one of their number , Edgar 'Sandy' Sanders MM NZ Anti-Tank Aldershot No. 598 , my cousin .

June 1940 saw Sandy and three of his mates , now in North Africa, invoke the opt out clause and join the newly formed Long Range Patrol , the Special Forces outfit that expanded into the Long Range Desert Group.
In May 1943 Ed Sanders joined Popski's Private Army , the PPA . Another irregular special forces reconnaissance unit , the only Kiwi in it .

cheers ,
Jock

NZATBattery(1939

Hi Jock,
That was a real interesting article you posted, Your cousin must have been some adventurous guy.
Thanks for the post.
Regards
Ray Smith
South Wales UK

Gidday Ray ,
yep he was a bit of an adventurer all right :)

In the late 1940's he went back to the sea , and was eventually shipwrecked on a wee island off the coast of South America .
He had a wife and two children b y the time he got back home here to Christchurch in 1964

Jock

NZATBattery(1939

Hi Jock,
Its a pity he had not wrote a book on his adventures,
That would have been some reading.
Yours Aye
Ray Smith

Bluey C. O. GRIMSEY NZ Anti-Tank Aldershot

Quote:

In their attempts to avoid the flies, which were the worst they had ever experienced, the New Zealanders moved their camp from one site to another. At each place they obtained water by sinking a well to a depth of from five to twenty feet. The flies were not the only pest. Corporal L. H. Browne was bitten by a snake but recovered after suffering hours of agony, and Gunner Bluey C. O. Grimsey ( LRP - LRDG ) was stung three times by a scorpion; the man survived but the scorpion died.

Using this dead scorpion as a model, Grimsey designed the badge (a scorpion within a wheel) which became the official insignia of the LRDG.

http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/schol...H2-1Epi-e.html

Peter McIntyre OBE NZ Anti-Tank Aldershot

In 1939 he enlisted in England, trained with the NZ Anti-Tank Battery (later numbered the 34th) at Aldershot, and served as an anti-tank gunner with the 2NZEF in Egypt.
He was appointed Official New Zealand War Artist and promoted to the rank of captain by Major General Bernard Freyberg in January 1941.
He was awarded the OBE in 1970.

(the above sketch is one of his)

Quote:

PETER McINTYRE: WAR ARTIST

Dr. Warren Feeney

Peter McIntyre was appointed war artist for the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Forces (2nd NZEF) by General Bernard Freyberg on 1 January 1941.

McIntyre’s earliest drawings are of the New Zealand soldier’s life in Maadi Camp. Reproduced in the army publication, Parade, Freyberg also valued and encouraged the comradeship that McIntyre captured in these works. Just as war artist Christopher Nevinson had revealed the distinctive personality of the British soldier, McIntyre rose to the challenge in sketches of New Zealanders often brewing tea or playing cards. In these and other drawings, McIntyre also rediscovered his identity.
He later recalled his experience of meeting the first New Zealander he had seen in nine years absence, on the train to Aldershot in 1940: "His hair was cut short above the ears with crisp waves on top... His face was drawn as if he had been looking into the sun... 'Gidday, how’s she going?' he said, and my nine years of exile melted away."

As war artist McIntyre also rapidly learnt the most practical methods of gathering information in battle, making short hand notes and tonal sketches for finished paintings back at army camp. When he arrived in Crete on 14 May 1941 the German Luftwaffe had begun bombing the New Zealand camp and McIntyre’s sketch of the terrain provides the sort of topographical detail that informed paintings such as General Hospital Crete

McIntyre was equally adept at summarising the changing light of the North African and Italian landscape. The working study for Mobile Showers Beside an Ancient Well, Tunisia 1943 records the NZEF’s camp in a confident and summary tonal sketch. Similarly, his drawing An Italian Village Under Shellfire, May 1944 provides an insight into his painting, with the composition for the finished work already formed in the drawing .

In 1976 McIntyre reflected on his time as war artist: "I think my two and a half years in the Western Desert with the New Zealand Division were the best times in my whole life in the company of men... To me the New Zealand Division in those days was a superb thing. Men at their best in extraordinary circumstances."

Over the period in which he served with the 2nd NZEF, McIntyre’s paintings and sketches perceptively conveyed the routine and harsh reality of war. Testimony to the authority of these familiar and dramatic narratives of the New Zealand soldier, his sketches and paintings continue to define New Zealand’s memory and experience of the Second World War today.

http://www.artis-jgg.co.nz/exhibition.asp?exb=95

And here is a link to a collection of Peter's war art
http://warart.archives.govt.nz/taxonomy/term/184/

Jock

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spr Jock (Post 196225)

Hi Jock
Would you know if this LRP badge was an original one that belonged to’Sandy’.
Thanks Edy

The thread is 6 years old and since then Jock is banned from the site so you wont get his answer.

regards

Thanks for that reply Simon,
I was hoping that someone was able to comment as to whether or not the NZ LRP badge in this post was an original example.
These LRDG badges are so rare that all those that turn up from time to time are of importance,
Cheers Edy Cardoso

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spr Jock (Post 196225)

Hi

By no means an expert on these badges, but the first picture of the LRP badge doesn't compare well with known examples. There is a "sinking" to the letter "R" (top stroke) and other letters have the same appearance.

What do they say about if you cut down all the oak trees in England that King Charles was supposed to have hidden in from the Roundheads, you'd have enough firewood to last you for years.....

Quote:

Originally Posted by manchesters (Post 489357)

The thread is 6 years old and since then Jock is banned from the site so you wont get his answer.

regards

Why was he banned?

No idea, ask the owner