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Description
Together with his brother, Mr. Stanley shares his story on making the decision to join up and steps taken towards training before heading overseas.
Transcription
We were farming there and we had a pretty good life then my brother and I decided to join up instead and away we went. I imagine my other brother going was an incentive you know for me to join and we got into Calgary and away we went to England, you know. All I remember is when we landed in Scotland and then they transferred us to Salisbury Plains in England and we were there til Dieppe. We were there til they landed in ’42.
Interviewer: And so before you left Canada did you receive any type of training?
Ya, they done training in Ontario and Camp Borden. We trained there for almost a year, you see, tank training and all. Well, what I did is I was a loader operator and that guy does the radio up in the turret, there’s three people up there above – the commander, the gunner and myself and two drivers down below so there’s a five man crew.
Interviewer: And within this crew I understand again that you were on the Churchill tanks. (We were.) Tell us about that. Tell us about the Churchills.
Well, I think it was very big and cumbersome you know, hard to handle and being the first time ever used in battle, it was something new for everybody to learn, you know.