Taken from the link below and identified by May 1940 (Andrew) and Rich Payne. BEF Vehicle Markings Thread Post Number 3. Now that vehicle units are being successfully identified I thought I'd pull any pictures out of the above thread that can have further information added to them from the war diaries I already have. A Bedford MWD carrying the GHQ Troops marking '134'. '134' (on red background) indicates 6th Battalion Royal Scots Fusiliers (GHQ Troops). This battalion was under command of 154 Brigade, 51st Division after 10th May and having gone through the diary for May/June it looks like this picture was most likely taken at Le Havre. See Diary below the picture. WO 167/818. 6th Royal Scots Fusiliers War Diary for June:
I think that you're almost certainly correct with your location, Andy. The Bedford has clearly been deliberately immobilised rather than battle damage. As we now know from the Arty thread, Havre had a rather grand 19th century centre prior to the destruction of 1944. http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/1940/33152-bef-artillery-markings-6.html#post380989 Interesting to see the criticism of the Staff departments in the war diaries and the assertion that the vehicles could have been evacuated from Le Havre if the correct decisions had been taken in time. Maybe the recent experience at the channel ports had brought about a mentality of abandoning equipment, regardless.
From official history June 12 was a peaceful day. All surplus stores were destroyed, as the evacuation of Le Havre was to take place that day and the Royal Navy had insisted on a daylight operation. By 11 p.m. the destruction was complete. As they waited, the Fusiliers witnessed and loudly cheered the performance of nine British Hurricane aircraft, which brought down a party of three German Heinkels making their way to Le Havre, and drove off a large force of enemy bombers and their protecting fighters before a single bomb could be dropped. For the first night for a long time the port area was undisturbed. All transport had been destroyed at the dockside by driving trucks into each other. Lord Rowallan’s car, polished till every part shone including the engine, was preserved until the last. Fusilier Hay, its driver, asked that another Fusilier might be made responsible for its destruction, as it was more than he himself could face. Some of the Fusiliers then embarked in the Amsterdam, aboard which they had arrived in France so short a time before. the remainder sailed in the Tynwald, one of the Isle of Man packets.
Harfleur is a suburban railway station in Harfleur near Le Havre. 134 can be just made out on the lorry to the right of the trees.
Hello Drew, hope you are having a good Christmas, Can you have a trawl back through the 6th Bn Diary to see if PSM Franks appears elsewhere? I've currently got him appearing in many documents for the 2nd Bn and then he appears in the diary above with 30 OR's from AULT..... If this turns out that he isn't in any other lists of the 6th, then I think I may have found a key part of the story of the 2nd. It appears many groups of the 2nd escaped after the action of the Ypres-Comines canal and made their way to the coast. This could be the reason he and 30 ORs appear and why he gets an MID. thanks and best regards Iain
