My grandfather, Tpr Christopher South, 6898866, GHQ Liaison Regiment "Phantom" A Squadron

Discussion in 'Recce' started by MikeSou, Feb 4, 2017.

  1. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    Further to my earlier post about Cpl Harry Rogal, I wanted to share some info and photo about my grandfather Christopher Dudley South.

    Chris South enlisted with the Queen Victoria Rifles on 28th April 1939. In one of his letters to his then girlfriend, later his wife, Vera, he mentions being posted to defend a bridge against the IRA. That letter is dated 21st August 1939. He was posted with the No. 3 "Hopkinson" Air Mission to France in November 1939.

    You can find more information about the No.3 Air Mission here:
    Royal Signals - Phantom

    He was evacuated from Dunkirk on May 27th.

    The ship he was evacuated on was the HMS Worcester, later renamed the HMS Yeoman. She made six trips to the Dunkirk beaches, transported a total of 4,350 troops to the United Kingdom, and suffered damage in a German air attack on 27 May 1940 (shown in the image below). Chris talked about being so exhausted from the fighting at Dunkirk that he slept through the ship being strafed or bombed.

    HMS worcester D96 Dunkirk A.jpg HMS worcester D96 Dunkirk B.jpg

    He then went on to become part of GHQ Liaison Regiment "Phantom" A Squadron, shown below. Chris is in the middle background. Unfortunately I don't have a higher resolution scan of this photo. His records show that he was qualified as a clerk.

    Phantom Force.jpg

    I have a number of letters he sent back to Vera from the front, including one written on official German Feldpost writing paper that was left behind in their retreat. He wrote:

    "As you can see by this paper Jerry is evidently in a hurry to leave this part of the country. He was kind enough to leave this writing paper laying around so we decided to make use of it.

    We are right on his tail all of the time and we can hear him catching bombs from our planes all day (and they don't bounce)."


    There are a few stories that I don't have much evidence for and may have been mis-remembered by family, but what I was told was that he once came zooming out of the woods in thick fog on his Norton motorbike with sidecar, straight into a German retreat. He was able to move with the retreat for a while before making off without being noticed. He also talked about gathering some intelligence from a building that was flattened by artillery or a bomb just after he stepped out of the door. I think he may have been around Belsen when it was liberated but I've not been able to confirm that. I'd love to find out more about exactly where he was and when, but it's very hard to find information out about Phantom. I have Phantom at War by Andy and Sue Parlour and I have Phantom by Philip Warner, but I've not had the chance to read them properly yet.

    Sadly Chris passed away on April 9th 1983, 3 years before I was born so I've never been able to speak to him about any of this. Cause of death was fibrosing alveolitis which he considered to be the MOD's fault because of the conditions he experienced during the war, and during training.

    Chris in his uniform. Date unknown.
    CDS 02.jpg

    Chris on the left hand side and some of the men of Phantom A Squadron. I don't have a date for this one or any other names.
    Phantom group.jpg

    Chris on the right hand side and some of the men of Phantom A Squadron. On the back of this postcard is written: "Chris & Co, Barham May 1941" There's only one other name on the back, that of Ted Bradbury which Is also written on the back of the photo with all of the motorbikes I showed earlier. Would love to be able to put names to some of these faces.
    ChrisSouthPhantom.jpg

    Chris South and Vera Rogal on their wedding day. They were married in Highbury Hill on September 7th 1940, the first day of the London Blitz. There's an article written by a friend of the family (possibly a distant relative) about the wedding and subsequent air raid here
    wedver2.JPG
    Another photo of their wedding day. There's some more info about this photo here.
    wedding group.JPG

    Chris and Vera South. Date unknown.
    scan0032.jpg

    Chris in uniform again. We're not sure when this photo was ripped or who the other person is.
    scan0001.jpg

    Chris with a Danish family he became friends with whilst in Europe.
    scan0003 (2).jpg

    Chris, Vera and family or friends. Date unknown.
    scan0029.jpg

    Chris, I don't know what he's doing here! Date unknown.
    CDS 01.jpg

    There are some fragments of information here i'm trying to correlate into a full story of where he was throughout the war. I have copies of his MOD records but they do not cover where he was active while he was deployed over there.
     
    Last edited: Feb 22, 2017
  2. Drew5233

    Drew5233 #FuturePilot 1940 Obsessive

    I can find a file on 3 Air Intelligence Section but no No.3 Mission. One of my books does mention very briefly Hopkinson's Military Mission's Intelligence Section joining No.3 Military Mission on the 27th May so it definitely existed. If I remember I'll check the 3 Air Intelligence file tonight as I think it may be the same unit.
     
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  3. Recce_Mitch

    Recce_Mitch Very Senior Member

    Mike thanks for posting photos of your Grandfather

    Cheers
    Paul
     
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  4. Richard Lewis

    Richard Lewis Member

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  5. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    Thanks again Richard!
     
  6. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    My Dad has some notes Chris wrote about his experiences at Dunkirk that were meant to go into a book about the evacuation but never made it in. He should be scanning those soon so i'll write them up here when he does.
     
  7. Rich Payne

    Rich Payne Rivet Counter Patron 1940 Obsessive

    Although the group depot photo shows Norton sidecar outfits, they were obsolete by 1944 and none went back to Europe so the reference to him using one at that time has probably been handed down incorrectly. There were plenty of solo machines (although by that time, Nortons were mainly restricted to the Canadians). The allies weren't above using captured German sidecar outfits though which might fit the circumstances better.
     
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  8. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    Ah thanks for the extra info Rich! This is why I love this forum, the amount of collective knowledge here is awesome.
     
  9. Rich Payne

    Rich Payne Rivet Counter Patron 1940 Obsessive

    There are quite a lot of photographs of QVR with their motorcycles in England during 1939. They were quite a high-profile unit and were photographed during preparations for their annual TA camp.

    [​IMG]

    Those who were not allocated to other duties went to Calais without their transport and were almost all captured.
     
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  10. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    Was at my parents house today, going through more stuff. Found his Phantom and QVR uniform patches, and a letter written on a typewriter in May 1945 talking about Phantom. Also have scanned some notes he wrote about his experiences at Dunkirk. Will transcribe those later. Pictures below.

    IMG_20170220_131725~2.jpg
    Scan_20170220 (14).jpg
     
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  11. Drew5233

    Drew5233 #FuturePilot 1940 Obsessive

    No mention in the Air Intelligence Section War Diary. In fact I'm not convinced they were together as this unit was further west, evacuating out of Cherbourg.
     
  12. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    As I mentioned earlier he made some rough notes about his experiences around Dunkirk. They were originally intended for Walter Lord, the author of Miracle of Dunkirk (published in 1982). I've formatted them into bullet points for easy reading.

    [Main body of text written across four and a bit A5 pages]
    • I am of the opinion that a book about Dunkirk would be incomplete without a mention of the Hopkinson Military Mission commanded by Lieut-Colonel G.F.Hopkinson.
    • The mission was made up of members of the Queen Victoria Rifles (K.R.R.C), 12 Lancers and the Royal Corps of Signals, and worked in close co-operation with No. 3 British Air Missions.
    • Briefly they were brought together early in 1939 at Aldershot, the QVRs with their motorcycles and sidecars, the Lancers with their Armoured Cars.
    • This formed the nucleus of a probing reconnaissance unit to work with the signals and British Air Mission. I was a sidecar driver (Q.V.R) in this outfit.
    • During the ‘Phoney War’ of 1940 we were stationed at Valenciennes (Caserne Vincent) in the “French Zone” on the Northern border of France.
    • the Germans entered Belgium we also crossed the border and by the end of that day we were very near the Albert Canal.
    • There the story really begins. For the next three weeks Colonel Hopkinson lead us back through the German lines mostly moving at night until after many adventures which I am sure could be researched out we reached “La Panne” near Dunkirk.
    • We were always in touch with London and consider our particular job had been successful. We duly noticed “La Panne” guiding French soldiers & civilians to embarking points and British soldiers to their beaches. Finally Colonel Hopkinson instructed us to destroy our vehicles and make out way back to England where he hoped to join us in due course.
    • After one rowing boat had sunk beneath us several of us got on board the “Worcester” [HMS Worcester] and returned to Dover.
    • There is obviously a lot more to this but it is very difficult to remember after all these years. If necessary I will be very proud to try to answer any questions.
    • On return from Dunkirk we founded the organisation called the “Phantom Regiment”. Colonel Hopkinson was killed while commanded the 1st Airborne Division in Italy.
    [Supplementary sheet]
    • I was serving with the Hopkinson Military Mission in the French Military Zone, based at the “Caserne Vincent” in Valenciennes, Northern France on the French/Belgian border. This was out of to the B.E.F. bounds [British Expeditionary Force] in the early days ‘39/40.
    • Rank: Rifleman (Q.V.R)
    • Motorcycle-sidecar driver with a Bren Gunner in the s/car.
    • Duties: Reconnaissance to collect information on local protection.
     
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  13. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    I'm hoping with a bit more research I can roughly piece together the journey he made to France, then Belgium, then back to the UK, then back out to France, Belgium, Germany and Denmark so I can retrace his steps myself.
     
  14. Peter Fisher

    Peter Fisher New Member

    My Father was in A Squadron and was under David Niven - I am tying to find as much as I can. My father was very secretive about all he did during the war. He was at Richmond Hill Hotel, came from Hereford, and ended up staying and living in Richmond.

    Would be interested to know more.




     
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  15. MikeSou

    MikeSou Member

    I'm still trying to find out more, I've had so little time. I meant to get to the various archives to get more info on them but they have thousands and thousands of pages to go through.
     

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