Book Review None Had Lances - The Story of the 24th Lancers - Leonard Willis

A place for some book reviews, opinions etc. of "None Had Lances" e.g. (quite an early one, I think, here...)

https://jramc.bmj.com/content/jramc/132/3/189.full.pdf

None Had Lances. The Story of the 24th Lancers. • Leonard Willis. 24th Lancers Old Comrades Association 1985. Ppl + 245. £14.95. Illustrated.

This is a book aimed specifically at those who served in the 24th Lancers during the regiment's brief reappearance in World War 2. Of necessity therefore it contains many names and tends to read rather like the more chatty unit entries in the AMS. Magazine.

Nevertheless there are parts of the book of particular interest to serving members of the Army Medical Services.

The book is, to all intents, in two distinct parts. The first traces the development of a newly formed unit in the "civilian" army in England in late 1940 and with liberal use of anecdote describes the transition of a mix of regulars and raw recruits to a fully equipped fighting unit. The atmosphere of units training for war during a war is well described and those with experience of National Service will find many familiar moments. The meat of the book for those of us with no links with the 24th Lancers must be the diaries of various officers who each give a vivid description of what it was really like in Normandy from D Day to 29th July 1944 when the unit was, quite suddenly, disbanded in the field having fought with great distinction. One of the many lessons which stands out from the book is the contrast between the elaborate and detailed plans that were developed before the Normandy landings and what actually transpired. The regimental padre, the Reverend Mark Green (then aged 26) describes the chaos of batttle, its effect upon him and his parishioners and the problems of casualty evacuation.His story is complementary to that of the RMO, Douglas Aitken who, at one stage found himself dealing with the casualties from three units unaided when RAPs and a section from the ADS were close at hand. The fog of war can obscure the obvious at times! Two small extracts will serve to illustrate this. '.

Padre's Diary D + 5: ... "1 seem to remember driving an ambulance between our own aid post and this c.c.P. though how 1 came to get hold of an ambulance I can't imagine ... all through the night the Doctor, Douglas Aitkin, was treating casualties under the worst possible conditions in the RAP and I was helping to ferry them back in the ambulance. I chiefly remember the extreme difficulty of finding the way in the dark across fields and rough tracks and the mental agony every time one drove over something rough and jolted the wounded in the back. I only hope their physical agony was not as great as one feared."

RMO's Diary D + 4 ... "I have the wireless on and can hear everything that is going on. The voices 'on the air' are getting tense and high pitched; one tank commander has lost his nerve and his operator eventually rings up with this information. What a pity that things like this are heard by everyone .... Five casualties come in - three fairly light, and one man with the whole of his lower jaw blown away, and the other with one leg badly injured; none of them are ours and no vehicle has been hit. .. A stream of bullets passes over my head and one chips the tree above me; how fortunate I was kneeling. I say to myself that whoever fired them is unlikely to fire in exactly the same direction again and we all go on working. We have fifteen cases waiting to go, all but three are stretchers and I daren't send them. If any more come I don't know what to do; I can't hold any more ... the noise is terrific and gradually mortar explosions become more prevalent than tank guns as it is getting dark. Darkness will save the situation which is already improving immensely. Sinclair and I are nearly beat - if we have to be up all night I don't know what will happen. I risk a couple of Benzedrines. Thirteen more infantry come in - a mortar landing in the middle of them and two have their legs off below the knee - there is one with both off and one with one off and the other hanging by a bit of skin and muscle .. some of the others are serious too. We sort them out and Sinclair and I get down to the job in the dimmed light of a torch. This is so dim that it is hardly worth using but it's all we dare use. We are constantly losing scissors and things when we lay them down. I remember noting to never use anything but white bandages and triangulars at night.

Mark Green wants to risk a journey back now that its dark; he says he knows the route through the cornfields. I am so tired I agree and we load up the two ambulances, a jeep and his scout car and off he goes. Bless that man, he is successful and comes back in no time at all with one extra ambulance and information that a section has opened in the next field - and we never knew it!. .. "

The diaries of the RMO, padre, and troop officer certainly deserve a wider reading than the limited edition of one thousand copies of the book will allow. They should certainly be required reading for all PGMOs and I have no hesitation in firmly recommending that the College Library at Millbank acquire a copy or two of this book.

CGCALLOW

 

There is apparently a review here: Review on JSTOR

(Which, I think, may be read by those logging in through a library, or "can be read online free - with the caveat - With a MyJSTOR account, you can read up to six articles each month for free.)

JOURNAL ARTICLE
Review
Reviewed Work: "NONE HAD LANCES. THE STORY OF THE 24th LANCERS" by Leonard Willis
Review by: W. Y. Carman
Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research
Vol. 72, No. 289 (Spring 1994), pp. 56-57
Published by: Society for Army Historical Research
Review on JSTOR
Page Count: 2

And another here: mhsa

"None Had Lances, The Story of the 24th Lancers: Apr/Jun 86 p45"
(Ref'd as a book review in "The Journal of the Military Historical Society of Australia")

 

9th-12th-Lancers_1986_0090.jpg - The Royal Lancers Museum at Derby