Good afternoon, This year is the 80th anniversary of the disastrous Oran landing as part of Operation Torch. My father Lt. JCC Pagnam SBS 2 landed with 10 other SBS. I am organizing a Memorial in Oran this November. I am trying really hard to contact descendants of the remaining 9 (I am in contact with Capt. Harry Holden-White's daughter). If you have read this far - check out my basic website for the other names and details about the Memorial. If you are connected to Oran in any way, I willingly invite you to the memorial. Home
Joe, Welcome aboard. Just looked at your website, the names of the nine are not fully visible. Do you have their first and middle names? Who died? I realise now this has been a long running task! There is a series of very small threads most of the SBS soldiers, with his full name: 233300 J C C PAGNAM, MiD, Gordon Highlanders attached SBS 3972208 L BATES, MiD, Welch Regiment attached SBS 4032370 Derek Charles ELLIS, MM, KSLI attached SBS 397220 C A BLEWETT, MiD, Welch Regiment attached SBS 14241643 H WRIGHT, MiD, Royal Artillery & SBS 2621940 Ronald SIDLOW, MiD*, Grenadier Guards attached SBS 6482237 Ronald William LOASBY, MiD, Royal Fusiliers attached SBS Who was captured later when on a beach recce on Panatelleria. From: http://www.commandoveterans.org/sites/www.commandoveterans.org/files/2SBS.pdf 162512 Harold Vere HOLDEN-WHITE, MC, MID, Royal Sussex Regiment attached SBS - who you have contact with his descendants Three are not subject of threads; were they those who died? So: J. Embelin, E.J.A. Lunn & Sgt. A. MIlne. Embelin and Lunn are not on: Commando Roll of Honour 1940 -1945 | ͏ These are all threads by dbf. Embelin was a Royal Engineer Company Sergeant Major. From: http://www.commandoveterans.org/sites/www.commandoveterans.org/files/2SBS.pdf The book 'SBS' by John Parker (published 2013) refers to a Lieutenant E. J. A. Lunn aka "Sally". From: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/SBS/0JpOAUU6yJ0C?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq="operation+reservist"+++"SBS"&pg=PT44&printsec=frontcover I note Wiki has a slim entry and nothing on 2 SBS being there: Operation Reservist - Wikipedia Could the person named as the author for a separate memorial in 2012 help? See: Operation Reservist
David, Thank you so very much for taking the effort and time to respond! I have amended my site so the names can be seen and this is the most definitive list I have: Capt. Holden-White, Lt. J C C Pagnam, Lt. E J A Lunn, Sgt. J Embelin, Sgt. A Milne, Cpl. D C Ellis, Cpl. Sidlow, Cpl. Wright, Cpl. Blewett, Cpl. R W Loasby, Cpl. L Bates. I don't have full names. I have reached out via this site and Commandos Veterans. I do some work with genealogy and have contacted families who I think could be descendants. I have read several books on the SBS, and have started my own book with totally about Oran. Your link is the same Eric "Sally" Lunn who had a very active SBS career, Oran aside. He did earn the MC - as did Holden-White (Oran). At Oran, Embelin was the only casualty and the rest were mostly captured. Off the top of my head, I know that 2 or 3 of the group did not marry, so that limits descendants. I know of Captain Peters of course, but your link to the 2012 memorial has the author's address, so I will communicate with him.
I looked at Ronald Loasby, as it is a slightly unusual surname and Ancestry has an entry that suggests he died in 1993. He was a Metropolitan Police officer based in Croydon in 1939. Would the local newspaper in Croydon, the Croydon Advertiser, be interested in a story seeking his relatives? See a recent thread here: http://www.ww2talk.com/index.php?th...soldier-in-the-heat-of-war.93383/#post-963318 Their email is: newsdesk@croydonadvertiser.co.uk Secondly, there is: https://www.met.police.uk/police-fo.../about-us/about-the-met/met-museums-archives/ . There is not a specific MPS history group, there is national police history group: https://www.policehistorysociety.com/ Facebook yields up this sentence: From: https://m.facebook.com/nt/screen/?params={"note_id":433886984677472}&path=/notes/note/&refsrc=deprecated&_rdr There is an artist who Google links to Romeo Mountjoy, though that name does not appear on his FB entry: https://www.facebook.com/1011013599077974/posts/down-poppy-lane/1317483461764318/ She is an artist in South Wales, with a number of advertisments and gallery showings, so contact could be made via them. For D.C. Ellis: Derek Charles Ellis (1920-1972) | WikiTree FREE Family Tree which shows no children and he died in 1972. It does have a photo of him. Found one of the missing Eric John Lunn: 198819 Eric John Alfred LUNN, MC*, MiD, Royal Artillery attached SBS and A.R. McClair and E.J.A. Lunn which shows his photo (from a later mission in Greece). There is an entry for Arthur Edward Embelin on: SBS - Embelin, Arthur Edward which has his Service No. 1867223 and on: Warrant Officer Class Ii Arthur Edward Embelin | War Casualty Details | CWGC He was from Dublin and a WO2, he has no known grave. On Twitter Embelin appears in a November 2021 entry by @AndyBenns: Perhaps worth contacting him? He has written up his research for the Royal Hibernian. DYRMS is a military school in Kent, with a strong military link. Perhaps a line of inquiry? Do they know of him even? See: Home There is an open access 2011 American article, 21 pgs. 'Death at the hands of Friends: The Oran Harbor Raid during Operation Torch' by Mark J. Reardon. I expect the focus is not the SBS. See: DEATH AT THE HANDS OF FRIENDS on JSTOR Finally I double-checked on the CWGC website to see if any of them died subsequently, none did.
One, last name just explored: Sgt. A. Milne on Joe's website. There is a good possible, as the only A. Milne from 2 SBS listed: SBS - Milne, Alexander (Ginger) He was 2 SBS, Service No. 2878140, who in June 1943 was reported: The CWGC record shows his first name was Alexander, ex-Gordon Highlanders and his only listed relative was: From: Serjeant Alexander Milne | War Casualty Details | CWGC
David, thank you so much for all this help and research you did. It does cover basically what I already have. Sgt Milne was my father's paddler, but again, no contact. I am contacting the Croydon Advertiser regarding Loasby. I am slightly disappointed to come to a dead end like this. I live in Virginia, and there are some difficult logistic for me to go to Oran in November. It would mean so much to hear from relatives, and for some of them to attend. Right now it is just me, Holden-White's daughter Harriet and my wife. She found out this evening, that it could just be the three of us and didn't seem to think it was a good idea. But if it just Harriet and me, we will afford the SBS team the recognition they deserve. If you have any, even distant contacts or ideas, please do let me know. If you wish a direct connection - joepagnam@comcast.net.
Made contact with Joe yesterday. He has cancelled the commemoration in Oran and is contemplating writing a book on Operation Reservist.
An official US military history refers on pg. 227, rather bluntly, to the operation: From: https://history.army.mil/html/books/006/6-1-1/CMH_Pub_6-1-1.pdf There are eighteen references to the operation, but I have not looked further.
David, Thank you so much for this. I have not seen this document before. I will get back to you later. Whatever is said, Reservist was a disaster from the beginning. I don't understand why they went ahead with it. So many lives lost.
Hello Joe, another view from the American perspective here. If there's even one thing within that you've not come across previously then the short read will be worth it. An article by John Curatola Phd, hosted by the National World War Two Museum New Orleans website. Some grim reading. Gallantry against Great Odds: LTC George Marshall and Operation RESERVIST | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans It will not make the loss felt any easier. Always remember, never forget, Jim.
Jim, thank you for your time and research / interest. I look forward to reading this. I am American but born British. Like I have said, I have spent days / weeks on Reservist, but now withdrawn. My father (SBS) was never too complementary on the Americans. And I think a lot of it came from Oran. The RN and especially the SBS were highly trained and battle scarred. The American troops were the complete opposite. Few of them could swim, so ending up in the harbor waters, especially during conflict must have been a nightmare for them. So I do have a lot of data on the British (focus on SBS). I am still glancing through the PDF. But I do clearly feel the anger of the Americans. The same question - why did Reservist even take place? The American troops, crammed below deck, must have felt and heard the battle all around them. But they could do nothing, and instead were ripped to pieces by the Vichy French arms. I have not actually discovered who thought up Reservist. I assume it was Allied High Command, therefore maybe a combination of American and British planning. Anyway, old history now, but I think there is sufficient documentation on the landing to make a movie. All the best, Joe
These two paragraphs make very interesting reading Joe. I happened upon them when initially "searching" yesterday. I guess you may have seen it before, maybe form other sources. It may be another line of inquiry for you, if you so wish of course. Again, it's hard reading. "Unfortunately 5 days before the operation was to take place intelligence reports indicated that the plan had been compromised, most probably by a senior Free French Officer who had Vichy sympathies, at this late stage Admiral Cunningham ordered the assault to take place though it was obvious the element of surprise on which the plan depended had been eliminated. Peters, who at 52 years of age was considered one of the best planners at SOE & Combined Ops, was not selected to undertake the raid; on hearing the news that the operation had been compromised and was now considered almost suicidal, he insisted that he would take command of the operation and lead the raid himself from the lead ship HMS Walney." The complete article that the quote is from can be found here: Operation Reservist Good luck with all. Kind regards, always, Jim.
Captain Peters bravery was appallingly treated by HMG, the US response being very different: From the 2012 article: Operation Reservist
Some thoughts about Oran. I am "Harry" Vere Holden White's daughter. I asked my father if he blamed the French for the tragedy of Oran. He said "no", that the Allies should have anticipated that they might be hostile. He also said that after being captured, he and a fellow commando were not well treated but that everything changed after the arrival of a French cavalry officer who greeted them with the words "mes amis" - my friends. (When I was a little girl growing up in France, in my child's mind I thought my father had done something very bad to have been imprisoned by the French and felt for a long time a sense of guilt and shame and kept it under wraps. It was only as I got older that I began to understand the truth and the reality of what had happened). In later life my father wrote a personal memoir of his time in the SBS called "Goodbye to All That". It gives a personal detailed account of Oran. He loved his time in the commandos and the camaraderie. When he died in 1988, the SBS sent a representative to his funeral who told me that that the SBS were proud of their history and that the same principals that were present in the SBS in my father's time were still being upheld by the present day SBS. I also remember my father saying that in Burma in the jungle, the commandos got so close to the Japanese, they could smell food cooking.
Harriet, Welcome aboard. I will notify Joe Pagnam of your arrival. Would you be willing to post your father's account of Oran here?
Dear David, Thank you. I made a stupid error. My father, Harry Vere Holden White's memoir is called "Goodbye to Old Hat". Let me have a little think before posting it up.
I do feel that it is important that as many people as possible know about Oran. My experience, having spent a great deal of my life in France, is that people in France have never heard of what happened there. Of course, everyone has heard of Mers El Kebir, but no one knows about the tragedy at Oran. I would like this to also become knowledge here in France. Not out of a sense of revenge, but simply out of respect for the hundreds of men who needlessly and tragically lost their lives there. My father said that the port was a trap and once you were in it, you couldn't get out. I am also getting older and I realise that time isn't on my side. I am however extremely grateful to the author and historian Saul David for his excellent account of Oran in his book about the authorised history of the SBS in the Second World War. My father was deeply affected by Oran. Mountbatten wanted him to go on the BBC and give a positive account of the raid but he refused to do so as he had been so appalled by the tragic and needless loss of life and felt that capital couldn't be made out of this.
There is a published book - not read myself - which a 2010 post indicates your father is cited in: From: A couple of SBS operations
