saint venant 1940-------farm boulet

hi all.
John i have been looking at this 'stop' order and found the following.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/histo...ous-but-2.html

scroll to the post by TonyT. it makes interesting reading.
it would appear that the 'stop' order only applied to the Panzer units not infantry. and the account in the RWF WD states that when the HQ staff were trying to withdraw across the bridge they came under heavy Mortar fire. as far as i was aware this is an infantry weapon.
In the post i have linked the references are for the Panzer's to Stop to allow the infantry to catch up, not withdraw. It does not appear to be a General stop order.
If this IS correct then there would appear to be no reason why an Infantry unit could not have been in Haverskirque.

Bore da Ivor,

First a general remark: Panzer divs contained an infantry regiment, including mortars. At St Venant it was the 3rd Schützen-Regiment (rifle regt). A motorised SS regt (Regt Germania) was attached for the attack across the Aire canal towards and beyond St Venant. The Infantry divisions were still trying to catch up.

3 Pz and Germania were ordered to pull back. See statement of Germania's CO below. I already mentioned this, in translation, in an earlier post.

John

Attachment 2899

Hi
The following is from Major Ellis's The War in France and Flanders 1939 - 1940 Chapter XI 24th and 25th May 1940.
while i have quoted from this before i was looking at St Venant. In a previous post i speculated as to thee direction that the 2/5 West Yorks had pulled back from Robecq. well some where in St Floris and some in Calonne. a couple more pieces of the Jigsaw
."In the Polforce sector between Thiennes and Robecq a French unit which had been holding the canal was withdrawn, leaving a gap in the defence which there were no troops to fill. Here elements of a German motorised division—the S.S. Verfügungs (or general service) Division—had crossed unopposed and had advanced to St Venant and the 2nd/5th West Yorkshire on the canal from Robecq to Hinges had moved companies back to Calonne and St Floris, to hold the flank of this enemy salient."
Ok,John, i think we have been around here before. looking at bridging units, but not this time.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/51528342/G...on-10-May-1940

if you look at the list you will find no mention on 10/5 of the S.S Germania. The 3rd Schutzen Brigade was made up of 3 Schutzen Regiment comprising 3 Brigades. all of which are shown as motorised.
Your quote refers to the Germania and the panzers pulling back. The panzers were to repair and refiit etc. i do not believe the order applied the Schutzen Bgd, only the tanks. theinking at the top was, it seems, to not risk the tanks as the mopping up could be done by infantry.



ivor

Ivor, the push past St Venant on the 24th involved only Germania. 3rd Pz was at St Pol and its infantry was not involved. It received orders that day to capture all bridges along the Aire canal on the 25th.

Please note that Germania was in line to the left of 3 Pz. It never was part of it. For the St Venant ops it was put under command of 3 Pz. That would not qualify it for a mention in 3 Pz orbat, certainly not two weeks before that date.

John

guys.
John, i will come back to our debate shortly but i was digging, and found another link to :-

http://www.feldgrau.net/forum/viewto...30914&start=45

you will need to scroll down nearly to the bottom but there is a very interesting pic on 23 taken apparently at Robecq. and an even more interesting pic on 27th of British POW's (note Location)

Hi.
i have downloaded the pic of POW's but even using one of my photo progs i can find no details.there may be something on the shoulder of the 2nd from left but it is too faint to be sure. there are 5 brits and 2 Germans in the picture and it would seem possible that the German with the light cap may be giving first aid to the brit without 'tin hat' in the background.


ivor

Hello,

I thought people would like to know of a surprising outcome to a little `behind the scenes` investigation connected to the search for Anthony Corkhill and the great work put in by members here to see this through.
Recently a French Auction site featured photographs taken around St Venant/Robecq in late May 1940.The photos showed British PoWs gathered in St Venant and more disturbingly a huge mass grave with British Dead clearly visable.The grave photos were titled `St Venant Massacre` if it is true is yet to be established. Tony purchased these photographs and with a Farm house in the Background this was thought by both Tony and myself to be around Feme Boulet,however John recognised the photograph as the one which featured in M.Faivres book on the Robecq Rd? John then received a casualty list complete with St Venant Mayors Office Stamps of the identified victims within this grave from M.Faivre together with a modern map showing the Mass graves original location.John was correct it was no where near Ferme Boulet I spent a couple of days cross checking the list with known casualty lists on the CWGC database together with the register of St Venant Communal Cemetery and with a few minor corrections for spellings and mis-read numbers found that all of these casualties now lay at rest within the cemetery.........except one,6142300 Gnr William Arthur Barlow 226 Bty., 57 (1/5th Bn. The East Surrey Regt.) Anti-Tank Regt although he is clearly listed on this list the CWGC lists him as no known grave commemorated Dunkirk Memorial ? A second check on another list I have submitted by the Mayor in 1945 ommits Gnr Barlow completely. So where is Gnr Barlow ? Logically if every other poor soul in that mass grave is in St Venant Cemetery then does this mean Gnr Barlow rests there too ..as an unknown?
After consultation with Tony and John I have sent off the Casualty list ,Map and a copy of the Mass Grave Photograph,kindly provided by Tony,to the CWGC for their thoughts on the matter.I have received a basic acknowledgement of the contact with a promise of a follow up reply.
It is more than a bit ironic that whilst searching for Anthony we may have stumbled on another lost soul.Sorry for diversing a little here but I thought this relevant if nothing else we will be able to gauge the CWGC reaction.
Best Wishes

Jim

hi.

great piece of work. brilliant. well done guys.


ivor

Ivor, forgive me for using your page but for some reason I have become unable to find the way into this thread any more. What I'd like to do is explain my theory of Anthony's disappearance that I have arrived at after a month of serious thinking and deliberating. I don't mind anyone shooting me down because most people have a much broader knowledge of the issue than I have even though I have become totally immersed in it for almost three years.

I keep thinking that we have widened the search for Anthony when maybe we should be narrowing it more. We have thought that he may have been killed and buried in Merville, Calonne, Robecq, Haverskerque etc.. Perhaps the best place to consider, is in fact, the last place he was seen alive---Saint Venant.

A while ago I found a document describing the fact that two British soldiers were killed in hospital in Saint Venant. Each had wounds to both legs. At the time, I thought nothing of this because I was convinced that Anthony was killed outside Farm Boulet at Bas Hamel and this would be a proven fact in due course.

I think that instead of thinking 'what if', 'maybe this', 'maybe that' let's look at what we already know and take it at face value.;-

The 'big picture' in Saint Venant at the time was the defence of the bridge and most personnel were involved in it one way or another.

Assuming that Anthony was wounded in this action, he would not have been able to stagger very far and therefore may have ended up on the canal bank, still in Saint Venant.

RSM Goddard must have been near enough to Anthony to be able to come across him on the bank. He was a POW and by then would not have been allowed to wander very far.

The German stretcher bearers told the RSM that they were taking Anthony to hospital. The logical choice was a hospital in Saint Venant, where they already were.

Acouple of days later two British lads with wounds to both legs were killed by the Germans.

All the above is what I think is highly likely to have happened. Certainly within the bounds of possibility. The doubtful bit? The dates are a bit tight. 25th---27th.

Now for my own 'what if'= I have heard of a hospital in the area closing down and getting 'rid' of patients around that time. 'What if' they transferred all able bodied patients to other hospitals and shot the rest.

Doubtful bit No2= The Red Cross say there are no records of Anthony ever having been booked into hospital but perhaps he was in hospital and his admission not recorded. It is worth remembering also that he may not have been in posession of his dog tags.

Like I said at the beginning, feel free to berate me if you think I am wrong. I'd rather be told I was wrong than go on forever more believing a load of bunkum.

So we're back in St Venant at last. Good thinking, Tony. I've always thought so, and I'm glad the you have found a document supporting this.

As I said in a previous post, there were two hospitals in St Venant. A cottage hospital cum nursing home (possibly even cum school) run by nuns, on the Rue de Guarbecque, and a large psychiatric hospital (the Asile des Alienés) on the Rue de Busnes. Both are still there.

If Anthony was unable to communicate due to blood loss by the time he was admitted, without his dog tags identification would have been very difficult. Hence perhaps the lack of records.

All in all it sounds very plausible.

John