NAME: William Albert JAMES
BORN: 26 Oct 1918 in Undy, Monmouthshire, Wales.
UNIT: South Wales Borderers. Private 3912236.
DIED: 26 Sep 1944, aged 26.
BURIED: Geel War Cemetery, Belgium. Grave 2.C.17.
LOCAL CONNECTIONS: Moorgate Farm, Undy & St. Mary’s Church (Undy)
Early Life
Growing up in Undy
William Albert JAMES was born 26 Oct 1918 in Undy, Monmouthshire, Wales. He was the son of John JAMES and his wife Ruth Amelia (ROACH).
John and were Ruth married on 22 Aug 1911 in Undy parish church. John was 44 and a farmer at Moorgate Farm, Undy which he ran with his unmarried sister Elizabeth (50). Ruth, aged 20, was a servant on the farm. At this time Ruth already had a 2-year-old daughter, Edith ROACH. John and Ruth would have 11 children together, so Albert grew up as part of a large family at Moorgate Farm.
In 1921, Albert (aged 2) and his family were still at Moorgate. The household then included John, Ruth, 9 children, John’s sister Elizabeth, and 2 farm servants. John declared himself to be 55 although he was actually 65.
As a boy, Albert attended Undy Church School. Sadly, his father John died on 07 May 1929, when Albert was just 10 years old. John was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary’s, Undy with other members of the JAMES family.
In 1939, Albert (21) lived with his widowed mother Ruth at Moorgate Farm, along with a futher 6 of her children. She was listed as a ‘Householder’ rather than a farmer. The children had various occupations but were not identified as farmer workers. For example, Albert’s older brother Thomas worked as a railway porter. Albert himself was a butcher’s assistant and worked with his uncle Alfred ROACH at their butchers’ shop on Caerleon Road, Newport, Monmouthshire.
Albert and WW2
South Wales Borderers
Albert enlisted in the army in 1939/40 and became Private 3912236 in the 2nd Battalion of The South Wales Borderers. He served overseas for 4 years in total.
The Borderers were a distinguished unit having fought in The American Revolutionary War, the Zulu War, the Boer War, and WW1. They were most famous for their defence of Rorke’s Drift during the Zulu War, where 11 Victoria Crosses were awarded in a single day (later the subject of the film ‘Zulu’).
Unfortunately, the Borderers’ WW2 diaries have not yet been digitised. So we cannot follow Albert’s trail in as detailed a way as we could for some of Magor’s WW1 heroes.
However, we do know that the 2nd Battalion were the first Welsh regiment to see action in WW2 when they participated in the ill-fated Norway campaign of 1940. They were also the only Welsh regiment to see action on D-Day as part of the Operation Overlord landings on Gold, Juno, and Sword beaches in Normandy.
D-Day (06 June 1944)
Albert and his comrades went through two months of training in preparation for the Allied assault on Normandy. Their mission was to follow the first wave of soldiers ashore. They waited offshore in their assault craft, watching the battle unfold on the beaches before them. Smoke and the sound of explosions filled the morning air. Then, at noon they were given the order to land. Fortunately, they met little resistance on the beach but sadly 2 men drowned during the landing.
The Borderers then pushed inland towards high ground north of Bayeaux. There they captured a radar station near Pouligny, forcing the German occupiers to retreat. As the sun began to set, the exploding station lit up the sky. By midnight they had also captured the bridge and artillery at Vaux-sur Aure, as planned. Not only had they met all their objectives but had advanced further than any other unit in the invasion. They had lost just 4 men and had 20 others wounded.
In The Vanguard
However, The Borderers’ job was not yet done. They remained in the vanguard of the fighting that pushed the Germans back through Belgium, France and Germany over the next 11 months. By May 1945 Albert’s regiment had made it to Hamburg, Germany. Sadly, Albert did not survive to see the triumphant arrival.
Death and Commemoration
Albert's Last Few Weeks - Sep 1944
After D-Day, the Borderers had paused their push inland to assist in the capture of Le Havre. Then, after a rest stop at Dieppe they rejoined the Allied advance into Belgium. As they did so, ecstatic Belgians covered their vehicles with fruit and flowers.
Cardgames, Camaraderie, and Danger
The camaraderie between the men in the Borderers was obvious and overrode formality and rank. Pte. John Davies, a relative newcomer, described his surprise at seeing a regular card game that involved 2 stretcher bearers, the Company Commander’s batman and the Company Commander himself; Major John Dauncey. They had all survived D-Day and as John says “There is nothing like danger shared to forge that sort of comradeship”.
Their first combat in Sep 1944 was at the nigh-time crossing of the Antwerp-Turnhout Canal. Unfortunately, their movements were discovered and they only just survived the German defensive assault by getting a couple of tanks across to the far bank. The tanks were devastating in attack and many German prisoners were captured by the Borderers.
'O.K. God, I suppose I am going to get killed ...'
A few days later, the Borderers were called upon to fight again. This time they were to mount an attack across open country a few miles beyond the Belgian town of Ryckevorsel (Rijkevorsel). Their objective was to cut a road, alongside which the Germans had dug in. The aims were (1) prevent the enemy using the road and (2) to act a as a diversion while the main attack took place elsewhere.
The attack began with the British mortar and artillery fire bombarding German roadside defences. The Borderers then advanced, one company across open ground and slightly uphill, while another moved through a wooded area. They soon came under heavy small arms fire from defensive positions that had survived the British bombardment. The Borderers pressed on apace so as to reach the relative safety of some of the captured German positions, even though they were makeshift. Pte. John Davies was caught in the open and had to dive for cover into a small depression in the field. While lying as flat as he could for shelter, he uttered what he described as a ‘naïve prayer’: “O.K. God, I suppose I am going to get killed. I love my mother very dearly and I know she loves me. Will you please comfort her when she gets the news“.
John Davies survived the bullets flying over his head and then made a dash for it. His dive into the trench alarmed his comrades who shouted “Blimey, we thought you were dead!” The Borderers were withdrawn before returning to action in a battle for Brecht a few weeks later.
His Burial
Only days after this Albert was killed. We do not know precisely where he died, but he was buried in the hamlet of Looy (or Looi), south of Rijkevorsel, Belgium. He was 26 years old.
Moved to Geel
Albert’s body was removed from Looy to Geel War Cemetery on 27 Jun 1946 under the Concentration of Graves scheme. He was buried in grave 2.C.17. His headstone included the inscription “In loving memory of Albert. Mother, brothers, and sisters”.
On receiving the news, his mother still had cause for worry. She had another two sons who were still fighting in the war. Thomas was a Corporal in Burma and Arthur was in Egypt with the RAF.
More Costly Than Passchendaele
The focus on the victory that followed the Normandy landings is understandable. However, the cost of victory is less well publicised. The British suffered a 75% casualty rate. An average of 2354 men per day were lost between 6 Jun and 28 Aug 1944. This is more than were lost in the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele) in WW1, where 2324 men died per day between July and November 1917.
Parents
As described above, Albert’s father had died in 1929. Albert’s widowed mother outlived her older husband by over 30 years. She died at Moorgate in 1961. Her estate went to probate and administration was awarded to her sons Reginald and Thomas.
Siblings
Edith JAMES (b. 1909). Worked as a domestic servant before sadly she became a patient in Abergavenny Mental Hospital by 1939.
Gwendoline JAMES (b. 1911). Married John F. FREDERICK, an electrical fitter, in 1938. After marriage they lived in Badminton Road, Newport. She died in 2002, aged 90.
Thomas JAMES (b. 1913). Worked as a Railway Porter and fought in Burma during WW2. Married Gwendoline COOK in 1949. Thomas worked as a Railway Signalman. He died in the Newport Registration District in 2000.
Elizabeth Ruby JAMES (b. 1914). Died in 1970, aged 57, and was buried in Undy churchyard.
James Herbert JAMES (b. 1915). Married Ivy M. NICHOLLS in 1936. They lived in Shop Row, Redwick, Monmouthshire where Herbert worked as a cowman on a farm. He died in 1974.
Annie Amelia JAMES (b. 1917). In 1939 she worked as a bar attendant in the GWR Station Queen’s Hotel Refreshment Rooms in Swindon, Wiltshire. She married US Army Sgt. Charles H. DARE in Swindon in 1943 and a family. She emigrated to the USA in 1946, becoming a US citizen in 1973 in Chicago, Illinois. She died in 1999 and is buried with her husband in Arlington Cemetery, DuPage, Illinois.
Richard Arthur JAMES (b. 1920). Arthur was in the RAF in Egypt during WW2. He married in 1950 and lived in Rogiet, Monmouthshire. Arthur died in 2002. He is buried in St. Mary’s churchyard, Rogiet. His wife passed away recently.
Florence Mary JAMES (b. 1922). Mary married Thomas PARKIN in 1941. She died in Glastonbury, Somerset in 2016.
Mabel JAMES (b. 1925). She married Douglas HODGES in 1949. They lived in Undy. Mabel died in 2015.
Reginald JAMES (b. 1927). He continued to live at Moorgate, Undy. Reginald worked as a Railway Signalman. He died 2019 after a short illness.
Links
South Wales Borderers in the National Army Museum
10 Things you didn’t know about D-Day
First hand accounts of the SWB landings on D-Day
Contact me if you want more detail about the sources used or any help finding your ancestors’ stories, military or otherwise.
