Bravery of war hero will not be forgotten
EIGHTY years ago World War II was raging at points around the globe. On Saturday June 27, 1942, Adam Wakenshaw from Newcastle, a private in the Durham Light Infantry, was killed in a ferocious battle in Egypt.
Before he finally succumbed to terrible injuries, the 28-year-old showed such remarkable bravery he was later awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross - Britain’s highest award for military valour.
The front page of the Daily Mirror reported how Pte Wakenshaw who “with an arm blown off, fired his gun in Egypt until he died, has been awarded the VC.”
The paper also told how his 33-year-old widow Lily and their two sons were living in a tenement in Duke Street, Newcastle.
A simple memorial service was held at Pte Wakenshaw’s old school, St Aloysius’ in Newcastle, and a grander one at a packed St Mary’s RC Cathedral in the city.
The VC would be presented in a special ceremony at Buckingham Palace with family members including the dead soldier’s sevenyear-old son George in attendance.
However, George needed a new pair of shoes for the trip and his mother could not afford them.
As various dignitaries visited the Wakenshaws’ humble home, the Evening Chronicle was prompted to set up the ‘VC Shilling Fund’ to help the stricken family.
For boys growing up on Tyneside in the 1940s and 50s, Pte Wakenshaw became a playground hero.
He was born in Duke Street,
Elswick, in 1914, the youngest of six children. After leaving school he worked at Elswick pit and aged 18 married Lily in 1932.
They went on to have three children, including a son John who was killed in a road accident aged just seven.
Life was tough for the family and in times of high unemployment Adam would take to the streets as a ‘hawker’ rather than go on the dole.
In World War II, Pte Wakenshaw served in the Ninth Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry.
In the early morning light of June 27, 1942, he found himself in action in Mersa Matruh, Egypt.
After the fall of Tobruk, the DLI was part of a defence line facing the formidable German Afrika Korps and their Italian allies.
The Toon soldier was manning a 20-pounder tank gun alongside his crew when the Germans attacked with deadly mortar and shell fire.
Pte Wakenshaw’s gun knocked out one enemy artillery vehicle but it was hit when another German mobile gun opened fire, killing all the British gunner crew apart from himself and Pte Eric Mohn.
Pte Wakenshaw suffered horrific wounds and his left arm above the elbow was blown off.
Incredibly, as the Germans began to advance, Pte Wakenshaw dragged himself to the gun and fired five more rounds, destroying another
enemy vehicle. A second enemy shell threw him away from the gun again and seriously wounded him even further, while Pte Mohn was killed. For a second time, a badlydisfigured Pte Wakenshaw managed to drag himself back to the gun.
However, as he loaded another round he was killed instantly when his ammunition store suffered a direct hit. He was dead at just 28.
His heroic efforts gave many of his comrades time to escape.
Pte Wakenhaw was buried where he fell and awarded a posthumous VC in September 1952. He was later buried in El Alamein Cemetary.