Captain Eric Spencer
Officer who held a bridgehead by himself and then entered a mined area to rescue an injured man
CAPTAIN ERIC SPENCER, who has died aged 95, was awarded an immediate Military Cross in Holland in 1944; he subsequently had a successful career in industry.
In December 1944 Eric Spencer, serving with “D” Company, 1st/5th Battalion The Welch Regiment
(1/5 WR) was in command of a patrol that was ordered to secure the west end of the Haelen-roermond railway bridge at first light.
The Germans occupied the east bank of the River Maas in strength and also a bridgehead on the western side, where they were established behind the massive ironwork of the blown bridge. Five previous attempts to drive them off had failed. On each occasion strong Spandau fire from the bridgehead and heavy defensive fire from the other side of the river had forced the patrols to withdraw with considerable losses.
On December 9, Spencer left five men to cover him and took two others to reconnoitre the position. The enemy had withdrawn to the other side of the river just before dawn, but what he did not know was that they had mined the embankment in front of their bridgehead with shu mines.
Spencer and one man moved along the flank of the embankment and secured the bridgehead position, which was not occupied. His objective was to have his patrol in position before daylight and surprise the German patrol when they crossed the river that evening.
The signal to bring up the rest of his patrol was not seen and Spencer sent a man back to get them before the light got stronger. That man and another were both blown up on the minefield and lost their legs.
Enemy Spandau fire, mortar and artillery shelling opened up immediately on the bridgehead position and continued throughout the morning. Spencer, alone on the bridgehead, held the position all day. After dark, hearing a wounded man moaning in the mined area, he climbed down into flood water, picked him up and staggered back with him.
Realising that the enemy might retake the bridgehead, he then made contact with a relieving patrol, guided them to the bridgehead and placed them in position. The citation for Spencer’s immediate MC paid tribute to his outstanding bravery in holding the bridgehead by himself for many hours and for repeatedly entering a mined area without regard for his own safety.
Eric Bryan Spencer was born in Birmingham on June 26 1922. He joined the Reconnaissance Corps in early 1942 and served in North Africa in the 1st Reconnaissance Regiment as a lance-corporal until the end of the campaign. He was commissioned into the Royal Warwickshire Regiment in July 1944 and was subsequently seconded to 1/5 WR. In January 1945 he was wounded in the fighting in the Ardennes, but rejoined his battalion from hospital and served as a platoon commander.
In April, at Rethem, Germany, in heavy fighting for the key crossing of the River Aller, he was again wounded, but returned to his unit at Duisburg in the summer. In 1946 he was appointed adjutant and was given the task of disbanding the battalion. He then moved to 160 South Wales Brigade HQ, taking the regimental goat with him.
After being demobilised, Spencer returned home to Birmingham and, in 1951, qualified as a chartered accountant. After three years working with management consultants in the Joseph Lucas Group, he was appointed chief accountant of Joseph Lucas (Electrical) Ltd.
In 1960 he went to Harvard Business School and two years later joined Plessey. He was marketing director of The Park Gate Iron and Steel Company before being appointed managing director of Churchill Gear Machines. In 1968 he joined a team of industrial advisers working with the corporate finance department of Hambros Bank and spent 12 enjoyable years there and as a director of several companies in Britain and America.
He settled in the Isle of Man in the mid-1980s. His interests included drawing and painting and he was an occasional patron to artists.
Eric Spencer married, in 1951, Winifred Betty Moore, who survives him with their son and daughter.