Remembering iconic Arnhem prisoner of war Jack Reynolds
Nostalgia
There are numerous iconic photographs taken during the airborne landings at Arnhem in September 1944. Probably the most intriguing is that of a captured British officer, taken by a German propaganda photographer. Widely published at the time, the Germans did not recognise its altruistic, unconventional Crecy-esque significance.
The soldier was from the 2nd Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment, and he is momentarily expressing exactly what he thought about becoming a prisoner, and probably his thoughts about his captors.
Years later the officer was identified in the slightly blurred, rushed ‘camera eye’ moment, a brash gesture that arguably sums up the stoic stand of the airborne troops that fought doggedly for over a week to capture ‘a bridge too far’ at Arnhem and hold the bridgehead over the Lower Rhine. His name is Lieutenant Jack Reynolds MC.
Jack Reynolds was born in
Chichester on May 5, 1922. He joined the Territorials and at the outbreak of war, he continued his training as a signaller.
Jack was recommended for a commission and joined the Royal Artillery Officer Cadet Training Unit in Plymouth for training.
Frustrated by the lack of action he applied for, and was eventually accepted by, the 1st Airborne Division and joined the 1st Air Landing Brigade, consisting of four regular infantry battalions which were glider borne.
He commanded the 2nd South Stafford’s Reconnaissance Platoon for the air landings on Sicily (Operation Ladbroke), and he was part of the ‘Simforce’ group, an improvised addition to the 2nd South Staffords force, formed 36 hours before take-off when new gliders became available.
Reynolds reached Sicily and participated in the defence of the bridge.
Captured after their ammunition ran out, Reynolds was amongst the group of prisoners who were freed shortly after and returned to the bridge in an attempt
to retake it.
For his conduct throughout he was awarded the Military Cross. His citation reads: “This officer with his party of nine men landed at 2225 hours some four miles south of the Bn R.V (Battalion Rendez Vous). He led his party throughout the night to Waterloo Bridge encountering stiff opposition on the way during which six of his nine men became casualties. On the way up he collected several stragglers, forming them into an organised group, eventually assisting in the defence of the Bridge, during which two more of his men were killed and another missing.
“Throughout the fighting this officer set a very high example of courage and leadership in the face of heavy odds.”
Back in England the training continued until mid-september 1944, when the battalion was sent to Manston Airfield, near the Kent coast.
It was quartered under canvas and briefed for the Arnhem operation.
Prior to taking off from Manston, they received a surprise rum ration; “Knowing for a fact the Army does not indulge in that sort of generosity very often, I put two and two together and made four very smartly about what we had in store.”
The flight was, ‘pretty uneventful’ and Jack was in the first wave of gliderborne troops and landed safely with the Signals Company, 2nd South Staffords.
Despite being the officer commanding No1 mortar platoon, the Brigadier sent him off as a pillion passenger with a motorbike despatch rider, ‘You’re me eyes Reynolds, I want you to go forward and tell me what’s going on down the road’.
It occurred to Jack afterwards, ‘he must have thought I was still in the old reconnaissance platoon’.
They encountered sniper-fire which disabled their motor-cycle and both men dived into a ditch; leaving the rider with the bike, Jack proceeded further down the road on foot alone.
When he reached the junction of the upper and lower roads, alongside the river, he observed German infantry and tanks, whereupon he retired and reported back to the landing field.
The battalion had by this time assembled and marched off towards Oosterbeek, with D Company South Staffords at the vanguard.
They met with heavy resistance along the way and heavy tank fire from the other side of the river.
Jack and his men caught up with stragglers from the South Staffords, who had taken a lot of casualties, and found a spot safe from the German 75mm and 88mm tank fire.
He left his Sergeant with the platoon and went forward alone to find out the strength of the opposition.
He was cut-off by the advancing German infantry and tanks but met up with another signal officer, Hugh Cartwright.
They spent several days behind the German lines seeking information and avoiding sniper fire.
Eventually they made their way back to Battalion HQ, which was completely overrun by a German infantry and tank attack and they were forced to surrender.
He joined the 2nd battalion South Staffords commander Lieutenantcolonel Mccardie and his second in his command, who were also captured on the same day.
Whilst being marched off to a prisoner-of-war-camp, Jack observed an official German Army photographer wearing a forage cap and grinning, so impulsively made his famous twofingered “gesture of good will, you might say,” to his German captors!
The Germans thought it was, “a Victory sign from Churchill... I didn’t disillusion them”.
The Chichester Observer dated October 21, 1944, reported: “Official notification has been received by Mr. and Mrs. C. G. Reynolds, 41, Southgate, Chichester that their son, Lieut. J. Reynolds, M.C., R.A., is among those reported missing when serving with the First Airborne Division at Arnhem.
“The last known of him is indicated in letters received from his Brigadier and the Captain of his unit, which show that he was all right on September 17, when he was seen directing mortar operations in Arnhem. An old Chichester High School boy, Lieut. Reynolds has heaps of friends hoping for his safety. He was awarded his M.C. for gallant conduct during famous bridge operation by Airborne troops in Sicily.”
A few weeks later (Saturday, November 11, 1944) the Chichester Observer reported that: ““Anxiety concerning the fate of LT. J. Reynolds, MC., son of Mr. and Mrs. C. G. Reynolds, Southgate, Chichester, has been dispelled by receipt of the news that he is a prisoner of war.
“Lt. Reynolds, who won his MC in Sicily, was known to have been fighting with the Airborne troops in Arnhem up to the date when their fate became uncertain, and has since been on the missing list.
“The many friends of his family, especially his old High School colleagues, will be relieved to hear the latest news concerning him.”
In a later interview Jack reflected on Operation Market that there were no maps of Arnhem, the fighting was total
confusion: “No cohesion, no control, the radios didn’t work, it was a complete shambles, nobody could do very much about it all, except Major Robert Cain.”
Cain was also in the 2nd South Staffords and was later awarded the Victoria Cross for his exploits, knocking out German tanks with a PIAT anti-tank gun.
There was no front line and the fighting consisted of pockets of men moving around searching for the enemy.
The planners had believed the eight miles from the Landing Zone to Arnhem bridge would only take two hours and Jack reflected that, ‘I think they underestimated the ability of the S.S and the opposition around Arnhem, and overestimated the penetrating power of the relieving force (Operation Garden) because they met a lot more opposition than they expected. That was the key to it, because they held Arnhem for long enough to be relieved... but they weren’t’.
Reynolds was one of many sent in cattle trucks to Oflag 79 officers’ camp in Brunswick (an ex-luftwaffe camp), together with his company commander, Captain A.H. Willcocks.
There he was processed and he shared a room, along with seven other officers, during their incarceration.
The top bunk was preferred as the bed bugs fell onto whoever was sleeping below.
Brown paper was lit to smoke the bugs out of the joints of the beds.
Those in the camp that had been incarcerated prior to D-day Jack described as ‘bag-happy’ playing games of bridge and resenting the influx of new prisoners.
On occasions RAF Mosquitos would shoot up anything along the Autobahn which ran along behind the camp, the cartridge cases falling inside the camp, and dropping ‘Blockbuster’ bombs on Hanover.
To occupy themselves they made up a cribbage board, and even put on some stage shows, including The Mikado.
They listened to the BBC News twice a day (an illegal radio in the sewers), the warning shout of look-outs being “Goon up!”
Jack claimed the guards, mostly wounded Hitler Youth ‘high on drugs’, once shot and killed a prisoner attempting to retrieve a football that had got caught on the barbed wire.
Every Friday a dead horse was delivered at the camp cookhouse, to be cooked for the 1,500 prisoners.
The bread ration was rye bread bulked up with sawdust, a slice measured against the width of their identity discs.
They drank tea made from raspberry leaves (which Jack dried out and smoked), and ate porridge made with millet.
Jack was released in May 1945, and returned home, weighing just under seven stone having left England with a, ‘boxing weight of ten stones four’.
He was freed by the Germans who, ‘suddenly behaved rather different’ as the American tanks approached.
He was transported to Brussels where everyone was deloused, given new uniforms and had a medical, then to Dunkirk and on to Portsmouth.
Back home he was told not to drink, so he indulged in ‘medicinal’ milk stout and later ‘medicinal’ Guinness.
On his prisoner of war leave that lasted a month, he met Eulalie Willcocks, youngest sister of fellow prisoner Captain A.H. Willcocks.
She was in the Women’s Auxiliary
Air Force working as a plotter in aerial photography at nearby RAF Tangmere station, who was part of the team that had plotted him out from Manston, and earlier in the war was on duty and plotted the very first V-1 ‘rocket plane’ flying towards London.
He had a second medical in Lincolnshire where he recalled his brother-in-law’s batman named Boris being rather embarrassed when asked by a female nurse to strip for a ‘cough and drop’ as he had a tattoo just below his belly button of an arrow and message declaring “Present for a nice girl.” She didn’t bat an eyelid when she saw the tattoo.
He feigned an illness he described to a ‘trick-cyclist’ as ‘the Burma Twitch’ to get posted to Brandon in Suffolk to be near Eulalie and, “did my courting in Norwich”.
Having served a full seven years in the army, Jack was demobbed in September 1946, delayed a month because he had lied about his age when he joined up as a Territorial, telling the adjutant, ‘So much for a grateful Government’. He married Eulalie in May 1947.
Due to business trips abroad he did not attend regimental reunions and only twice visited Arnhem later when his son persuaded him to do so.
He was first identified as the gesturing prisoner by Lieutenantcolonel Hugh Cartwright, formerly of the 2nd South Staffords Signals Platoon.
When questioned about his ‘twofingered’ gesture, Jack, tongue-in-cheek, replied: “It was an act of defiance but a momentary lapse of military discipline, which given the circumstance seemed totally justifiable!”
One of the other captured British airborne soldiers in the photograph is Lance-corporal George Parry (wearing red beret and smoking a cigarette in the photo), in B Company, 2nd Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment from Cannock.
Years later Mr Parry recalled: “I remember Lieutenant Reynolds kept making the two-fingered salute and I thought, if he keeps on we are all going to stop a bullet.”
Like Lieutenant Reynolds, Mr Parry, of Albert Street, Cannock, was also a survivor of the botched glider-borne invasion of Sicily in July 1943. He died in December 2011.
Jack Reynolds died on August 22, at the age of 97, at his home in Pulborough.
Most of his possessions are in the Oosterbeek museum, including his Prisoner of War identity card.