AB Sydney Compston DSM (1919-2010)

After leaving HMS Venomous Sydney was posted to the fast mine layer HMS Abdiel as part of a skeleton crew during a refit followed by a shore posting at Plymouth before being transferred to the newly formed Royal Naval Commandos.

The Royal Naval Commandos were responsible for establishing, maintaining and controlling beachheads during amphibious operations. Each of the 22 Royal Naval Commando units was commanded by a lieutenant commander or commander and consisted of 10 officers and 65 ratings organised into three parties, each of 25 men. AB Sydney Compston (D/JX 169001) was assigned to Royal Navy Beach Commando Fox (RNBC Fox) which trained at Inverkip Camp, June to July 1942.

The beach commandos were "key men in the complex machinery of amphibious operations. Every man must be able to handle any weapon from a revolver to a heavy gun, drive a vehicle from a motor cycle to a heavy tank and handle any kind of boat from a dingy to a tank landing craft. They rule the beach on any landing in enemy territory. Their officer, the beach master, who may be merely a sub lieutenant, is in absolute control of a landing. They land with the very first wave of commandos or assault troops, make a swift 'recce' of the beach to decide whether it was safe for the operation in hand. When the whole area has been surveyed the beach master lies down at the water's edge with his bodyguard alongside him facing inland, and signals in the oncoming craft" (contemporary press report).

HMS Armadillo, training camp for RN Commandos

HMS Armadillo, training camp for RN Commandos

Sydney Compston and RNBC Fox took part in the landings at Algiers and at Sicily. His old ship was not far away. Venomous was escorting HMS Hecla and Vindictive to the invasion beaches at Algiers when Hecla was torpedoed in November 1942 and escorted the liners carrying the troops and their LCT to Augusta in Sicily in July 1943. He returned home on leave and married Wini (Winifred) Brain, the girl he was stepping out with before the war when they both worked at the British Federal Welder and Machine Company in Dudley.

While Venomous, its engines shot, returned to Falmouth for a major refit lasting several months the Royal Navy Commandos prepared for the landing on the Normandy beaches. They trained at HMS Armadillo, a shore base at Ardentinny on Loch Long, Scotland (see right). On 6th June 1944 RNBC Fox was assigned as Beach Masters body guard for Sword beach and Sydney was one of the first people ashore on Queen Red Beach (the eastern end of Sword). The beach master at Sword was a 24 year old lieutenant, later Rear Admiral "Teddy" Gueritz, who organised the flow of 30,000 troops and material into the beachhead on the first day.

Early on in the morning Sydney was badly wounded by machine gun fire. While lying wounded on the beach he witnessed Lord Lovat's piper, Bill Millin, play the Royal Marine Commandos ashore: "Lord Lovat said this was going to be the greatest invasion in the history of warfare and he wanted the bagpipes leading it. He said I was to play and he would worry about the consequences later." Bill Millin walked up and down the beach at the water's edge playing a series of tunes over the noise of battle despite the fact many of his comrades were falling around him. He said he felt so helpless as he walked among the wounded wanting medical help but for Sydney and many other soldiers his playing boosted morale at a critical time. Piper Bill Millin is in the foreground on the right in the MOD photograph of the Royal Marines landing on Queen Red Beach.

The "Wound Certificate" completed by Sub Lt S.E. Willis RNVR of RNBC Fox and signed by its CO, Lt Cdr W.G. Payne SANF, states that: "while crawling up Queen Red beach, Sword Area, they came under machine gun fire. AB S. Compston was hit in the back whereupon he was moved to the beach dressing station, and subsequently evacuated to the UK." For his actions on D-day Sydney was awarded the DSM.

After recovering from his wound he was scheduled to be transferred to the far east but the war ended before that took place. He decided he didn't want to return to his pre-war factory job or work in the family bakery business so he took advantage of a retraining scheme to become a farm worker and moved from his native town of Sedgley to rural Hereford and Worcestershire. Sydney and Wini had two children, Jean and Brian, and had been married for more than sixty years when Wini died last year. Jean lived in France and Brian returned home to look after his elderly parents and drove Sydney to the book launch at the RN Museum in Portsmouth on the 14 April where he was photographed with other veterans of HMS Venomous and HMS Hecla. He died on the 17 November while convalescing in a care home after a fall.