Hello and welcome to Family Stories, the podcast written by you, our listeners.

This week's Family Stories take us from the horrors of the Italian campaign to mapping

the war on through a trumpeters time at Bledchdy Park and seeing Coventry Burn. We begin

this week with this from Liz Coward, dear Alan James. This is the story of William Earl

who sadly passed away last year. William was a nursing orderly in the 214th Field Ambulance.

In September 1943 he took part in the invasion of mainland Italy. This is his account.

We were due to go in at 0r plus 25. As the time approached we sailed as close as possible

to Sugar Beach. When we stopped the ramp splashed down a major doogles shattered go. There

were 18 of us led by Sergeant Abley. We jumped into the water with our first aid kits and

extra supplies. We sprinted onto the beach as fast as we could. The moment we cleared

the bridge had Sergeant Abley yelled dig in. Around us infantrymen were crushing to the

ground dead or injured. We had to wait until there was a lull in the naval bombardment

before we could go out. The moment there was Sergeant Abley told us to deal with what

wounded we could see. Some men just needed a bit of help to get up and moving again.

If someone had a leg wound we'd use his field dressing to make a tourniquet to stop the

bleeding. If the wound was too big we'd rip his trousers and use whatever came to hand.

For those that couldn't walk Frank and I would link our wrists together to make a chair.

As long as a man could put his arms around us we could move him out of danger. Sometimes

the men were in such a dangerous position we had to get them somewhere safe before we

could even start treating them. Once we'd done that we'd leave them and find another

casualty. We eventually ended up at a farm and Frank and I sheltered in a trench between

two rows of plum tomatoes and grapes. We feasted on them as we watched the landing craft

...