Operation BLACKCOCK was conducted in January 1945 with the objective of liberating the small region to the west of the River Roer. The operational area was mostly in Germany but included small areas of the Netherlands.
The attack on the German town of Heinsberg was conducted towards the end of the overall operation. The 52nd Lowland Division and 4th Battalion Kings Own Scottish Borderers had taken part in a number of previous attacks earlier in the month. During the early stages of the operation, a Divisional soldier, 18-year old Fusilier Dennis Donnini of the 4/5th Royal Scots Fusiliers, posthumously won the Victoria Cross during an attack on the German village of Stein, just to the west of Heinsberg.
I visited the site of the battle in Spring 2003. The text of 'With the Jocks' as well as the lay of the ground made it relatively easy to locate the site of the ordeal suffered by both Peter White's platoon, as well as B Coy HQ. The Klosterhof farm was still in situ as a working farm, the small chapel, and the land upon which B Coy attempted to dig in were readily discernible. At the time of my visit, there also existed the stunted tree line that Peter White seen in Peter White's sketch.
NW Europe
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| Operation BLACKCOCK, January 1945 |
Background
Peter White gives details of the Orders Group for the attack on Heinsberg in 'With the Jocks':
A call came for 'O' group, and I hurried to Company HQ established in a battered house. The plan for the attack was: first, to soften Heinsberg up with a concentrated barrage of heavy, medium and mountain artillery and the ever-present 25-pounders. While this was going on, B and C companies of the 4th KOSB, and the 7th.9th Royal Scots were to flank and surround the town on both sides, our Company, B, going to the left. Finally, at dawn, following a creeping barrage, the rest of the Battalion would clear the town from south to north. Our particular job would be to dig in and prevent the enemy filtering back into the town with reinforcements, and also to deal with any trying to break out of the town.
Heinsberg was a largish place lying on the edge of the valley of the rivers Wurm and Roer, and right under the heavy guns of the Siegfried Line, a fact which we grew to appreciate fully before the acton was over. These, together with plentiful mortars, were to batter us as we had not been battered before in B Company for a solid thirty hours.
Eventually, freezing darkness descended, and with it came the order to move forward. It was the evening of the 23rd. The attack was not due to commence until 2 am the next morning, 24 January 1945, so we had the best part of the night ahead of us to march forward 10 miles over slippery ice and snow-caked roads. (pp.108-109)
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| Advance to Heinsberg from Waldfeucht, based on Peter White's narrative. |
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| 'Snow hike' on 23 January 1945 on the move from Erdbruggerhof farm in preparation for the overnight attack on Heinsberg. |
As alluded to, Peter White's unit is subjected to, at times, quite effective long-range fire from the German Siegfried Line guns during the march to Heinsberg. The guns' uncanny effectiveness is recounted:
Repeatedly, we dropped flat into the snow, a ditch or a doorway. Of the six guns which fired in each salvo, the sixth shell was always the closest. Five shrieks overhead, then with less warning and far louder the sixth vomited a shower of earth about us, leaving a smoking black cavern in the snow. Shaking the snow off with equally explosive curses, the Jocks were on their feet going forward again. It was no place to stop and idle, which to that extent made the process of advancing easier. (pp.112-113)
The approach to the town is accurately recounted in the book and consequently easily traceable when I visited the battlefield in 2003.
As we neared the main road leading into the town, Colin came up with me in front against the advancing tanks, to see 'the form', and dropped Tommy Gray's platoon (now under command of Sgt Dodd Oliver as tommy was on his turn out of battle) at the crossroads. Next Don Urquhart's platoon, also officerless and under Sgt Cowie, crept in against the town on the right while we with Company HQ followed don with the tanks.
Still we had encountered no other opposition than the DF task artillery and mortar fire. Ahead up a slope in the gloom as we crept round the western rim of the town, I could just make out a group of trees and a farm which I knew from the map I had memorised earlier was called Klosterhof. Next to it was another landmark, a little shrine. We had not far to go to get to the objective, and things were going very smoothly.
Just short of the farm, we were to branch off a track to the right and dig in on the edge of the town 300 yards away, while the tanks by-passed the farm and churned steadily on over the fields alongside the Royal Scots, just ahead of us, but somewhere out of sight. Colin was worried that it might not be the right track, but there was only the one on the map and this was right in relation to the shrine, so I took 10 platoon on ahead a bit.
Up with Cpl Allan in the leading section, we had got to within 100 yards of the drainage ditch on the edge of the town when I spotted some twenty or so figures move towards un in the gloom. (p.114-115)
Immediately, while they were on the hop, we got up and moved forward out of the lane into the waste of snow to our left with the intention of digging in along the edge of some gardens bordering open country about 80 yards to the north.
We had covered half the distance out into the field and I was up in the lead with Cpl Beal's section, trying to see if I could locate the nearest section of the Royal Scots who should by now have been digging in 300 yards to our north. (pp.115-116)
We pushed on to the objective with the prisoner stumbling along too at the point of a Jock's rifle, still querulously pleading. I contacted the Royal Scots to establish where they were and let them know our position, then we started to dig in the garden of a house on low ground overlooking the ditch towards Klosterhof farm. This was 250 yards to our west on higher ground and Company HQ was 95 yards south of us in some bushes over a fence. (pp.116-117)
Orientation of the Ground
The account by Peter White gives a good account of where he was approximately dug in. However, there is some ambiguity as to whether the platoon was located in the field, or in the garden. He does states the latter 'we started to dig in the garden of a house on low ground overlooking the ditch towards Klosterhof farm'. But also states his: 'intention of digging in along the edge of some gardens bordering open country about 80 yards to the north'. There is room for manoeuvre for locating his position on either side of the drainage ditch which I recall was the boundary between the farmer's field and the then gardens. The latter is now the site of housing. When I visited the site, I thought the location was actually to the west of the drainage ditch as it better conformed to Peter White's sketch. That said, the sketch itself shows the platoon spread out with Cpl Beal's section located on the other side of a small tree line. So if his position was to the east of the drainage ditch (where housing is now) then Cpl Beal's section would be in the field I took for the main position.
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| Approximate disposition of B Coy, 4 KOSB (GSGS Series 4414, Sheet 4902, 1944) |
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| Approximate disposition overlaid on Google satellite view. |
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| Map of 2003 photograph locations. |
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| Photo 1 |
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| Photo 2: At main road, looking north towards Farm. |
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| Photo 3: Looking NE towards scrub area where Coy HQ was located. |
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| Photo 4: The small white structure is the shrine. Red tiled Klosterhof Farm. |
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| Photo 5: Looking towards town of Lieck, Klosterhof structure at right. |
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| Photo 6: Looking NE the platoon turned right onto the lane at front. |
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| Photo 7: Klosterhof behind, to my left. The view of where 10 Platoon was located. |
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| Photo 8: Same, looking NE towards 7/9 Royal Scots position. |
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| Photo 9: Same, looking SE into the Coy HQ position across the laneway. |
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| Photo 10: Same, look SSE past Coy HQ position towards south end of Heinsberg. |
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| Photo 11: Looking E, approximating German view of 10 Platoon's position. |
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| Photo 12: Similar to photo 11. |
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| Photo 13: Now looking SW towards the shrine; the route into the position. |
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| Photo 14: Looking NNE long field/former gardens boundary towards the Royal Scots position. I noticed the drainage ditch on right edge of photo. |
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| Photo 15: NNW direction, looking onto a possible location of Peter White's platoon. |
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| Photo 16: The view of Klosterhof Farm from Peter White's position. Best approximation to his own sketch. |
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I stitched photos 14, 15, 16 together to give a better appreciation of the field below Klosterhof.
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| Photo 17: Closer detail of Klosterhof Farm. |
We were now feeling very tired and cold and the Jocks had to be chased a bit to dig in to the iron-hard crust of the frozen waterlogged bogland. Their shovels rang like steel to steel on the surface and when eventually after infinite labour we did get to softer peaty soil, we struck water only 14 inches down. Here we had been ordered to dig, so if trouble came we would have to make the most of it, lying full length in icy water, barely below the surface.Just then, when we were only partly dug in, a sudden fiendish volley of shells shrieked into eruption right among us. In the flashing light of explosion and confusion of the contrasting darkness, those of us who had a hole, having used up time on contacting the Royal Scots and in fixing the positions, so I lay in a shallow scoop I had started against some earth Pte Neal had excavated beside me. The whole position was blanketed with a haze of flashes, the most appalling noise, blast and smoke. It was our own 25-pounders putting down a concentrated barrage right onto us and about 350 yards short of the rim of the target on which they should have been falling. As fast as one salvo landed and the stunning concussion of the blast had rippled out, another batch of shells could be heard shrieking in on top. To know that these were our own shells put one's mind in a mental turmoil of desperate conflict, anger and amazement. Immediately between the crash and shriek of hurtling pandemonium came the new heart-rending sounds of groaning and piteous cries for stretcher bearers in agonised weakening voices.Glancing along the ground through the acrid smoke and pattering debris I wondered why Pte Neal was apparently not trying to take proper cover in his hole. Then I realised he was dead. He had been hit in the head by shrapnel from a shell which had cratered a shallow scoop in the frozen earth between us, carrying away part of the parapet he had been building round his hole. Beyond him another shell had crumpled and killed Pte Allaway in his first action after recently joining us as a replacement. Another couple of groaning men jerking and rolling in uncontrolled movement and injury I recognised to be Pte Mackay and Pte Barclay. who seemed desperately hit. The stretcher bearers had joined us, scrambling about frantically on hands and knees and throwing themselves flat as each salvo shrieked in. They were doing a wonderful job under terrifying conditions. Pte Barclay was rolled onto a stretcher and dragged back over the snow but unhappily did not survive the journey to the RAP. Company HQ were also being shelled and one of their chaps was hit and died later.
How long this hell lasted I could only guess but it seemed a good half hour before there was a pause. All this time I was staggered that Colin had apparently not been able to get contact with the artillery link on his radio to get the gunners to lift their range into the rim of the town. I have never yet found out exactly what happened as before I was to have a chance to see Colin again, Company HQ were themselves nearly wiped out. Surely, I wondered, these couldn't be enemy shells. The rapidity of their fire, the calibre and the direction from which they were arriving from the west all seemed to indicate our 25-pounders. Meanwhile. I became conscious of the deeper thudding of medium shells pounding the town to our rear. At the least pause we were digging in like madmen, but again a sudden approaching multiple shriek, this time it seemed from a slightly more northerly direction heralded the arrival of more shells slap on us, along the line of the ditch bordering the edge of the town and up towards the Royal Scots.
We grovelled frantically, shivering with cold and fear while trying to mould our bodies deeper into the 4 inches of freezing water and mud and snow as hell blossomed about us again. Very few of us were properly below the surface of the waterlogged frozen bogland as to go deeper merely meant lying submerged in bone-numbing soup of ice, snow and water. A stunning blast of explosion on the opposite side of me from Neal's body revealed the unhurt but badly shaken and stunned face of Ptes Learmonth and Wardale. They gazed towards me with a dazed, wide-eyed look of fright as their much-spattered beings appeared through the thinning smoke debris of a shell that had missed them by the length of a billiard cue. (pp.117-118)
The friendly fire was only the beginning. After a crewman from a broken down Sherman was shot nearby, it became evident to Peter White that the Germans held Klosterhof farm, totally dominating their position.
I was staggered to realise at that moment that the fire had obviously come from Klosterhof farm where either the enemy had been all the time or he had filtered back from Lieck village after the tanks had passed it. From then, about 6.45 am, right on until dusk, absolute hell with fiendish intensity lay in store for us. Klosterhof looked down right into our positions from its hill 250 yards away and we had seldom, if ever, been less able to dig in. Even so, it was only in stages that we began fully to appreciate what we were up against, and that not entirely until the place was eventually taken after two attacks 24 hours later. It was then found that a strong group of determined enemy were installed there with five Spandau machine guns, three 5cm mortars, a dozen or so rifles, loads of ammunition . . . and, perhaps worst of all, had been using the farm as an artillery observation post from which land lines. ran. back direct to the guns, including the heaviest, of the Siegfried Line. (p.121)
B Company Headquarters was in a very similar situation with the German automatic and mortar fire.
Cries of agony, groans and yells for stretcher bearers came from Company HQ, telling that they were being hit badly. I recognised one voice to be Capt John Elliot's but could not make out if he was in pain. 'Call on the 38 set for you to go to Company HQ as quick as you can Surr', the radio operator croaked to me. (pp.127-128)
After leaving the scarce shelter of his shell scrape, Peter White eventually made the 95 yards to Company HQ, aided by intermittent smoke shells to obscure the German fire.
The low bushes that surrounded the slit trenches of Company HQ had caused the mortars to burst in the air and spread down a lethal hail of metal. The scene which confronted me fully explained both why I had been summoned so urgently and why the message which had come from the Company HQ radio operator had been so nakedly direct and unorthodox in phrase. LCpl Leitch the signaller was crumpled, grey in the face and sprinkled with debris over his 18 set radio, weakly, almost in a coma, calling the artillery for smoke shells. The lower half of his body was a mass of blood and torn clothing with one leg very nearly severed at the hip by a large piece of shrapnel. CSM Pook was hunched, groaning on his side, his face the same smoke-blasted pale shade as the snow and too weak to sit up. He had evidently been hit severely in the thigh or buttocks. Maj Colin Hogg had been hit equally badly, apparently in the chest and lungs, and like the other two was so weak with his wounds and concussive shock that he was on the verge of delirium. He seemed to be only keeping conscious by a painful effort but gave a slight sign of recognition as I crashed, gasping for breath, into the shallow, crumbling scoop in the earth in which they lay. I was very distressed to see Capt John Elliot lying flat, face in the earth of the trench, sprinkled with broken twigs and snow. (p.130)
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| Stitched photos 9 & 10: location of Coy HQ to S of 10 Platoon's position. |
Capt John Elliot was killed in the action at Heinsberg and was buried the in the nearby Sittard War Cemetery.
John was a fine courteous chap who was very conscientious in everything he did. The Company would not seem the same without him. My thoughts kept going back to his wife and little girls at home and I felt quite numb and nauseated with the stupidity and waste of war. (pp.133-134)
I was intrigued and even a bit elated to realise then, and a little later when more and heavier artillery crashed into our positions, that putting my trust in God on the first trip had, despite its ordeal, marked the overcoming of fear to a considerable extent and all sense of worry over the responsibility which had so suddenly descended on me in this action. In no time I found myself sprawling breathlessly back in my old mud scoop and feeling almost warm in spite of the icy water seeping seeping through my clothes from the puddle in which I lay. (p.134)
Shortly thereafter, 10 platoon is subjected another barrage:
Despite the furious concussion and fearful noise I became astonished to know that for the first time I was conscious of moments of complete freedom from fear. Partly I thought that this novel feeling might have been explained by having eluded death so often that day, but gradually as this new experience continued I became aware with elation that fear had met its match by my putting my trust in the one concept on which fear could not intrude. I was yet to find, however, that this wonderful state of mind had not been attained once and for all, but had to be fought for with varied degrees of success in each action, according to the balance with which one credited all power to God or shared this dominion with the clamour of fear and materiality. How hard I found it later to sufficiently remember this inspiration. (p.135)
The assault by 4 KOSB through Heinsberg was successful. Soon, artillery was brought to bear on the German held farm:
To our delight we saw the face of Klosterhof farm erupt in plumes of black smoke, red brick dust, and rubble... (p.136)
The remains of 10 platoon and Coy HQ eventually sheltered in a nearby house. Klosterhof farm was subjected to an attack by both passing Crocodile flame-throwers then, later in the evening, by the KOSB Carrier platoon. The wounded were slowly evacuated to the rear and the survivors spent a cold night huddled against the cold.
At about 8 in the morning the ration party at last reached us, and as things seemed pretty peaceful I decided to risk the smoke being seen in lighting the fire in the back room of our wrecked house to cook up some Spam and beans to go with our army biscuits and an unbelievably welcome cup of steaming tea. One could not help reflecting that the extra rations we were eating really belonged to the unreal, wax-like figures of the dead stacked outside the window in the yard; or that so easily any of the weary, grey-faced chaps clustered round the warm stove restoring their warmth and life might have been in that silent company outside instead. Life seemed to have so departed from known values as to be totally unreal. The thought kept coming to mind: how many minutes, hours or days might pass before yet more of these familiar faces flickering with humour, hopes and fears might pass away to be replaced, then replaced again by others, each perhaps equally hopeful of 'getting through' and believing that it was another who would 'get it'. To those of us who had managed to survive on this knife tip against the grindstone, the irresistible process of elimination seemed to suggest a future too heavily loaded against one to contemplate seriously.At about 1000 hours the Padre arrived in a carrier with some stretcher bearers for the sad task of taking away our dead, those forms, faces and hands so familiar to us, yet now so different as to seem to have no connection at all with the hearty, lively friends we had come to know and like so well. (p.143)
Subsequently, on my recommendation Leitch got a well-earned award of the DCM, and Sgt Dickinson another notch nearer his MM. He earned this not for any one action, but for his solid, unshakable behaviour in a long succession of them. He had landed with, I think, the Green Howards on D-Day, to be eventually transferred to us as a replacement. He survived with sanity, efficiency and intactness almost every action until the war ended. (p.132)
Lance Corporal Leitch's citation for the Distinguished Conduct Medal:
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| IWM B 14109 |
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| IWM B 14110 |
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| IWM B 14111 |
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| RAF Wratting Common website |
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| Getty |
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| EPA |
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| Wikimedia |
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| Wikimedia |
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