View source for 1st Tyneside Scottish December 1943

1st Battalion Tyneside Scottish
War Diary December 1943

2nd December 1943 SOUTHWOLD.

Major D.N. Nicol assumed command of the Battalion.

6th – 8th December 1943

Exercise “DISCOVER” was held.  The supporting documentation for the exercise was filed with the War Diary – for details see below.

10th December 1943

Exercise “BAKER” was held – this was a Field Firing Exercise to practise the Company in the Attack, with the support of Tanks, Artillery and Mortars.  No supporting documentation appears to have survived about this exercise.

10th – 11th December 1943

A visit was made to the battalion by the Divisional Commander.

11th December 1943

Lt Col A.J.H. Cassels re-assumed command of the Battalion.

11th December onwards

Company training and specialist courses were held – Signals, Medical, Intelligence, Motor Transport and Pioneer.

23rd December 1943

Christmas Orders of the Day were issued by Major-General E.H. Barker C.B.E., D.S.O., M.C. and Brigadier P.P. King.

24th December 1943

Christmas Greeting were sent to Her Majesty the Queen (Colonel in Chief of the Black Watch), General Sir Arthur Wauchope (Colonel of the Regiment), Colonel J.R. Hall (Honorary Colonel of the Battalion) and the Officer Commanding the Queen’s Barracks, PERTH.

31st December 1943

Lt Col A.J.H. Cassels left the Battalion to take up another appointment.

Appendices attached to the 1st Tyneside Scottish War Diary for December 1943.

Exercise “DISCOVER”.

Only a limited portion of the papers for this exercise were filed with the War Diary – these were the Administrative Instructions, the Movement Instruction to reach the Concentration Area and the trace of the Unit locations within the Concentration Area.

The diagram of the Unit locations within the Concentration Area is set out below from the War Diary file at The National Archives – this is also a useful guide to the make-up of the Brigade Group.

The papers containing the basis for the exercise were not included in the 1st Tyneside Scottish file but can be consulted in more depth within the 70th Brigade War Diary.

The Administrative Instruction set out that the RASC were supplying 16 3-ton lorries to the Battalion as Troop Carriers.  Companies were told to accommodate the RASC Drivers and Motorcyclists accompanying the vehicles.  Almost all the Battalion’s own vehicles were to be loaded with their full War Loads for the purposes of the exercise.

The number of men taking part in the exercise was to be limited to the Battalion’s War Establishment.

Detailed arrangements were set out for rations and meals.  The Order of March for the Battalion set out the detailed make-up of seven vehicle groups – lead by the Carrier Platoon.

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