Edwin (Bob) Robert Pinches
1st Battalion Herefordshire Regiment (1939-1946)
Edwin Pinches (Maureen Edwards Collection)
Edwin was the son of Henry Edwin Pinches and the nephew of Stanley Pinches and known by all as Bob.
During the 1st World War both his father and uncle had served on the Western Front. His father, wounded at Ypres, had returned to the UK a broken man while his uncle, Stanley, who is commemorated on the Pembridge War Memorial, was killed in action in 1917 on the Belgian coast. Henry’s grandfather, as well as being a coal merchant, owned Townsend Farm, Pembridge where his two sons had been farm workers.
Henry “Pop” Pinches Stanley Pinches
(Maureen Edwards Collection)
In the 1911 census, Pop, Bob’s father, was residing with his family at Bridge Street, Pembridge. It was here that Bob spent his childhood attending the local village school.
Bob Pinches’s family home, Bridge Street (black & white house on the left)
After leaving school, he became an apprentice baker at The Olde Steppes and was still practicing that trade in 1939.
During the spring of 1939, the deteriorating international situation had forced the British government under Neville Chamberlain to consider preparations for a possible war against Nazi Germany. Plans for limited conscription applying to single men aged between 20 and 22 were given parliamentary approval in the Military Training Act in May 1939. This required men to undertake six months' military training, and some 240,000 registered for service.
Bob Pinches enlisted in the 1st Battalion, Herefordshire Regiment which was a Territorial Regiment.
Bob Pinches’s attestation (Maureen Edwards Collection)
“When war was declared the Battalion had just returned from Annual camp. The Battalion concentrated in Hereford as part of 159th (Welsh Border) Brigade, 53rd (Welsh) Division and commenced a long and varied period of training, which was to continue until the Battalion was committed to action in Normandy on 13th June 1944. The Battalion started with a strong nucleus of territorials and was quickly brought up to war establishment by drafts of militiamen and recruits.” (1)
The German invasion of Norway and Denmark in April 1940 made raids against Northern Ireland, if not a full-scale invasion, possible, and it became essential that the troops in Northern Ireland should be reinforced. The threat of invasion became more real after the Dunkirk evacuation. There was also the possibility of Irish Republican action which in some areas was sympathetic to Germany. Given this, elements of 53rd Div had been sent to Northern Ireland in Autumn 1939 and were reinforced with the remainder of the Division. (2)
From 19th June 1940 until 9th May 1941, the battalion was stationed at Castlewellan where it spent a most uncomfortable time under canvas.
It was at Castlewellan that Bob Pinches met his wife, Lois, a Scots girl.
In May 1942,159th Infantry Brigade was taken out of 53rd (Welsh) Division to combine with 29th Armoured Brigade and form 11th Armoured Division. The creation of the latter was part of the British Army's answer to the success of the German Army's panzer divisions in the previous years. During the invasion of Poland in September 1939 then in Western Europe in the Netherlands, Belgium and France in mid-1940, the German armoured elements had clearly displayed new tactics and methods of fighting. The Allied Forces now had to address those developments in Europe.
The battalion’s activities from autumn 1939 to the prelude to D-Day are best summed up by Major Hesketh (1stBattalion Herefordshire Regiment)
‘ As a Battalion we wore down the Mountains of Mourne; as a Battalion we exercised in the Potteries, on the Downs, on the battle areas of Suffolk and over the Wolds of Yorkshire. Finishing touches to training were applied at Inverary in Scotland and street fighting at West Ham. It was a severe and unrelenting grind but it all made its mark……… After all this drilling, grilling, sorting and shuffling, the Battalion was a first class unit. Trained to the finger tips, where the principles of Infantry/Armour cooperation had been absorbed by everybody down to the all important private soldier. Morale was high and each unit’s esprit de corps was merged into an ‘Esprit de Bull’ (3)
The 159th Brigade landed in Normandy, as part of Operation Overlord on Juno Beach on 13th June 1944, seven days after the initial D-Day landings on 6th June 1944.
During the Battle for Caen the brigade took part in Operation Epsom (26th-30th June). The offensive was intended to outflank and seize the German-occupied city of Caen which had been an important Allied objective in the early stages of Operation Overlord.
An ammunition carrier of the British 11th Armoured Division explodes after it is hit by a mortar round during Operation Epsom, Battle of Caen 26 June 1944 (Wikipedia)
In mutually costly fighting over the following two days, a foothold was secured across the River Odon and efforts were made to expand this, by capturing tactically valuable points around the salient. By 30th June, after German counterattacks, some of the British forces across the river were withdrawn and the captured ground consolidated, bringing the operation to a close.
Operation Epsom, conceived by Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Bernard Montgomery did not achieve its objective of a breakout of Normandy despite the huge losses incurred.
“Then the 159th Brigade took part in Operation Goodwood. Planning and execution errors, coupled with strong German defences, led to a tactical British defeat. Goodwood was cancelled on 20th July, with the 11th Armoured Division being withdrawn from the front line to rest and refit. In only two days of fighting, it had lost 126 tanks. Many casualties were suffered by both sides.” (Wikipedia)
Soldiers of 1st Welsh Guards in action near Cagny during Operation Goodwood, July 1944 (Wikipedia)
“159th Brigade’s next engagement was Operation Bluecoat (30th July – 7th August 1944). “The geographical objectives of the attack were to secure the key road junction of Vire and the high ground of Mont Pinçon. Strategically, the attack was made to support the American exploitation of their break-out on the western flank of the Normandy beachhead” https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Operation_Bluecoat
Universal carriers and infantry of the 15th (Infantry) Scottish Division move forward during Operation Bluecoat, 30th July 1944 (Wikipedia)
Though Operation Bluecoat failed to create a breakout, it kept German armoured units fixed on the British eastern front and continued the wearing down of the strength of German armoured formations in the area. By the time of the American breakout at Avranches, there was little to no reserve strength left for their effort at a counter-attack. The static defense that Hitler imposed upon his army in Normandy coupled with the Allied domination of the skies during the day had resulted in a large entrapment of German forces at the Falaise Gap.
“The Falaise pocket or Battle of the Falaise pocket (12–21 August 1944) was the decisive engagement of the Battle of Normandy in the Second World War.
Wrecked enemy vehicles in The Falaise Gap (Australian War Museum)
Allied forces formed a pocket around Falaise, Calvados, in which German Army Group B, with the 7th Army and the Fifth Panzer Army (formerly Panzergruppe West) were encircled by the Western Allies.
Germans surrendering in St Lambert, Falaise on 19th August 1944 (Wikipedia)
The battle resulted in the destruction of most of Army Group B west of the Seine, which opened the way to Paris and the Franco-German border.
Once the battle for the Falaise gap was over, the 11th Armoured Division liberated L'Aigle on 23rd August and crossed the Seine on 30th August. After a night move, and an unprecedented advance of 60 miles in one day, the fastest and deepest penetration into enemy territory ever made until the Gulf War in the early 1990s, the division liberated Amiens on 1st September. The 11th Armoured Division then turned northward to Belgium and captured the city of Antwerp on 4th September.” (Wikipedia)
Liberation of Antwerp by 11th Armoured Division, 4th September 1944 (IWM)
Two days later, the 11th Armoured Division tried to establish a bridgehead over the Albert Canal, but the attempt, due to intense enemy fire, was not successful.
A British tank crossing the Albert Canal by Bailey Bridge, whilst refugees make their way back into a safer area, 1944 (NAM)
After this failure, 11th Armoured Division had to cross much further to the east at Beringen.
Above photo: Beeringen Bridge, Albert Canal
The 11th Armoured Division later took part in The Battle of the Bulge (16th December- 25th January 1944), a German offensive intended to stop Allied use of the Belgian port of Antwerp and to split the Allied lines, allowing the Germans to encircle and destroy each of the four Allied armies and force the western Allies to negotiate a peace treaty in the Axis powers' favor.
The Germans committed over 410,000 men, just over 1,400 tanks and armored fighting vehicles, 2,600 artillery pieces, and over 1,000 combat aircraft. Between 63,000 and 104,000 of these men were killed, missing, wounded in action, or captured. The battle severely depleted Germany's armored forces, which remained largely unreplaced throughout the remainder of the war. It was here that Bob Pinches skinned a rabbit and used the fur to make a pair of socks.
Soon thereafter, the 11th Armoured Division pushed forward into the German-occupied Netherlands. As 159th Brigade drove into Germany, the brigade occupied the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp on 15th April 1945, pursuant to a 12th April agreement with the retreating Germans to surrender the camp peacefully. When the 159th Brigade entered the camp, they found more than 60,000 emaciated and ill prisoners in desperate need of medical attention.
More than 13,000 corpses in various stages of decomposition lay littered around the camp. Elements of the 11th Armoured Division and its higher formations were detached to oversee the work needed in the camp.
A mass grave at Bergen-Belsen soon after the liberation of the camp. Bergen-Belsen, Germany, May 1945 (United States Memorial Museum)
In March 1945, the 11th Armoured Division crossed the Rhine River and by the end of the war had advanced to the northeast and captured the German city of Lübeck on 2 May 1945.
11th Armoured Division moving through Lubeck 5th May 1945 (IWM)
“After Hitler’s suicide on the 30 April and the German surrender on 8 May 1945, Germany was in total chaos. Grand Admiral Doenitz had been nominated by Hitler as his successor and formed a 'puppet' government and established it in a German Naval barracks in Flensberg. The Allies at first thought this was a good move with a compliant German government being able to bring order to Germany and the Government was initially condoned by the British authorities. It was soon realized, however, that the Doenitz administration was not particularly efficient, and that dangerous hard line Nazi elements existed within it.”
In consequence Op (Operation) Blackout was conceived, the object of which was to liquidate the 'puppet' government and the OKW1 administration, with a single stroke. 1st Battalion Herefordshire Regiment was to carry out this operation in conjunction with 1st Battalion Cheshire Regiment and 15th/19th Hussars, all units of 11th Armoured Division. Each unit was provided with a long list of 'wanted' persons, divided into four categories according to their importance. The two infantry battalions were to search for and arrest these people, while 15th/19th Hussars were to assist in sealing off the area to prevent any people escaping.”
More than 13,000 corpses in various stages of decomposition lay littered around the camp. Elements of the 11th Armoured Division and its higher formations were detached to oversee the work needed in the camp. (5)
Admiral Karl Dönitz is arrested in Flensburg, Germany by British soldiers on May 23, 1945. Courtesy of the Imperial War Museum
“The operation was a complete success, as the Germans had been taken completely by surprise, and during the day a total of 756 arrests were made, among them many Nazi high officials.”
The next 14 months involved Occupation duties, as well as preparing men for demob. In January 1946, 11th Armoured Division was disbanded. 159 Brigade returned to 53rd Division then stationed in Krefeld. In July, the Battalion was placed in suspended animation. (6)
After his demobilisation, Bob Pinches settled in Castlewellan with his wife, Lois. Here he opened a cafe and bakery and was involved with the local soccer club. castlewellan.org/book/6.html
The house that Bob and his wife resided in was renamed Louvain after one of the Belgian towns that the 1stHerefordshire Regiment had helped liberate.
In the early 1980s, he returned to Pembridge where he died in 1980 at the age of 61.
Sources
1/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/wars/wwii/
2/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/wars/wwii/
3/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/uploads/3-the-build-up-1939-1944-the-1st-battalion.pdf
4/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/uploads/b1-op-blackout.pdf
5/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/uploads/b1-op-blackout.pdf
6/ https://herefordshirelightinfantrymuseum.com/history/ww2/
7/ www.castlewellan.org/book/6.html
