Photos WW2 British & Commonwealth Forces

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19 August 1941 Australian infantry return from a patrol near the Tobruk perimeter

August 1941 Australian troops occupy a front line position at Tobruk.

 

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Infantry from B Company, Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders pushing through St. Lambert-sur-Dive. The obliterated Panzer IV on the right was destroyed by infiltrating Highlanders sneaking through houses & lobbing a charge into an open hatch.

 

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RAAF Pilot Rowell after crash landing A-20 Mk III A28-8 Code DU-J 22sqn 1943.

DB-7B Boston Mark III "J is for Jessica" has since been restored to static condition and can be seen on display at the RAAF Museum Point Cook in Victoria.

 

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Officer uses a disabled a German ‘Goliath’ tracked mine as a desk for dispensing pay to RAF personnel; Normandy; July 1944.

 

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RAF Polish pilot after training prang, Spitfire IXe or XVIe, late war '45

 

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Ship's company of the destroyer HMCS Gatineau, St. John's, Newfoundland, 21 August 1943

 

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OTD in 1944, France. Men from Green Howards Regiment

OTD 1944, L'Aigle, France. French civilians assisting British troops clearing a road.

OTD in 1944, Lisieux, France. A column of Cromwell and Sherman tanks from 1 Royal Tank Regiment.

 

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OTD in 1944, Amendola airfield, Italy. Crew members from 31 Squadron SAAF (Sth African Air Force) B-24s which took part in resupplying during the Warsaw Uprising. In dropping their loads under 500 feet over drop-zones in the middle of the city, the squadron suffered heavy losses.

 

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23 Aug 1940, Gorleston. King George VI inspecting men from 155 Brigade Reconnaissance Group.

23 Aug 1942, North Africa. Winston Churchill greeting men from 4 Queen's Own Hussars.

 

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Around this day in 1944, troopers Davies and Walden from 6 Airborne Recce shot down two German fighter planes with this captured SdKfz 10/4 20mm anti-aircraft gun

 

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1st September 1941. British gunners, manning German 149mm guns captured from the Italians, playing a game of darts at Tobruk

 

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Summer 1941. Australian anti-aircraft gun in action at Tobruk during an air raid at night. Gun flashes provide the only lighting for this photograph.

 

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Tobruk, August 1941. Australian soldiers standing by in a hot section of the front, 400 yards from the enemy. Many forward posts like this are/ were isolated during the daylight hours

This photograph was reproduced in the unit history 'Purple and blue: the history of the 2/10th Battalion' published in 1958. The men were identified in the unit history as, front to rear: VX35964 Private (Pte) William John Goodgame', VX36671 Pte Gordon James Watkins and SX1412 Pte Charles George Stening'. All three were promoted to the rank of Lance Corporal during their service. Lance Corporals Goodgame and Watkins were killed in action at Buna, Papua, on 24 December 1942. This image gives a clear impression a clear impression of the exposed nature of their position and the cramped conditions under which they operated. Charlie Stenning was a well known identity in the 2nd/10th Battalion Association after the War, Bill Goodgame in the foreground is clearly not planning to withdraw; he has no boots on! He is armed with a Thompson sub machine gun. AWM 009514 Image by George Silk

 

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Morotai, Netherlands East Indies. 9 April 1945. Pilots of No. 457 'Grey Nurse' Squadron RAAF pose for the camera in front of one of their Supermarine Spitfires

 

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Avro Lancasters of No. 514 Squadron RAF, lined up at Waterbeach, Cambridgeshire, before taking part in a daylight attack on fortified villages east of Caen, in support of the Second Army's armoured offensive in Normandy. July 1944

 

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Painted by fitter, 16528 Leading Aircraftman Jack Ronald Clifford Featherby of Sydney, NSW. The 'Desert Harassers' of No 450 (Kittyhawk) Squadron, RAAF, have adopted as an insignia during operations over Sicily and Italy in 1943. Possibly painted on a "flight" of P-40s.

This image is 401283 Flying Officer (later Flight Lieutenant), Humphrey Arthur Cecil (Slim) Jowett of 450 Squadron, RAAF, at Kairouan, Tunisia, 1943. He enlisted January 1941 and discharged October 1945

 

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OTD in 1943, the BBC sent war correspondent Wynford Vaughan-Thomas (right) and sound engineer Reg Pidsley (left) on a bombing raid over Berlin in Lancaster "F for Freddy".

This aircraft, from 207 Squadron, was shot down over its target on 6th January, 1944 on a mission to Stettin (now Szczecin) in Poland, with the loss of the entire crew. Those who flew with Vaughn-Thomas were not on board - all except one of them survived the war.

 

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Men of the BEF being transported from Cherbourg to their assembly area in a railway goods wagon, 29 September 1939

 

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Australian troops wearing heavy greatcoats against the desert cold advance into Bardia in January 1941.

 

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Mortar crew of the London-Irish Rifles, Italy 1945.