Synopsis
I first became interested in the US Army's 504 Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR) 82nd Airborne Division when my partner's brother-in-law, a former US Marine and 1st Gulf War veteran who is very interested in military history, invited me to get involved in a living history re-enactment of a small part of the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions drop into Normandy on the night of the 5th/6th of June 1944. It seemed like a good idea at the time...I have served with the Royal Air Force and the Territorial Army (6(v) Battalion, Royal Anglian Regiment), so have something of a military background. I'd been interested in World War 2 and the 1940s for some time, having been to a number of D-Day 60th Anniversary commemorative events during the summer of 2004.We were also, by complete coincidence, going to be on holiday in the region at a time that this particular event had been planned - it was organised by the owner of the French gite (holiday cottage) at which we were to stay. I decided that a little digging for information was called for, just so I would have some idea of the background to the operation and the units involved (this soon became quite a large excavation, as these things have a habit of doing, hence the book you are reading now!). It didn't take me long to discover that units of the 82nd Airborne Division had been billeted all over my home county of Leicestershire during the period, and that the 504 PIR in particular had actually been billeted at Shady Lane, Evington (although it would appear - until now - little has been written about this period of their WW2 history).This was only about a mile from where I was born and spent my childhood and early teenage years. I lived in Oadby, a village just south of Evington in Leicestershire, and used to spend many happy and exciting hours during the long school summer holidays playing adventurous games of war in and around what we imaginatively knew as "Ghost Town". In reality, these old derelict Nissen huts and buildings had once been part of RAF Leicester East Airfield at nearby Stoughton. (My father had been an Air Cadet with the local Air Training Corps 1461 Squadron during the war, and remembers vividly hanging around the airfield in their uniforms, scrounging joy rides from the "Yanks" in the C47 Dakota's that operated out of there at the time. The airfield still exists today and is home to the Leicester Aero Club - where my father learned to fly back in the 1960s - and a go-karting club, amongst other organisations).It was only natural then, that I should represent a trooper from the 504 during the re-enactment in Normandy. The only problem was, as my investigations soon revealed, the 504 (as a unit) didn't take part in the D-Day operation, although a small number were involved as security details attached to the pathfinders for the 507 and 508 PIR. So pathfinder security I would have to be...This book is not essentially a military history; there are lots of excellent publications that do justice to the 504 PIR's fine combat record during the Second World War. What I have attempted to do is to tell the story of the five-month period in 1944 when the men of the 504 PIR, battered and bruised from campaigns in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, found themselves neighbours - and in a lot of cases good friends - to the villagers of Evington, Stoughton and Oadby in Leicestershire, England. It is dedicated to all those who served with the 504 Parachute Infantry Regiment during World War Two.
by William Guarnere
