Fireman John Sheldon Wesley "A" Clark
National Fire Service
from:22 Hawthorn Cottages, South Hetton, County Durham
Like most of the young men in the village, my Dad, Sheldon Clark, was a miner at South Hetton Colliery. Nevertheless, he joined the AFS and "did his bit" whilst continuing to do his duties underground; I believe he was at this time a "shot firer", which entailed driving "roadways" underground by means of drilling holes and packing them with explosives. He never told me details of any fires; South Hetton is a long way from Germany, Denmark and Norway and had only one target worth mentioning (the coal mine with its associated railway installations) and, with one exception, never attracted the attention of the Luftwaffe. There were, however, two incidents which he did mention.
The first occurred one night when the rig (which I believe was a van towing a trailer) was called out to the nearby village of Murton. There was (and still is) no direct road, so the van was driven at high speed in the blackout through the village of Easington Lane, where it turned off for Murton, which was to be reached via a notorious right-angle bend known as "Tattenham Corner". I believe the name has some significance to race goers. The night was dark, the illumination fron the van's lights was poor and the speed was excessive. Inevitably, at Tattenham Corner, the rig left the road. Fortunately, damage and injuries (apart from to their pride) were slight. What about the fire? Dad never said, but I assume it was attended to by a crew from one of the neighbouring towns.
The second incident did involve Dad personally. One night he was on his way home, whether from work or the decrepit shed where the fire rig was housed, I cannot recall. Dad was walking behind a couple of colleagues who were deep in conversation. He heard an aircraft approach and looked up to see a couple of parachutes heading his way. The two in front of him were completely oblivious; correctly surmising the 'chutes were attached to land mines rather than to Fallschirmjaeger, he jumped on the two unsuspecting lads, knocking them to the ground, and told them to keep still. The first projectile hit the railway embankment, causing some damage but the earthwork protected the three young men sheltering on the other side. The second fell further away, in some allotments behind a street of houses (Fallowfield Terrace, for those familiar with the area).
Expecting carnage amongst the chickens he knew to be kept there, Dad went to investigate the outcome. Surprisingly, however, despite the drogue effect of the parachute, the land mine had sunk deep into the boggy ground before going of, with the result that almost all of the explosive force had been directed harmlessly upwards and, like the humans involved, most of the chickens had got away with it (I'm tempted to say "by the skin of their teeth", but I'll try not to).
