262929 Pte. John William Fisher British Army 1st Btn. Cheshire Regiment from:Malpas This was my father, who was born on the 26th May 1921. He was from Cheshire and enlisted in the 1st Cheshire Regiment in 1938, I believe. I am his eldest daughter.
He served in North Africa under Field Marshal Montgomery. I remember him telling me a story about how he hid under a petrol tank he was driving for three days whilst the Germans were bombing his Army unit. He told me about Egypt and the camels there. He was also in Malta for 3 years, surrounded by Germans u-boats and under bombardment by the Italians. I am led to believe that he returned to Britain for a few months in 1944, when he met my mother. He was then sent to Germany to serve as an Army scout on a motorbike, a lookout for the Cheshire Regiment. He found German villagers to be quite friendly. His horror story was that he was with the 1st Cheshires when they helped liberate the Bergen Belsen concentration camp. I know he was there – he told me so – but he wouldn’t talk of the horrors he witnessed.
My father was a cruel man to me as a child, using the buckle strap on me regularly. He was also very cruel to animals. My mother told me that he suffered from shell-shock and could not help how he was with me with his vile temper. As a child, and also as an adult, I was afraid of him. Now that I’m older and have researched and read about my father’s war I forgive him and realise that he went through a lot of horror. I now not only forgive him, I am also very proud of him and his service with the 1st Cheshires during the war. God bless all who served in that war.
I know that my father came out of the Army in 1945, sooner than he was supposed to have done, but he wanted to marry my mother. So he had a choice to work on the farm or in the coal mines. He chose farm life. This was the only specification he had on leaving the Army early: he had no choice in his job.
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