Maj. John Arthur Sheppard
British Army Royal Signals
from:Chislehurst, Kent
My father Jack Sheppard was a telecommunications engineer who worked for the Post Office and later BT. He studied electrical engineering at Kings College London with sponsorship from the army, and during WWII he served in Egypt.
He didn't talk much about that time, although he had fond memories of the Egyptian and Palestinian people, and a cafe in Cairo called El Fishawi. Of the few stories he told us, I remember, one concerned a retreat by the British Army, during which he had to maintain the communications post and destroy it after everyone else had left, using devices whose premature explosion permanently altered his hairline. Another was an advance, when he had to set up the communications post after an enemy retreat. He entered what he thought was an empty building and found about a dozen Italian officers having a meal. He took out his revolver, which contained six shots, and prepared to defend himself. Instead he had to accept the surrender of the officers. I believe one or both of these events happened in Benghazi. Finally, he told us that he had been asked to conduct the British invasion of Turkey. He was provided with one tank, on a tank transporter, a fuel tanker and his own vehicle, and set off through Palestine. Before he could complete this mission, he was advised that political circumstances had changed and told not to invade Turkey.
After he died, we found his regimental sword and a call-up letter from King George VI. Besides telecommunications he was a mountain climber and one of the world's first cave divers.
