Lance Corporal, Trooper Roy Merrett

Roy was Major Bloods gunner / operator.  Bert Crane recalls how he stood in for Roy while he was unwell with flu during one week in action.  Bert Loveridge was their driver.  While not mentioned by name, Roy would have been involved in actions described below, as the gunner for Major Blood.

Information from Roy’s family suggests that he was not with the regiment when first deployed to Normandy, so was lucky to have avoided the Derrycunihy disaster.  It’s possible he was originally with B squadron, who followed the rest of the regiment to Normandy in an LCT on the evening of Jun 24th, before moving to C Squadron.  At the time of the sinking, no one in B squadron was aware what had happened to the rest of their regiment that same that morning.

Roy was one of the two surviving 43 Recce comrades, the other being Alan Dracup, who re-formed the Old Comrades Association in 1995.  They were also instrumental to the creation of 43rd Recce Living History Group in 1996.

Record of a Recce regiment, CLEVE FOREST p161-163. 15 Feb 1945.

Early on the 15th, C Squadron passed through the corner of the Reichswald, and into the Haw area. 9 Troop, commanded by Lieut W. C. Cammel, then began to recce the road towards Niederdam. He reached the village; entering it without seeing the enemy, and 10 Troop, commanded by Lieut Brickwood, passed through, turned left, and began to move towards the North Eastern corner of the Cleve Forest.

9 Troop [patrol], led by Sergeant Pavey in a heavy Humber, passed the burnt out hulks of B Squadron’s cars, and reached the far end of the village. Here a position, occupied by the Monmouths (53rd Division), was contacted on the edge of the Reichswald. As soon as 9 Troop began to leave the cover of the houses shells and mortar bombs began to rain down heavily and consistently. The leading car took cover by the last house. Down the road, about 400 yards ahead, a road block could be seen. The troop tried to push on towards it, but every time the cars showed themselves the mortaring and shelling recommenced. After three attempts a carrier patrol, led by Lieut Ken Scarr, came up and moved out into the open. Almost at once Lieut Scarr was hit in the thumb by a sniper’s bullet, and the patrol had to come back to cover. The patrol then tried to penetrate into the Cleve Forest, turning left off the main road, but were met by extremely heavy fire and had to come back.

It was evident that the enemy was present in force. 10 Troop had become bogged near the level crossing, but when they did move on, they contacted enemy with bazookas on the crossing, and met fire from the forest itself.

The Squadron Leader, Major Bindon Blood, now came up in his LRC, and on his instructions 9 Troop withdrew slightly. Then Lieut Cammell took his own car out into the open alone, in an attempt to reach the road block, but the sniper opened fire again, hitting the car in the blanket box, and heavy mortar fire came down, He had to withdraw. The mortaring became intense. Sergeant Pavey’s car was damaged when a bomb exploded underneath it. Major Blood’s LRC was also damaged, and a little further back the carriers of 9 Troop were also having a bad time. Sergeant Darvell, M.M. and Cpl Horsfall were killed, and three others wounded

In spite of these setbacks, Major Blood continued to probe the Cleve Forest. Lieut Wood took an Assault Troop patrol out on the left, and approached the forest but it ran into a German machine gun post, and came under heavy fire, which wounded Cpl Chadwick. He had to be left, while the troop extricated itself under smoke, but a little later a carrier, driven by Trooper Hall of 9 Troop, with Cpl Harris, and the Medical Orderly,

L/Cpl Lane, aboard, moved out in full view of the enemy ; L/Cpl Lane dismounted and picked Cpl Chadwick up. For this gallant rescue under fire L/Cpl Lane won the M.M. Another attempt to approach the forest was made by a carrier patrol from 10 Troop, under Lt R. Petty.

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Roy was also involved in the tragic events of April 30th 1945, which resulted in total loss of two crews, and summarised by Major Blood (despite the journalists typo where Roy’s name was misquoted as Ray).

More about this incident is available here.