The Vale in the Wars
Introduction
The 20th century witnessed the two deadliest conflicts in the history of mankind, and the first two wars which were fought by their participants in many parts of the globe. There was some sort of military action in all of the continents in either or both of the wars, and although no action of any sort took place in South America, some of the countries there, such as Brazil, took part on the Allied side.
Valemen and women went off to serve in many different theatres of war including the war at sea and many did not return. Many of those that did return were permanently scarred by wounds, by having been prisoners of war and by the trauma of what they had experienced.
At home everyone was impacted by the war, and many people also served one way or another – the ethic of service, that “we’re all in this together” is a lasting impression, particularly from WW2. All sorts of divisions were put aside for the duration. It certainly changed nearly everyone’s life and those who are old enough to remember have some stories from that time that have always stuck with them.
It is impossible in a web-site such as this to do justice to all that happened to Vale people in the First World War (“WW1” hereafter), which lasted from 4th August 1914 until 11 November 1919 and the Second World War (“WW2” hereafter), which lasted from 3rd September 1939 until 8th May 1945 in Europe (V-E Day) and 15th August 1945 in Asia (V-J Day). Apart from anything else, many of the stories died with the participants and their children while many mementoes and recollections just disappeared over time. However, there is still quite a body of information out there in letters, documents, photographs, written recollections, web-sites such as Secret Scotland, newspapers, oral tradition and memorabilia such as medals, badges, even bits of planes and vehicles.
We would like as much of that as possible to be documented before it too disappears and invite contributions from anyone who has anything they’d like to say. Normally we like to maintain a chronological approach to content, but that’s not realistic with a subject as large as this. There are many subjects which span the length of the wars such as Identity Cards and Ration Books, and those we will place when they are introduced. However, content is more likely to be episodic e.g. the Clydebank Blitz. We will post episodes as we receive them and will try to maintain a very broad chronology in the presentation of the episodes. We shall also divide the content into WW1 and WW2.
WORLD WAR 1
We received some interesting images and documents from local man Eddie Geoghan. These are related to his grandfather's time in the army during WW1. Eddie kindly let us scan these for the website.
The documents include a letter sent from the trenches with a graphic account of what it was like to be there during that terrible conflict.
"How any one of us lived to come out of such a battle God only knows. They were lying dead in heaps both British and Germans and anywhere you looked you were looking at wounded and dead men and animals."
WORLD WAR 2
The Balloch Navy
Introduction
An account of the “Balloch Navy” was written by Ian Lynn whose grandfather Henry was one of the founders of the boat-hiring and cruise traditions at Balloch and whose father Tommy owned the yard on the east side of the Leven to the north of Balloch Bridge from about 1911 until his death in 1947. Ian worked in the yard at the outbreak of WW2 and this is his recollection of the formation of a small Royal Navy unit to patrol Loch Lomond in the summer of 1940. It was written in June 2005 when he was 85 and sent by Ian from his home in New South Wales, Australia to Graham Hopner of Dumbarton Libraries who has very kindly made it available to the web-site.
The illustrations of the cabin cruisers were done by Ian himself. The Cignet which he had to tow down to Balloch had first appeared on the Leven as John Sweeney’s first steam launch in the 1890’s. There are two photos in which it almost certainly appears in its early days as a steam launch – either on its own sailing on the Loch or one of the three on moorings just to the north of to-day’s Humane Society’s boatshed. Unfortunately there is no identification for any of these launches in these photos which come from Alan Brown’s excellent book Loch Lomond Passenger Steamers.
Similarly, the photo of Lynn’s yard in the 1930’s shows both the Glen Fruin II (which towed the Cignet) and Glen Douglas II, but it’s impossible to tell which was which from that distance. The slipway is in the far background close to the White Dyke and very close to where the present slip is. The photo of Tom Lynn – “Faither” or the “old man” in Ian’s story shows him a very characteristic pose holding a catch of salmon which had been landed at the yard to be weighed in the 1930’s. Until the yard closed it was one of the few places on the Loch where fish could be weighed for the Loch Lomond Angling Improvement Association’s records.
In 1940 the authorities were quite right to take the threat of a potential German landing on Loch Lomond seriously. The attacks in the Low Countries and in Norway had shown that the Germans were quite capable of doing the unexpected, especially with aircraft. Besides in WW1 a German who had been sent to spy on the Arrochar torpedo range was arrested in Tarbet Hotel and later executed in London. So there was plenty of evidence to urge action on the Loch.
When Rudolf Hess parachute landed at Eaglesham, he was taken to the military hospital at Buchanan Castle Drymen. As a precaution the Balloch Navy was deployed to patrol the Endrick Bank and the lower stretch of the River Endrick – but that’s another story.
Somewhere out there is a photograph of a patrol cruiser complete with a machine gun. If we get a copy, we will load it here.
Apart from some changes to spacing and paragraphs, this account is exactly as Ian wrote it.
