Jepps | Norman
Biography
Norman Jepps is born in 1925, in Shillington, a small village in Bedforshire, about 18 kilometres north of the town of Luton. He is the son of Frank Jepps (born in Shillington in 1891) and Elsie Jepps (maiden name Izzard, born in the village of Meppershall a few kilometres away in 1894). Frank comes from a family of six children, Elsie from a family of four. Frank and Elsie marry in Biggleswade in March 1923 and move to Shillington. Norman is their only child.
Young Norman works in the greenhouses of his uncle, who is a gardener in Meppershall. Norman falls in love with a girl from the village of Pirton, three kilometres from Shillington. The youngsters from Shillington and Pirton get along well and regularly attend dance evenings in Pirton as Pirton has the better dance hall.
But love is not given a chance, as young Norman is called up for military service. He will serve in the 1st Battalion Suffolk Regiment Infantry which is then based at Devonport, in Plymouth.
The Suffolks land on Sword Beach, one of the Normandy beaches, on 6 June 1944 during D-Day. They then advance through northern France and Belgium into The Netherlands. On 8 October Norman and the battalion are in Mook with the task of guarding the railway bridge, but in the afternoon they are transferred by truck to Rijkevoort where they remain in reserve for several days. On 11 October, they arrive north of Overloon, but there they hear that the attack on Overloon has been postponed due to bad weather. The night is then spent in the woods north of Overloon. The next morning the order follows to clear the western part of Overloon as far as the brick factory. That attack starts at 12.15pm under the protection of the artillery’s creeping barrage. At 17.30 all objectives are reached.
As part of Pollux, code name of the second phase of Operation Constellation (the Allied plan to roll up the German bridgehead Venlo), the Suffolks’ task is to cross the Loobeek at 7am on 16 October. Normally, the Loobeek is a small stream, but due to heavy rainfall, the stream has burst its banks and has become as wide as 6 metres in some places! The British have enormous difficulty crossing the stream. Meanwhile, as the Suffolks begin their crossing, the Germans have been alerted and the Suffolks come under heavy German machine-gun fire. To escape the German bullets, some of the British jump into the stream, but the ground is filled with German mines. The name Blood Brook arises from the heavy losses suffered when crossing this stream. Nevertheless, the Suffolks manage to cross the Loobeek around 9 o’clock in the morning on 17 October and advance towards Venray, where they reach Sint Anna that same day. The next day they are deployed, along with the East Yorks and the South Lancashires, to liberate Venray. At 11.30am, the area is cleared. Venray is liberated, but due to the overall heavy British losses in the battle for Overloon and Venray, the continuation of the operation towards Venlo will be halted for some time. The focus will now first be on Antwerp and the rest of Brabant.
You can read how it continues in the full version of “Faces from the Past” below.
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