On This
Day: Christmas 1943 - Italy
Albert Roper, Private Diary, 1 Green Howards Regiment
Christmas Day 1943
Albert Roper, formerly a butcher, made
sure that his platoon had a roast on Christmas Day. He recalled:
“I went outside this shell
battered farmhouse on Christmas Eve and saw by the light of a full moon that in
the branches of the tree there were guinea fowl roosting. My mate wanted to get his rifle and shoot
one down, but I knew guinea fowl better.
They can be so docile and trusting.
I just shinned up the tree, caught hold of one by the legs and brought
it down. Then I went up again for a few
more. We spent the next hour or so
plucking them and on Christmas Day got the farm oven heated and had a fine old roast dinner – guinea fowl
and biscuits washed down with red vino from a huge demijohn we found in one of
the out houses”.
Tomorrow: Christmas Day, Kings
Own Yorkshire Light Infantry
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