James Holland

And David Render has the wit to realise that you've got to learn and heed those lessons very quickly or else you're toast.

Anyway, by Tuesday the 13th of June, the regiment is finally pulled back.

out of the line, and they go to a little village just down the way, only a couple of miles back.

John Semkin is totally exhausted.

As I mentioned, he's only 23, but he's now commanding a squadron of well over 100 men.

And he's told that evening the squadron's going to have to move again, but Semkin recalls, everyone's asleep.

I got on the air and couldn't raise anybody in the entire squadron.

And he has to shake one trooper awake and get him to bang a hammer on the tanks to wake everyone.

And then they set off, but they're setting off to rest camp.

Yeah.

I mean, that's the thing.

I mean, there's lots of sort of, you know, hurry up and slow down.

Yeah.

It's so...

any movement.

It's not like you sort of hurtle down a hill and...

Everything's fits and starts.

It's a start, start, start, start, start, start.

So basically, they're ordered out on that evening.

They're ordered out of Sampian 103, and they're sent back to this little village called Chouin.