Memories of Joseph Pitman
I stumbled across this page a little while back. It is a narrative from a Joseph Pitman who served with the Seaforth Highlanders during the Italian campaign.
Pitman, who came from Canada's west coast, enlisted in 1940, was sent overseas in 1941, and married in 1942 to an English war bride. He finally ended up in Sicily in Aug 1943.
Interesting to read his impressions from the invasion of Italy to Ortona in Dec, 1943 where, sadly, his narrative ends. Pitman died in 1989 at the age of 82.
Pitman, who came from Canada's west coast, enlisted in 1940, was sent overseas in 1941, and married in 1942 to an English war bride. He finally ended up in Sicily in Aug 1943.
Interesting to read his impressions from the invasion of Italy to Ortona in Dec, 1943 where, sadly, his narrative ends. Pitman died in 1989 at the age of 82.
posted by Ronmac at 6:18 pm
5 Comments:
Unfortunately Ronmac - Shaw ca. cannot find the page and when one asks for "help' - we get gobbeldegook - as always- nice to hear from you again !
Cheers
I know what's wrong. Take out the period at the end of htm in the url and it should work. I just tried it! I see I should hve put the link in the link button instead. Maybe the admin could adjust if I'm not able to adjust my original post.
Tomcan, maybe you ran acros ths Pitman character during your travels as he was a Seaforth.
Ronmac
As you will see I have rectified your link. Putting long URLs in the way you did interferes with the permanent list of links on the right. In this case it fortunately wrapped as the link itself was wrong.
You used the code for this correctly but then you again repeated the full URL in the trigger, making it confusing to fathom out what was going on.
Please see the FAQ on the right where I give full guidance on how to post links. If anything is not clear let me know and I will ammend it.
I will remove this comment in due course once you have responded.
I think I got it now. Thanks.
Ronmac -
fascinatinmg story of Pitman's - evoked so many memories of the madcap Canadians with the familiar names of Major Syd Thompson who was C.O. of the Seaforths until late in the Gothic Line - the Van Doos(Quebec 22nd regt) fighting at Casa Beradi where Capt Paul Triquot ( ? ) won his V.C. - Campobasso which was turned into a leave centre after the Battle there- Brig. Hoffmeister who became Maj.Gen G.O.C. 5th Division which was fired by Monty for upsetting the Seaforths before Ortona !- this was when we- 21st Tank bde and the 25th Tank bde were given the job of supporting the Cdn 1st Div all the way up to when all the Canadinas left Italy in Feb '45...can't say that I recall this Pitman character although he might have been involved in picking me up at San Martino and hauling me back to the Seaforths aid post - who knows - we fought mainly with "A" and "C" companies - our "B" sqdn looked after "B" and "D" companies - as he says - the ordinary soldier didn't see the big picture - not even the small picture at times !
great tale - pity he missed out the rest as he obviously survived !
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