Six: Lieutenant-Colonel A. M. Askwith, Intelligence Corps, late King’s Shropshire Light Infantry

1939-45 Star; Africa Star, clasp, 1st Army; Italy Star; Defence and War Medals, these unnamed; General Service 1918-62, 1 clasp, Malaya, G.VI.R. (Major, Int. Corps) mounted as worn, good very fine (6) £260-300

Andrew Marcus Askwith was born on 26 July 1913 and was commissioned into the King’s Shropshire Light Infantry from Sandhurst on 31 August 1933. He was promoted to Lieutenant in August 1936 and Captain in August 1941 and attached to the 8th Battalion Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders serving in North Africa and Italy. He was a Company Commander and was badly wounded in Italy during a failed assault on German lines. He is mentioned in the book the 8th Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders:

‘From all these investigations it was deduced that the enemy had outposts on the escarpment, but that his main positions were probably on the higher ground behind. In any event, the escarpment was the only position which could give protection to the river crossings (Sangro River), and it had to be captured to form a bridgehead. On November 19th, four battalions, of which 8 Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders was the left hand one, each sent a Company forward to seize and hold a position on the escarpment. As soon as it was dark, at about 5pm, Captain Askwith started with X Company. His task was to occupy a position at Popular Gully from which to make an attack on a farm the following night. The river had subsided, so the crossing was only a matter of wading, and the company reached it's objective, after a slight skirmish and proceeded to dig in. However, since strong enemy posts were near at hand, the only positions which could be occupied were on the banks of the gully from which there was very little field of view. Soon after dawn the Germans made a strong attack on the gully from two directions. The company had both flanks exposed and had no room to manoeuvre, and when the platoon at the head of the gully was overrun the position became hopeless. Captain Askwith then withdrew the remainder with difficulty over the open fields and across the river. At the river, they stumbled on anti-personnel mines, which wounded Captain Askwith and the two platoon commanders. This brought the total casualties within the company to 5 killed, 7 wounded and 35 missing. It is often inevitable that an operation starts with 'a boy being sent to do a mans job,' and this may be fairly classed as one of those occasions, for it later required two battalion attacks on successive nights to capture the area of X Company's objective.’

Askwith was later transferred to the Intelligence Corps and in Malaya was attached to the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. He was promoted to Major in August 1946 and to Lieutenant-Colonel in November 1958. In the 1953 Army List he is listed as a Russian Interpreter 2nd Class. As a Lieutenant-Colonel he retired on 29 May 1960. With copied death certificate, regimental history extract and copied service details.