Orders, Decorations and Medals

Seven: Corporal J. W. Goddard, 3rd and 10th Battalions, The Parachute Regiment, late East Surreys, who was taken P.O.W. at Arnhem

1939-45 Star; Africa Star, clasp, 1st Army; Italy Star; France and Germany Star; Defence and War Medals; Police L.S. & G.C., E.II.R., 2nd issue (John W. Goddard, Const.), good very fine or better (7) £1200-1500

John William Goddard served in ‘B’ Company, 3rd Battalion, The Parachute Regiment in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, prior to joining the 10th Battalion back in the U.K. in March 1944. A component of Brigadier John Hackett’s 4th Parachute Brigade, the 10th landed on Dropping Zone ‘Y’, at the top of Ginkel Heath, on 18 September, under mortar fire, and quickly went into action, taking heavy casualties in an attempt to retake the crossing at Wolfhezen on the 19th. One of their number, Captain Lionel Queripel, Royal Sussex Regiment, won a V.C. this day, the citation bearing testament to the ruthless and confused nature of the fighting. And from Wolfhezen, the Battalion was ordered to fight its way through to Divisional H.Q. inside the Oosterbeek perimeter on the 20th, a task duly achieved at great cost, Lieutenant-Colonel K. B. I. Smyth, the C.O., reporting to the General Urquhart that he had just 60 men left on arrival - they were quickly ordered to defend some houses to the north-east. In common with so many men from the 10th, Smythe died of wounds, but others were taken P.O.W., among them Goddard, who was held at Stalag 4B at Muhlberg, on the Elbe, at which establishment he arrived on 6 October 1944.