Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The important and excessively rare Second World War S.B.S. operations M.M. and Bar group of five awarded to Sergeant D. “Duggie” Pomford, South Lancashire Regiment: a pre-war champion amateur boxer - who later established and ran the famous Golden Gloves Club in Liverpool - he honed his fighting skills in No. 2 Special Service Brigade and No. 11 Commando under Keyes, V.C., prior to becoming a founder member of No. 1 Special Boat Section in 1941: he was subsequently twice decorated for his gallantry as a member ‘S’ Detachment, No. 1 Special Boat Squadron during hit and run raids on assorted islands of the Eastern Mediterranean in 1943-44 - fighting alongside a stunning cast of much decorated cut throats, among them Lassen, V.C.

Military Medal, G.VI.R., with Second Award Bar (3456406 Cpl. D. Pomford, S. Lan. R.); 1939-45 Star; Africa Star; Italy Star; War Medal 1939-45, good very fine or better (5) £40000-50000

‘Pomford was popular and pleasant and, except when wearing (boxing) gloves, not normally violent but nobody tangled with him willingly - not even Busty Aubrey, who is regarded to this day as possibly the strongest man ever enlisted by the S.A.S.’

Anders Lassen, V.C., M.C. of the S.A.S., by Mike Langley, refers.

Douglas “Duggie” Pomford, who was born in Liverpool in March 1920, traded his first tentative punches as a seven year old with the Dingle Club, the commencement of a highly successful career in amateur boxing in the period leading up to the outbreak of war, a career that witnessed him winning the Lancashire and Cheshire middleweight title and taking the champion Bruce Woodcock to the final round in the Northern Counties light heavyweight competition at Blackpool Tower - ‘I must have been giving away nine or 10 lbs. but lost only on a casting vote.’

Baptism of fire - Commando

On enlisting in the South Lancashire Regiment in Preston in May 1940, he still got in plenty of boxing, winning Company, Regimental and Command competitions, fine work that also established him as a natural candidate for the Commandos - hence his appointment to No. 2 Special Service Brigade in December 1940, from whence he joined No. 11 Commando, bound for the Middle East as part of “Layforce”.

Here, then, Pomford’s baptism of fire, for he participated in operations in Syria and elsewhere under Lieutenant-Colonel Geoffrey Keyes, M.C. - shortly to win a posthumous V.C for his leadership of Operation “Flipper”, the attempt to capture Rommel at his H.Q. In fact it was as a result of the latter raid that the Commando was disbanded at the end of 1941 - a raid in which Pomford may well have been among the participants, albeit in the submarine Talisman, which had to withdraw owing to conditions off the coast.

S.B.S. - founder member - M.M.

Meanwhile, Major R. J. A. Courtney was recruiting likely candidates for a new clandestine force, and “Duggie” Pomford became a founding member of No. 1 Special Boat Section, Eastern Mediterranean Command. And, as might be expected of such a pugnacious character, quickly made his mark. A case in point being the following incident related by a fellow member of the S.B.S. in Mike Langley’s Anders Lassen, V.C., M.C. of the S.A.S.:

‘An R.A.F. Sergeant climbed aboard an S.A.S. lorry, wanting a lift without asking and obviously looking for trouble. He refused to leave and said so in a truculent manner. Pomford, only a Corporal, then stood up and said: “Sergeant, if you don’t leave, I’ll put you off.” The Sergeant sneered, “Who, you?” Pomford’s punch knocked him clean over the tailboard.’

Indeed frequent mention is made of Pomford in related reference works - not least the memoirs of his immediate C.O., Major David Sutherland - He Who Dares. So, too, in more recent publications, including Gavin Mortimer’s impressive illustrated history of The S.B.S. in World War II, in which appear photographs from the accompanying archive (see below).

Of Pomford’s activities in 1942, little appears to be known, although in a newspaper interview after the war it was stated that ‘He once spent seven months in a Greek mountain hideout with a group of partisans after missing a submarine connection and though he did not know it at the time it saved his life for the submarine was sunk.’

In April 1943, the S.B.S. moved to a new training base in Palestine, an establishment of 230 officers and men, with a core element of three Operational Detachments numbering 60 men, based on five patrols, ten strong, with an H.Q. and signals team. The three detachments were named after their founders - thus ‘L’ for Langton, ‘M’ for MacLean and ‘S’ for Sutherland. Pomford was allocated to ‘S’, Sutherland noting that he stood out even among such notable company as Anders Lassen who had recently joined his unit from England.

As described by Sutherland in He Who Dares, ‘S’ Detachment was chosen by overall C.O. Major Lord Jellicoe to take part in Operation “Albumen”, a combined S.B.S. raid on three airfields in Crete in June 1943 - one of them, at Kastelli Pediada, allocated to a party under Anders Lassen.

Thus on the night of the 23rd, M.L. 361 dropped off three officers, 14 men and two guides - another airfield raiding party arriving in similar fashion four nights later. The three raiding parties having departed, Sutherland and Pomford, and one or two others, formed, the H.Q. party, holed up in caves about 500 metres inshore - where they had to maintain W./T. contact with the raiding parties and, above all, remain undiscovered for nearly three weeks - ‘it was hot, uncomfortable, but vital work’.

Inevitably, perhaps, but fortunately on the very eve of their departure, a brace of German patrols came into contact with the S.B.S. force, and in the ensuing firefight Lieutenant Ken Lamonby was mortally wounded - but his body could not be found. Mike Langley’s Anders Lassen, V.C., M.C. and S.A.S. takes up the story:

‘Lassen and Doug Pomford searched for it. They had heard the shot but the sound proved no guide. Dusk was gathering and the ground, a tangle of bushes and jumble of rocks, was impassable to anything except Crete’s chamois, the Agrimi. Lamonby was left where he fell.

He was the only casualty of an operation that was saluted a few weeks later by a cascade of awards - Bars to their Military Crosses for both Sutherland and Lassen, Military Medals for Ray Jones, Sidney Greaves, Dick Holmes and Jack Nicholson. The decorations recognised the tenacious bravery of raiders who had refused to be undone by the inaccurate intelligence that had targeted an unused airfield. Sutherland’s men, although knowing they deserved better results, sailed away in good heart with a story of partial success, as well as a couple of prisoners and the Wehrmacht’s new self-loading rifle. Sutherland said: “We were lucky to get hold of this weapon. It was way ahead of its time and provided useful information for the powers in Cairo.” The prisoner caught with the rifle was a graduate and spoke excellent English. It’s said that he and his partner were taken by Sutherland and Lassen for ice-cream sodas at Groppi’s, a teeming cafe in Cairo ... ’

Such raids aside, No. 1 S.B.S. turned its attention to the Dodecanese Islands and, by September 1943, most were under British control, ‘S’ Detachment and Pomford having played a major part in the capture of Kos, where an airfield was established.

Famously, however, the Germans responded in kind, October and November witnessing the arrival of reinforcements and a determined offensive that was supported by the Luftwaffe and the use of paratroopers - and before long both Kos and Leros were retaken. Sutherland’s men went through the worst of the Leros bombing, an episode he described as ‘an advanced form of hell’:

‘There were deep lines of exhaustion on our faces, and the whiff of disaster lying just ahead. We were all demoralised by the ceaseless bombing and the fact that the enemy called all the shots. It was like Dunkirk and Tobruk all over again.’

Finally evacuated to Samos, and thence to Turkey, Pomford and his comrades - including Lassen - were arrested by the neutral authorities and confined to a narrow strip of beach with no provisions whatsoever. One week later they were entrained for a transit camp at Aleppo in Syria, where they were given sufficient rations and new uniforms. In his history The S.B.S. in World War II, Gavin Mortimer recalls an incident at the camp:

‘As the S.B.S. soldiers stood together warming themselves at a brazier a camp policeman approached.

“Who are you blokes?” he asked.

“We’re SBS,” replied Duggie Pomford.

“Never heard of you,” sneered the policeman.

“You will, mate,” said Pomford.

He was awarded the M.M.

Return to the Islands - second M.M.

No. 1 Special Boat Squadron now re-grouped and came under the co-ordinating umbrella of Raiding Forces Middle East, the commencement of a planned flurry of operations in the Aegean in 1944 and such was the impact of these operations that Captain John Lodwick, late of the French Foreign Legion, was able to observe, ‘Gone were the days when the German defenders would be found in bed ... The German defenders now slept increasingly in slit trenches with barbed wire for their eiderdown.’

By this stage Pomford was serving in a party of ‘S’ Detachment commanded by Lieutenant K. G. “Nobby” Clarke - in which capacity he won his second M.M. for raids on Ios, Amorgos and Naxos in April-May. The S.B.S. in World War II, by Gavin Mortimer, takes up the story:

‘Lieutenant Kingsley ‘Nobby' Clarke was sent on a tour of the islands with instructions from Sutherland to spread alarm and despondency at every available opportunity. With him went some of the most hardened men in ‘S’ Squadron: Dick Holmes, Doug Wright, Duggie Pomford and Alan Sanders who, on being asked by Jellicoe the previous year why he wished to join the S.B.S., had replied that it was to escape the bed-bugs that infested the barracks. Also with the patrol was Fred Crouch, a 26-year-old former Metropolitan policeman who, like Holmes, hailed from east London. ‘Freddy was a great guy, steady as a rock, and a very good soldier,’ recalled Holmes.

The first island visited by Clarke's patrol was los in the south of the Cyclades, known to be lightly defended. Clarke and Pomford broke into a billet and surprised two Germans getting ready for bed. The pair were brave men, leaping at the intruders and trying to kill them with their bare hands. Unfortunately they had the misfortune of taking on Pomford, one of the best amateur boxers in England. Neither German survived.

Meanwhile Dick Holmes, Doug Wright and Fred Crouch had been sent by Clarke to capture three Germans known to be living in a billet on another part of the island. ‘We were to lay an ambush for these three Germans,’ recalled Holmes. ‘I told Doug that I'd shout “hande hoch” but as soon as I did he was to open up with the Bren and shoot the bastards.’

M.M. London Gazette 23 March 1944.

Bar to M.M. London Gazette 4 January 1945. The original recommendation for an immediate award - submitted by Major D. G. C. Sutherland, C.O. of ‘S’ Detachment, 1/S.B.S. - states:

‘For distinguished conduct during operations on the islands of Ios, Amorgos and Naxos.

This Sergeant was the senior N.C.O. of the S.B.S. patrol which, on the night of 26 April 1944, attacked an enemy post in Ios town. In the close quarter engagement which ensued, this N.C.O. personally accounted for two of the enemy, whilst the remaining three were captured.

The patrol then proceeded to Amorgos and attacked the W./T. Station at Katapola Port on the night of 1 May 1944. This N.C.O. formed part of the assault party under Captain Clarke, and was able, under cover of very accurate L.M.G. fire, to get within a few yards of the main door of the building in which the W./T. Station was situated. From there, this N.C.O. assisted in putting two M.Gs out of action with grenades and sub-machine-gun fire. The enemy then attempted to get out of the house and six were immediately killed by the assault party. This N.C.O. then went forward alone in to the house and ascertained that no further enemy remained inside.

The whole patrol then entered, destroyed the electric generator and re-embarked together with the W./T. set and all the codes and documents.

On 22 May 1944, during the attack on the German garrison in Naxos town, this N.C.O. conducted himself with coolness and complete disregard for danger, as a result of which 15 casualties were caused to the enemy without loss.

Throughout all these operations the determination, leadership and example set by this N.C.O. was of the highest order.’

John Lodwick wrote his version of events in The Filibusters, describing how the Germans saw the S.B.S. men approach and grabbed some local children for human shields, and using them for protection made their escape. This was not what happened. ‘In fact they [the Germans] just came into the village with a young Greek boy walking next to them,’ explained Holmes. ‘So we let them pass into the village and when they returned without the boy we got them.’

Mortimer’s history continues:

‘Clarke and his men then destroyed the island's telegraph station and blew up a cache of 75mm. shells. With los subdued the patrol set sail for Amorgos, 15 miles east, having learned that approximately 30 Germans had recently left the island for Santorini (they were despatched to help hunt for Lassen and his men, who had already escaped). The only man left on Amorgos was the officer in charge, Lieutenant Schiller, who was taking advantage of the solitude to spend time with his Greek mistress. Called upon by Clarke to surrender, the German refused. ‘He was a stupid little man and he wasted a great deal of my time,’ wrote Clarke in his report.

And on a return trip to Amorgos:

‘On 1 May Clarke returned to Amorgos. By now ten of the German garrison who had sailed to Santorini had returned to discover that their officer, Lieutenant Schiller, was nowhere to be found at their billet at Katapola Port. ‘The ten Germans now on the island had taken over the village school but we knew the lie of the land,’ recalled Doug Wright. ‘I positioned myself on a flat-topped roof to give covering fire with the rest of the patrol behind a wall on the other side of the school.’

Wright, a left-hander, was approximately 300 yards from the target with the rest of the patrol, which now included five members of the Greek Sacred Squadron, spread out around the school. The attack commenced with a Greek soldier hurling a grenade through one of the school windows. This was Wright's signal. ‘I fired ten Bren gun magazines loaded with a good mixture of ball, tracer and incendiary and armour piercing,’ he remembered, ‘raking all the windows and doors of the building.’

Immediately after Wright ceased firing Duggie Pomford dashed forward, throwing a grenade through a window and then firing a quick burst from his Tommy gun. Clarke called on the Germans to surrender. Instead they chose to burst out of the building, guns blazing as if they were Wild West bandits fleeing a botched bank raid. Two of the ten escaped in the darkness; the rest were shot dead. ‘It wasn't possible to take many prisoners,’ reflected Wright, who was awarded the Military Medal for his part in the attack as its success was ‘to a very great extent due to the work of this N.C.O.’

At Raiding Forces H.Q. in Azzib, there was widespread delight at all the destruction being wrought on the islands. An Intelligence Report, written in the first week of May, described April's activities and ended with the following:

‘Tribute is paid many times to Raiding Forces, agents and Greeks alike in the captured German orders from Mykonos, but none so gratifying to all concerned as the phrase: WIR BEFINDEN UNS IN FEINDES LAND written across the middle of a page of security instructions. Translation (approx.) 'WE ARE LIVING IN AN ENEMY COUNTRY'.’

And the raid on Naxos:

‘On the nearby island of Naxos, Nobby Clarke was once again creating havoc with his patrol.  A single German garrison containing one officer and 17 men was attacked on 22 May. Once again devastatingly accurate bursts of fire from Doug Wright's Bren terrorised the Germans, and as on Amorgos Duggie Pomford ‘conducted himself with coolness and complete disregard for danger’ for which he was awarded a Bar to his Military Medal.

Those left alive surrendered, including one Sergeant who provided much amusement on the sea voyage home. ‘Every five minutes he would stand up, give a Nazi salute and shout "Heil Hitler",’ recalled Wright. ‘He was a fine figure of a man but completely brainwashed.’
Though Clarke's patrol were on their way back to their base in Turkey there was still great danger in the Aegean. ‘On the way back the motor blew so we had to sail across,’ remembered Holmes. ‘On a couple of occasions German aircraft came in low to investigate us but fortunately some of the boys had taken to wearing the German peaked caps and we carried a lot of German weapons so that fooled the pilots. It was pretty nerve-wracking but the Levant (Schooner) crew were cool customers.’

Other raiding parties from ‘S’ Detachment were less fortunate, most notably a party of five sent to Alimnia in April 1944 - four of them, and the crew of their Levant schooner, falling victim to Hitler’s Commando Order: captured, tortured and shot in cold blood, their fate would bring about the downfall of Kurt Waldheim, the U.N. Secretary General, in the late 1980s, for in his capacity as a wartime German Intelligence Order he had ordered their execution.



For his own part Pomford qualified as a paratrooper and took part in further operations in the Balkans, under the auspices of Land Forces Adriatic, where the Albanian peasants were a lot friendlier than the partisans - Sutherland and his men were held hostage by the latter on Istria in April 1945. He was finally demobilised in April 1946.

Post-war - Golden Gloves

Returning home to take up employment as Foreman of the Port of Liverpool Stevedoring Company, he was to add one further accolade to his many distinctions when, in 1954, he jumped into a Liverpool dock to rescue a drowning man - bravery that won him a Royal Humane Society certificate.

Above all, however, he pursued his interests in boxing, and was instrumental in setting up the famous Golden Gloves Amateur Boxing Club in Liverpool in 1949, at which establishment he served as Secretary and Trainer for the remainder of his life.

“Duggie” Pomford died in October 1969 - it is said indirectly of complications caused by malaria contracted on active service.

sold with the following original documentation, photographs and artefacts:

(i) Buckingham Palace M.M. forwarding letter in the name of ‘3456406 Cpl. D. Pomford, M.M., The South Lancashire Regiment’.; his Certificate of Transfer to the Army Reserve, dated 22 April 1946, and copied Certificate of Service, issued in March 1964.

(ii) A wartime photograph album (approximately 70 images), very much of S.B.S. interest, including captioned portrait photographs and scenes taken on operations; another wartime photograph album (approximately 100 images), largely of naval interest from the Mediterranean theatre of war, circa 1941; and a captured German photograph album, with Luftwaffe metalled badge to cover (approximately 85 images), though some of these in loose format and taken as souvenirs on separate occasions.

(iii) A water colour of the recipient in the boxing ring, entitled ‘Doug Pomford’.

(iv) An embroidered wartime S.B.S. banner, believed to a prototype design for a unit badge, and also incorporating ‘Special Air Service’ in addition to airborne “wings” and other devices (see illustration).

(v) The recipient’s khaki battle dress tunic, complete with airborne “wings”, medal ribands and Sergeant’s stripes, ‘No. 91, Made in Australia’, 1943, Size 9 (see illustration).

(vi) A silk wartime map covering Croatia (W. and Central), Montenegro (West), Hungary (West), Slovakia (South), Germany (South), Italy N. & E.) and Switzerland (East), with frontiers ‘as at September 1943’.