Eyewitness report by William RobinsonRoyal Army/Great Britain

William Robinson came from Hessle near Hull and served in the war with the 55th Field Regiment, West Somerset Yeomanry.

Am 07.05.1945 hörten wir eines Nachts in den BBC-Nachrichten, dass der Krieg am nächsten Morgen zu Ende sein würde. Zuerst konnte es niemand fassen, aber als es vom Divisional Hauptquartier bestätigt wurde, war es ein solcher Anti-Höhepunkt. Niemand wurde verrückt vor Freude oder so, nur ein riesiges Gefühl der Erleichterung, dass es enden würde. Wir hatten immer noch das Glück, noch am Leben zu sein.

Orders came from Divisional Headquarters that all Army guns were to give ten minutes of rapid high explosive fire the next morning at ten minutes to eight and then smoke. It was an impressive sight to see all the different colored smoke on the horizon. Then we loosened up again and drove to Cuxhaven where we were faced with two German divisions, still fully armed. Except for the odd minor incident, they behaved themselves. There were also quite a large number of German marines at large.) We soon stopped outside Cuxhaven to capture an armored train in the open. Quite a few of us managed to procure Luger pistols which we thought might prove useful later.Leaves came and went and finally my demobilization party arrived. After a series of farewell parties I set off for Cuxhaven for the journey home. As luck would have it, the demo run was Cuxhaven - Hull. About half a day after leaving Cuxhaven we sighted the Humber. After lying on the quay all night we started to disembark. Customs practically turned us inside out (souvenir rifles etc. were thrown overboard) but eventually we boarded the train to York to the demo centre. It was high tide as we passed St Andrew's Dock. As we passed I saw my brother Frank. I shouted at him but he never saw me. We went to York where everyone was now so polite that we were demobilised. On 1st December 1946 I was given the DCM - "Don't come on Monday". That was the end of my military career.