To War with the Bays: A Tank Gunner Remembers, 1939-1945

Jack Merewood’s memoir covers the whole period of the Second World War. After a brief visit to France in 1940, he saw action as a tank gunner in North Africa and Italy, being awarded the Military Medal after the Battle of the Mareth Line. He kept a diary of the war years, on which he has drawn to record the minutiae of army life; and his whole account has unaffected integrity of style that is graphic and on occasion moving. He and his wife live in Huddersfield, the town in which they were both born. They have two children: their daughter lives in the United States and their son runs the family business the author started in 1962 with two associates – selling woodworking machinery – and in which he still takes an active interest. He is a keen gardener, with particular knowledge of roses, a subject on which he writes regular articles.