Colonel Charles Greenwood RIP

Kyt · Sep 4, 2008

Colonel Charles Greenwood - Telegraph

Colonel Charles Greenwood, who has died aged 89, fought at the Battle of Monte Cassino and was awarded an MC in the field.

In May 1944 Greenwood, then a captain, was serving with 22 Field Regiment Royal Artillery (22 FR). On the night of May 11, he was forward observation officer with the leading company of 1/6 Battalion East Surrey Regiment in their attack on an important tactical feature at Monte Cassino.

He was able to get his party on to the objective but they then found themselves in a highly precarious situation. For the next 36 hours, while under constant sniping, shelling and attack from mortars, Greenwood, by quick calls for fire, saved the infantry in what was an almost untenable position. When their last officer was wounded he took charge and continued to consolidate the defences. He was awarded an immediate MC in the field.

Grahame Charles Arthur Greenwood was born at Andover, Hampshire, on February 18 1919. His uncle Harry, while serving with the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, had won a VC in France the previous year.

Young Charles was educated at Haileybury before working for a firm of stock jobbers in the City. He then had a spell with Unilever. He joined the Honourable Artillery Company in 1936 and the Supplementary Reserve in 1939 as a gunner officer. He went to France with 22 FR as part of the BEF.

During the withdrawal to Dunkirk, he needed to break into the safe to obtain the battery funds and had to enlist the skills of one of his men who followed a rather dubious profession in peacetime. They were evacuated on the Medway Queen, a paddle steamer, which used to ply up and down the Thames in peacetime.

Back in England, before the battery was properly re-equipped it was issued with wooden-wheeled, 1895 vintage, French 75mm guns and, instead of small arms, lengths of gas pipe with bayonets welded to the ends.

In 1943 Greenwood accompanied 22 FR to Algeria to join First Army for the closing phase of the North African campaign. He landed at Naples and took part in some of the fiercest fighting in the long slog north through Italy.

After the fall of Rome his division was moved to the Adriatic coast but it suffered such high casualties that it was eventually withdrawn from the line, and 22 FR went to Taranto in the toe of Italy. When the Germans started to withdraw from Greece, a savage civil war broke out between the partisans, and Greenwood was posted there with a small force which was attached to 30 FR.

Greenwood was granted a regular commission in December 1945 and subsequently served in BAOR, Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore.

In Korea, he survived an appendix operation, haemorrhagic fever, a Jeep accident and some heavy fighting. In Singapore, for his service during a period of unrest leading to independence from Britain, he was appointed MBE; he was advanced to OBE in 1962.

Two tours at the MoD were separated by a second posting to Hong Kong, where he commanded 34 LAA Regiment RA, then Aden and BAOR. In 1966 he was appointed chief instructor at the School of Artillery's Tactics Wing. He took his two large dobermans to work and they would sit beside him as he lectured, glaring at the audience. Interruptions were very rare.

After serving as Deputy Commander and Brigade Colonel to GOC Wales at Brecon, in 1972 Greenwood retired from the Army to take up the post of deputy secretary of the TAVR Association for Wales and Monmouthshire. He was promoted to secretary in 1975 and settled in Cardiff.

In 1979 he was appointed Deputy Lieutenant of South Glamorgan. One of his duties at royal events was to attend the 21-gun salutes at Cardiff Castle. The resident peacocks boycotted these ceremonies and screamed in protest as each gun was fired.

Aged 69, Greenwood completed a Masters in Education at Cardiff University. He was a keen fly fisherman and sailor and an accomplished cook.

Charles Greenwood died on August 12. He married, in 1950, Margarita Bailward, who survives him with their four daughters.
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Antipodean Andy · Sep 7, 2008

A very long career of service. RIP.

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Colonel Charles Greenwood RIP

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