In exactly four weeks time it will be 8th May, V.E. Day which commemorates the surrender of German forces.
Some countries celebrate VE Day on the 9th May.
All the family in north London shared the relief. There were street parties and dancing. Food rationing continued in Britain until the early1950s.
V.E. day was the beginning of the end of WW2. Hitler had committed suicide on 30th April 1945. He was succeeded by Admiral Karl Dornitz who negotiated the end of the war with the allies. The surrender of German forces in the Netherlands, West Germany and Denmark was delivered to Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery at Luenberg, East of Hamburg.
The previous day, 7th May, Allied Commander General Eisenhower accepted the surrender of German forces in Rheims, France. Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union signed a document in Berlin on the 8th May with Field Marshall William Keitel, which accepted the surrender of German forces. In Britain, the BBC broadcast the news late in the day on 7th May. Programmes were interrupted. People took to the streets and celebrated. The pubs stayed open late.
The peace process had begun. It wasn’t until August, British Deputy Prime Minister Clement Atlee signed the Potsdam Agreement with President Truman and Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin.
The younger Tom Critchley was away on officer training at that time. He wrote:
"The Drill Sergeant is fierce man. He doubled us round, rifles above heads, until men dropped, collapsed, fainted, on the square and then yelled at us to go on. It was funny, & also, coinciding with the revelations of the German horror camps, rather revolting. I heard last week about Len Oak’s death. It is doubly sad at this stage of the war and Brook's lines have been running through my head. “They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old…. We shall remember them."
"Have fired the rifle at last on the 30 yard range yesterday. It was easy enough."
"I had V E day. leave. I moved from Wrotham to Repton. Wrotham finished in a blaze of Victory. Margaret came down and stayed at the Pilgrim’s Rest on the weekend (May 5th) & then on Monday evening I went home from Wrotham … V. E. day leave. We went to central London on Tuesday evening and mingled with the crowds again and again… a lump came to my throat, the waving, the cheering and ecstasy. Dancing in Whitehall and Leicester Square, funny hats and red white and blue everywhere. A few drunks, but mostly the crowd was staid, sober. There were fireworks and the floodlighting was very, very moving. “Lighten our darkness we beseech oh Lord!” Five years and eight months. It was grand, grand & ones memory drifted back and away."
" Caught the 11.18 to Gravesend, prepared to walk 9 miles to Wrotham, but was lucky in getting a lift. Flags were everywhere and bonfires in the little south London back streets. It was ike the Blitz, and strangely reminiscent.”
"My training continued in Milton, near Derby. I have been given pages of notes on etiquette in the officers mess, much of which, is immensely amusing.
" I am heartily sick of this course, as, indeed, is everybody else here. Thank you for the tuck box which arrived today. You’ve no idea how good it is to receive a parcel like that, because the food here is really bad and there is nowhere at all to go in the evenings for anything nice."
"Tomorrow the senior platoon is passing out, so the band and brigadier and so on are all coming. Of more importance to us, though, tomorrow we complete the second week here! By the way, I believe my army pay will include my civilian pay when I am commissioned. I’ll have it worked out by Saturday.”
Tom Critchley was drafted to Cairo to wind up British Forces wartime operations in Egypt in the autumn of 1945.
Perhaps one of the most important post war treaties to be signed was the Treaty of Brussels 1948. It was signed by Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg and France. In tandem with that, was the setting up of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.
Two years later, in 1950, Tom Critchley was in France to meet up with delegates from the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg and France, to discuss the future of political and trade alliances. In 1951, France and Germany set up the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). and the Benelux countries soon joined. In 1957, the Treaty of Rome was signed to inaugurate the European Economic Community.
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