D-Day 80 The Last Veterans: Bill Johnston

Bill Johnston, Age 100, Royal Field Artillery

Interviewed 20 Nov 2023

Died 16 August 2024

A driver and wireless operator with a gun crew, Bill Johnston landed on Gold Beach on D-Day in the back of a half track - a truck with wheels on the front and tracks in the back. 

He’d crossed the Channel from Bournemouth in a Tank Landing Craft with gun crews.

25 pounder guns mounted on a Sherman tank chassis and fired barrages on enemy positions and targeted enemy tanks. 

He said: "I obviously didn’t know it was D-Day. It wasn’t talked about. It was a fairly quiet run-in until we got within range as it were.

"Our guns in the welldeck were firing at targets ashore and there was incoming

, plenty of water splashes and what-not. It was only when we hit the beach and the ramp went down that I remember seeing the signs and the barbed wire and the wreckage - "This is Enemy Territory."

"That’s when it really dawned on me.

"I got ashore dry, just drove off the craft onto the beach to wherever we were going. At that point I wasn’t scared. Naive perhaps is a good word."

Mr Johnston would sometimes drive ahead of the guns to spot targets and other times act as a wireless operator in the tanks. 

"Sometimes it was a jeep," he said.

"Other times it was an 800 weight wireless truck. Whatever, that was my rank. I wasn’t a gunner, I wasn’t a private, I was a driver and wireless operator.’"

Mr Johnston remembers being involved in action and another gun crew knocking out Panzer tanks as they moved forward.

He and the crews would receive targets and pass it onto the gun crews.

"Often times I would drive to spot targets, spot the shots and on one occasion we formed a creeping barrage. With the infantry sheltering behind us until we could get no further and they came past us.

"I was in a Sherman tank at this time as a wireless operator."

In September he was fired upon while driving a jeep, wounded and later discharged.

He said: "A shell landed nearby and I was driving a jeep at the time and dived into a ditch.

"So far as I know I was knocked out for two or three days and I have flashing memories of civilians, Nuns. I was flown home and fetched up at the Royal Infirmary in Cardiff. That was the end of my war."

Want a quick and expert briefing on the biggest news stories? Listen to our latest podcasts to find out What You Need To Know...