The Story of LES BAYNTON

...Les lit the fuse when his platoon blew up the bridge at Zetten on the flooded 'Island' to prevent a counter-attack by German paratroopers, an action for which two Military Crosses and a Military Medal were awarded to the senior ranks.

Les was on leave when the Polar Bears took Arnhem but was back to do some booby-trapping before the war was over. The Netherlands was offically liberated by the Allies on May 5th 1945 after five long years of occupation. By the end of the war 205,900 Dutch men and women had died. The Netherlands had the highest per capita death rate of all Nazi-occupied countries in Western Europe, 2.36%.

"Our 49th Division was responsible for the Liberation of Utrecht and Amsterdam but because at the time they were under command of the Canadian Army, again to this day the Amsterdam authorities are adamant that it was the Canadians who were the first into the city!"

The wartime R.E Field Companies of 49th Div were replaced in October 1945 by the original pre-war units and Les was posted for a short while to an Army Troops Company on the Rhine, but later was sent, for twelve months, as a surveyor-engineer to the 172nd Tunnelling Company R.E. in Gibraltar, quartered at the Governor’s
Cottage near Catalan Bay.

After the war, Les went back to his studies at college and after six years became a Chartered Architect dipArch RIBA. In civilian life, Les has lived mainly in the Wirral area and was employed for many years by the Sir Alfred McAlpine & Son Ltd construction company based at Hooton, for whom he also worked in Portugal and Algeria. For 24 years he was an officer in the Special Constabulary of both the Cheshire and Merseyside Police Forces.

Les still lives in the Wirral with his wife Helen. He is currently Chairman of the Wirral and Chester Branch of the Normandy Veterans Association and Vice-President of the 49th (West Riding) Infantry Division Polar Bear Association. He is also a member of the Essex Regiment and the Market Garden Associations, the Royal Engineers Association and the International Police and Old Warwickian Associations. In June 2009 Les traveled back to Normandy with D-Day Revisited. Here he was able to visit the Polar Bear Memorial at Fonteney-le-Pesnil and lay a wreath to remember his comrades.