Fighting intensifies in run-up to VE Day

1945 began with intense fighting on all fronts.

 

In the West, the Germans had launched an armoured attack through the Ardennes, with the intention to reach Antwerp and strangle the supply of materials to the Allied armies. This onslaught, known to history as the Battle of the Bulge, would ultimately fail due to the lack of air cover and, above all, fuel.

 

The Allied bombing of Dresden cost over 25,000 lives, mainly civilians. On the Eastern Front, the Russian armies advanced inexorably towards Berlin, grinding down German military resistance and wreaking terrible revenge on both military personnel and civilians alike. In the Pacific, the U.S. Marines took the island of Iwo Jima by February 23, inflicting 19,000 fatalities on the Japanese defenders. By March, Allied Forces had crossed the Rhine and German resistance was collapsing, eventually resulting in the capture of 370,000 German troops.

 

Having smashed German resistance to the east of Berlin on the Seelow Heights, two Russian armies fought their way into the city, eventually reaching the Fuhrerbunker, where, on April 30, Adolf Hitler committed suicide.

 

The war in the West ended on May 7, although it would be a further three months before the dropping of two atomic bombs brought the war against Japan to a terrible end.

 

At Oban, both naval and RAF operations had continued during this period, with the focus of RAF training moving from the Atlantic to Far Eastern Operations.

 

After VE Day, operations were swiftly wound down at RAF Oban, the base being rapidly reduced to a Care and Maintenance function from April 16, 1945.

 

A final parade on the North Pier signified the termination of six years at Oban. Surplus Officer's Mess funds were used to buy stained glass for the mortuary at the West Highland Hospital, a facility only too well known to the Services.

 

The last Catalinas and Sunderlands departed to Killadeas in Northern Ireland and the RAF power boats, skiffs and sundry vessels were either sailed to Bowling on the Clyde or burned at Ardentrive Bay on Kerrera.

 

The town itself held a V.E. Day ceremony involving all three Services and local people on the Corran Park.

 

 

Corran Park VE Commemoration.