From Dunkirk to D-Day : A Commando's War

From Dunkirk to D-Day : A Commando's WarBill Adlam's hair raising escape from Dunkirk, his dramaticcommando raids and his storming the D Day beaches reads likefiction. But it all happened. Bill escaped the Dunkirk disaster via a bayonet charge intoNazi machine guns. He was presented with the Military Medal`for gallantry under fire' by King George VI. Later, Bill volunteered forcommandos: he thrived on adrenaline. Number 4 Commando took him to a surgical strike in thenorth of Norway. The

Bill Adlam's hair-raising escape from Dunkirk, his dramatic�commando raids and his storming the D-Day beaches reads like�fiction. But it all happened. Bill escaped the Dunkirk disaster via a bayonet charge into�Nazi machine guns. He was presented with the Military Medal�`for gallantry under fire' by King George VI. Later, Bill volunteered for�commandos: he thrived on adrenaline. Number 4 Commando took him to a surgical strike in the�north of Norway. The stated objective: to destroy oil installations.�It was a feint. Ian Fleming of the Secret Intelligence Service had�masterminded the raid. Its objective: to help break the Enigma Code. Number 4 Commando then sent him on a raid to Dieppe in August 1942 to�spike naval guns to enable a landing by Canadian forces. Bill's�commanding officer was Lord Lovat: cousin to Ian Fleming and�(allegedly) template for the fictional James Bond. Bill's prowess as a commando saw him headhunted to a top secret�location in the wilds of Scotland. Here he trained others in�the dark arts of `butcher and bolt'. On the morning o 6 June 1944, D-Day, Bill passed over the sands of Normandy�in minutes. The next two months saw him up against Hitler's�elite army and Waffen SS divisions. The reader will ask the same question that Bill asked: how�would he ever come out alive?