Niall Cherry
Niall Cherry was born in 1959 ‘down’ the Old Kent Road in South East London–a location that probably needs no more words said about it, after its fame from the Monopoly game. Like his good friend Frog he served in the army, but in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He worked in the defence industry for around 30 years, deeply interested in military history and a particular interest in the Airborne Forces of WW2, he has written 18 books to date and is a battlefield tour guide specialising in Arnhem. His main claim to fame is he was the only non-Arnhem veteran to be the Secretary of the Arnhem 1944 Veterans’ Club.
A Tom’s Tale: Mount Longdon 1982Â
A gritty, down to earth account of one Tom’s story from his childhood through to joining the Junior Parachute Company and then onto joining the 3rd Battalion The Parachute Regiment.
In 1982 the 3rd Battalion (3 Para) was called upon to go ‘down south’ as part of the Task Force, with the aim of retaking the Falkland Islands which had been invaded and occupied in April of that year.
A Tom’s Tale relates Frog’s story, concentrating on the voyage south on the Canberra, the time at Ascension Island, then landing at Port San Carlos in May. At this time he was a member of 4 Platoon, B Company and he was the platoon runner. His platoon sergeant who had not been in post long was Sergeant Ian McKay, Frog often shared a trench with him down south and they became close. As we know 3 Para was destined to take part in the bloodiest fight on the Falklands and that was to take Mount Longdon. As you will read the Platoon was decimated on the unforgiving slopes of Mount Longdon and this book details the fight by Frog and the rest of 4 Platoon to get on. Frog was the last man to see and hear Sergeant Ian McKay as the two of them attacked an Argentinean machine gun position on Longdon. Ian, who was killed doing this, was awarded the last Victoria Cross of the 20th Century.
The account is illustrated by a number of photographs taken in 1982–many of them never published before–and ones taken in 2024 when the two authors undertook a pilgrimage to the places connected with 1982.
We hope this book will strike a chord with those who were there on Longdon, and for those who will struggle to get down south, we hope the book will help you paint a picture of what it was like.
The book is complemented by around 100 photographs, documents and maps. Foreword by Major General Jonathan Shaw and Afterword by Captain Adrian Logan.
The Silence of Stone, 50 Arnhem Casualties: The Stories Behind The Headstones
The Battle of Arnhem has always attracted a lot of attention with numerous films, books and articles been written about it. Most concentrate on the actual fighting and briefly mention the casualties. Around 12,000 men from the 1st British Airborne Division, the 1st Polish Independent Parachute Brigade and men from the Glider Pilot Regiment when to Arnhem. From this band of brothers, the number who died during the fighting is around 1,930 with a large number of these being buried in the Arnhem Oosterbeek War Cemetery.
Martin Middlebrook records the dead as 1,485 from the 1st Airborne Division, 368 Royal Air Force and 79 Royal Army Service Corps Air Despatchers.
A number of men who died as a result of the battle are in some instances buried as far away as the Czech Republic, Germany and indeed a number of men died later of wounds or illness and are buried in the United Kingdom.
In this first volume of The Silence of Stone Niall Cherry has looked at the circumstances of 50 men who died as a result of the fighting in what can be called ‘a story behind the headstone’. These 50 stories include a Royal Navy man, a Dutch civilian, a CANLOAN officer and men from a wide range of units that comprised the 1st British Airborne Division. Each story is unique and personal and so provides a new insight into the men who fought at Arnhem.
