William’s Story (as told by his daughter)

Alison Donaldson writes > My father was William George Grieve Forrest; he was a meteorologist in the RAF during the war. He landed on Omaha and his service record says he was with the 21BDS but like so many he never talked about his experience; he died many years ago.

Ron Muggleton responds >: I found the following in the Operations Record Book for No. 24 Sector which may be of interest.

24 Sector Operations Record Book, 24th August 1944:

“On the following day the Meteorological Section arrived and set up business on the Ops site and produced weather reports”.

I doubt that each Sector had its own Meteorological Section but it is entirely possible there was a single Met Section attached to No.85 (Base) Group which operated on behalf of all the constituent parts and moved around the various sites as needed.

24 Sector Operations Record Book, 16th September 1944:

On the 16th the major move gets under way and is reported as follows: “Camp is called at 05.00, breakfast at 06.00 and the final loading of tents and cookhouse takes place. Start at 08.00 was however delayed until 08.25. The morning is fine but chilly. The main convoy of 26 vehicles is preceded by a small convoy of Intelligence and Met Section and followed later by the main Ops Party who came off last night watch. All told, some 140 to 160 vehicles arrived at Boos for the night, which is spent in the open.”

As you can see it refers to 24 Sector rather than 21 Sector, but as No. 85 (Base) Group, which was the parent unit of 21, 24 and 25 Sectors, was the main formation, it is quite possible that the Meteorological Section was part of 85 Group and moved around between the Sectors as required. By the dates shown above, 4 GCIs of 21 Sector were about to return to England, but all of the other attached units (which could have included the Met Section) would have remained on the Continent probably as a constituent part of 85 (Base) Group.