RSM Lionel Bryson

London 6 Jan 1910 ◐ – ?

RSM Lionel Bryson (7259229)

About: The regimental sergeant major of 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance, and sergeant major of the British hospital in the Willem III barracks at Apeldoorn, where Murphy and Sam Walsh gave their names to "the medical RSM" about 2 October 1944 (◐ very probably Bryson: the Pegasus Archive's bracket names him, and Warrack made him the hospital's sergeant major). Walsh wrote that the RSM had given them to understand that on escape it was every man for himself; the two escaped on 6 October (Walsh).

Unit or role: Warrant Officer Class I, regimental sergeant major (RSM), 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps, army number 7259229 (his recommendation, p. 2; London Gazette, p. 1315). At Apeldoorn, sergeant major of the hospital's administrative wing under Lt Col Arthur Marrable (✓ Warrack, Travel by Dark, p. 62).

Where: The dressing stations of the field ambulance at Oosterbeek, from 17 September 1944 (his recommendation, p. 2); then the Willem III barracks at Apeldoorn, which Warrack's sketch map captions "Kazerne Willem III, used as prison hospital 25 September—26 October, 1944" (✓ Warrack, p. 76; the map).

Evidence: ✓ his recommendation for the Dutch Bronze Cross, 1945 (The National Archives, WO 373/144/184); ✓ the London Gazette, 20 March 1947, p. 1315; ✓ Walsh's MI9 report and Hardy's, both in the Pegasus Archive's transcription, which names him in brackets; ✓ Graeme Warrack's memoir, Travel by Dark (1963), pp. 27, 29, 60, 62, 67–69, 75–82 (the full text; every page read on its page images); his Pegasus Archive page; ParaData's article on the Apeldoorn hospital.

✓ Graeme Warrack, the division's ADMS, who worked with him at Oosterbeek and Apeldoorn:

The next man I saw was RSM Bryson. I had picked him out at the Corps Depot at Crookam, where he was Company Sergeant Major, and had decided that he would make a keen and efficient RSM for any Airborne field ambulance.

Bryson was a great big fellow, who had started service in the Irish Guards at the age of sixteen. He became a corporal, then his father bought him out, but he didn't like civvy life so he joined up again, this time in the RAMC.

— Graeme Warrack · Travel by Dark (1963), p. 60 · the full text · page image

No dates for his service are given. ◐ His German prisoner-of-war card, as Kew catalogues it, has "Lionel Henry Bryson", born "06/01/1910" in London, his number 7259229 (WO 416/44/371; catalogue text only, the card not seen).

He landed by glider at Arnhem on 17 September 1944 as RSM of 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance, which set up its dressing stations at Oosterbeek (his recommendation, p. 2):

These Dressing stations were continuously under enemy shell and mortar fire and it is directly due to RSM Bryson's drive and efficiency and to the discipline which he had installed into the unit, that such excellent work was done and maintained by the men. During the whole action RSM Bryson showed a tireless devotion to duty and a complete disregard for his own safety.

— Lt Col A. T. Marrable, OC 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance · recommendation for the Dutch Bronze Cross, 1945 · The National Archives, Kew, WO 373/144/184 · the transcription, p. 2

Warrack has him twice at the dressing station in the Schoonoord hotel:

• ✓ The morning after "the third evening". At reveille Warrack went down to the dressing station, "where everything seemed to be going very well and (Lofty) Bryson, RSM of the 181st Field Ambulance, was being a tower of strength, as was Simon Frazer" (Warrack, p. 27).
  • That is 20 September by the book's own sequence: Warrack dates the day as "Tuesday the 19th" (p. 24) and runs it on to "the third evening" (p. 26), reveille follows on p. 27, and the next dated morning is "Next morning, 21st September" (p. 32); the 20th is our arithmetic between the two, not a date he prints.
• ✓ The Germans take the Schoonoord. At midday the same day a German section took possession of the hotel; Warrack, who had taken off his "red tabs and rank badges" after talking to Marrable as orders were shouted in German in the street (p. 28), "suggested to RSM Bryson that he should 'chase me up', but this was too much for him and he kept calling me 'sir'" (p. 29).

✓ After the battle, by his commanding officer's recommendation, the field ambulance:

took over an empty barracks and ran it as a hospital for 900 men wounded at ARNHEM. It was mainly due to RSM Bryson's drive and efficiency that this tremendous task was done quickly and well by very tired men

— Lt Col A.T. Marrable, OC 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance · recommendation for the Dutch Bronze Cross, 1945 · The National Archives, Kew, WO 373/144/184 · the transcription, p. 2

The recommendation names no barracks. ✓ Warrack, who commanded the hospital in the Willem III barracks, split it into an administrative wing and a professional wing: "I put Marrable in charge of the former, with Bryson as sergeant major, and Alford in charge of the latter" (Warrack, p. 62; Bill Alford), and wrote of him that "During the recent battle he had been a tower of strength to us" (p. 60). ParaData's account of the hospital has "Administrative Wing Commander: Lt Col Marrable, assisted by WO1 Len Bryson" (ParaData).

◐ Warrack's diary, near-contemporary (no source says it was written that evening), has a "BRYSON" at the first meeting, on the evening the main party arrived, 26 September: "Call a meeting of OCs Fd Ambs, Capt REDMAN, HERFORD and BRYSON, and explain the plot to them" (Warrack's diary, p. 27; typed transcript of about 1982, Wellcome Collection RAMC/1584). The diary gives the surname only, among the "OCs Fd Ambs"; no Bryson is in its list of officers (pp. 48–50), and that the man summoned is the RSM is our reading, from Warrack's 1963 book having "Sergeant Major Bryson" in the barracks in the first week (below). ✓ Its roll of the medical staff at Apeldoorn has "7259229 RSM BRYSON L H", with no note against him (◐ the legend marks departures only, so a blank does not show he stayed) (the roll, p. 51).

✓ Sam Walsh's MI9 report: "About the 2 OCT our clothing was returned to us and we were moved to the WILLEM III Barracks also in APELDOORN", where "we gave our names to the medical RSM … who detailed all those who were able for various jobs in looking after the wounded as there was a shortage of medical orderlies" (Walsh). ◐ Walsh gives no name: the name is the Pegasus Archive's bracket in its transcription, "259229. W.O.I. Lionel Henry Bryson. 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance, R.A.M.C.", which drops the first figure of his number (7259229 in his recommendation and the Gazette).

Walsh goes on: "We had been given to understand by the RSM that so far as escape was concerned it was every man for himself and Pte. MURPHY … of my Coy and I decided to make an attempt" (Walsh). The two got out of the barracks on the evening of 6 October; the escape is told on Apeldoorn and the escape and on Sam Walsh's page.

✓ James Hardy of 16 Parachute Field Ambulance, held at the barracks since 25 September, who later met Murphy in hiding at Elspeet, was told on the morning of 5 October that he was to leave with an evacuation that afternoon:

I then spoke to the R.S.M. … and asked him if it was O.K. for me to attempt escape and he said that I could if I wished and as I had no compass he gave me one.

— Pte James Hardy, 16 Parachute Field Ambulance · MI9 escape report · Pegasus Archive transcription · Hardy

◐ Hardy writes only "the R.S.M."; the Pegasus Archive's bracket names the R.S.M. as "7259229. W.O.I. Lionel Henry Bryson. R.S.M., 181 Airlanding Field Ambulance, R.A.M.C.". Hardy hid in the cookhouse and the adjoining dining hall that night and the next, and left at about 0015 on the night of 6/7 October (Hardy).

Warrack tells three more episodes with Bryson in them. Murphy is in none of them; they are about the same hospital.

• ✓ Maguire's escape. One way out was to hide in the heap of straw beside an incinerator outside the ring of sentries. Hugh Maguire's first try failed, and on the next night Bryson went out with him and buried him in straw; Warrack gives no date (Warrack, pp. 75–76, on the page images and the next, quoted below).
• ✓ The German broadcaster. In "our first week at Apeldoorn" a German naval lieutenant offered to have the men speak on the wireless or send their names home. Warrack sent for the senior chaplain, Bill Harlow, and "Sergeant Major Bryson", ordered that no officer or other rank speak on any wireless or recording machine, and left it to each man whether to send his name. When the German came back for his list, "'No, sir,' remarked Bryson, beaming. 'None of the men want to send their names or any messages; …'" (pp. 67–69: 67, 68, 69 and 69).
• ✓ The counts. Every day Bryson and Warrack took the German lieutenant, Narka, and his sergeant round the building for the count; on the Monday after a party of officers and NCOs broke out after the Sunday evening service, the officers were told to "shuffle round while they were being counted" (pp. 80–82: 81, 82). ◐ That Monday is 16 October: Warrack has the party's leaders arrive on 12 October and the break-out set for "the following Saturday and Sunday" (pp. 78–79).

Hugh Maguire tried this way. His first attempt was not a success, for though he got himself into the bundle of straw, the incinerator was alight and the German relief sentries stood round it and talked for hours, and Hugh couldn't get out until it was too late to attempt to escape. He returned to camp dishevelled and very cold. The next night he made another try. Sergeant Major Bryson went with him and piled such an enormous load of straw on top of him that when the time came for him to crawl out he thought he would never manage it, but in the end he wriggled through and got away.

— Graeme Warrack · Travel by Dark (1963), pp. 75–76 · the full text · page images 75, 76

✓ Lt Col Marrable recommended him for the Dutch Bronze Cross; brigade received it on 10 June and passed it on 1 July 1945, and division received it on 10 July and passed it on 24 July, over the divisional commander's signature (WO 373/144/184, p. 2). The recommendation closes: "RSM Bryson was quite outstanding throughout. His conduct is worthy of the very highest praise."

✓ The Netherlands gave him the Bronze Lion: "No. 7259229 Warrant Officer Class I Leonard Henry BRYSON, Royal Army Medical Corps", gazetted on 20 March 1947 in the same list as Albert Allen (London Gazette, p. 1315). The number is the one on his recommendation and his Pegasus Archive page (his page).

◐ After the hospital: the same card has "Stalag IXC Bad Sulza", prisoner of war number 52987, with no date or place of capture (WO 416/44/371). Marrable's card has the same camp and 52979 (Arthur Marrable), ◐ so the two were very probably registered there close together; neither card gives a date. Nothing has been found on his later life. No escape, evasion or liberation report of his own was found when the item-level entries of WO 208/3324–3352, 5405–5436 and the card index 5275 were checked by surname and service number (3345 and 3347 have no item-level entries) (the catalogue sweep).

• His name. ⚠︎ The Gazette has "Leonard Henry"; his recommendation and his Pegasus Archive page have "Lionel Henry" (WO 373/144/184, p. 2; his page; London Gazette, p. 1315). ParaData has "WO1 Len Bryson" (ParaData) and Warrack "(Lofty) Bryson", a nickname (Warrack, p. 27). The number, 7259229, is the same in the Gazette and the recommendation, so it is one man.
• His award. The Gazette lists him under "Bronze Lion"; the recommendation was for the "Dutch Bronze Cross" (WO 373/144/184), and his Pegasus Archive page gives "Bronzen Kruis", the Bronze Cross (his page). ✓ The Gazette records what was conferred.
• The broadcaster. Warrack's book has a German naval lieutenant in the first week, and Bryson telling him the men wanted to send no names (pp. 67–69, above).
  • His diary, on 2 October, has "name of KRAMMER, I think. Was a war correspondent paid by his Government", who "spoke ENGLISH with a strong AMERICAN accent"; the names were to be gathered "through the padres", and when the man came back "He didn't get a single one" (the diary, pp. 35–36). It does not name Bryson in the episode.
  • ✓ Lt-Col Martin Herford's report of 1944 has it on 2 October too: "An ex-U-boat German-American arrived and tried to persuade some of the men to give family messages for broadcast over the wireless. Every man refused" (Herford's report, Journal of the RAMC, vol. 98 (1952), p. 297, read on the page image). ◐ A former U-boat man fits the book's naval lieutenant and his American speech the diary's accent; the diary's war correspondent is the odd one out. Herford names no one who answered him.
  • ◐ 2 October is within a week of Warrack's arrival; the description of the man differs.
• How many wounded. His recommendation has the barracks run "as a hospital for 900 men wounded at ARNHEM" (WO 373/144/184, p. 2). The others:
  • Hardy: "I believe there were about 1,000 wounded accommodated there" (Hardy);
  • Warrack: "a list of 1,200 names in the office", which he told the German broadcaster could be had, in his first week (✓ Warrack, pp. 68–69), a list of names, not a count;
  • the Pegasus Archive's page on Warrack: a hospital "specifically for 1,700" (Pegasus Archive);
  • ParaData: the wounded moved in on 26 September, "boosting casualty numbers to about 2,000", while nearly 500 walking wounded left for Germany that day (ParaData).
  • Warrack's diary: "some 900 patients" on the evening of 26 September, and its own counts, 796 on 29 September to 533 on 3 October (the diary, pp. 27, 34, 38).
  • ◐ Men came and went daily, so each figure may be right for a different day; ParaData's and the diary's give one.

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