Teesside stories you may have missed this week
Here are some stories you may have missed on Teesside this week.
"It was like nothing I'd ever seen," 102-year-old RAF veteran Kenneth Johnson said of the VE Day celebrations in 1945.
He is one of thousands across the north-east of England and Cumbria who commemorated the 80th anniversary of the end of World War Two in Europe.
Services and parties took place, including parades in Redcar, ahead of the lighting of beacons as part of a national hilltop ceremony.
"Everyone was waltzing and snake dancing [conga lines] - it seems quite silly now," Mr Johnson, from Darlington recalled.
Read about Mr Johnson's memories here
llegal vapes and tobacco worth more than £12,000 were stored under "rotting waste" in wheelie bins, Trading Standards officers found.
The officials seized 685 packs of cigarettes, 24 packs of hand-rolling tobacco and 83 illegal vapes from bins outside a shop in Darlington.
Cleveland Police informed Darlington Borough Council after spotting a shop worker removing tobacco from the bins where it was being used as off-site storage.
Read the full story here
Little jumpers knitted by grandmothers are being used to prevent penguins caught in oil spills from getting ill while trying to clean their feathers.
Dubbing themselves the Knitting Nannas, the group based at Hazelgrove Court Care Home in Saltburn, Teesside, have been sending their mini creations to a charity in Australia.
The woolly tops are used as a barrier to stop the birds ingesting toxic chemicals when they try to preen themselves after swimming through oil.
Read all about the Knitting Nannas story here
A football fan paid £1,000 to help others travel to Wembley for an FA Trophy final.
Lifelong Spennymoor Town FC fan Gary Finley said he had to "follow his heart" and pay transport costs for more than 65 fans going to watch their team play Aldershot Town on Sunday.
It comes after Spennymoor Town Council refused to help the club pay for fans to travel to the final as part of their Back the Fans and Pack the Stands campaign.
Read all about this act of generosity here
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11 hours ago
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'VJ Day wasn't of any great consequence to us'
A 100-year-old World War Two veteran said VJ Day did not seem to be of any "great consequence" at the time, even though he was serving in the Pacific. Richard Clegg, from Bozeat, near Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, was on board HMS Victorious on 15 August 1945 when Japan surrendered. Events to mark the 80th anniversary were held on Friday and over the weekend across the UK. Mr Clegg said the events were "for people who weren't there to remember it. People who were there I don't think make a fuss about it really". Victory over Japan Day commemorates the Japanese surrender that brought the war to a complete end. Mr Clegg said that 80 years ago, HMS Victorious was "delivering a load of American planes into the middle of the American Pacific Fleet". He told BBC Radio Northampton's Annabel Amos they "got halfway there to our destination" when they were stopped. 'No communication' "We didn't know what had happened, and the next day they then told us that the first atom bomb had been dropped [on Hiroshima], and then... three days later they dropped the second atom bomb [on Nagasaki] so they then said the fleet will disperse," Mr Clegg said. The bombs killed more than 200,000 people – some from the immediate blast and others from radiation sickness and burns – and led to Japan's surrender. Mr Clegg said HMS Victorious sailed to Brisbane and was then used to take Japanese prisoners of war home or to hospital. "[VJ Day] wasn't of any great consequence to us at the time because we were never directly involved with fighting the actual Japanese people," he said. The veteran also said VE Day – marking Victory in Europe – which happened earlier in the year, in May, was not celebrated in the Pacific because it "wasn't possible – there was no communication". The centenarian is the last of his friends from the services still alive, and he put his longevity down to "good fortune". He added: "I've always kept fit. You just learnt to look after yourself when you are in the navy." Follow Northamptonshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X. Related stories 80th VJ Day service is poignant moment for veteran VJ Day explained in 60 seconds Related internet links Royal Navy
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
Last surviving Second World War Victoria Cross recipient dies aged 105
Britain's last surviving Second World War Victoria Cross recipient has died aged 105. Flight Lieutenant John Cruickshank, from Aberdeen, received the VC for bravery during an attack on an enemy submarine that left him seriously injured. A total of 181 people received Britain's highest military decoration for their actions during the war. The RAF captain's family told the BBC he died last week and that a funeral would be held in private, the news outlet reported on Saturday. Flt Lt Cruickshank was the captain of a Catalina flying boat with 210 Squadron, flying submarine-hunting missions from RAF Sullom Voe, in the Shetland Islands, Scotland. On July 17 1944, aged 24, he was sent on a patrol to protect the British Home Fleet as it returned from an attack on the German battleship Tirpitz. A U-boat was spotted on the surface near Norway and the aircraft he was captaining and piloting launched an offensive. The first bombs failed to release but Flt Lt Cruickshank turned the plane to face enemy fire and attack again. He dropped depth charges during the second attempt, sinking the U-boat. Flt Lt Cruickshank sustained 72 injuries including two to his lungs and 10 to his lower limbs during the assault. The navigator was killed, three other crew members were severely injured, and the badly damaged aircraft was filled with fumes from exploding shells. After the victory, Flt Lt Cruickshank left the cockpit but refused painkillers and continued to advise his second pilot who had taken control. The surviving crew members spent five and a half hours flying back to Sullom Voe. Despite losing consciousness multiple times during their return, he assisted the second pilot with the landing which took an hour. In 2013, Flt Lt Cruickshank said: 'It was just normal, we were trained to do the job and that was it. 'I wouldn't like to say I'm the only one that has an amazing story, there are plenty of other stories coming from that time. 'It wasn't that wonderful in those days, I can tell you that. We could only think in those days there were better days to come.' After the war ended Flt Lt Cruickshank returned to his career in banking.
Yahoo
a day ago
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How a 'moth-eaten rag' became a war memorial
A small coastal town is home to an unusual World War Two war memorial created by soldiers in memory of comrades who died while prisoners of war (POW). It was made by men from the 4th Battalion, The Suffolk Regiment, who were captured at the fall of Singapore in 1942. They spent more than three years as slave labourers for the Japanese army, much of it at Chungkai camp in Thailand. The centrepiece of the memorial in Leiston, Suffolk, is a union jack, used in the camp during funeral services and brought home by Corp Herbie Bailey after he and the other survivors were finally liberated. In 1952, the veterans transformed the "moth-eaten rag" into a tribute to the POWs of the 4th Battalion who died and to mark the 10th anniversary of their capture. "Sometimes people just refer to it as a flag, but it's not just a flag - the flag is just the centrepiece of a very, very interesting and unusual war memorial," said Taff Gillingham, chairman of the Friends of the Suffolk Regiment. In 1942, the 4th Battalion was among many Allied divisions rushed to defend Singapore, in the wake of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbour. After fierce fighting but against impossible odds, the British, Australian and Indian forces were ordered to surrender. Somehow the 11ft by 6ft (3.3m by 1.8m) flag went with the men of the 4th Battalion when they were transferred to Chungkai camp, said Mr Gillingham. This was a POW camp used during the construction of the infamous Burma-Thailand Railway, and today it is a Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery. About 13,000 Allied prisoners of war died during the railway project, plus an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 civilians, according to the commission. Mr Gillingham said the 4th and 5th battalions of the Suffolk Regiment were about 2,000 strong when they disembarked at Singapore in 1942, but more than a third of them had died by the end of the war. The POWs were allowed to build a little wooden chapel at Chungkai for church services, where the flag rested on its altar. "And every time one of the soldiers died, it was used for the funeral service," Mr Gillingham said. "Starved, beaten and executed for the slightest misdemeanours - the thing that inspires me is their resilience and their ingenuity, making medicines from plants that they'd find in the jungle, for example." Every aspect of the memorial has a specific link to the 4th Battalion, a territorial unit which recruited from the Leiston area. Mr Gillingham said: "The frame is just as interesting [as the flag], in that it's made from wood salvaged from Southwold Pier and the metal frame it sits on was made by the engineering works of Garretts, the engineering works in Leiston, so it was a proper local project. "And the colours behind the flag mean something too - they are the colours of the Pacific Star, the medal that all the Far East prisoners of war were given." Today, it is owned by the Friends of the Suffolk Regiment and is on long-term loan to the town's Long Shop Museum. When the men of the 4th Battalion were liberated at the end of the war, many, including Corp Bailey, continued to serve in the territorials for years, with weekly training and annual camps. Underneath the memorial is a plaque which describes it as "a moth-eaten rag on a worm-eaten pole". It also records how the union jack was "hoisted to the top of the pole in the camp by the men of the battalion who survived three years of living hell". Mr Gillingham said: "It's often said to be the only war memorial based on an artefact brought back from the field, and it's certainly the only one I can think of, but it's a lovely thing because it has a direct connection with the place, and the people, with those who died." A service to mark the 80th anniversary of Victory over Japan Day and the end of World War Two will be held at the memorial at 10:30 BST. Follow Suffolk news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X. More on this story 'Death railway' soldiers honoured with exhibition Film to tell regiment's 'poignant' war battles 'VE celebrations muted due to Far East prisoners' Related internet links The Long Shop Museum, Leiston Friends of the Suffolk Regiment
