
The Estate - Bevendean History Project

Norman Allcorn's Father was in the Home Guard, here are his memories

Norman Allcorn having read the book ‘The Secret Sussex Resistance’ by Stewart Angell comments as follows.
I believe my father Norman ‘Jack’ Allcorn (1904-1988) was a member of an Auxiliary Unit. He was a farmer’s son, used to handling guns. We lived at Lower Bevendean Farm, Brighton (now a housing estate). The farm was only a mile or so over the hill from one of Hitlers landing beaches. He belonged to the Home Guard and had a rifle but one day came home with a Sten Gun. He did a lot of night patrols and then had to come back and milk the cows.
Many, many years later he was talking about the war when my mother stopped him. “Remember the Official Secrets Act” she said and he shut up. My mother was a stickler for doing things right. I never asked again, one of the many things I wished I had asked before he passed on.
I notice from your map which shows the position of the Sussex Auxiliary Units underground hideouts throughout Sussex that there is a gap to the east of Brighton. Is it possible that there was a unit in this area as yet undiscovered? Perhaps 2020 will have an answer, if I live that long as I am nearly 86.
You mention Harold West of Bevendean Farm. (It would have been Upper Bevendean at that time.) Harold was a contemporary of my father, born 1903. As such, he too would have been a prime candidate for a unit member, but he was a Radio Operator! There were two sons of my age that I played with sometimes, but if they are still alive they would, like me, be in their middle eighties.
Being very young at that time, I did not realise what danger we were in or how brave the Auxiliary Units were.
We left Lower Bevendean just before Christmas 1942. My grandfather was evicted for poor farming by The War Agricultural Committee. We went, for 9 months, to Messens Farm, Ninfield and then to Priory Farm, Rushlake Green. My father was a member of the Home Guard in both of these villages but I never saw him with a Sten Gun again.
This part of East Sussex was known as (Flying) ‘Bomb Alley’. There were two Doodle Bug events while we were at The Priory, but that is another story!
I believe my father Norman ‘Jack’ Allcorn (1904-1988) was a member of an Auxiliary Unit. He was a farmer’s son, used to handling guns. We lived at Lower Bevendean Farm, Brighton (now a housing estate). The farm was only a mile or so over the hill from one of Hitlers landing beaches. He belonged to the Home Guard and had a rifle but one day came home with a Sten Gun. He did a lot of night patrols and then had to come back and milk the cows.
Many, many years later he was talking about the war when my mother stopped him. “Remember the Official Secrets Act” she said and he shut up. My mother was a stickler for doing things right. I never asked again, one of the many things I wished I had asked before he passed on.
I notice from your map which shows the position of the Sussex Auxiliary Units underground hideouts throughout Sussex that there is a gap to the east of Brighton. Is it possible that there was a unit in this area as yet undiscovered? Perhaps 2020 will have an answer, if I live that long as I am nearly 86.
You mention Harold West of Bevendean Farm. (It would have been Upper Bevendean at that time.) Harold was a contemporary of my father, born 1903. As such, he too would have been a prime candidate for a unit member, but he was a Radio Operator! There were two sons of my age that I played with sometimes, but if they are still alive they would, like me, be in their middle eighties.
Being very young at that time, I did not realise what danger we were in or how brave the Auxiliary Units were.
We left Lower Bevendean just before Christmas 1942. My grandfather was evicted for poor farming by The War Agricultural Committee. We went, for 9 months, to Messens Farm, Ninfield and then to Priory Farm, Rushlake Green. My father was a member of the Home Guard in both of these villages but I never saw him with a Sten Gun again.
This part of East Sussex was known as (Flying) ‘Bomb Alley’. There were two Doodle Bug events while we were at The Priory, but that is another story!
Frederick ‘Norman’ Allcorn - May 2018
In 2023 Norman discovered that
his father had been a member of the Rodmell Auxiliary Unit from 1940 to
1942 when he left Lower Bevendean Farm. Here is what he has dicovered.
