7263856 Private George Walter Condon
7263856 Private George Walter Condon was born on 8th March 1920. In 1921 he was living in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk
with his mother Kate née Castor.
He enlisted on 24th March 1937.
Having trained as a medic as a member of The Royal Army Medical Corps, he was attached to the 11th Parachute Battalion
and undertook his parachute training on course No. 61 at Ramat David,
Palestine, from 18 until 30 August 1943 and after completion of the course he was assigned as a medic to
Headquarters Company, 11th Parachute Battalion.
Prior to being deployed to Arnhem, George married Lillian Marks in Fakenham, Norfolk.
Taken prisoner of war on 19th September 1944 at Arnhem, he was held from September until November 1944
at Stalag XIIA, Limburg and in Stalag IVB Mulberg from November 1944 until
10th November 1945. His prisoner of war number was 90825.
During an interview with George after the battle, he said the
following:
“I went out on a Monday from an airport in Leicestershire. I felt rather nervous and our pilot, who had taken a lot of troops over on the Sunday, said to me, ‘Don’t worry, it’s a piece of cake’. I had an American revolver and a Sten gun and carried a kitbag containing ammunition, field dressings and a fold-up stretcher. We had a 48-hour ration pack with five cigarettes, concentrated porridge, and meat and cubes of sugar, milk and tea. We also had some chocolate and a little cooker like a camping stove with a block of meths you set light to when you wanted to cook anything, but I never had any time to use it. During the flight towards Holland there was a lot of FLAK and small arms fire when we jumped and part of the landing ground was alight. We were told to shoot through to get to the bridge. We managed to get within 300 yards of it but the fighting was so fierce that we took up positions in the upstairs part of a house and moved from one house to another as the Germans pressed in on us.”
After the war George and Lillian settled in London and in 1951 were living at 257a Elgin Avenue, Paddington.
George died in 1992 in Lambeth, Greater London.