Raymond Mitchell

Raymond Mitchell (November 3, 1920 - August 30, 2001) was a British Royal Marine Commando from 1940 to 1946, involved in military campaigns in Europe, including amphibious landings at Sicily, Salerno, D-Day and the Dutch island of Walcheren, to open the Port of Antwerp.

Later career Civil Engineer, Mitchell lived in Newcastle upon Tyne in Northern England. Married to wife Joan, with four children and five grandchildren.

He volunteered for the Royal Marines in 1940, aged 19. After initial training, was posted to the 8th Battalion Royal Marines and served with that unit as a Motor Cyclist in the Bren Gun Carrier Platoon until October 1942, when the battalion was chosen to form 41 Royal Marines Commando.

In July 1943, as a rifleman in the Commando, Mitchell took part in spearheading the landing on Sicily of the Canadian First Division, part of Montgomery's Eighth Army. Two months later, then attached to US General Mark Clark's Fifth Army for the capture of Naples, the Commando went ashore at Vietri sul Mare. Mitchell received a leg wound from a German hand-grenade on the last day of the Commando's action in the Salerno operation, and was evacuated to North Africa.

Mitchell re-joined the Commando in Catania, Sicily, and arrived back in the UK in January 1944 when the Commando, re-formed and re-equipped, began training for the invasion of Europe and, on D-Day 6 June, in which he landed on Sword Beach, as a Despatch rider. The Commando captured Lion-sur-Mer and later moved across the River Orne where, under command of the Sixth Airborne Division, it held various sectors of the Bridgehead Front until the breakout on 17 August. Subsequently, the Commando Brigade was attached to the Canadian First Army for the amphibious assault on the Dutch island of Walcheren, followed by action on various sectors of the Maas River Front. After the cessation of hostilities, Mitchell was engaged in occupation duties in Germany until November 1945, when the Commando returned to the UK, and released into civilian life in March 1946.

Mitchell was accepted by the City Engineer of Newcastle as an Engineering Learner under Agreement, settled down to studying and, by 1952, was qualified as a Chartered Civil Engineer and a Chartered Municipal Engineer, retiring in 1985 as Assistant City Engineer.

Mitchell's interests were writing, languages, genealogy, waste-derived fuel and alternative forms of energy.