These personal stories all relate to the the experience of Americans in Bristol during the Second World War. Tales from both the military personnel themselves and the Bristolians who welcomed to the city are included. They have come from personal interviews, recorded archives, local history books, shared stories and other websites. If you have your own memories or family memoirs or know of any other stories, please email them to YanksinBristol@gmail.com

Stories from Bristolians
Megan Liddiatt and Captain John Reddy – A schoolgirl in Fishponds and the U.S.. Army Captain who stayed at their house
Delphine Rowden – Young woman working for Imperial Tobacco
John Tarling – A schoolboy in Fishponds
Terry Barton – A schoolboy living next to Shirehampton Golf Course
Doreen May – A young woman from Knowle West who dated a GI.
Tom Fletcher – A schoolboy in Filton
Hilary Brock – A schoolgirl who witnessed D-Day preparations on the Downs
Schoolgirls from ‘The West at War’ – The experiences of four schoolgirls that were featured in an HTV series from 1990
Brian Gearing – A schoolboy in Sea Mills
David Woodman – A boy growing up near a U.S. Army base in Kingswood
Stories from Americans
Richard Taylor – A filmmaking D-Day hero who stayed in Chipping Sodbury
Mystery brick carvings in Westbury-on-Trym – Our successful investigation into tracing American place names carved into Bristol bricks
Lionel G. Hanley – An orthopaedic photographer at Frenchay who took unique pictures of wartime Bristol
Merle Hagerman and Winifred Weeks – A successful Anglo-American relationship forged in Patchway
Otis F. Wollenberg – A New Yorker with the 32nd Machine Records Unit
Ruth Hamilton Prengle – A senior nurse on the plastic surgery ward at Frenchay
Elijah Glenn Ward, Louis Edmead and Walter Haynes – African American soldiers featured in a BBC West documentary
Eugene S Norton – An anglophile G.I. who found a new home in Brislington
Kenneth Long – Ohio soldier who worked at U.S. First Army Headquarters
Alva Walt Leeper – Oklahoma pilot killed in a P-51B at Gaunt’s Earthcott.
Laures Champlin – How did a US Army Corporal’s dog-tags end up in the Bristol School of Art’s grounds? (external)
Norma Raley – A nurse with the 298th General Hospital at Frenchay who met and married a US airman
Americans at Frenchay Hospital – Short biographies of Americans who worked there with photos (external)
Tom Burand and Doris Mitchell – A rare Anglo-American marriage who settled in Bristol
General Omar Bradley – Officer Commanding First United States Army
Unit Histories
77th Evacuation Hospital – Selected extracts from the history of a unit at Frenchay Hospital
519th Port Battalion – Some of the men who worked at Avonmouth Docks
We’d love to hear your own stories. Please get in touch with us by emailing YanksinBristol@gmail.com
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