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Lance-Sergeant Charles Liddell Rutherford McIlhargey
Unit : "C" Company, 8th Parachute Battalion
Service No. : 3244339
Charles McIlhargey was born on the 11th November 1915, grew up in the Glasgow area, and joined the 8th Parachute Battalion after service in India as a regular soldier. Despite being regarded as something of a loner, he was a famous character as a consequence of his mischievous antics and the numerous tattoos covering his body - see the photographs to the right. Archie Bookless, an officer who knew him, later nicknamed his daughter McIlhargey, and commented that he was forever moving up and down the ranks for his behaviour. One day, while taking a rest by the roadside, two officers came past and asked, "who are you and what are you". Charlie is supposed to have replied "I'm the company runner and I'm buggered". He was demoted again.
Lance-Sergeant McIlhargey parachuted into Normandy with the 8th Battalion on the 6th June, and he distinguished himself in the months of fighting that followed, being mentioned three times in the Battalion war diary for his conduct on patrols. On one occasion it was said that he simply wandered off by himself one day and returned later with three German prisoners. On the 25th August, as the 8th Battalion was fighting to gain control of Beuzeville, McIlhargey was on a fighting patrol when he and another man, Private Robert Box, were hit and wounded. The patrol had to press on but promised to return for them later, however the Germans reached them first and took both men prisoner. It was later believed that their wounds had been treated, their hands were tied and that they were then driven away on the back of a lorry, which was strafed soon after by a British aircraft and both McIlhargey and Box were killed. However, as was known at the time after the 8th Battalion men talked with the locals, it is now known that the Germans took them to a house as prisoners of war before taking them into a nearby field, where both were murdered with a gunshot to the back of the head. They were then buried in shallow graves.
Ted Eaglen, McIlhargey's friend and fellow 8th Battalion veteran, was on the same patrol and said of him:
"I met Charles McIlhargey when he came from India to the 8th Battalion. He was quite a character and we got on very well together from the start. And eventually he met a young lady in the NAAFI - which is a restaurant for the troops - he told me that he'd met this lady and that he was very much in love with her, and D-Day was coming very close, and we knew that, so I said "Well why don't you marry her quick, before we go away?". He said, "Oh there isn't time", I said, "Of course there's time.", he said "but I don't know her well enough," "Well if you get killed she'll get a pension. Do you know her well enough for that? And do you love her as much as that", "Oh yes". I said, "Well go on then and get married". So this is what he did."
"And we came over here {to Normandy} and he was in the "C" Company all the way from Dozulé, Annebault, Pont L'Eveque, we came up here and right at the last he was wounded, just as he was on the outskirts of Beuzeville. We were on a patrol, on a fighting patrol I should say, and he got wounded, him and Private Box. We put them both at the side, just on a grass verge, and we said we'll be back in a minute. It was not too serious that they couldn't manage there. By the time we came back they'd been found by the Germans, and the Germans at that time was trying to get across the Seine. According to the local inhabitants the Germans took them into the woods and shot them in the back of the head. That is what we were told from the local people here at Petiville La Raoult and roundabout. The story has changed a little over the years, but I still maintain that is what happened to them and I was on that patrol with them. But I never saw them actually wounded, but I was close by when they were, and I saw them when I left them. To me it was sheer murder, nothing but. There was no need to have killed them, they could have escaped themselves, the Germans could have got over the Seine and left McIlhargey and Box there. But they didn't, they decided to execute them. And what gain did they make by executing two wounded soldiers which would have eventually gone back to England? How can you forget or forgive people for doing things like that?"
"McIlhargey was a really great character. Tattooed all over his body. He was a wonderful fellow, I wasn't with him all the time because he was a little close, he kept his own company quite a lot. But he was a smashing chap. In the barrack room, I remember threatening him one day because I had said something to him, and he came up to me and said "There's only one thing that's stopping me hitting you under the chin." and I said "Yes Mac, what is that?" he said, "That's the fear of retaliation from the Great Eaglen." so I said "I wouldn't hit you Mac, but I'm just winding you up a little bit". We were very very good friends. He was a man who was a good soldier and he became a Sergeant in the 8th Battalion - Alastair Pearson must have thought a lot about him to have made him a Sergeant. McIlhargey was a character, and I would put my life with him because he would not let you down. In war, you get wounded, you get shot and killed in various ways, But to come to the end of your life, being executed, really there was no reason for that to happen. War is war, yes, but execution is not war, it's just sheer murder."