During the Allied advance through France into Germany in the final months of World War Two Linthwaite soldier Harry Wimpenny picked up a German revolver.

It was a war souvenir he never brought home.

For on the boat journey back to England after the fighting had finished he threw it into the Channel in a symbolic gesture.

His son, Nic, says: “It was dad’s way of saying it was all over. He’d had enough of the war.”

But the war years did stay with Harry for he kept a diary while he served and photos from the time. Nic now wonders if he can trace the family of a Huddersfield soldier featured on one and the descendants of French families who his father met on his way through France.

The soldier’s surname was Lockwood and he lived in Birkby. Nic is also particularly keen to find descendants of the Delaunay family in Normandy, France, who Harry met in the weeks following the Allied invasion on D Day.

Harry enlisted in July 1940 and joined the 10th Survey Regiment of the Royal Artillery, serving in C Troop.

Harry Wimpenny during his service in the early days of World War Two - a bit of spit and polish in the barrack room

Nic said: “Dad kept a daily record in an exercise book of his campaign even though it was against regulations to keep one and every day is noted with very few exceptions.”

Most of the war years was spent training in England and the real war started for Harry when his regiment landed at Vers sur Mer in 1944, a coastal village just east of Arromanches in Normandy and part of Gold Beach during the D-Day landings 18 days earlier.

His journey through Europe took in Bayeaux, then north of Paris to Amiens and Brussels before crossing the Rhine at Wesel north of Dusseldorf onto Luneberg where the Germans formally surrendered. By May 12, 1945, he was marching to Kiel guarding 4,000 German prisoners.

But on May 4 he reveals that he was given some German staff cars and told to ‘decommission’ them so the soldiers played dodgems in them until they were completely wrecked.

Nic revealed: “I find it very touching that the places he visited in France – les Andelys, Argentan, Rouen, Beauvais, Bayeux and especially Lille – were all places I travelled to as a businessman from 1978. I got to know the area well and there is little sign of the devastation he would have seen.

Harry Wimpenny (third left) with the Delaunay French family in Normandy shortly after D Day

“Dad’s photo album has a picture of Delmenhorst in Germany and the next town to Delmenhorst is Ganderkesee where my German colleagues have their office and I’ve been several times on business. A little spooky, really.”

Harry’s diary reveals that they boarded a ship bound for France on June 14 and arrived off the coast at 6pm on June 16. The ammunition was taken off the ship first but then on June 19 there was a major storm and they were stuck on board for days. They finally got off the ship on June 24 although the day before Harry had noted in his diary “four ships sunk.”

But Harry did return home with another souvenir of the war.

He thought he had found some German binoculars but it later turned out they were Russian so must have been taken from a Russian by a German soldier.

After the war Harry became a director at Linthwaite builders J Wimpenny and Co and died in 2010 aged 90.

In 1949 he married Margaret who died 12 years ago and they had four children, Jonathan, now 65, Nic, 63, James, 61 and Helen, 53.

Any relatives of the soldier called Lockwood should contact Andrew Hirst at The Huddersfield Daily Examiner on 01484 437761.

Harry also brought home a booklet that is pure history gold.

Simply called Germany, it was advice to troops who were occupying the country after the war was over.

Harry Wimpenny (second left) with a soldier from Birkby (fourth right) who was called Lockwood!

And it pulls no punches, warning the soldiers not to feel sorry for the German civilians and mentions the way the German army had brutally treated occupied countries.

It states: “There will be no brutality about a British occupation, but neither will there be softness or sentimentality. You may see many pitiful sights, hard luck stories may somehow reach you. Some of them may be true, at least in part, but most will be hypocritical attempts to win sympathy. For, taken as a whole, the German is brutal when he is winning and is sorry for himself and whines for sympathy when he is beaten. So be on your guard against ‘propaganda’ in the form of hard luck stories. Be fair and just, but don’t be soft.”

And it warns the soldiers to be prepared for sights of mass destruction by bombing.

It states: “If you come in from the west you will enter the most bombed area in Europe. Here the destruction is many times greater than anything you have seen in London, Coventry or Bristol. In 11 months (September 1940 to July 1941) the Germans dropped 7,500 tons of bombs on London. We dropped nearly 10,000 tons of bombs on Duisburg in October 1944. In western and central Germany you will find an area of bleak poverty and devastation. Expect to find a population that is hungry, exhausted and on the verge of despair.”

Harry Wimpenny

And the booklet claims the Germans had for centuries been trained to submit to authority with obedience imposed on them by force.

“That is one reason why they accepted Hitler,” the booklet states. “He ordered them about and most of them liked it. It saved them the trouble of thinking.”

But, alarmingly, it also claimed: “There are signs that the German leaders are already making plans for a Third World War. That must be prevented at all costs.”

And it states that marriages between the occupying soldiers and German women is forbidden as it was regarded as an easy way out of the country for new wives.

The booklet states: “Many German girls will be just waiting for the chance to marry a Briton whether they care for him or not. When once they had their marriage lines he would have served his purpose.”

And one last final piece of advice: “Go easy on Schnaps.”