o. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando was a commando unit of the British Army during the Second World War. The first No. 10 Commando was proposed in August 1940, using volunteers from Northern Command, however there was such a poor response that No. 10 Commando was disbanded and the men that had volunteered were posted to other commando units.
In early 1942 the commando was raised again, this time as No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando. By the end of the war the commando had become the largest commando in the British Army and included volunteers from France, Belgium, Holland, Norway, Denmark, Poland and Yugoslavia. There was another group of volunteers in X Troop which contained enemy aliens, Germans and Austrians who had escaped from Nazi Germany. Men from the No. 10 Commando served in the Mediterranean, Scandinavia, Burma and Western Europe during the Second World War, mostly in small numbers attached to other formations, never as a complete unit.
The No. 3 (X) Troop was possibly the strangest unit in the British Army, consisting of enemy aliens. Under the command of Captain Hylton-Jones the first men to arrive in July 1942 were eight men from Czechoslovakia. The troop was also known as the English, Jewish or British troop and was officially renamed the Miscellaneous Troop in 1944. Most of the troop were Jewish and had German, Austrian or Eastern European backgrounds, others were political or religious refugees from Nazi Germany, and at least one member had been imprisoned in Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps. All members of the troop adopted British names and false personnel histories. A total of 130 men served in X Troop, but they never fought as a complete unit but provided valuable service to other formations as interpreters and interrogators. The troop lost 21 men killed and a further 22 wounded.
Name: Hess, Otto (served as Peter Giles)
Rank: Sergeant
Age. 23
No 6387034
Unit: Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment
Missing since: 01-10-1944
Next of Kin:
Groesbeek Panel: 5
KIA Information: Known to have been killed in the Schelde area.
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Philip Reinders, 2016