Writer:- The Hornet editorial team. Artist:- Yaroslav Horak?

Main cast:- Second Lieutenant Peter West; Sergeant Jenks.

Time period:- late 1944 / early 1945, World War Two, Ardennes, France.

Second Lieutenant Peter West arrives at the British 17th Reconnaissance Group to find his new section enjoying the war. They have been billeted in a quiet sector of the Ardennes, a forested, mountainous region straddling a corner of Belgium, Luxembourg and a small area of France. West looks very green and inexperienced. So much so, that the troops, reckon he isn't up to the job. The new officer though is anything but green and is soon showing his men that he is more an capable of leading them. Which is just as well as the war soon hots up when German forces launch their final large offensive of World War Two, in a snowy December 1944 against the Allies lines. The offensive became better known to the Allies as the Battle of the Bulge and to the Germans as the Von Rundstedt Offensive. This was the offensive where small numbers of German troops dressed up as American soldiers to cause chaos behind their lines.

The offensive struck hardest against the American forces and part of the line was initinally overun. American forces stubbonly fought back and with the help of Allied airstrikes, not only re-gained the the land they lost, but also stopped the offensive. This was the largest and bloodiest battle American forces would fight in World War Two. They suffered 89,000 casualties of which 19,000 men were killed.

It's against this background of a wintery cauldron of conflict that West and his section's adventures are told. Artwork is (I think) by Horak.

The following adventures of The One Pip Wonder are from issues 135, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143 and 146.

text © Adrian Banfield, 2012; artwork © D.C. Thomson Co. Ltd.