North Africa

With the great British 8th Army. Having traditionally served the French Army, AFS was a little at loose ends after the fall of France in the summer of 1940.  But then it got going again, first by joining the Hadfield-Spears unit, first sent to the Middle East; and then becoming attached, as it had been with the French, to the British 9th and 8th Armies.   AFS took part in all the major battles of North Africa, notably El Alamein.   There was a small group, a spinoff from the Hadfield-Spears, which continued to serve the Free French, attached to the British.