AT the age of 12, the future Royal Marine Lee Hanmore was taken by his dad to a book signing.

Mr Hanmore was a bit of a history buff and wanted the author to put his signature on the tome he was reading.

The author was William ‘Bill’ Sparks. The book was The Last of the Cockleshell Heroes.

Lee admits that the meeting “went a bit over my head” – but several years down the line the now green beret is following in the heroes’ wake.

With a fellow Royal Marine Commando, Lee, based at CTC RM in Lympstone intends to recreate Operation Frankton – the official name for the ‘Cockleshell heroes’ raid – as Bill Sparks and his comrades did it: in traditional canoes; paddling by night; sleeping rough – in December. Pretty much the only thing missing will be the Germans.

In December 1942 a dozen commandos paddled up the Gironde to destroy German shipping in the port of Bordeaux – something they succeeded in doing but at a terrible cost.

Only two of the Royals survived the raid – Maj ‘B londie’ Hasler and Mne Bill Sparks – the rest were drowned, killed, or captured by the Nazis and subsequently executed as ‘saboteurs’.

Sxity-five years on Lee has enlisted the help of Portsmouth naval base support organisation FSL to build a replica canoe, or cockle – hence the name of the subsequent book and film – so the recreation of the mission will be as authentic as possible.

“The plans for the boats changed all the time – there’s no definitive version saying ‘this is the cockle used,’” explained Graham Feasey of FSL, who’s overseeing a team of apprentices.

“It’s not easy building the boats – it’s actually quite intense, even though it’s only wood and canvas, because we want to use the same methods as they did 60 years ago.”

Authenticity is key to the recreation. Lee will take it in turns to sleep in his boat as the men did in 1942, while his colleague performs sentry duty. The duo will paddle by night and rest by day.

“We are not using anything which was not used in 1942 – we even have replica ration packs from the era,” he explained.

“There will be a safety boat with us because if we capsize there’s no way of righting the canoe again with 150lbs of kit aboard.

“Negotiating the river is going to be a shock to the system, but hopefully by then all our training will have paid off.”

All of which begs a simple question: why?

“Many of the recruits and qualified marines I serve with have heard of the raid but perhaps don’t know who carried it out or what it was for, so a key aim is to raise awareness,” said Lee.