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Chap 2
More serious work came after April ’42. The blitz had intensified in ’42 and when the George Cross was awarded on 15th April we were told that Rome Radio had warned that the UK personnel evacuation camps would be bombed. (I have never been able to confirm this and certainly at the time we took little notice) Then on Saturday April 25th the attack came at 7 a.m. My father had a rare day off and we were asleep in the storage area of the central Dining Hall. The din was deafening and as we were near the door in the middle could see the flashes of exploding bombs. Then there was the chilling sound of falling masonry as our own building was hit.

When the raid was over, we walked out to complete devastation. The Luftwaffe had first eliminated the Heavy 4.5-in.and Bofors guns at Spinola batteries across St Georges’ Bay and then turned their attention to the barracks. Almost every building was destroyed. Our Dining Hall shelter, in the shape of a T had received a direct hit on the bottom of the T but the top of the T, sheltering several hundred people, was unscathed. Our own room in A block had a direct hit and we began the task of salvaging what was left. I remember my father saying all four of us are safe, so don’t worry about our possessions. During the course of that day and the next two or three, between rushes to the shelter we collected bits and pieces. My father’s half-hunter watch was hanging on a hook on the first wall that was standing five or six ‘rooms’ away. The mah-jongg set had been near the bomb and we began to find pieces all over the barrack square. It became a joke among our helpers and we found all except about five pieces!

We were billeted temporarily in the moat of the fort half way to St Andrew’s Barracks but the conditions took their toll on our health and first my mother and then I were carted off to Imtarfa Hospital with enteric fever. It was fascinating for a young boy, almost 14, who as he recovered, stood with forces personnel looking out over Ta’ Qali airfield watching the intense bombing and the recovery, as Spitfires were flown in, swiftly re-fuelled and armed, and joined in the fight. They shot down a number of bombers in front of us and we had a grandstand view.

The family found a flat in Point Street, Sliema in May ‘42 and my second and third type of war work began. During March the convoy known as MW10 had arrived from Alexandria after intense attacks. Talabot and Pampas were sunk in Grand Harbour as they were being unloaded. There was criticism that the unloading was taking to much time, so it was decided that future convoys would be unloaded swiftly to dumps around the island and supplies would then be redistributed. I was asked with other Scouts to guard the food dumps which would be subject to pilfering, so as Convoy ‘Harpoon’ arrived in June I went on night duty. Armed only with a Scout staff, I am not sure I would have been any good stopping a determined attempt but although we saw movements and heard whispering, we were not attacked. My task was to guard Pink Dump though I have no idea where that was.

Finally, I was told of another convoy about to arrive, we hoped. This was the famous ‘Pedestal’ Convoy and as the ships began to arrive in August ’42 I was sent to ‘P’ point at the Marsa, near Corradino. I worked from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. as a telephone boy on Operation ‘Ceres’. As a tug towed lighters round to my wharf, my job was to record the tug and lighter numbers and report their arrival to HQ. HQ then told me which ship to instruct the tug skipper to return to. As all the ‘stevedores’ were UK forces personnel I got on well. There were few UK people left and though I had many Maltese friends and liked the Maltese very much, it was good to talk English. Unfortunately there was not much food landed at P point — it was mostly ammunition, fire engines and the like. I remember sitting on a pile of bombs talking to resting soldiers as we waited for the next tug. But for some reason the raids were light and the smoke screen helped us. However, that same smoke screen entered the lungs of my Uncle Allan, Chief Engineer on the Brisbane Star, there in the harbour with a huge hole in its bows. He eventually died from it.

For that job I was paid ten shillings a day for ten days — my first week’s wage. (When I entered the Admiralty Dockyard a few months later as an electrical apprentice, it was two shillings and sixpence a week.) I collected some guilt as well, for the Maltese Scout colleague who took the night shift relieved me early and was in turn relieved late because my only transport was the ‘dockyard bus’ which took UK personnel from Sliema to the Dockyard.

The siege continued for a number of months — in fact it became worse in terms of shortages. My sister and I went to bed hungry most nights, but our parents were hungrier and the armed forces were even worse off. On the black market eggs were 2/6 each — I think about one twentieth of the average wage. We lived by Victory Kitchens for our main meals and remained without light or cooking facilities. I continued to help run the Scout Troop at St Andrew’s and remember one occasion when, crossing a football pitch (against rules!) we threw ourselves to the ground as an enemy plane strafed the barracks. The final scary blitz was in October and the relieving convoy arrived in November. I started work in the dockyard on 7 November but that month the siege was over.

It was a strange start for an apprentice. Sunken ships everywhere, the destroyer Kingston on its side in No.4 dock; the wreckage of cranes spread across the roads, collapsed buildings all over the Yard. The only toilets were cubicles overhanging the dockside with water pumped through them. But the Yard kept going and I became proud of being part of the effort to keep the Navy in service. The final excitement was, as an electrical apprentice, during a strike, sailing on an MFV to one of the aircraft carriers out at sea to carry out repairs. It was part of the fleet assembled there to invade Sicily. My war was almost over.

Paul Fuller

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