大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jock Watt. He fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

What A Nightmare!

It was another messy day on the Gazala line and it was not over yet. Sadly there were still a few hours of daylight left and we were tired, very tired. Now what are we in for - an order has just come through for the Honey Squadron to withdraw to an area behind our lines. Still rather puzzled and with my other two tanks, we joined a column and moved south in the fading light to an assembly area. Here, we joined Honeys from other regiments and refuelled ready for a night march.

Guided by 11th Hussars Armoured Cars, we drove south in the dark, nose to tail, in a cloud of choking dust. It was a driver鈥檚 nightmare, struggling to see through eyes half closed against the flying grit, hell bent on keeping up with the tank in front. The whole column crawled slowly across the desert revving and braking repeatedly, bumping and banging like trucks shunting in a goods yard. My aching body bounced around in the turret ring with the Ack.Ack. gun retaining plunger trying to punch a hole in the middle of my back.

We travelled south, west, and then north throughout the night, stopping occasionally for stragglers to catch up. The Hussars did a marvellous job, herding us along like a wild west cattle drive. It was still dark when we stopped and some how formed up in line abreast, our position was at the left end of the line.

As the day dawned we reached the top of a ridge and there beneath us was the object of that nightmare journey. A mass of enemy transport, packed close together in a normal night laager, apparently unaware of our presence and without an obvious escort. In an instant all hell let loose, tanks firing every weapon they had, determined to destroy the columns before they broke out of line.

In just minutes the scene was chaotic, vehicles burning, ammunition exploding and troops running around in circles. Our task on the left was to prevent the rear vehicles getting away. We moved down the hill to attack from the rear and chased a few that broke free, but the situation was getting out of hand when Dixie went over the next ridge after a cookhouse lorry. I caught up with him as he was removing a sack of something from the rear of the lorry, he had stopped it with a 37mm. through the cab. The order came to withdraw and we topped the ridge leaving behind a mass of destruction.

Damn Dixie and his solo chase, we were at the end of the column and, after travelling some miles south away from the scene, I was ordered to halt with my troop behind a ridge as rear guard to the column. With a heavy heart I watched the end vehicles disappear in a cloud of dust and peered through my binoculars at the black cloud of smoke hanging above the far horizon. My body sagged as I rested on my elbows and gazed at the black cloud rising high in the sky. A deathly silence, broken only by the buzzing of a persistent fly, gave a feeling of peace and tranquillity. No noise from the crew or the other tanks, they were probably snatching a long delayed forty winks. My God I was tired and struggled to keep my eyes open by staring at the far horizon, apparently without really seeing.

Suddenly they were there, three enemy tanks, less than a mile away coming towards us in a cloud of dust. How could I possibly have missed them coming over that far ridge. I grabbed the microphone to report but the wireless was dead. Looking inside and screaming at the operator I saw his hand move to switch the set on, the idiot had switched the damned thing off. I swung my leg in rage and kicked him in the back. He had seen the enemy and thought if we did not report we would not be ordered to engage. The combination of weariness and fear distorts the mind resulting in irrational judgement. The order came to rejoin the regiment and with great relief our Honeys raced across the desert, leaving the enemy in our dust cloud.
There was no problem with navigation, the track marks left by the regiment showed us the way home.

Jock Watt. 3rd. R.T.R.

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