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A story of my service career as requested by those who I hope enjoy it.
As Told by George Walker of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders

Chapter 8

At Casino, Route six, the main road, aims in a straight line into town for about 1 and a half miles. No army vehicles came down the road to town, not even at night, they always went a detour further east and entered the town that way, because of the shelling. We called it the ‘Mad Mile’.

One night we heard a vehicle coming from that direction and somehow knew it was not a military one. It was a Salvation Army canteen van. He’d lost his way. When we stopped him, he was a bit confused, then said he’d come down that road, but wasn’t going to take the buns and tea back with him, so we got permission to leave the trenches in pairs for a bun and tea. And the Jerries were only yards away in places. What service, that’s why I always donate to and admire the ‘Sally bobs’
Never heard if he got back alright but I think he must have done so.

When we were advancing on the Hitler line near Adrano we came upon a German Field Hospital. It was dug into the ground like a great big dug out. On one of the ‘beds’ lay a dead German, his arm was dangling down, with an expensive looking watch on his wrist. Now we had always been on the look-out for booby traps and such. So one or two were debating whether it was worth the risk. A sergeant came in and told us to move on, I hadn’t seen him before, I think he had been one of the new reinforcements we had just had. We hadn’t been long on our way when we heard a loud bang.

Another time, our section found ourselves in a farm house when the battalion stopped to consolidate the position after capturing the area. It must have been some German HQ mess, because there was a table laid out ready for a meal, and on the stove stocked up with wood, was a pan with a plucked chicken in, ready for cooking. We looked at it for ages, very tempting for hungry lads. After a while we knew we would be moving on, so we tied some rifle slings together, looped it round the pan, hid in the next room and pulled. The only sound was the pan crashing to the floor and contents all over the place. At that moment we were ordered to move on. I’ve often wondered if the wood in the stove had been booby trapped, and maybe have gone up if anyone had lit it.

At one farm we came across there was only this woman, with two children, She said her husband had been captured in Africa and was in England as a POW. She was running the farm herself. She had a meal on of pasta and tomato broth, which she gave to us before we moved on. It was a real change of diet. We gave her some chocolate for the kids and some tins of corned beef. She hadn’t seen any before.

Another time the occupants of a farm gave us spaghetti and ‘coffee’ made from dried grape seeds. We didn’t grumble at the taste. We left some tins of dried milk, tea and sugar. (The dried milk tea and sugar were all in one tin.)

In England during the Italian Campaign, a certain MP Lady Aster said in Parliament that the 8th Army was doing nothing in Italy and should be fighting in France instead of having a holiday and enjoying the sun. She ought to have been with us, far from sunny or a holiday, what with the rain snow and cold. I bet she wouldn’t have liked being in a trench filled with water or been in the mountains, the area covered with snow and that freezing, weapons had to be fired every so often to save being frozen up, not forgetting us being frozen.
There are plenty of cemeteries in Italy to show it was not a holiday. Our battalion alone, from Nov 1942 to Oct 1943 lost over 1000 men. Some holiday.
We called ourselves ‘The D day Dodgers’ and someone wrote a song, to the tune of ‘Lily Marlene’.
The Division had 300 casualties in the last fortnight of conflict in Italy.

When we were in Egypt, every man had a medical check and tooth inspection. At the dentists you sat in the chair and opened your mouth. In next to no time I had two teeth pulled without anaesthetic. They didn’t feel bad to me and had given me no trouble before.

Egypt. There all weapons had to be chained to the centre posts of the tents. It was not unusual for a whole tent to ‘walk’ during the night. We had a company of Negro Senegalese troops patrolling the area. They soon settled the Arabs nonsense.

In the last days of the war I was being driven through Milan by one of the Italians when near the centre we heard a commotion, and had to drive through crowds. We passed a garage, and I witnessed a very historical event.
So called ‘partisans’ were tying the bodies of Mussolini & his mistress, and some others upside down above the forecourt of the garage. It appears they captured the party trying to escape into Switzerland.
The next day we had to make the same journey, and I obtained some snapshots of the event. I still have them.

When I was demobbed, I had to go to Florence to a collecting transit Point. Whilst there I bought a ring for Eva from a shop on the Ponte Vechio. A very old historical bridge even then. It had a yellowish square stone on top.

At that time too, there were painters in the NAAFI (army canteen) doing oil portraits. I had a photo of Valerie and Eva with me, and asked if one could paint a copy of that for me. He said it would take time, so I said could he do one of Valerie and send it on to England. Which he did.

I hope that I have not glorified war, there are lots of action and incidents not being able to write about or describe. When in action one learnt to ‘block’ things, and after not dwell too much on it nor the loss of friends. In the fighting it was either ‘him or me’, but if we took any prisoners, they were treated ok because we realised they were same as us, fighting for their country.
When I go to reunions and Remembrance Service it is to Remember and meet very good friends and be thankful I survived, not to celebrate the war. I was very lucky, and the thing that really kept me going was that I would someday, get back to Eva and Valerie.

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