大象传媒

Just before Christmas 1944 we were ordered to Greece. We left Taranto for Athens in a Canadian ship, Eastern Prince, very comfortable for the men and for us. The food was excellent but the stewards surly and union-minded. The Chief Steward interrupted the C.O., when he was giving orders, telling him to 鈥渉urry it up and come and have dinner or else he would have to pay the waiter overtime鈥�.

I went ashore with my OP party in an LCA [landing craft] by night; rather eerie, as, although the landing was unopposed, the two shots fired at us did not inspire confidence. My job was to set up an OP from which I could direct fire in support of our troops clearing Athens. I found a nice house, high up with a small hut on the roof top. The owners seemed pleased to see us, very hospitable, and insisted that I had a bed with a spring mattress. Our 18 set worked so well that we had to relay messages for everyone else.

My first shoot was with the guns of a Greek cruiser, with a British officer on board to translate my orders. This was for political reasons, as it was considered undesirable at that stage for British guns to be firing on Athens. I am possibly the only British officer to have directed the fire of a Greek cruiser and on Athens at that!

Later I was appointed CRA [Commander Royal Artillery] Athens, normally a brigadier鈥檚 job. I loaded my armoured car, and with six bodies inside, two wireless sets and several tons of kit within and without, we belted up the Phalion 鈥� Athens road, head lights blazing and doors closed, arriving safely in double quick time.

The main task was to organise DF [defensive fire] in support of troops fronting ELAS. I was kept busy on the phone.

The General, an infantryman, asked me on Christmas night about moving guns to cover further north. He seemed slightly put out when I suggested that moving a Battery away would leave HQ defenceless. Next day, dynamite was discovered under HQ buildings; Churchill and Eden were in the area. What propaganda could be made out of it, a gunpowder plot to get rid of Churchill 鈥� especially as the ELAS representatives arrived late.

29th December, we had quite a day of it, firing some two thousand rounds of HE in support of the clearing of south Athens; very satisfactory with lots of back scratching afterwards.

Within a week ELAS just vanished one night. Evidently the Paras gave them enough to make their minds up. So ended my term as CRA Arkforce, and I returned to regimental duty.
From the luxury of the King David hotel to a modest house as Troop Commander, with the Battery Mess in a larger house nearby. ELAS were gone but we were required to concentrate on Infantry training, use of Bren guns, grenades etc.

In spite of my having carried out normal safety drill, one of my men managed to shoot himself in the back, dismounting from the back of a 3-tonner. Fortunately we got him to hospital in time; he survived and got an early posting home.

Another time, one of the men ran amok for no apparent reason; the sentry on duty had to shoot him dead. For the sake of his parents, we reported him 鈥榢illed in action鈥�.

I managed to scrounge some paint from the Navy and turned our guns gleaming grey from dirty manure. With driver Quirk, I took them a gift of a small pig as a gesture of thanks; being an Irishman, Quirk could be expected to know about pigs. At Piraeus, I sent a signal, 鈥楶SB鈥� [please send boat]; a boat arrived, and we were piped aboard.

Quirk disappeared with the pig into the nether regions, while I was conducted to the Wardroom to be filled up with pink gins by a succession of Naval officers, who drank one with me and then disappeared. I felt I had done my duty without disgracing the Army, and made a discreet withdrawal with Quirk, in reasonably good order. Very hospitable the Navy, but crafty with it.

14th February, the regiment split up; 80 Battery went north to Volos with eight guns, the rifle battery disintegrated. We re-formed as a 2-gun regiment! I spent time organising troop small arms practice as a league, with prizes of beer and cigarettes.

I had to threaten to break BSM 鈥楪eordie鈥� xxxxxxxxxx for drunkenness and inefficiency, although he was a nice old man. In the event, he survived the month until he was repatriated, and I went to his booze-up in the Sergeants鈥� Mess to see him off
New guns and equipment arrived and, 29th March, we left Athens.

The trip north was a fascinating one, but the everlastingly magnificent views of hills and ravines began to pall, and I longed for a little quiet close country, with farms and a variety of trees. We came down the Pass near Thermopylae; nothing but plain, as far as the eye could see. We went through Larissa, out of the plain, up through more hills, until we came round a corner and saw yet another plain below, the town of Eleison on the far side, some lesser hills, and beyond them all, a snow-draped Olympus, extending over most of the horizon.

Along a winding, steeply rising road, more and more scrubby bare hills greeted the eye. Servia, an old town with many cherry trees set against a dark forbidding skyline of peaks and crags, was the only relief. We were delayed at the pontoon ferry south of Servia, but got the cookhouse back from the other side in time for dinner; the meal was ready within half an hour of their return.

The drive was a remarkable effort by the Battery and the first time I remember completing such a journey without a casualty.

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