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EARLY DAYS (Training)

I was called up, at the age of 28, on the 4th. January, 1941 as a 2nd. Lieutenant, Royal Army Ordnance Corps (Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) and told to report to Rushton Hall, Rushton near Kettering for a month’s training to become an officer. There I met Fiennes Wickham, who became a good friend. After a month I was posted to 1st. Ack Ack Regiment workshops at Park Royal and later transferred to Loughton workshops under Major Rothschild. I was later asked if I wanted to go for four months training at Bury in Lancashire but I did not want to go and went instead on a six weeks course at Sidcup. During this period I spent a week at C.A. Vandervel at Acton on fuel injection. As soon as the Sidcup course was finished I was mobilized to go abroad with the 87th. Heavy Anti-aircraft Ack Ack Regiment workshop at Nottingham. I had anti-typhoid and anti-tetanus injections. In October, 1941, I took a church parade of 400 men marching to Bulwell. Difficult because I did not know how to control and stop the men!

Then, in October, 1941 we left Nottingham by train to an unknown destination which turned out to be Gourock on the Clyde and boarded the "STRATHALLAN" (32,000 tons) in the Bay. We set off in convoy travelling North West until we reached Newfoundland when two of the ships in the convoy hit each other in the fog. We left them behind. We sailed due South to Freetown, Sierra Leone in Africa passing by the Azores on the way. This circuitous route was to try to avoid U-boats. We passed the spot where, two days before, the German U-boats had sunk our convoy of A.A. guns and vehicles.

Travelling Out to The Middle East

We spent three days in Freetown, which was very humid. Then on to Cape Town which was wonderful because it was all lit up. Such a contrast to the blackout in England. After three days of entertainment by delightful girls at the Orange Grove Restaurant we set sail for Bombay where we anchored in the "Lanes" (a very wide area where they allocated the boats). It was very humid. We then sailed across the Arabian Sea into the Gulf of Oman and up the Gulf. On up the Shatt al-Arab river to Basra which was very bleak. Here we disembarked and took possession of a piece of desert outside Basra . I had carbuncles on the wrist and head and, later on, in the middle of the back.

After a few days I was told to go to Baghdad and Habbãnîyah on the Euphrates, passing Ur the oldest town in the world, in preparation for the workshop and Regiment. Stayed at one of the best hotels in Baghdad just beside the Tigris Bridge and travelled 40 miles through the desert to the R.A.F. camp at Habbãnîyah on the Euphrates. Went up the escarpment to claim a piece of desert where there had just been a battle between ourselves and the Iraqis who left behind a few bits such as fingers and billions of flies. I remember bathing in a salty lake.

IRAQ.

Our Ack Ack Regiment's job was to protect the oil fields of the Iraq Petroleum Company from the Germans who were just North of Iran - we were just South of it. The oil fields were at Mosul and Kirkuk about 100 miles apart. Captain Croft took half the workshop to Mosul and I took the other half to Kirkuk.

We arrived, in November, 1942, on a sandy desert plain on a slight slope near the I.P.C. headquarters where they had a comfortable mess for eating and we slept on camp beds on the sand. One night it started to rain and I looked down and there were a few inches of water flowing through my tent. In the morning it turned to snow and everywhere was freezing. Our gun towers which had London bus engines and were called Associated Equipment Company Matadors, had frozen radiators and cracked cylinder blocks which meant we were immobile and so our fitters tried welding the radiators and cylinder blocks with some success. Mr. Bishop, the Chief Engineer of I.P.C. gave us some welding rods and he took me to Kermondshar to try to obtain some more. En route we passed the blind beggar who lived in the middle of the desert and he cried out "Allah is good"! Eventually we got the Matadors going again.

One trouble in Kirkuk was cooking. Plenty of eggs from the locals. Oil was oozing out of the sand and nearby the oil was continuously burning. It had done this since Biblical times in the hills behind. We had an oven and a large cotton tent for messing in so we devised a can of oil with a drip outlet which we let fall into a metal cup below, set it alight and so cooked hundreds of eggs. On Christmas Day (1942) we served the 50 men but by a miracle we did not catch fire!

We later left Kirkuk and travelled back to Habbãnîyah, near Baghdad and from there we travelled back across the desert on a track half a mile wide, until we came near Transjordan and a proper road and green grass and we dropped down below sea level to the Jordan Valley. Across the Allenby Bridge near Jericho up to Tulkarn where there were oranges on the trees. We then moved Northwards to Beirut where we stayed for a few months in a flat with four other officers including an M.P. who entertained us with stories. One day a little old lady, who was a Druze, came into our flat about 5 a.m. and was taking my wallet when I awakened. The Military Policeman stopped her at the front door and threw her down the steps.
Later on I caught sandfly fever and collapsed breaking my front teeth. The medical orderly sent me to the New Zealand Hospital for a week to recover.

Finally, the A.A. Regiment left Beirut with us in attendance. We travelled up over the Lebanon Mountains and up to Balbeck and a bit beyond, to a village called Zaboud where we stayed for a week or two.

We were then ordered to Tobruk, Libya in North Africa. To get there we had to drop down a very long hill to the Jordan Valley and then we discovered that the brakes on the Matadors were not good. In one or two cases we had to leave the road and get the guns and Matadors leaning against the mountain to pull them up, to be recovered later the next day by our Scamell. Finally we reached Cairo and then on to Tobruk just after the battle of El Alamein where the 8th Army defeated Rommel's Africa Corps in September or October, 1942.

TOBRUK DECEMBER, 1942.

Our 87th. A.A. Regiment arrived in Tobruk soon after the victory of El Alamein and we met Captain Bernard Gaccon who was a jolly fellow and had been in Tobruk a few months earlier when it was surrounded by Germans. He told us he had evacuated the town in an open 3-tonner with his two large German Alsatian dogs. However, in the heat of battle, as he tore away from Tobruk, the two dogs decided to mate and this was apparently successful because six puppies arrived later. Later Bernard returned with one of the dogs after we had chased the Germans out.

Our job was to set up four 3.7 inch static guns. The tank transport duly arrived. However, we had no facilities for unloading and had to devise our own method. The guns were 35 tons in weight and rather top-heavy. However, we had some angle iron supports and two 8" by 4" girders 10 feet long which were bolted to the gun and were long enough to extend beyond the tank transporters. We then placed four 10 ton jacks under the girders and drove the tank transporter forward leaving the gun supported on the four jacks which were gently lowered to the ground. Fortunately, there was little or no wind, and the operation went off smoothly.

Soon after this I was promoted to Captain and posted to Cairo in charge of 90 men and equipment of the 99th. A.A. Regiment and workshop. To my surprise on my departure I was given a leather brief case. I was soon on the train to Cairo. Unfortunately the train was derailed at Mersa Matruh and I had to carry my gear some way to the replacement train. Arriving at Cassasin (out in the desert) I met Colonel Wilkinson, a regular Guards Officer and friend of Sir Oliver Leese (Leese took over the Army Command from "Monty"). His main desire seemed to be to engage the enemy particularly with his workshops! Anyway after a few weeks I was ordered to take a convoy of 400 vehicles, all with unknown drivers, across the desert to an unknown destination. We set off in the afternoon across the Suez canal and stopped when it got dark. Those who had rations ate them after which we set off again until about 23.00 hours when we stopped at a transit camp. There we stayed until 03.00 hours when we set off again.

At dawn, about 05.00 hours, there were wonderful scents from the few flowers along the track which were truly delightful. At about 06.30 hours we came to a cross-roads. No one to tell us which way to go!

After about 10 minutes a flustered M.P. on a motor bike drew up alongside and told us we had gone the wrong way and then we had about 100 vehicles to turn around. I told him I would report him. So we then proceeded and finally arrived at Beirut. The vehicles were loaded into a cargo ship and I went on board. Then we set off for Alexandria (near Cairo) and later to Augusta on the East coast of Sicily where I met up with the rest of the Regiment and workshops.

ITALY 1943-5

We then travelled Northwards to Mount Etna and across the Messina Straits and then upwards to Foggia near the North coast of Italy opposite Naples and San Severo which was just to the North. The R.S.M. of the Regiment found us accommodation in an abattoir, all very greasy and unpleasant. We stayed one night and then went across the road to a meat factory which was clean.

About this time the Colonel produced a 3-tonner which he said he wanted us to convert into a caravan. I told him it was very difficult getting work done when we had to move every two or three days so the Colonel said he would leave us behind for a few weeks.

The war moved on and we were trying to capture Campobasso some thirty miles on. The Germans were in the North of the town and we were in the South so the Colonel decided to bring us up into the middle of the town. We arrived being shelled and took over a garage full of Italian cars and they had to move out as we moved in. At the same time I was having a row with the Colonel over our priorities. I maintained that it was more important to keep the guns and equipment in action than to make a caravan for him. When he threatened to send me back to base I then gave the caravan priority!

There was a train blocked (due to shell fire damage) and stationary in the station so we decided to rip out the basin pipes and water tank and put them in the caravan. Within a week the caravan was complete and ready for occupation. The Colonel was delighted. No more talk of change of job. He kept the caravan until the end of the war.

After Campobasso we proceeded up Italy until we reached the Sangro River staying in Atessa (a very small place) with the workshop on a fairly steep hill down to the Sangro and it started snowing. This was Christmas week and I well remember having a fight with a fellow officer, the only fight I have ever had. His name was Lieutenant Jeffs and he was the chap who got me in trouble with the Colonel and nearly got me the sack. However, we had a good fight rolling on the beds and the result was a draw. I remember later sleeping on the floor and the snow came in under the eaves.

Next the Army Commander called a halt to our advance and there was the last town to capture which was Casoli, a hill town with one street. Lieutenant Laurie Savitt, who was a Jew, and I were located in a Doctor's house on the top edge of the hill looking across the River Sangro to where the Germans were occupying Guardiagrele on the other bank about a mile away . They shelled us every day for the whole Winter. The Colonel believed his workshop should fight the enemy and the next town one mile away along the ridge was Toricelli , a small village where the Germans had occupied the church tower as an observation post. Our regiment shelled the tower regularly.

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