大象传媒

A Privates War Chris Wilson

IN THE DESERT AND ONWARD

1942 We were at MERSA MATRUH. On Sunday 28 July, we went on a half hours notice to move back towards FUKA, we had breakfast and lunch there and at 2.30pm we were about to move along the coast road. We only went about 14 miles and we pulled off the road, we were told the Germans (Jerry) had surrounded our position and we could not get through. The Bofors got into action, but only one plane came low enough to open fire on, he soon made away. Jerry was shelling the road all the time, right over our heads, he was at it all day but no damage was done. It was getting on towards 8.00pm our Officer came along and called all of us together and told us we were surrounded, but we were going to fight are way out. The sergeant in charge was briefed, the orders being ( we move off at 9.30pm) there are going to be four columns, each one a fighting column and we were to give air protection for the last column. We were to move up to a place called The Road to Rome and we were to pull off the road, the officer went foreword to contact the colonel in charge of the column.
We moved off on time got to the road to Rome and waited there while the officer went forward, at this time the first column was moving in single file through a gap in the mine field. They had been on the move for a half hour when Jerry got his range on the gap & set a few trucks alight, which it very bad but they still went on. I don鈥檛 remember seeing so many trucks in one place together.
Jerry planes came over and dropped flares, the officer gave orders to go to the other side of the road and get ready for action. We did but none of the planes dropped anything, we didn鈥檛 open up as would have given our position away. The guns were ready in case they had to engage. The officer came to myself & told me, I was to drive a Mechanic back where we came from to destroy a tractor unit, which had been left behind. In my tractor unit we set off but didn鈥檛 get far due to the vehicles blocking road, so we set off walking got to the tractor and put it out of commission. We set off back to my tractor and returned, reported to the officer.
It was now 1am and officers of the other regiment came along, we were on our own all the other columns had gone through the minefield. While the officers were discussing things, bursts of machine gun fire and anti-tank shells were going off all around us they were very close now coming up the coast road. The officers & men stayed very calm almost as if this awesome firing was not happening. The officer told us Jerry was very close and it was every man for himself and if we thought we could get away to do so right away. So we jumped on a truck the officer wished us luck said he would follow, we never saw him again. Our truck took the lead we travelled about 28mls and caught up with the 3rd column.

Jerry must off heard us moving, because he was firing at random all the time, hitting nothing, he had hit a few tanks before we caught up with the column but we managed to get by them. We had only travelled 4mls with this column. When we came upon some more trucks, they stopped us saying that it was impossible to get through. If attempted Jerry was opening up with a horrendous barrage with all kind of guns. One officer there, whom I did not know said for all to get on their trucks, he was taking us through. We all got ready and started off for this gap, we trundled up an incline, the lead truck came under intense fire on reaching the top, we never saw that officer again, as we couldn鈥檛 get near him. We had to take cover in the dip for some time. It was starting to get light, the Sgt in charge said it was no good trying any other way with the trucks, we will fill our water bottles and go on foot. We filled our bottles and some food in a sack and set off across a minefield, all of a sudden a mist came down, which was a Godsend to us.
We were a party of seven gunners including myself; the N.C.O. went off on their own. We walked across this minefield, it was about 2mls wide, and when we got out of it we made off southward in the desert. We passed a lot of dead mainly Italian soldiers only a few Jerry鈥檚. The next thing we had to do quickly, as the fog was lifting, was find a good hideout. Luck was with us we came to a hilly place and found a Wadis to hide in.
We rested there for a few hours & had something to eat, on the move again keeping down so as not to be seen. We kept resting then moving on, occasionally climbing up the wadis to look for any Jerry movements all the time only using small amounts of water. We heard trucks moving around us the Italians were in front of us & Jerry was to the right of us, we were that close we could hear them talking, so we kept low & in the afternoon they went away. We left to go further on & found a wagon with no one in it. We found out it belonged to signals, they had decommissioned it, but we found water and maps, one map being very useful to us the rest we tore up. We had a rough idea where we were so set a course from the map. The wadis came to a dead end, to our surprise we found hid under a rock a Senassi soldier. We got his pay book and found out he was alright, so he came with us. We gave him food and water then rested till 9pm, setting off with the Sanussi in the lead he knew the country better than us. I know we travelled South all night and the next day being Tuesday we had 5hrs rest then set off again still going South, at night time we decided to change direction to South East. At night when we were walking our planes were dropping flares and to our surprise we were walking between two lines of Jerry.
For the rest of the night there was a constant flow of planes dropping flares and heavy bombs they made sure the enemy had no rest, then a finishing touch with straffing. It was full moon and when we heard the planes coming, we had to get down but we were very tired and nearly fell a sleep. So on the next day we got walking again, we could see some camels in the distance with sheep being herded by Arabs, we also noticed a Bren carrier with some soldiers standing beside it. We walked up to them, to our delight they were four signals, though the bren carrier was no good. They had their revolvers out in case we were Jerry, we had a good laugh about it. The Senussi soldier went to the Arabs and had a conversation in Arabic, he found they were headed for El Daba and there was water about a mile away, so we followed them. We got water and that night they made us some rice and tea, we were going to stay all night with them, but then we said we would set off at midnight so off we go again. We decided on heading for Fuka as we had been told by the Arabs the English were there, so early next morning we stopped and had a good drink of water, as we had not much food. Getting near to Fuka we had the luck to see two more Arabs, they told us Jerry was in Fuka and maybe in El Daba, and they were talking about a car, so the corporal of the sigs. who understood the Arab language a good deal, said there was a lorry over there somewhere, they were going to show us. We gave them some cigarettes.
They bought us to a 15cwt ford v8., one of my mates got in and it started up right away. It only had three springs on the chassie but we all climbed aboard and the Arabs told us were we could get water nearby, we also spotted some more trucks and were able to extract more petrol from them. We set off for the well, arriving o/k we replenished the water cans we had and then set off for El Dab, travelling all night. And the next day, we came to a very bad country area and we heard a battle going on so we knew that El Daba was close. Heading towards it to see if the enemy was there, and seeing men laying mines and tanks coming towards us, we headed South again. We were all beat by now, we made camp and laid up overnight. The next morning we started early, after four hours dodging convoys and patrol cars, which we could see very faintly, at last we came to a wide open space with trucks and armoured cars also tanks all around. It looked like the end, so we took a chance and you could tell how happy we were to discover they were South Africans, we did not know whether to laugh or cry. The Major came and spoke to us and when he saw the lorry with the three springs and a wire rope around the axle he laughed, sending us to the Col., of the signals. He saw us and said we were all to go to Cairo for a rest.
The Quartermaster could not do enough for us, he gave us so much food and water we did not know what to do with it. So we had to leave our old faithful behind (the lorry) and go in another truck to Cairo, it took three more days travelling. We reported to R.A.Base and it was there we had to part with four signals and the Sanussi Soldier (we called him George). When we shook hands, none of us felt too good, we are like brothers and George as we called him was nearly crying. So we were in the base for two days and then we were sent to our Regiment. All the lads were delighted to see us, we found out later that we were the only seven of our troop to return. We had our weeks rest in Cairo and then back to the battle to defeat Jerry. We live to fight another day.

THE END

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