大象传媒

Needless to say that didn鈥檛 take place until it was dark and then we trooped off the ship onto the Quay each of us provided with various rations. It must have been a strange site to see hundreds of soldiers leaving the ship with loaves of bread and tins of bully beef tucked in front of them inside their belts. Of course it didn鈥檛 take long for some nit to make us laugh. When we were all off and were straggling along the streets someone gave an imitation of a sheep and before long every one had taken it up.

To lead us to a billet for the night was the indomitable Captain Cook. We were to spend the night at a big sports stadium, but out beloved Captain had other ideas. We spent the night in a subway underneath the railway which ran down the middle of the main street. In our Regiment there were over 700 men and we all jammed into this tunnel affair. Of course it was practically impossible to lie down full length and there were no lights. Then someone made the mistake of saying he hadn鈥檛 any bread and immediately there were loaves of bread being chucked about right, left and centre. This request was followed by similar request for tins of Bully and margarine etc. Chaos reigned and we had quite a long list of casualties before everyone was satisfied.

When morning came we were awakened by various civilians trying to get one side of the street to the other, and you can imagine their surprise to find the subway full of British soldiers. I am pleased to say that every one took it in good part. We soon evacuated the subway and lined up on the road in order to get ready to embark for a further journey up the coast. Then we were told the startling news that we would have to collect all the surplus food left in the subway, as we were likely to get only biscuits for quite a while. There was consternation everywhere when those detailed to collect the surplus food came back with the news that everything had been cleared, by kind permission of the civilian population.

We had one amusing incident however to cheer us up. As a local was passing with his little donkey and cart one of our bright boys went behind and stopped the cart and the donkey by the simple expedient of catching hold of the back. The driver was quite indignant and even the donkey looked round with surprise on his face. Shortly after this we embarked onto a destroyer and sailed for Bone. On arrival here in the evening we had another happy welcome. It was pouring with rain and we had to walk quite a distance to our camp and found that we were to sleep and live in tents. We settled down to a fairly comfortable existence and had the joyful experience of being able at long last to write home and say how, if not where, we were. Also we were able to get a good supply of Tangerines and I was very pleased with life when eating these delicious fruits by the dozen. It was also possible to send these home in boxes. One of our company sent a box home to his wife, but it must have taken longer than usual because she write to him eventually and thanked him for the box of Walnuts.

It wasn鈥檛 long before we joined the rest of the 1st Army in the Line and then began a strange life. We slept out of doors, wet or fine, but we soon got used to the rain-soaked blankets. The strange thing is that I don鈥檛 think any of us caught anything worse than colds. When I look back on the conditions under which the campaign was taking place, I am amazed at the good condition of our health.

Occasionally we were able to find shelter. There was the time just outside a place called Sedjenane when while on Observation Point duty we spent a night or two by a Mosque on top of a hill. Then later on we slept in Wog huts. They were not altogether healthy, and it was not surprising when one morning I awoke to find my blankets walking out of the door under their own power. That place certainly brought us up to scratch.

The most memorable day for us was when we at last joined up with the 8th Army and saw these wonderful troops for the first time. The campaign in North Africa was drawing to its close and we didn鈥檛 stay long in one place. As some of you may know he last action was an exciting chase up the Cap Bon Peninsular and we were very thrilled to see the enemy giving themselves up in droves as we went along.

When it was all over we stayed outside Tunis for a short while before being sent back to a place called Setif waiting for the next action. There were several regiments of the Artillery group here and life settled to guards, practices etc. On the first day there it was decided that we could go into Setif without passes providing we went there under our own power, and without transport being provided. Unfortunately three of us had not travelled down from Tunis with the rest of the Regiment, but had come on later with one of our armoured vehicles. When I did arrive I went out the first night with one of my friends, and hitch-hiking back we were taken the wrong way and got completely lost. Round about midnight it was frightening walking through silent Arab villages in the still moonlight not knowing if anyone was going to come out on us and being scared out of our wits by the sudden barking of dogs.

Of course, before very long we realised we had no chance of getting back before daylight and we were very lucky to come across an R.A.F. camp. They told us that if we couldn鈥檛 get back we could stay the night there, which we did. When morning came we retraced out steps to Setif and soon found our way back to camp. Needless to say we were put on a charge and confined to camp for two days and had to forfeit one days pay. This was not too bad, but unfortunately the permission for us to go to Setif without a pass was stopped and we felt very guilty about this.

It wasn鈥檛 long before the inevitable happened. We had to go to the rifle range to see how well we could shoot. I was hopeless. After getting to within about 20 yards of the target without being able to hit it I was told that the best thing I could do would be 鈥渢o fix bayonets and charge鈥�.

One of the happy past-times was the football matches between the various regiments. These were thoroughly enjoyed by us all and through them I was able to meet some of those who had started in the army at the same time as me in Edinburgh.

It was during one such match that we experienced the Sirocco, a very strong wind, which swept down a nearby hill side. In the distance we could hear a moaning noise which gradually got louder and louder. We all knew what to expect and there was one mad rush to get back to our tents to hold them down. The wind caught us before we got there and we fought our way through blinding dust until we staggered into our tents. Then began a fierce battle against the elements to hang on to our possessions, if I remember correctly most of us won, but it left us exhausted.

Then we moved to Bizerta to get ready for our landing at Salerno. Here again we were in tents, and had to make the best of things. It was very dry and there were large cracks in the ground out of which every evening came large beetles, something like cockroaches. When the sun had gone down, therefore, we would all make a concerted attack inside our respective tents on these beetles and the air would reverberate with the sound of thumps and wackings on the sides of the tents. The secret was to make your bed during the dinner break wrapping the blankets carefully and then placing the mosquito net on the top suspended from the top of the tent and tucking it in all round so that there was no entrance for the beetles. The difficult part came when retiring to bed. After destroying all the beetles in sight you had to crawl into bed under the mosquito net in as small a space as possible.

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