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Harry Baker’s Journal Part IV. Extracts from the Journal of 1429538 Gunner Thomas Henry Baker - Royal Artillery, of Hull

Harry Baker served throughout the war both at home and overseas; he was born in Hull in 1913 and died there in 1998. The journal has been kindly loaned to Iris Middleton by his daughter Joan Wright of Hull.
IV
Life was not so bad in Africa for the 62nd Regiment, we started a leave rota, and John Todd and I had a weeks leave in the home of a French Couple in Tunis. As soon as we got back to camp the rumours started about our next move — to Italy. We set off in a tank-landing craft. I slept on deck to cope with my sea-sickness but was awakened by sirens and flashing lights to find that our rudder had broken, eventually we beached near Naples, and marched ten miles before being picked up by the matadors and driven to a village named Stonarra, two miles from Foggia which was in the centre of a triangle of two American and one British airfields. We set up our station and what a pleasure it was to have our screens filled with our own aircraft. The RAF did the night raids and the USAF the day-time raids using Flying Fortresses and Liberators — it was our duty to see that the Germans did not come and wreck the airfields during the night. There were only a few raids and eventually we were moved to the Adriatic coast to Ancona. This town was wrecked with no sign of life; it had been the scene of heavy fighting between the Germans and the Poles until our destroyers, Lightning and Lookout shelled the area and drove the Germans out. We had to get wood for our campfires from the area, one day I was with a truck, loading up wood from the ruins near Ancona town centre when I heard a crash from below. My friend John Todd emerged from a basement and said that Jesus had nearly crowned him — the basement turned out to be part of Ancona Cathedral, and John had pulled at a nice piece of timber which dislodged a statue of Jesus which fell about eight feet, narrowly missing John’s head.
Life at Ancona was not too bad, although we were attacked several times at night, but we were able to make a football pitch, and I spent most of my time playing football. When I took a notice to one of our officers regarding a match with an RAF team, he asked if I had thought of a transfer to the Army Education Corps; I was editor of the troop newspaper which I had called the Forum, I was secretary of the Sports Club, captain of the football team, and still only a gunner. ‘No’ I said, ‘I had not. He replied, ‘Well, I think the time will come when the army will decide that it can put ack-ack gunners to more use than we are now, and I have no doubt that Radar men will be the first to go’
For days later, he called me into his office and said he had a mission for me. I had to take a jeep and pick up a Royal Engineers captain from HQ at Foligne, and take him via Rome to Naples docks to collect some new equipment that was being sent out from England to be tested under battleground conditions. It was going to be difficult as the route would take us through Cassino and much of the area was stilled mined. Whilst in Africa we had listened on the radio to news about the fighting for Cassino, and I expected that Rome would have been liberated before we got there. How wrong I was. When we reached the outskirts of Cassino we were stopped by Redcaps, and advised to camp with an engineers unit as Cassino was still in German hands. I went to explore, and found that almost everything was wrecked, the river had been bombed out of its normal route so that it was trickling down what had been a main road, the shops and house were really battered, and as I turned back at the white tape marking the end of the zone clear of mines, I heard the sound of a squadron of American bombers heading for the monastery. The German ack-ack was soon in action, the bombs were falling, with Artillery on both sides opening up, and I realised that the Allied troops were only half-way up the hill. I expected to have to wait a few days before we could set off for Rome, but the Royal Engineers were clearing a road through the town, and lots of troops were already heading for Rome. We left the next day, part of a convoy of trucks making very slow progress when we heard that the Germans had pulled out of Cassino but were fighting a rear guard action along the valley. Tanks, guns, armoured cars, and lorry loads of troops passed us. Two days later we arrived at Naples docks only to find that the convoy carrying our item had only just left England and no one knew when it would arrive in Italy. So we stayed at Allied HQ in Caserta and every day checked at Naples for any news. This meant that after dropping the officer at Naval HQ I had the jeep to myself for the rest of the day. I met up with some American units that had film shows, and they made me welcome with sweets, chocolates and even ice-cream — they were much better catered for than the British. They even invited me to boxing matches, one of which was between an American sergeant who looked like an immaculately turned out pocket Hercules, and the other was Gunner Bennett of Sheffield England, dressed in tatty khaki and sandshoes. Despite appearances, the Sheffield lad won, although by his appearance I would not have given him much hope. When the equipment arrived from England we returned to Ancona where the rumour was going round that I had joined the Secret Service! My few days away had been better than that.

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