Searching for Sofia, page 21
Nothing could have prepared Jack for both the speed and the ferocity of the attack when it came, right on time at 0530hrs as planned. Beginning with a sea and air assault, the Navy opened fire from the coastline while the RAF roared overhead. Jack watched the torpedoes tumbling from the sky, where they collided with the ground in thunderous explosions that shook the earth. He noted that the Italians wasted no time in reacting, for almost immediately, colourful flares were visible from their quarters as they returned fire.
The sound was stupendous as a series of explosions occurred to the far left, and Jack guessed that the outer wire fence that surrounded Bardia had been breached by the Bangalore torpedos. Now the infantry would be able to enter and advance on the Italian defence posts that surrounded the perimeter.
Seizing the freedom of his newly appointed status, a role for which no one really seemed to know the rules, Jack left the men of the 17th, and moved closer to the battle field, where he could see the buildings of upper Bardia in the distance, the lighthouse dominant on the horizon. He knew that below the cliff sat a second cluster of buildings, the headquarters of the Italian military garrison.
Within an hour, a group of about five hundred men were marched from the field—Italian prisoners—and Jack thought that the battle might be over quicker than expected. However, over the next few hours the noise only intensified as various skirmishes occurred on both to his right and left, as the Italians resisted with ferocity. Through the dusty haze, Jack watched the sappers—an advanced foot-team of engineers—working with picks and shovels to remove debris, ever watchful for enemy land mines. As they cleared the way, he saw a dozen Matildas advance. He’d once heard these described as the Queens of the Battlefield, and could see why. Their progress was stately, like a fleet of battle cruisers advancing, with turrets high, one or two with pennants fluttering in the breeze, their guns menacing. It seemed that nothing would deter them from their duty, and with shellfire pinging as it bounced off their armour, they forged through the eight-foot wire fences. Their targets were the Italian gunners who were stationed every few hundred yards along the boundary fence; if the Matildas successfully disabled these, the 17th’s job would be easier.
By mid-morning, thousands of Italian prisoners had been taken, and Jack knew that many of the Allied soldiers would have fallen. He was thankful that at least the men of the 2/5th weren’t among those, for still they were being held out of the battle.
It was late in the morning when, with mixed feelings, Jack saw the men of his unit enter the battlefield—the first that they would fight on together. Led by the tanks, the lads jogged in line abreast formation. Shorty stood out—a head taller than most—and Jack could see Snowy and Macka, a few lines back. They jogged forward, with faces grim, their rifles gripped firmly against their chests, ready for action. A wave of regret washed over Jack as he watched them with a mixture of admiration and nervousness. The jovial rascals he knew were now a formidable group of trained professional soldiers advancing forth on a mission that he should have been part of.
The thudding of artillery escalated as the 2/5th made their presence felt, and then dozens more men entered the field—the 19th Brigade—who provided further reinforcement. Jack was glad to know that his mates had backup.
During the second day, Jack was able to get closer to the township where beyond gunfire, he heard shouting—mostly cursing, or the frenzied voices of the sergeants bellowed orders as they attempted to bring sense to the chaos. Other sounds came to him also. The surprised cries of the injured, the rattle of a woman’s voice, angry and frightened, and the wailing of a baby. He hoped that the civilians in the town had found safe places to hide for the duration of the battle’s deadly course.
Over three days, the battle raged. There were moments of hope that it would be over soon, as white flags appeared and prisoners were taken, but on it went. In that time Jack produced dozens of sketches, first focusing on the overall shapes of the landscape and the advancing units, and then picking out details. He sketched the plumes of smoke bursting from the Vickers and Brens as they released their fire; an abandoned Italian tank resting on its side; an advancing infantry unit silhouetted against the dunes. He could see how these small sketches would contribute to a larger painting of the battle, a massive canvas like those he’d seen at London’s National Gallery, portraying the desert landscape, its gently rising hills, the huddle of buildings, and the carnage now being inflicted on this Italian outpost on the Libyan coastline.
Mid-morning on the third day, Jack noticed the barrage from the Tommy guns and rifles subsiding and the seconds between shots lengthening to minutes until only the occasional single shot was heard. More white flags appeared, and then there were more—small strips of white cloth tied to guns or poles and held aloft. Lines of men came forth, dusty and weary, their arms raised in surrender. An important image, Jack was sure, and he repositioned himself closer to capture their expressions. Row upon row of Italian soldiers, five to a line, passed within yards of him. Some staggered, supported by mates, their blood-soaked clothing a sure sign that they’d taken a hit.
Jack was shocked as he looked into the smooth, dirt-coated faces of the soldiers, with lank hair and ragged uniforms. Their foes were a bunch of boys! Some glanced towards him and smiled tiredly, their relief to finally submit after forty hours of relentless fighting, evident in their eyes.
Jack considered following the endless stream of prisoners now filing past him, but decided there’d be time enough to see their destination later. First, he would investigate the scars of the battlefield, where smouldering debris and lifeless bodies lay amid abandoned vehicles and weapons. Already, he could see Allied soldiers moving among the buildings, some with weapons poised as they did a final check for snipers, others speaking to a frightened-looking huddle of citizens in the town square, doubtless in shock from what had just taken place. He held his rifle before him as he approached, a gesture that seemed somewhat belated, but nonetheless sensible, given that he was entering a battlefield.
There were surprises. A small wire-haired dog lay beside its dead master; a second sniffed amongst the debris with interest. Slinging his rifle over his shoulder, Jack’s hand moved over his drawing book as he created quick sketches of the desolation around him—outlines with enough details to help him recall this moment at a later date.
Not everybody was lifeless, and Jack paused beside a young man who lay on his back in a small alleyway, surprised by the movement of a head turning towards him. The young man’s eyes were not fear-filled, as may have been expected, but rather steeped in fatigue. Weary and accepting the fate that would come quickly, judging by a jagged wound at the base of his shin, now absent a right foot. A dark crimson stream seeped through a cloth where someone had attempted to bandage the stump. It was easy to see that the soldier had little chance of surviving. Squatting alongside him, Jack positioned himself so that he cast a shadow over the lad’s face, relieving him of the harsh sunlight. The irony of the action did not escape him; thirty minutes earlier, the Allied forces were raining bullets upon the boy. Now here was Jack, protecting him from rays of sunshine.
It was a small gesture to a fellow human, Jack felt. Certainly, in a political sense, the lad was his enemy, and unarguably the gun he carried was intended to maim and kill the Australians he’d just been fighting. Perhaps he’d even landed a mark on a few. But luck had been against him today. Retrieving a water canteen strapped to the boy’s pack, Jack offered him a sip, and for his effort received a tired smile and a grunt of thanks, a foreign ‘humph’ sound.
Reminded of Andrés, Jack found it hard to leave this boy in his last few minutes of life, and so he didn’t. What the hell. He was an artist at this minute, not a soldier, and nobody was depending on him for fire cover or support. Pulling out his pad, he held it close to the young man’s face, watching as he grasped the pencil. The blackened hand trembled, but was not beyond scrawling a few words until weakness set in and it dropped from the page. Jack could feel the eyes fixed upon his face, as the man slumped backwards.
‘I’ll see it gets home, mate,’ Jack said, offering him another sip of water. It was all the young Italian could do to swallow a mouthful, and then that was it. It was over for him.
Had this been the young man’s first battle? Jack wondered. Was he like Margaret’s Jim? Had he signed up in a fit of nationalistic fervour, to last only a couple of months? Would his family be proud of his sacrifice, or just confused by the waste of it all? For it was a waste of a young life, Jack had no doubts. But that was war. Invade or be invaded. Kill or be killed.
Just as Treloar had said, war wasn’t pretty—and surely this recognition of a young man’s life was as worthy a record as any. Jack quickly sketched him: now still, his eyes staring unseeing into the sky, a thick pool of crimson around his lower leg, flies gathering to take advantage of the windfall. Jack flicked them away. It should have been terrible, and in a way it was, but it was also a moment of kindness and opportunity, and Jack felt humbled as, bending close, he placed the lad’s beret over his face before making a quick record of the badge, carefully noting the number printed beneath it.
Standing, he glanced around the battlefield, at soldiers now sorting through guns, ammunition, food supplies and vehicles, some of which had been abandoned, others of which held drivers who’d been shot mid-battle. Their bodies were roughly pulled aside and the vehicles driven to a clearing. Later they’d be collected by the Allies. The spoils of battle. Jack noted that war was as much about accumulation of resources as it was about destroying lives.
In the distance, Jack saw injured soldiers being loaded into ambulances for transfer to the field hospital. Packing away his pencils, he went across to assist. As well as the injured, there was the dead, both Italian and their own. The bodies were carefully laid in neat rows, hats covering their faces, awaiting the lorries to collect them. Jack was thankful that none of them was exceptionally tall or bore a shock of fair hair.
He thought about the families—the mothers and fathers, wives and sweethearts—about to have their lives destroyed by a postman arriving on their doorstep with a telegram in his hand, and his heart felt heavy for them.
That day, thirty-five thousand Italian prisoners were taken. The troops of the 17th gave three cheers the next morning after being told that London’s Daily Express had described the Australian soldiers at Bardia as ‘the cream of the Empire’s troops–the finest and toughest fighting men in the world!’
* * *
Soon after their success at Bardia, orders for the 2/5th’s next mission came through: they were to seize a town called Tobruk farther to the west, which, like Bardia, was being held by Italian troops. The men were still jubilant following the success of their first battle, and ready for anything. Even though they’d travelled across the world to knock the Germans off their perch, for now, they were happy to practise on the Italians.
* * *
Like Bardia, Tobruk was a coastal town on the desert fringe where the sand met the sea. For days the men of the 6th Division waited in the featureless landscape, enduring a battering of dust storms intent on redistributing sand into their food, clothing, mouths, noses and ears. The heat was dreadful, and flies were everywhere. However, the spirits of the 2/5th remained high; a few flies could not crush them. Waiting, they entertained themselves with cricket, card games and two-up.
The good humour of the troops in the face of the harsh conditions of the western desert earned congratulations from Brigadier Savige, and whilst the men shrugged off the praise from their commander for their cheerfulness and daring, Jack had no doubts that inside, each one of them was gratified by his encouraging words.
The battle of Tobruk was almost a repeat of that at Bardia three weeks earlier, only made easier by the fact that the British had managed to cut the town’s telephone lines, preventing the Italians from alerting their command of the attack. Like Bardia, the assault began before sunrise, and Jack watched the British planes dipping in the sky as the RAF pilots skilfully dropped bombs to soften the targets. In the grey light of dawn he could see movement from the sappers as they cleared the way for the tanks. The first group of tanks to enter were the L3/35s, Italian tanks that had been salvaged from the Bardian battle, and which were now being driven by Australians. He cheered as they advanced. A few days earlier he’d been asked to put his brushes to work to Australianise them, and now images of kangaroos decorated their sides. However, rather than leaping forward like ‘roos in flight, their movement was more like that of slowly ambling tortoises as they waited for sweepers to carefully search the sand ahead for tell-tale signs that a landmine was planted beneath the surface.
As in Bardia, heavy artillery fire was exchanged with the Italians for most of the day, with the addition of a flight of Italian airplanes that were quickly shot down by the RAF. Again, the men of the 2/5th had to wait their turn, as the sixteenth brigade entered the battle first, followed by a British Tanks regiment. It was after 1000hrs before the 17th Brigade finally entered, and within half an hour, many of the Italian strongpoints within Tobruk had been taken. Throughout the afternoon the air attack continued as Blenheims and Hurricanes patrolled the skies whilst the Australian infantry pushed forward.
The Italians fought valiantly, but the allied attack was strong, and Jack watched with surprise when late in the afternoon they turned their gunfire onto their own harbour and its stores. He realised that they’d accepted they were defeated, and intended to deny the Allies the spoils of war.
And early the following morning, white flags were raised and the gunfire ceased. Jack watched as hundreds of Italian soldiers emerged with their hands held high. He was thrilled for the victory as he advanced into Tobruk’s narrow streets, where he paused and sketched the battered Digger’s slouch hat that had been raised on the centre flag post, replacing the green, white and red Italian flag that lay in tatters on the ground. It was the 17th Brigade’s second victory in the space of a month, and the men cheered jubilantly.
In the early evening, Jack sketched scenes of the enclosure holding the prisoners—another twenty-thousand of which had been taken. Listening to the sounds from within, where officers of 2/7th Battalion supervised the prisoners, he smiled. Good-natured in their supervision, they were encouraging the Italians to sing along with them to the tunes of ‘Waltzing Matilda’ and ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’.
* * *
The 17th Brigade remained in Tobruk, helping the villagers re-establish their water supply and clear debris. It was a relaxing time, and the men were glad for the opportunity to assist the locals to make the village livable before returning to Egypt. However, when in late March, instructions came through that the 2/5th were to be deployed to Greece, the boys were ecstatic. At long last they were being given a chance to fight the Germans!
Chapter 21
As ever, confusion reigned about the state of Greece and the battle ahead of them; factual information about the various battlefronts was invariably scant, and frequently complicated by rumours and updates of events that were long over. The BBC was the 2/5th’s most reliable source of information, and even it was subject to propaganda, misinformation and confusion.
Fortunately, one of the chaps, Harold Green, who prior to the war had been a school teacher with a passion for history, made it his business to stay abreast of the various battles that were being fought across Europe. Harold was a wealth of information regarding the international overview. Some of the chaps teased him, calling him ‘The Professor’. Ever patient, and happy to answer the smallest of questions, Harold was a whiz at creating outlines of countries and mountain ranges that they’d never heard of, explaining the political motivations of the Italians, Germans, Russians and Albanians as they were drawn into the action, and suggesting possible scenarios based on the outcomes of the various battles. On occasions, when the sergeant gave his morning briefings, Jack noticed him glance at Harold as if to confirm the briefing had been in full accordance with Harold’s research; and Jack developed the habit of looking for Harold’s response, his rapid nod or perhaps a frown, suggesting the sergeant’s information was flawed.
The morning after the news that the 2/5th would sail to Greece, Jack joined the others gathered around Harold at the breakfast table. ‘What are the Germans doing in Greece, Professor?’ Snowy asked him. Jack listened with interest, for not only had they been told that Greece was a neutral nation, but that the Germans were concentrating their efforts in northern Europe.
Harold was happy to clarify the latest political shifts that had forced Greece into the war. ‘What’s happened is that Mussolini has seized an opportunity to expand Italy’s power by taking Greece for himself,’ he explained. ‘You know, extend Italy’s presence in Southern Europe. Mussolini thought subjugating the Greeks would be easy, but not so. They’ve put up a good show in holding the Italians off in their northern mountains. However, weeks have turned into months and now the Greek army is exhausted. You can imagine what it’s like, the snow and blistering winds in the mountains. It must be dreadful—freezing, starving and ready to drop. I wouldn’t like it.’
For the soldiers around the table, who’d been subjected to the open desert and relentless sand storms for months, cold they could understand, but imagining snow covered mountains was difficult. Nonetheless, they nodded for Harold to continue.
‘Yes, but what has that got to do with Hitler?’ Jack asked.
‘It’s not Mussolini’s plight that Hitler’s worried about. He’d probably be happy to ignore the Italians, let them sort out the mess that they’ve started in Greece. However, a new problem has arisen because Churchill—the canny bastard—has taken advantage of the fact that the Greeks are exhausted, and offered to come to their aid. By sending us and the New Zealanders to support the Greek army, Britain stands to gain a military presence in Southern Europe.’
