40
On returning home, Ralph was given ninety days’ leave. It was interrupted twice. In early December he had a bout of the shakes that was not just malaria. The army sent him, with Ronte, to a field hospital near Strathalbyn, in the Adelaide Hills. The hospital specialized in ‘shell-shock’ cases. He was discharged after eight days of the ‘talking cure’. It patched things over a little, but he would show signs of post-traumatic stress disorder for the rest of his life.
There had been a mention in the press about Ralph’s escape before he returned to Australia; his family were probably the source. Then he and Ronte were the subject of a street fashion shot in The Australian Women’s Weekly, where his escape was mentioned. Then Captain Heslop’s recommendation and account of Ralph’s exploits were received. The Australian Army did not believe it. In February 1945 he was arrested by military police at his parents’ house and escorted under guard by train to Melbourne and Army HQ at Victoria Barracks. There he was accused of spreading false rumours. Two days of incarceration and interrogation followed. A Victorian escapee, Lance Corporal Arnold Woods, was brought back from leave on his farm in Seymour at Ralph’s suggestion. Only then was Ralph’s story believed. Before he returned to Adelaide he was personally interviewed by General Blamey and forcefully told to not even say he had escaped.*
Ralph’s skills and experience saw him returned to military intelligence. Promoted to sergeant, he was posted to Murchison in rural Victoria to a POW camp housing German prisoners. Thanks to a superior’s hare-brained idea, Ralph went undercover as a German soldier to gather intelligence. His colloquial German may have been good, but Ralph’s decision during the escape not to become a spy proved a sound one: he had little knowledge of Wehrmacht procedure or training to enable him to keep his cover, and after only a few days he was pulled out and made a translator.
At the end of the war in Europe he was sent to a training camp for intelligence agents. All the others there were battle-hardened officers; Ralph was the only NCO. He was placed seventh in a class of forty, described as ‘an enthusiastic and cheerful soldier, who was popular with his fellow students: possesses an alert and analytical mind, and proved capable of accurate work under strain: has ability to lead, and organises well’.1
In Slovenia and Yugoslavia, meanwhile, news of his party’s escape spread. Even Tito’s HQ celebrated, though it inflated the number of escapees sixfold, which caused some alarm in SOE.2 For MI9, Losco, and Lindsay, it was proof of concept. Such ambitious escapes were possible. Losco had missed the trial run, but no matter: he had his mission and was furnished with contacts. Major Losco would cross the Kozjak Mountains into Austria and establish a network of safe houses, supply dumps, and escape lines. Stalag XVIIIA and its Arbeitskommandos still held 39,000 prisoners, 6,000 of them British Empire troops. They were Losco’s prize.3 The Partisans would guard this line. Hundreds of their fighters now roamed the mountainous border region, armed to the teeth with British weapons.4 Construction on an airfield near Gornji Grad had also begun. Were it to become operational, escapees could bypass the Sava gauntlet, and fly direct to Italy. It’d be a godsend for 4th Zone wounded, and would mean that Lindsay could easily arm all new recruits.
But then came a hammer blow to MI9’s plans. Under British pressure, on 12 September the exiled King Petar recognized Tito as the military leader of Yugoslavia. Tito had almost everything he needed to take power. The Red Army was nearing eastern Serbia, and he had the authority of Stalin, Churchill, and the King. So why should he risk anything to maintain good relations with Imperialist Britain, when the King had spoken and the Soviets arrived? Indeed, Tito and many senior Communists feared the British would support former collaborators and oppose Yugoslav territorial gains. Those gains were mostly for Slovenia, including southern Austria, Primorska, and above all the port city of Trieste.5 On 18 September, even as he was celebrating the escape, Tito quietly ordered all Anglo-American missions confined to their relevant HQ.6
Unable to leave 4th Zone HQ in the Savinja Valley, for Lindsay and Losco hopes of more mass escapes were scuttled. The Partisans also handicapped themselves by halting construction of the northern airfield. Losco was reduced to providing supplies for E&Es who passed through. For their part, the Partisans continued to aid E&Es. Only a few Arbeitskommandos remained in Štajerska, many having been evacuated into the Reich after the Ožbalt raid. But downed aircrews were still common and were rescued and conveyed to Semič. For Jack Saggers, the airfield situation was still difficult. Otok, where Ralph had taken off from, had no drainage and was often unable to take planes because the ground was too soft, with would-be passengers sent on foot to Croatia. When planes could land, they could only take off again with a reduced load. Five or six E&Es or Partisan wounded could board, rather than the normal two dozen.7
Lindsay, meanwhile, continued to arm and supply the Partisans, despite being shut out and a Partisan agent being assigned to report his every move. Everyone knew a German counter-attack would come, so Lindsay asked SOE for a mass airlift with enough supplies to heavily arm 2,000 Partisans and provide ammunition, food, and clothes for another 3,000. SOE said this could be done, but the drop never took place.8 Either SOE admin were at fault, or RAF Command were too busy to spare the planes and crews. With no weapons, the Partisans had no choice but to evacuate new recruits south, where weapons were more plentiful.9
Another botched delivery had fatal consequences. Commander Stane, now leading all Slovenian Partisan forces, whose actions were so key to the fate of Štajerska and the escape, was killed on 7 November. He was testing a British light mortar when the bomb exploded in the tube.* A week later, SOE messaged all its liaison missions: it had realized that using parachutes to deliver bombs which were armed by a sharp downward knock wasn’t a great idea.10
Lindsay’s time with Cuckold came to an end at the beginning of December 1944, when he was ordered to move to Croatia. Even though everyone knew the Germans were gathering, on 6 December 4th Zone took a grave risk and threw a farewell party in Gornji Grad tavern, and spirits flowed. The pub itself had been sacked a month ago in a ram-raid attack by the Germans. Only a few bottles of spirits remained, and the pub itself was a ruin. For many it was their last drink. Partisan obstructions to the Cuckold Mission had soured relations between Lindsay and Partisan commanders, but ultimately they were comrades who had fought together. Many senior officers confessed to Lindsay their unhappiness at the orders they had received to obstruct the mission, and their misgivings about the Partisan tilt towards the Soviets.11
Lindsay left early in the morning and made it out in time, but for the Partisans it was too late. German troops withdrawn from both Eastern and Western Fronts, with armour and artillery, arrived for the final assault.* 4th Zone was cut off from Pohorje and the Sava, the 14th Division and other Partisan units went in the only direction they could – up into the mountains12 – and the Germans recaptured all the valley’s villages and farms. They burned everything they could not hold. Štajerska’s jails filled with Partisans and civilians alike.
Yet those Partisans who were still breathing never abandoned Allied escapees. On 17 December 1944, thirty-six prisoners escaped from the last camps in Maribor and, though the path through Pohorje and across the Sava was blocked, the Partisans found a way, smuggling them home via the same route the 14th had taken into Štajerska: the long way round through Croatia.13 During that last winter a handful of others would, against all odds, make it across the Alps and be conveyed home, but by now the escapes were all but over.
For the 14th Partisan Division up in the mountains, the situation only worsened. That winter saw catastrophic snowfall, and there were so many German troops that all the roads could be held in an iron grip. Short on food and bitterly cold, Major Losco collapsed on a snow march and had to be carried.14 He could do nothing more. His stores and the safe zone were destroyed. He could not even be quartermaster to escapees. Four days before Christmas he radioed MI9 from the sole working radio, borrowed from the Partisans.
Our radio contact broke down. Zone now being chased by Huns who probably intend to clear area north of Sava. Consequently there is no future for [MI9] work and what little may crop up can be handled by mission. Further . . . all our stores have been captured. Bearing in mind imperative to cut down mission personnel to minimum send instructions if I am to come or remain.15
Between Partisan obstruction, the weather, and the enemy, he could achieve nothing. MI9 had been receiving messages to that effect for months. Losco was now asking for his life. After three days, a response was sent.
Appreciate your position. But in view of prisoners still in working camps south Austria essential you remain and do what is possible. Doing utmost to get stores to you.
Best wishes for Christmas.16
Cold, starving, in metres of snow, and on the run, it was the last message Losco received. On Boxing Day he and an MI6 associate attempted a risky road crossing.* They were spotted by Germans, shot and wounded, and captured. The last heard of them was an unconfirmed Partisan intelligence report that they were taken under guard to the SS military hospital in Ljubljana.17 Either they died of their wounds, or they recovered and were imprisoned, tortured, and shot.