2
A Balkan Spring
Martyn Uren
It was about the beginning of March 1941 that the usual rumours concerning a move began to circulate very strongly ... Our intermediate destination was what the army calls a transit camp for troops leaving from Alexandria to other countries, and for inward bound troops also. Here we were camped in tents, miles away from anywhere, for ten days. This was just about as unpleasant a ten days as I have ever spent in a camp. It was very hot and we had many route marches with full packs...
We experienced the worst sand storm I have known in three years. For two days we were confined to tents, and these are just like sieves when the khamsin blows. Once I went out to find the cookhouse, and was lost for two hours – the cookhouse was only 30 yards away. The anti-aircraft guard decided that it was high time that they took cover, as they could not see each other, let alone enemy planes, and while returning to their tents were lost for over four hours.
However, all this unpleasantness came to an end at last, and we began embarkation ... Our personal embarkation took place two days after our equipment, and we marched to the station some miles away with all our gear, and settled down on our ship in good time. Here my ideas regarding destination were a little strengthened when I saw the name of our boat – H.M. the King of Greece’s yacht Hellas – of graceful lines and a good turn of speed. A typical Grecian figurehead graced the bows and further strengthened the impression of beauty. Our entire regiment was crammed on board under exceptionally good organisation.
We left Alexandra in convoy, with a powerful escort, on the 18th of March. Many of us thought that at last we were going to leave Egypt for good and all. We conceived a powerful force operating somewhere in the Balkans and executing a drive to the west and the north. Few of us guessed the probability of a hasty return; of the impossibility of the mission on which we were bound. Glad we were to say goodbye to Egyptian waters, but glad we were to set foot again upon Egyptian soil two months later.
The 19th of March is clear in my memory as being one of the most beautiful and peaceful days spent since I left home. The sea was azure blue, a hue such as only the Mediterranean can assume ... About midday the Battery was assembled on our deck and a letter from General Freyberg was read out to us. In short, he said that we were going to Greece to fight, and wished us luck. He had complete confidence in us and we soon learnt to have complete confidence in him. This news was received with a mixed feeling of eager anticipation to see a new country, especially Greece, and of wonderment tinged with misapprehension as to our fate.
1943, Kiwi Saga
‘Kalimera Engleesh,’ came the boyish voices from the road.
‘English my left eyeball,’ returned the Sergeant, a bit cross-grained. ‘Don’t you know the difference between a Tommy and a bloody Kiwi?’
He waved his ‘boy scout’ peaked hat and shouted, ‘Look, bloody Kiwi!’
‘Bloody Kiwi,’ echoed the children, delighted.
The Sergeant’s reaction must have been a universal one, because within a few days our common greeting from the hospitable Greek was more often than not the homely cry of ‘Kalimera, bloody Kiwi!’
Chas M. Wheeler, Kalimera Kiwi
Greece
Travers Watt
The convoy moved out. As always the direction was into the desert but as soon as we were clear of towns and villages we changed direction hard right. According to my compass we were heading towards the Canal and, sure enough, we were. At Port Said a ship awaited us. No one said anything, just sat quietly in the trucks till Sergeant Buckley came along the convoy. I was last in line and he said, ‘Bring your truck up front.’ The Captain told me to load my truck onto the ship first then go down to the hold to get it into position, after which I was to stow all the trucks as they came down. Canopies were lowered so as to lie flat on the tray. Once the loading started the vehicles came down at a fair rate and just before dark all trucks and cars were loaded.
We reached Greece early next morning. As soon as the ship was tied up sling loads of supplies were swung onto the wharf and the spare drivers waited to stack the supplies for transportation. All went smoothly. As soon as each truck was safely ashore its driver hopped in and drove off.
It was after lunch when someone said, ‘There’s a plane, very high up.’ No one took any notice, just kept on unloading as fast as the crane would work. There were three trucks to go, one just hanging over my head, and I’ll never forget what happened next, bombs were suddenly screaming down. The ship pulled at her moorings, swaying from side to side, and although she wasn’t hit some of the bombs landed in the water very close by. It wasn’t funny. I could hardly keep my feet and clung to the truck still in the hold, the one still hanging from the crane swaying wildly. If it had fallen I wouldn’t have had a chance to get clear. Then all was quiet again. The truck on the crane went up, then the next one. I was just backing my truck on to the sling when there was another shower of screaming bombs ... I was frightened to death, all alone there in the bottom of the ship which, in another hold, was half full of petrol. If one of those bombs hit and the ship caught fire it would be ‘goodnight nurse for me’!
‘If there is a God He certainly looked after me that time,’ I told myself.
When the bombing stopped the planes strafed the wharf and that started a few fires. As soon as my truck touched down on the wharf I drove like a madman away from it all. I learned later that some of the men who’d been unloading in other parts of the ship had been injured quite badly. I won’t forget in a hurry our landing at Pereaus [Piraeus] Harbour.
1993, No Butter on my Crust
Halt on a Rainy Night in Greece
L.W. Sinden
Drenched and heavy-shrouded is the night,
Our trucks lurch to the roadside,
Pull the mud about their tyres and cease,
Wet leaves against the windscreen; raindrops fall
With ceaseless patter in dim-gleaming pools,
The hoary throated thunder rumbles,
End on end down endless valleys. Knife-edge winds
Sharp-whetted on keen northern snows,
Cut and curl round turned up collars;
A cigarette end draws and glows and gleams
And raindrops patter, patter, tinkle on tin hats.
Beyond the hedgerows, in the dark,
Are pastures plentiful with all earth’s giving;
Eager grasses climb the fencing posts,
And flowers bloom there for beauty’s sake alone;
Dark cattle shuffle, restless round their fold,
Anxious for dawn; and apple blossom
Studs the silent velvet furrows and the orchard floors.
A soldier makes a coarse remark,
A jest which gleams the heart’s most inner core,
And everybody laughs...
But suddenly,
An order passes down; the column stirs,
And concertina-like, it moves and folds into the night;
A soldier’s laugh is snatched up by the driven wind
And whisked away.
Silence gathers in her folds once again,
And darkness tumbles noiselessly around.
22 December 1941, NZEF Times
A One-way Airway
Travers Watt
Our next move was to a place called Katarine. There we carted ammunition for New Zealand troops; they were forming a line at the mouth of the River Aliakmon. We made several trips before the German fighter planes spotted us. They came in at tree height and sprayed us and everything else in their sights with cannon-shell fire. The aircraft were yellow-nosed 109 Messerschmitts ... There were a lot of casualties as the Luftwaffe had no opposition and could come and go as they pleased. Our transport was entirely unprotected and if enemy planes were sighted by the spare drivers, we jumped out of the trucks and lay hard up against the banks or alongside the wheels of our vehicles. Most of the time we could hear the bombs dropping before we got out; it shook the nerves somewhat.
It was also our task to transport New Zealand Infantry to a place called Surva [Servia]. On our maps it was shown as Surva Pass. Here we had our first encounter with the dreaded enemy dive bomber, the Stuka. The pass was high and rocky with steep banks on both sides. The dive bombers came straight down at us. Just before they went into a dive a siren-like sound started up and there was a fearful screaming as the plane descended at speed. The bombs were let go just before the pilot pulled out of his dive. The Stukas were always followed up by Messerschmitts, so as one plane finished its dive, another came in to machine gun the convoy. One driver said one of the planes was so low he could see the pilot shake his fist at him as he went past.
Those Stuka raids really upset our drivers. It seemed we’d just get back into our vehicles when more Stukas would come on the scene to prevent supplies getting through to our fighting men who were holding the enemy up front ... and it became so intense that we had to travel at night, hiding the trucks as best we could by day. To drive at night in that steep hilly country put a terrific strain on us all. We weren’t even allowed to strike a match or smoke a cigarette, as the glow could be seen many miles away ... Our one concern was to get to and from ammunition points, and the fighting men. In doing this, windows were blown out of vehicles, trucks were disabled and soldiers were killed. It was sickening to find out how many of our mates were missing after each raid on a convoy.
1993, No Butter on my Crust
Image 7
Prelude to Battle
Martyn Uren
As I lay down on my comfortable new bed hewn out of the ground, I felt as if we were on the eve of great things. It seemed as though a battle was imminent, for we already knew that the Allied forces in Servia Pass were engaging the enemy, and the Greeks on our left were in contact with his forward elements. Our engineers at that moment were mining the road through our pass and all the bridges behind us were being mined. Our Divisional Cavalry had done their delaying job, and retired through us. The stage was set.
But it seemed that another anti-climax was to be our lot, for we had not been in bed for longer than 20 minutes when we got the old order, ‘Prepare to move,’ and ‘We move at 1.30a.m.’ The Greeks on our left had been pushed back, and had given way altogether in one sector. The Germans were through and we were in danger of being cut off. Once the Germans were on the southern side of Olympus, with our forces still in the mountains, the fight was over. Accordingly a withdrawal was ordered ... through the mountains south-east of Olympus was a tunnel; this came out on a road which led to Larissa in the east ... someone had to hold the tunnel road to Larissa. Failing this, more than two divisions were cut off. The forces at Servia Pass had been withdrawn first and our battalions that were there did a wonderful forced march of 42 miles on foot, carrying rifles, Brens, machine guns, mortars and rations. It was an epic feat and it saved them from encirclement.
To one Australian battalion, one battalion from Auckland, one company of machine gunners, a squadron of divisional cavalry and our battery, fell the task of fighting a delaying action long enough to allow the forces in the mountains to withdraw to a new line. The new line was famous in Greek legend as the place where a hundred Spartans held back the Persian hordes until only one remained and he ran back to Marathon with a lighted torch to tell the news ... Thermopylae, now known to us as Molos. The place where we were to fight our rearguard action was on the tunnel road to Larissa, near a place called Penaeus Pass.
1943, Kiwi Saga
‘The British are firmly established in Greece, ready to fight to the last man. The last man, of course, won’t be an Englishman, but some colonial dupe from New Zealand or Australia.’
Lord Haw Haw was running true to form. A few days ago he had told us ‘Freyberg’s circus is on the move again. These simple country boys are about to find that war is a tougher game than rugby football. And Germany has another answer to their arrival. It is proposed to deal with this nuisance by sponsoring a rise of a pound a week per man in the New Zealander’s wages. This will ensure that within a short period they will all drink themselves to death.’
Chas M. Wheeler, Kalimera Kiwi
‘I’m no Coward, but...’
Travers Watt
We were fully loaded with requirements for the front line troops who were holding the Aliakmon Line – tanks and artillery, with the infantry dug in overlooking the Aliakmon River. In front of them were the anti-tank guns and there were twenty-five pound guns at several places.
We drove all night through the mountains, showing no lights and just following the truck ahead. Eight of us who were carrying small arms ammunition were diverted over the Aliakmon River via a bridge loaded with high explosives. The bridge was on the main route from Greece to Albania. And when the Germans came the engineers would blow up the huge wooden structure. The message was passed in no uncertain terms that we were to drive very carefully over it or the fuses might be set off. That message put the fear of God into me. As driver-mechanic I was ordered to go too but I wasn’t all that keen about it. It wasn’t until we were safely over that my heart started to function normally again. I’m no coward, but not too brave for all that...
Finally, after driving all night we arrived at our destination, British Headquarters, and were shown where the ammunition was to be unloaded. The atmosphere was very strange. It was quiet with nothing much in the way of action. The sky was even clear of planes.
Our officer was Captain Toogood and he sent a message along the line of trucks ordering us to follow him to a petrol dump. ‘Fill your trucks to the very top with petrol,’ we were told. It wasn’t an easy task. Each truck had two tanks and a lot was wasted in the process. The Captain sent a runner along the line. Drivers were to get a wriggle on as Jerry was in the area. The British troops were trying to hold him at this point. We sure did get a move along then ... By the time the last truck was ready to move, shells were landing all around us. At last we were all away without any casualties, back down the mountainside.
We came to the bridge again and more men were there, waving their arms around as each truck moved on to it. When it was our turn an engineer officer asked if we were the last. ‘I think so,’ Maurice told him. ‘Good, because as soon as you’re over we’ll blow this little beauty. Go carefully.’ We weren’t half a mile away when she went up and timbers landed past us in all directions. We couldn’t get down that road quickly enough. We had no desire to be clobbered by a lump of twelve-by-six hardwood.
Around midday we reached our Company’s position. The sight we saw took the wind right out of our sails. Men were removing the petrol tanks from all trucks in our section, including those in our convoy. As we drove in, a Don Arc came up to me and said I was to report to the Major. I was so stiff after a night and half a day bumping aronund in that truck I could hardly walk. The Major said, ‘Our Anti-Tank Regiment is at Aliakmon trying to hold the German attack as they attempt to cross the river. If the Anti-tank has to evacuate its position their transport will have insufficient petrol to get them back, so I’m sending you and Lenny back up there with the tanks from our truck so they’ll have enough gas to get out.’
‘Do I have to go Major?’
‘Yes, you’re our mechanic, so you take your truck and Lenny will take his, then if either of you break down you will have to do what you can for the best.’
It happened to be Hitler’s birthday. Hitler sent all his birthday presents to us at Katarine. Every bomber and fighter plane he must have had at his disposal bombed and strafed us as we went along. It was one of the worst days I spent in Greece. Anything that moved was bombed, even the girls working in the fields. Len and I were lying against a bank during one raid and felt sick to see Jerry drop bombs on about a hundred girls in a particular field. When they heard the planes they ran together waving their arms above their heads. They didn’t know they should have thrown themselves flat. We yelled at them to get down but in all the noise they didn’t hear us. The bombs blew them to pieces – they just vanished from sight...
Somehow we did manage to reach the Anti-Tank Regiment and must have just about fallen out of our trucks.
‘The buggers are drunk,’ I heard someone comment.
A Captain came up to us and asked, ‘Have you had a hard time getting here?’
We chorused a heartfelt, ‘Yes!’
‘Well we’ll unload your trucks then you can rest till we need you again.’
‘We’d better get back,’ Len said.
‘No, we might need your help to take some of our fellows when we move out.’ ... We had something to eat and then climbed into the backs of our trucks and went to sleep. I awoke not knowing what time it was, or even what day.
We were greeted with, ‘Thank goodness you got through. Div Sigs sent a message saying you’d left but through our field glasses we could see Jerry bombing the road all day. We wondered whether or not you’d manage to get here. I can’t tell you how much depended on your arrival. Just wait at your trucks, and give them a good check over, for when we move we’ll be in a hurry.’
I took a good look at mine. There were several sizeable holes in the side, the left hand window was missing and my tin hat hung on the headlamp and there was quite a gash along the side of it. Len’s cab had a few holes through it, but apart from that all appeared to be well ... A despatch rider arrived to tell us that the Germans were breaking through the line. We were to get ready to leave at a moment’s notice. Within minutes men began to arrive for loading onto our trucks – two officers, one for each truck, and twenty gunners, including some wounded, in the back of each. ‘Let’s go!’ A number of vehicles from the Anti-tank followed us.
1993, No Butter on my Crust
Image 8
I asked a gunner what had been the trouble, hadn’t they been able to hold the line? ‘We could have held, easy, but we were told to come out as the Greek Government had capitulated. It was the Government who asked us to come out and save everything we were able.’
Martyn Uren, Kiwi Saga
Penaeus Pass Rearguard
Martyn Uren
We travelled through the mountain passes and before dawn we arrived upon the plains south of Olympus, then up another winding road towards the top of a low foothill. Here we stopped. Orders came down to disperse the vehicles, erect camouflage nets and bed down. On no account was anyone to stir outside the nets during hours of daylight. This order was not hard to obey, for it meant sleep, glorious sleep ... I slept until 11 next morning and awoke to the sound of many aero engines. Looking up I saw in open formation fifty heavy bombers directly overhead. But no one moved, not a shot was fired, and they never saw us. An hour later, 36 Stukas; they, too, did not see us. And so we spent the day reviewing a show of German air strength. The orders about not stirring from under our nets were obeyed to the letter, and we were content to lie on our beds, eat a little and drink tea.
Under cover of darkness we moved again back on to the crowded roads leading south. We moved all that night until 3a.m., when we were forced to lie up for five hours on account of the traffic. As soon as it was clear again we pushed on towards Larissa ... Larissa had been heavily bombed and hardly a building had been left unscathed, many were just a heap of rubble on the ground, while those left standing showed cracks in the walls. That the townsfolk had been badly shaken was apparent; they stood around in silent groups numbed into a state of fatalistic carelessness. They were powerless against the overwhelming evil that was upon their fair land, and here were the troops that could give the invaders fight, withdrawing. Even under the shadow of gloom some of them managed to raise a smile and a wave of the hand. Always charitable were the Greeks.
By about ten that night we had arrived at a patch of harder grassland and it was here that we camped ... I gathered then that it could not be far from here that our battle was to take place.
It was 2100 hours on 16th April 1941 that our battery fired its first rounds in anger at the enemy. I had just got to sleep, not knowing that we were going to fire, and I was woken with the shock and blast of our guns. Next morning I found out the tactical situation. Apparently the Australian and New Zealand battalions had arrived at Penaeus two days before us and for two days had fought the enemy without artillery support. They were dug in on a line parallel to a river in front of us, which more or less covered the floor of the pass. The map stated that the river was about eight feet deep; thus we thought it impassable to tanks and on these grounds we treated the river as a tank trap ... Approaching this sector were two enemy infantry divisions and an armoured (panzer) division. Our infantry had been forced to retreat to this place.
A day never to be forgotten was the 17th April. On this day we bore the brunt of German blitzkrieg methods; we fought three divisions in that pass and we had no air support or protection. For yet another day the remnants of two battalions stemmed the advance of 30,000 men and tanks. The orders were to delay the enemy until nightfall on the 17th, and the price that the Commander of our forces in Greece was prepared to pay was the loss of our battalions and our battery. We were not expected to get out; our General told us some weeks afterwards.
1943, Kiwi Saga
Image 9
Martyn Uren
Enemy infantry were seen approaching the river early in the morning and we opened fire. The execution was ghastly. They must have been doped, our infantry was saying afterwards, for they marched towards the river ten abreast, singing and doing the goosestep some of the time. Our shells fell among them for several hours, our machine gunners and infantry fired their weapons continuously. One machine gunner told me afterwards that many of them were sick with the slaughter, physically sick of killing Germans.
At ten o’clock, 27 Stukas came over in their usual formation. These German pilots must have enjoyed plastering sitting targets at no risk to themselves, for we had no R.A.F. and no A.A. guns. They headed straight for our wagon lines; each plane peeled off into a dive and sent its bombs screaming down. It was the first time I had seen Stukas in action, and I stood aghast at the havoc and din they caused. Casualties were few actually, but an ammunition truck and a cook’s truck were left blazing ... It took the planes an hour to go back to their ’drome, refuel and refit, and return. We were dive-bombed and machine-gunned eight times on that terrible day, and I shall never forget the first experience of planes screaming down towards us, pulling out of their dive, leaving the bombs to carry on the deadly screech.
An infantry captain sent a message through that he could easily observe columns of advancing infantry from where he was, so our B.C. [battery commander] connected a ’phone up to him and let him shoot one of our troops. His orders were, of course not those of an artillery officer who is trained to talk in terms of switches in degrees from zero lines, and they came down something like this (I was at the command post and heard them coming over the ’phone). ‘About 400 yards to the right of where you have just fired is a column of infantry.’
Our command post quickly translated this into ‘More four degrees, 6800, one round gun fire.’
‘No,’ came the reply, ‘that was 300 yards short.’
‘Add 300 yards, repeat,’ came the fire orders.
‘Great, marvellous, right among them – let him have it.’
‘Five rounds gun fire,’ said the Gun Position Officer.
‘Give him hell,’ came the voice.
‘Repeat,’ said the G.P.O., and this sort of thing went on for nearly an hour.
As the afternoon wore on, things became worse. Our infantry were starting to trickle through us. The enemy shelling increased, and the intensity of the Stuka attacks increased. Our guns put up a ceaseless barrage, for there were wonderful targets. The great difficulty was in keeping our observation posts, for enemy infiltration troops were advancing on one flank on to our O.P. ridge, and at least one troop commander at the O.P. reported that things were getting too hot for them. At 3p.m. the captain of Don Troop reported that infantry had gained possession of the northern end of our O.P. spur, and were firing at him. He asked his signallers whether they were going to lie low, or try and fight it out. He himself chose to fight his way out, while the others voted hiding until dark. His last message over the ’phone was disturbing. ‘Enemy tanks crossing the river’ was the first news ... The troop commander’s last message was, ‘The tanks have broken through...’ The line went dead.
Alarums
Chas M. Wheeler
Our camp south of Ellasson – number ten out of fifteen overnight stopping places in Greece – was cosy enough, even if our slumbers were rather uneasy. Alan (‘Colonel’) Grieve, the transport bloke, came over soon after we were settled in. ‘Things were pretty hot in the village this afternoon,’ he told me. ‘We came in from one end just as the section came in from the other and a line of Stukas came over the hill! You should have seen the scatter! Most of us went into the riverbed, and I sheltered under the bridge for a while, until I realised that Jerry was trying to hit the bridge. Miraculously enough, the whole section came through without a scratch. The net result seemed to be that the boys found a Naafi store, whose attendants had wisely departed for a cooler climate. It was full of beer. Result – so now are the lads.’
George Chapman came to see me the next day. He had had an exciting time with the cavalry up ahead of the Vermion Line and was looking somewhat the worse for wear.
‘Take my advice,’ he told me, ‘and do your drinking with the Div. Cav. but see you’re miles away from them when there’s a scrap on. When you see them heading down the road don’t even wait to warm your engine! They nearly drove me grey sitting on demolition charges and trying to select the point where the Kiwi convoy ended and the Jerry one began.’
The escapades of these irresponsible men in the black berets were to make that headgear a symbol which all Kiwis treated with respect. In them, familiarity with the enemy seemed to breed contempt for danger. In the earlier campaigns their sheer impudent bravado was to carry those armoured cars and whippet tanks through hair-raising operations which could hardly have been expected to succeed if attempted behind many inches of armour plate. And always they were our pilots and our shield against surprise attack – reconnoitring our advances and covering our retreats. Recruited largely from the old Territorial Mounted Rifles, these lads were of the solid and stolid type of the New Zealand farmer. Hard fighters, they were famous too as hard players.
Indeed, this first campaign of action for the New Zealand Division bred in all branches a new respect for the other arms of the service. We saw the ‘footsloggers’ of the infantry turn stubborn and un-fearing faces to whatever threat was hurled their way, endure nerve-shattering horror and grim privation with a grin. We saw the ‘long-range snipers’ of the artillery, singled out for all the fury of concentrated air attack, stagger back to their guns with grim and grimy faces and reopen their fire before the planes were out of sight. We saw the ‘grocers’ of the Army Service Corps pick their determined way over bomb-pitted roads while the heavens rained screaming doom in their midst.
Thus did the battle inoculation of the Division weave in us soldiers new appreciation of our interdependence and of the qualities called for, as much in the man cooking the breakfast as in the man pulling the trigger.
Having completed preparations of the road demolitions at Ellasson, I decided to do a round trip to Tyrnavos. Near its centre I found some members of the 7th Field Company working under a big main road bridge. Pete Wildey, an old schoolmate, was directing the drilling of holes in the great piers of stone arches. ‘Hello Pete,’ I greeted him. ‘Nice quiet job, far from the battle line?’
Pete glanced at his watch. ‘Just wait another ten minutes and see for yourself. We get blitzed every thirty-five minutes with monotonous regularity. Last time a bomb actually knocked a chip of the side of the bridge, falling and then exploded in the riverbed.’ He pointed to a gaping hole across the stream.
‘Where were you at the time? In the river?’
‘I was right in this hole we’ve dug to take the main charges, lying low with a few hundred pounds of gelignite to protect me from flying splinters. The Huns heard my teeth chattering and thought it was machine-gun fire, so they pushed off.’
That twenty miles back to Ellasson took me four hours. I must have passed the whole of 5th Brigade. Pouring down out of Katerine Pass, lights blazing, they filled the narrow road as they bumped happily along. Every breakdown, every wheel in the ditch meant a halt miles long, until impatient drivers tried to pass, and met double traffic the other way; hopeless confusion, complete inertia for half an hour at a time.
Next morning Doug Kelsall’s No.1 Section formed the rearguard to the withdrawal of 4th Brigade from Servia Pass. ‘The troops were moving out all night,’ he told us later. ‘At every demolition job we were delayed, and our programme got further and further behind schedule. Our boys were scattered all along the mountainside, working their way down on foot. The Jerries seemed to have got wind of the move, for they were infiltrating pretty boldly. Their scouts had ‘walkie-talkie’ radios and were in touch with the long-range mortar crews. They were doing a very effective job of directing fire right amongst the vehicle concentrations.
‘We had orders not to shoot later than certain hours all the charges along the roads, but we could hear chaps calling in the dark up in the bush for us to wait for them. However, we got them all off and gave a sigh of relief as we formed up and drove off from the last. But our troubles had only started.
‘At the road junction at Elevetherokhorion a Hun tank ran right into the middle of the section convoy. He scored a direct hit on one of the trucks, killing the driver and blocking the road for the rest. A bunch of Div. Cavalry armoured cars appeared from nowhere and put up a brisk scrap, but they barely managed to fight their own way through. Five of my eight trucks went west.’
Many of the forty or so sappers cut off managed to take to the bush and make the long trip back to the unit, some of them as far away as Thermopylae, a hundred miles to the south. One of them was Jack Farnham, the Company’s one-man arsenal. Last seen standing, Colossus-like, astride an offending enemy tank, trying to find a chink in its armour; he later walked into camp after a three-day trek and hitch hike. Challenging the tank to a duel, he had created the only known instance of hand-to-hand tank hunting in the campaign. Unfortunately the affair had ended in a stalemate, since the tank crew couldn’t see him and his only available weapon, a pistol, proved rather futile against some inches of steel.
1946, Kalimera Kiwi
Late on Saturday afternoon, 19th April we arrived at Thermopylae or Molos. Here a line had been formed while we fought delaying actions, and it was a place well chosen for battle against odds. The defences consisted partly of natural obstacles, such as had been foreseen by the Spartans two thousand years ago ... Here we were supposed to rest for two days before taking up another battle position.
Martyn Uren, Kiwi Saga
A Grecian Epigram
S.W.J
‘Go tell the Spartans, Thou that passeth by,
That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.’
So spake in ancient betrayed Thermopylae
Leonidas the fearless, who did stand and die.
Rolled on the centuries torn with strife
Sapping from Greece her flowing life.
But deep in her heart ever did abide
her traditions, her courage and indomitable pride.
This the misjudgement the invader made,
For not into nothingness could her nobility fade.
And once again on high Olympus peak
Stood fighting men their iron vengeance to wreak.
From far across the seas they willingly came...
As unflinchingly and resolutely they gave their best.
Undaunted with steady and courageous device
Exacting from the foe a fearful price...
3 May 1943, NZEF Times
Roll Call
Martyn Uren
Sunday was supposed to be our big day of rest and recuperation, but we found that fate had ordained it otherwise. In order to find out our casualties, and so I might furnish a parade state to Regimental HQ, it was necessary to call a roll in the presence of all members of the battery that had survived the last wild dash and the preceding battle. Accordingly, the battery commander called a parade under the olive trees, and a macabre gathering it was. I read out the names from our battery roll; some men answered and many did not ... In a dried up stream bed I set up an office and proceeded with my parade state. The listing of the names of battle casualties and various categories of missing took some time. It was the most heartbreaking job I have ever done, although possibly the fact of it being our first action made it worse. I suppose now a man is more hardened to this sort of thing, although never quite immune; but to me there seemed to be a lot of misery stored up in those few pages, in each name a tragedy of a life, of several lives, at home.
1943, Kiwi Saga
Evacuation
Martyn Uren
I think it was about 3 o’clock on 23rd April that we were told the bad news. The Greeks, who were weary of war after a long but glorious Albanian campaign, had been forced to capitulate, giving us time to re-embark upon transport and evacuate their fair land. These tidings hit us hard at first ... At nine o’clock that night we were to steal, once again, away from the enemy, under cover of darkness and forsake the one country which we had liked almost as much as our own.
1943, Kiwi Saga
Travers Watt
We were on our way just after dark, to the next place on the map, Almiros. We expected to be there by early morning and we were. The road was still clear so the Captain ordered us to proceed to the next village, Lamir, but we weren’t welcome there. They’d already had their fill of bombers attacking transport passing through. A man came running out flapping his hands in agitation, looking up at the sky. ‘Airplanes kill my people. You not wanted here. Go far away.’
Not much further on we came to the village of Thermopylae. The New Zealand Army were fighting a rear guard battle nearby so we moved on to where the action was taking place. The anti-tank officers went to make enquiries and returned to say that a message had come through from Military Headquarters to all en route to ‘D’ Beach. There were plenty of anti-aircraft guns in the area to give us cover, so the order was given ... ‘On to D Beach’. Before we left, however, all wounded were taken to the medical tent. The gunners took off as well. While this was going on another message was received, that the two divisional ammunition trucks should proceed to D Beach and there the vehicles were to be destroyed. Flies were swarming like bees in the back of the trucks, chasing the blood from the wounded who’d been lying there, so we washed the trays down before moving off yet again.
On the way we were attacked by Stukas and strafed from the long range fighters. Len and I didn’t stop, just drove as fast as our trucks could go. Large strips of steel were torn off the sides of the faithful Bedfords. When finally we arrived at the beachhead I was glued to the seat from sheer fright. The radiator in my truck must have suffered a fair-sized hole because steam was pouring through the floorboards nearly cooking my feet.
1993, No Butter on my Crust
Chas M. Wheeler
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We were awakened at dawn by the sound of the usual morning hate. Rather more intense than in the past few days. Planes everywhere of all sorts and sizes ... Then down from the north-west sailed three huge Junkers 52 troop carriers. Their course lay right across the broad plain between us and the north half of the [Corinth] canal. And as they reached it their sides erupted white puffs that dropped, checked, steadied into great umbrellas. Parachute troops! Our rifles opened a steady fire, but the odds were all with the swaying figures who had only a few hundred feet to fall.
The boys were beginning to move up to the terrace. In a few minutes our hideout would become a death trap. I waved them on, struggled into a jacket and boots. A second wave of parachutes was landing, much nearer this time. The next would be behind us. Whenever I could make myself heard I passed around word to collect a mile beyond Corinth Village. The Company was there, I knew very vaguely. Meanwhile, every man for himself was the only rule. On his own a man stood a chance of surviving the withering hail from the air, but any grouping would be suicidal. Our beloved trucks, with all their precious contents had to be left as they stood.
I made a dash for Corinth Village, where I knew there was an Embarkation Report Centre. Not a soul left. Sprinted back toward the camp, but it was deserted now ... I watched the fourth or fifth row of parachutes laid neatly across what had been our camp. Not a sign of any of the lads, and another trio of 52s hove in sight. I deemed it high time to head for the horizon.
1946, Kalimera Kiwi
Travers Watt
Our ‘Old Faithfuls’ had run their race well, we told ourselves. We took out our rifles, web gear, greatcoats and dixies and drove to a high bank, put the Bedfords in low gear and jumped out. Both trucks fell into the sea below. We watched as they bobbed about for a time before finally disappearing from sight. Picking up our gear we headed to where the boats were, about half a mile away. By the time we’d reached the water’s edge to await our transport, the German Army had landed by parachute on Corinth Canal, not too far away from where we were on D Beach. Word went round that our troops were holding a line a mere two miles away, fighting for their very lives. When the war was over, men coming home from internment in German prison camps, said they knew they wouldn’t get away that day but held fast to their positions in the hope that as many of our troops as possible would be evacuated.
Martyn Uren
At length, about 8.30 that night, we were lined up on the little lane that led through our position ready to move. I remember that even then the R.H.A. [Royal Horse Artillery] behind us was firing continuously so that our absence would not be noticeable until we had got well away ... All that night we travelled. No lights and no smoking. It appears that we beat the enemy to it by a matter of two hours, for he was fast approaching down another track, to attack what he thought was still our defended line on another flank...
About 3 o’clock in the afternoon we were on the road again and travelled until late that night. We slept for some hours at a place called Daphne. At that time Jerry was combing the hills of Thermopylae in search of the missing Kiwis and Aussies, and had we known how close behind us he was, I doubt whether we would have slept so soundly ... Before dawn we were on our way once more, and during the day we passed Athens for the third time ... on ANZAC Day when in retreat. It was the most poignant memory of the most memorable of all campaigns. For women young and old, tiny tots and white-haired ladies, waved to us with tears in their eyes as we passed by. The streets were crowded with people wishing us ‘good luck’ and ‘goodbye’. Several old dears smiled bravely and said, ‘Be back soon boys.’
Chas M. Wheeler
All day we kept to the hills, moving generally south-west, keeping out of sight of the planes, eating our emergency rations and whatever else we could find ... later we found the country becoming too rough and cautiously reconnoitred the road. A lorry load of grey-clad troops barged round a corner towards us. We – and they – disappeared into the undergrowth like rabbits, and it took a half-hour game of cowboys and Indians to discover that they were only Greeks.
Next we met a group of lads from our own Company, and split off to form our own sapper party. Our next encounter was with a brigade major, clinging to the running board of his car on the lookout for aircraft. He dropped off to tell us that an infantry party had moved back and were holding the enemy ... as we talked a passing plane made three runs over us, gave us his individual attention to the tune of two bombs and several hundred rounds of explosive ammunition. The major departed with the remark that this was the most inhospitable visit he’d paid anyone for a long time.
Travers Watt
Our company was long since gone, we were told, but we were to wait for the tank transporter which was expected to pick up another load. At last, just on dark, a huge transporter arrived, dropped its big tailgate onto dry land and in no time at all one thousand troops were loaded, standing as close together as stock in a cattle truck taking them to slaughter. The barge was taking a lot of water. We were standing in it up to our waists before the landing platform was hoisted up. We could hear field guns firing close at hand. The twenty-five pounders were only a few yards from the beach.
The engines started up, but the barge didn’t move – must have been overloaded. The captain gave the order to move forward so as to lift the front off the beach. We pushed each other forward several times before at last she slid off and moved out to sea. I hadn’t the foggiest notion where we were going, nor did I care very much. I just wanted to go to sleep. It was the first time I’d ever slept standing up. Fortunately we were packed so tightly together that we held each other up as we slept.
Martyn Uren
We had one more stop after Athens and then we were told to dismount and put our gear upon our backs. From there we were led up the side of a ridge to an area covered with small trees and scrub. Here we were to lie up for that night and the following day. Meanwhile drivers took their trucks to a well concealed demolition point in the valley ... The next day was a long and anxious one. Not half a mile from where we lay was the sea. Only a few small fishing smacks were in sight. We lay quietly all day; we had strict instructions not to move an inch from under the small trees which hid us from the air, and the necessity for obeying these instructions was apparent during that day when enemy aircraft came overhead several times and seemed to search for us. Each plane flew low and circled round and round. They were breathless moments...
Travers Watt
Around one in the morning we came alongside HMS ‘Calcutta’ which was standing out at sea. Getting aboard was a real shambles. Nets hung down from the ship’s side and men began to push and rush to get to them. As the ship moved with the sea there was a gap between it and the barge and men fell off the nets into the water. Weighed down as they were with all their gear they just disappeared, and were never seen again ... the ship was swaying so much one felt lucky to make the twelve feet or so from the bottom of the net to the rail. My mate, Lennie, and I got there safe and sound. Once aboard the ‘Calcutta’ we were shown where to go for something to eat. We were handed a very large sausage and a chunk of fresh bread and that simple meal was a real lifesaver.
My mind went to those brave troops still fighting to stop the German onslaught so that many others could get away to safety, maybe to fight again in another position. Most people have forgotten those gallant men ... but the men who came out of that battle will never forget.
Martyn Uren
We set off under cover of the night towards the beach in single file. Some of us were led on to a tiny jetty, and some went further on to another little beach. On this jetty we were counted, first a hundred men, then a further twenty. Tied to the jetty was a fishing smack and into this we packed. Here, I had my big slice of fortune – I was the 120th man ... This small vessel took its quota of men out to the invasion ship Salween, which was bound straight for Egypt.
We gazed about us towards the shore as the Greek started up his auxiliary motor, for it sounded very loud in the silence of the stealthy night; but no shots were fired at us, no hue and cry was raised. We were almost safe ... Soon we came up against the lofty side of the good ship Salween. Up the ladder assisted by cheerful sailors and into our quarters below deck we went. We were now in Navy hands, and this was our first acquaintance with their wonderful organisation. The hot drink and the warm quarters made us feel cheerful again, and we realised just how tired we were from the nervous strain. The days of hiding under trees, of dodging enemy planes and of running away, were over for a while.
Chas M. Wheeler
The little harbour at Argos was seething with activity when we reached there about 10p.m. On the outskirts we had been told to line up at the wharves and take our turn to go on board one of the five ships leaving that night. A casual glance at the crowd ahead suggested that we could be in line for the fifty-fifth ship from now. For many blocks in all directions from the wharves were densely packed with men ... from time to time the solid mass of men arose in a long wave, stretched, muttered, edged along a few yards as another boatload moved from the wharves.
The berthing accommodation was very limited and most of our rescue ships lay out in the roadstead, attended by a train of lighters, landing craft and launches. The pall of secrecy absurdly touched the voices of this band of fugitives, lowering them to subdued and furtive murmurs. But nothing could hide the brisk efficiency of the naval men who courteously lifted the weight of initiative from our weary shoulders.
‘Straight down here. Mind the steps, they’re a bit slippery. Here, take a hold on that hawser. Can’t take that rifle aboard, soldier, sling it in the harbour. No more smoking till you get below decks. Crowd up along the end, there, room for another fifty on here yet.’...
A huge and tireless Cockney lad stood at the top of the ladder, silhouetted Colossus-like against the sky. His brawny arm brought each man up the last few steps to the deck with an easy swing. Just ahead of me was a very pukka major with a portable radio under his arm.
‘Sorry, sir, you can’t bring that aboard.’
‘Not bring my radio?’ spluttered the major. ‘Good heavens man, that’s ridiculous...’
‘I’m afraid it’s against orders, sir; only small packs aboard. No room, we’re crowded out now.’
‘But, dash all, you can’t do that. I’ve carried this radio all over Greece; walked for miles with it today...’
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A very able-bodied seaman patiently took the article in question from his hands, poised it over the rail. It disappeared. The major was still spluttering like a damp squib.
We must have been about the last aboard, for every inch of space seemed to be crowded with soldiers. I stepped across the deck and a sailor pushed a huge mug of steaming cocoa in my hands. It was as welcome as anything I ever drank, but made me sleepier than ever. A naval officer guided me down steep steel ladders, we picked our delicate way along corridors strewn with sleeping men, to the ward room. Ten minutes later with my greatcoat under my head on the steel floor under the table, I was sound asleep. Only vaguely I heard the four-inch anti-aircraft gun ten feet above my head commence its shattering roar at dawn. It shook the floor where I lay all day almost without pause. But I was oblivious ... sleep and more sleep seemed to be the only thing that mattered.
...I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and gazed delightedly at the lovely scene. Grandeur, quiet, deceptive peace.
‘What place is this?’ I asked the Tar who was lovingly polishing the ‘Chicago Piano’ – a multiple anti-air weapon like a set of organ pipes. He gave me a wondering glance out of red-rimmed eyes set in a face grimy with cordite smoke.
‘This is Suda Bay, in Crete,’ he told me, ‘and the sooner we get out of it the better I’ll like it. No harbour for me in this weather. Give me the open sea.’
‘You seem to have had a busy time with that pom-pom of yours today. Were there many planes about?’
He turned on me in amazement. ‘Hell, many planes?’ he echoed. ‘Say, weren’t you on this trip?’
‘Just asleep,’ I explained, unconvincingly. ‘By the way, what ship is this?’
‘This,’ he replied with some very pardonable pride, ‘is the anti-aircraft cruiser Calcutta!’ [Her second evacuation to Crete in two days.]