Monty, his part in my victory - Spike Milligan [27]
Sept. 5th 1943
Battery Diary:
All light vehicles left for Phillipville staging at Ain Milia.
This means we lost Al Fildes. We said goodbye, “see you somewhere some time.” He gave us a thumbs up and a smile as he drove off with the convoy. It was all happening. We were given no rest. Intensive signal training. We had to learn new Signalling Codes, we had to adopt the American phonetics. A used to be Ack, it was now Able, B used to be Beer, it was now Baker and so on. We were told to replace all our old kit, for most of us that meant everything, our KD’s were so threadbare the Arabs refused to steal them, my underwear on a line looked like distress signals from shipwrecked tramps.
Condition of L/Bdr Milligan’s kit at end of Tunis Campaign
8th September 1943
Italy have surrendered!
An Italian soldier, having been captured, takes up the culinary art in hopes of opening a Trattoria in London
9th September 1943
5th Army lands at Salerno; there is heavy fighting. 8th Army lands in the South unopposed.
The days that followed were all focused on the wireless news about Salerno, it was obvious that it was pretty tricky going, with the 8th Army hurrying up the coast to link up with the 5th.
On the 13th of September Alexander signalled Churchill, “I consider situation critical,” of course I didn’t know that at the time, no, I had to buy Alexander’s Biography in 1973 to find out and by then it was too late for me to worry. It was a near thing! All our vehicles are being waterproofed, it looks like a beach landing.
“Oh yes, waterproof the bloody vehicles, what about us?” says Gunner White, “it doesn’t matter if we drown.”
10th September 1943
Loading party return from Phillipville, where they have been loading vehicles onto cargo ships, we’re all puzzled, if we were waterproofing vehicles why are they on cargo ships????
“Somewhere, Harry,” I said, “there is a lunatic. Every day he’s taken from Colney Hatch, locked in a room with a phone at the War Office, he phones through a series of orders and these are transmitted directly to us.”
Edgington nodded his head and laughed. “It’s something like that,” he said.
Now dear reader, a blank appears in my memory, all there is in my diary is the word PISSED. This happened between Sept. l0th and the 11th. But I recall arriving back in a lorry with Edgington to Ain Abessa to discover the Camp deserted.
“They’ve deserted without us,” said Edgington jumping down.
“Wait! an oil lamp glows in yon Nissen hut,” I said.
A figure filled the doorway. It was Bdr Fuller. “Where’s everybody?” I said.
“They’ve gone to secret destination 397,” says Fuller donning his crash helmet.
He gave us 15 minutes to pack any gear we had left in the Nissen hut. We were all a bit dazed by the change of events, here we were looking forward to a good night’s sleep, and now we were off to somewhere.
“This is an outrage,” said Edgington as he strained, lifted and hurled his kit onto the lorry.
“It’s also an inrage,” I said, carefully mixing my kit with his.
“We’ve got to catch up with the main convoy,” said Fuller, “they’re 10 hours ahead.”
“Australia’s only 8.”
“Let’s chase that — it’s nearer.”
“Hurry up,” shouts Fuller, “we’re keeping Adolf waiting.”
“Fuck ‘im,” said a voice under some strain.
“Right away.” Edgington slams the tailboard, and bangs on the side.
Off we drive in exactly the same direction from which we had come. With a rolled blanket for a pillow, I fell into a deep sleep. I awoke with a start, we appeared to be driving over a field of corrugated iron, the vibrations moved us about like chess pieces. Edgington, still asleep, passed me on his way to the tailboard, the quality of the vibrations changed and Edgington passed me again. Through the back of the lorry I saw a late moon, it bounced like a ping pong ball as the lorry jolted. Edgington was going towards the tailboard again, he was awake. “Wot’s