by Iain Gale
There were, he knew only two inescapable conclusions: the position had to be held at all costs and any penetration would have to be cleaned up by immediate counter-attack to prevent it being extended into a break-through. For if a break-through occurred, the British would throw their whole striking power into the breach. And that, he was in no doubt, would be the end.
He picked up the telephone again, dialled a number and spoke quickly to his aide, General Albert Gause: ‘Gause. Call Wiener Neustadt. Order an aircraft for seven a.m. We’re going back to Africa.’
SEVENTEEN 11.00 a.m. Tactical HQ Eighth Army Montgomery
It was not good. That was quite clear. All morning news had been filtering in from the front line and Montgomery had been becoming increasingly concerned. Now he began to see just what sort of problem Auchinleck had faced. Principally it involved a lack of belief in one’s immediate junior commanders. Auchinleck’s problem he knew had been with his lack of faith in Ritchie. But it had really been his predecessor’s attempts at counter-attacks that had been his downfall. And now Montgomery was able to see just how easily those mistakes could have been made. Of course he had known that desert warfare was never going to be simple but in truth he had never really admitted it. How could he have? Well, now there was no alternative. He cursed all those damn Jock Columns, the defensive boxes and everything else. Everything he had inherited and whose memory he had still not been able to eradicate. His generals simply had to learn to trust him. Gatehouse had proved unreliable and weakhearted and it seemed that every hour now brought news of some other mishap.
Briggs’ First Armoured Division was not on course. Kidney Ridge, the small area of high ground that extended as a salient towards the enemy in the north of the position, was held not in force, as he had been told by Lumsden, but rather it seemed by a mere whisker and only at its southern end. In the southern sector it was even worse. The French had signally failed in their attempt to capture the Himeimat Heights. Well, he had never had much faith in them. But Horrocks had been too overoptimistic. Rather than forcing the Twenty-First Panzers to attack he himself had been drawn in too far and been compelled to withdraw with heavy casualties to the Seventh Armoured. Montgomery had been furious. And then Gatehouse had had the audacity to suggest that they retreat behind the minefields and give up everything he had won in the past day. He wanted, he had said, to avoid taking heavy casualties.
Montgomery had scarcely been able to speak. Avoid heavy casualties? He had known at the outset that casualties would be taken. Lumsden of course had agreed with Gatehouse. Montgomery had spoken to the idiot on the field telephone and had gritted his teeth. Particularly when the fool had admitted to being not at the front but ten miles behind his leading tanks. Montgomery’s cool had broken then and in a way he now regretted it. But what was the point of a general being so far to the rear? He had ordered him to the front. ‘Take charge of your battle, man. Lead from the front.’
And now it was desperate. Anyone could see that. Montgomery pondered for a moment. He stood outside the caravan surrounded at a respectful distance by his nervous staff. Yes, it had definitely been a mistake to have shouted at Gatehouse, no matter how great an oaf the man was. Freddie de Guingand stood closest to his commanding officer, as he always did and John Poston next to him. This, Montgomery realized, was the real crisis of the battle. He had thought it to have been last night when he had called their conference. But this was it. Like Wellington at Waterloo as the French cavalry had flowed against the squares. Like Marlborough at Blenheim, moving the battle from one flank to the other. The great duke had been at his old school, St Paul’s and he had learnt John Churchill’s tactics from an early age. Well, here was his own great test and he knew that now he must rise to it. It seemed particularly appropriate that it should occur today, on the anniversary of two of Britain’s most celebrated military engagements, Agincourt and Balaclava. He prayed that his would be the success of the former and not the notorious disaster of the latter. Time for a visit to the New Zealanders’ commander, he decided.
He called to de Guingand: ‘Freddie. We should leave now. We need to see General Freyberg at once.’
De Guingand looked over his shoulder and signalled to the driver who had been waiting for the last half-hour expecting just such a summons, and running his engine for the last ten minutes as Montgomery had paced the sand. Slowly he brought the Humber staff car round to the front of the caravan and de Guingand and Montgomery climbed in, with Poston in attendance. It was a short drive in the course of which Montgomery said nothing. They soon arrived at Freyberg’s HQ, a large tent erected in the sand at Burgh-el-Arab. Montgomery opened the door of the car and got out. He walked over to Freyberg at the open entrance to the side of the tent and greeted him warmly.
‘Hello, Bernard. We seem to be running into a little trouble with your New Zealand Division.’
Freyberg smiled but Montgomery could see that it was forced. ‘Yes, sir. You might say that. Things are getting a bit hot.’
‘General Gatehouse has assured me that he only has one regiment out on the Wiska Ridge.’
‘No, sir, with respect. There are actually three regiments out there. All of Eight Brigade as well as the infantry. But they’ve taken some hits, sir.’
‘Bad?’
‘Pretty bad. The Staffs Yeomanry have been pretty badly cut up. Thirteen out of fifteen Crusaders and fourteen of the twenty-eight heavy tanks.’
Montgomery bristled: ‘Why wasn’t I told this?’
No one spoke.
‘Tell me the worst. The very worst.’
Freyberg led him over to a table in the centre of the tent on which was spread a map of the area marked with the deployment of all units and the enemy. Freyberg pointed to their position: ‘He’s pulled them all back, sir. General Gatehouse. Pulled them all back.’
‘What?’
‘The bare fact is, sir, there are no armoured division troops, no tanks, no anti-tank guns, nothing in fact beyond Miteiriya Ridge.’
De Guingand interjected: ‘Nothing except the tanks of the Warwicks Yeomanry, sir.’
One of Freyberg’s staff, a Major Stewart spoke up: ‘What we mean, General, is that there’s just no armour to our south at all.’
Montgomery half-closed his eyes: ‘You’re telling me that the operation that I had so carefully planned in the utmost detail, the “crumbling” plan that your New Zealand troops are currently undertaking, you’re telling me now that it’s utterly unprotected?’
Freyberg spoke: ‘Yes. In effect, sir, I am.’
Montgomery stood and stared at nothingness. It was unthinkable. That early morning conference with the generals had clearly had no effect at all. Montgomery realized that he had gone too far with it. Perhaps he had frightened both Lumsden and Gatehouse, the former into taciturn silence, the latter into outright deception. Well, at least to a shortening of the truth. The word crisis hardly seemed bad enough. This was tantamount to almost losing the battle. It was beyond reasoning. The New Zealand infantry had been left utterly exposed. At any moment Rommel’s panzer divisions, even the Italian Littorio could come pouring over the ridge and there would be nothing anyone with the New Zealanders would be able to do about it. They would be annihilated and the Germans would break through in a flanking counter-attack.
‘Freddie, get General Leese and General Lumsden here now.’
His fury boiling over, Montgomery walked to a quiet corner of the tent and waited. Within a few minutes Leese and Lumsden arrived. Montgomery walked over to them: ‘Thank you for coming, gentlemen. We have a problem. The question is, what are we going to do about it?’
Lumsden spoke: ‘Sir. The problem is that Miteiriya Ridge has a greater number and depth of mines than we had previously supposed. We are taking time to move them, sir. Time we had not allowed for and under constant shellfire.’
Freyberg interrupted: ‘Sir. If I might speak. It is simply unbelievable. General Gatehouse is holding back while my lads are being blown to piec
es.’
De Guingand smiled at him and waved him down politely, but Freyberg was having none of it. ‘Sir, please. We must have armoured support. It is impossible to proceed with the plan as directed, the “crumbling” manoeuvres with my infantry. Certainly not for the rest of the day. I’m afraid to say, sir, that I simply cannot believe that General Gatehouse’s division will break out through Miteiriya Ridge. I would strongly advise, sir, that we hold off the operation until this evening. Then perhaps we can attack properly and get General Gatehouse’s tanks through.’
Lumsden nodded: ‘I agree. That seems an excellent idea. Sir?’
Montgomery waited for a few moments and then slowly shook his head. ‘No.’
The three generals stared at him. ‘Sir?’
You heard me, did you not, gentlemen? I said no and I mean no.’ He paused: ‘General Freyberg is right. His New Zealand infantry are some of the finest we have. They are not to be squandered. They put up a fine fight in the first day and took heavy casualties. We must do all we can to preserve them, gentlemen. We cannot use them in this way now and thus run the risk of losing them.’
He thought fast, his gut reaction taking over from the much vaunted scientific approach. They must shift the focus of the battle, that was the only answer. Gatehouse was weak, both as a man and in his materiel. His armour had been compromised. What to do now? The answer was clear; he must ignore the weaknesses and think positively, exploit his own strong points. The armoured brigades seemed to have no stomach for the fight. This was turning into an infantry battle. Montgomery knew that his commanders, old desert hands, would protest. Their vision was of wave upon wave of tanks sweeping across the sand. But that was not the way it was to be. This battle would be fought now through close cooperation between all arms.
He knew too that what he must do now was keep his opposite number guessing what he would next attempt. General von Thoma was in charge now. Stumme had been killed apparently, according to intelligence. Rommel it seemed was still on sick leave in Germany. Montgomery prayed that he would stay there. There was no point in going in again along the ridge. That would simply eat up more of the tanks to no effect. No, the answer must lie in moving the attack to a different sector. He looked at Freyberg and smiled gently.
‘Bernard. I advise that your men should not attack tonight, brave as it would be. You have performed beyond all that we asked. Perhaps you should rest for a while.’
Freyberg made to protest: ‘Sir, we could put in an attack with artillery support and take a position here.’ He pointed to a place on the map some 4000 metres beyond the ridge. ‘Then General Gatehouse’s tanks could occupy that position.’
Montgomery shook his head: ‘No, Bernard. That would also take too many lives. We cannot afford to lose the infantry. I need them for the days ahead.’
Freyberg opened his mouth. De Guingand looked at him with a telling gaze and he closed it. Montgomery went on: ‘Freddie, have General Gatehouse’s brigades, all of Tenth Amoured, withdraw from the battle. Place them in the reserve.’
The assembled group looked at him waiting for the next bombshell.
After a while he spoke: ‘Freddie, gentlemen, what we’re going to do is this. We’re going to throw everything we have over on to the right flank.’
De Guingand looked at him. ‘Sir?’ Lumsden gave a sharp intake of breath. The others looked down at the map.
‘Everything. We turn everything 180 degrees. We change the entire direction of the attack. And in so doing we catch the enemy unawares, gentlemen; XXX Corps will stop as of now. Is that clear, Freddie? Oliver? Effective immediately. They will hold Miteiriya Ridge and will not operate southwest beyond it as they have been doing. We will push out the First Armoured shield and begin the crumbling again. But this time we aim into the north but towards the sea. First Armoured will fight its way to the west with the object of threatening the enemy’s supply routes in the area of the Rahman Track. That is also vital, Freddie. Threaten the enemy’s flank. They should establish themselves here.’
He pointed again to the map. ‘Kidney Ridge.
As the generals pored over the map, Montgomery stood back from the group. He knew what he had just done was momentous. He had made the decision on which the outcome of the battle would rest and indeed quite possibly given its significance, that of the entire war. It was the turning point. He walked over to the map and pointed to a spot by the coast just to the north of Tel el Eisa. He looked at de Guingand: ‘The Australians, Freddie. I know they’re spoiling for a fight and we damned well need them now. Ask General Morshead to meet me at my HQ. The Australians, gentlemen. It all lies with them now.’
EIGHTEEN 5.00 p.m. East of Trig Twenty-nine Sergeant Bill Kibby
Bill Kibby shovelled another spoonful of cold corned beef into his mouth and when he’d almost finished chewing it turned to the man at his side who was writing something in a notebook. He swallowed the mouthful and spoke: ‘Herb, mate. See if you can call the men together. I reckon it’s about time I told the lads what’s going on.’
Herb Ashby, Kibby’s platoon sergeant, looked up from his diary and nodded. Kibby, normally so outspoken, had been unusually quiet since he had returned from the CO’s briefing of platoon commanders at midday and Ashby knew something was up.
‘Will do, Bill. Do I get any clues?’
‘Well it sounds like a big one, mate. We’ve got our work cut out right enough. I’ll clue you in with the others.’
Ashby closed the little notebook and tucked it into his breast pocket and as he ran off to summon the men of their platoon, Kibby contemplated his current position. He was sitting in a captured German trench some five miles from their previous day’s start line. And he was about to brief his platoon. Christ, he thought; ‘His’ platoon.
Since yesterday he had been platoon leader and it still shocked him how quickly his promotion had come and why. He had originally been platoon sergeant to Diver Derrick’s Eight Platoon but with a massive shake-up after the last big fight at Alam Halfa and that business in August a new lieutenant, Peter Crompton, had been given command of D Company. He’d moved Bill across to Seventeen Platoon. That had been promotion enough, he’d thought. But fate had more in store.
Bill had led Seventeen into the fight yesterday night, had taken them forward through the wire and the mines and into the German positions. Had watched them fall and then as they’d reached their first objective had seen his officer, Lieutenant Lewin, Tubby as the men called him, fall to the ground – hit in the knee.
He knew from that moment that command had fallen to him. As the bullets had flown around them, Kibby had found Ashby and told him that he was taking over and he was his new sergeant. It stood to reason. Ashby had served with distinction at Alam Halfa and Bill knew he would be a fine leader.
His chance to prove it had come just a few minutes later. Together they had led a charge into the secondary German positions. It had been madness he knew but then again there was no other way. They’d fixed that Jerry strongpoint for sure. Got a few of the blighters and the rest had given up.
Kibby liked to lead from the front, to set the pace. Not just for his own platoon but for its neighbours. Now though he guessed that he and the rest of the company of which his platoon was part were in trouble. They had just advanced too far too fast. D Company were on the north, C and A west and northwest respectively. They had expected an enemy counter-attack at first light on the twenty-fourth. A strong one. The engineers had set a double row of Hawkins mines around their new position. Daft bits of kit he thought, nothing more than tin cans full of explosive placed on the ground. But the sappers assured him that they would do the job. Against what, he wondered? Jerry panzers? He didn’t bloody think so.
And sure enough at daybreak there came a terrible squealing and clanking from beyond the sand dunes to their front. The tanks were out there, a hundred yards to their front. Unseen, lurking. Kibby had waited for the first shells to come ploughing in taking men with them. Instead thou
gh, planes had come over, British planes. This, he thought, was what Monty meant by working together. They had cheered as the Brylcreem Boys had taken out the panzers.
But now there was a new nightmare. Ashby was back in the trench now, their men following close behind him, thirty of them in all. Kibby called them closer around him so that while he stood in the trench they were crouching around the perimeter.
‘All right, fellas. I’m not going to pull any punches. Some clever brass hat at GHQ’s dreamed up a real blinder of a plan. Guess what we’ve got to do?’
Someone, was it Marsh, said: ‘Go and capture Rommel, Sarge?’
Kibby smiled: ‘Not quite, son. But damn close. No. You see, seems there’s a hill up there.’ He pointed towards the south. ‘Trig Twenty-nine they call it. Well, according to Battalion there’s a forward observation post of ours up there that’s been spotting for the guns and not been doing a half-bad job of it. It’s a high point. You can see everything. The railway line and the whole of XXX Corps too. So the Jerries are a bit narked and want it for themselves.’
There were sniggers from the ranks, cries of, ‘Selfish buggers.’
‘It’s about a mile forward from us. And for the last few hours the Jerries have been plastering it with shellfire. Well, seems it’s getting a bit hairy for the lads up there and they’ve asked for some proper soldiers to come and sort the Jerries out. And that’s where we come in. They want us to secure the hill and the spur around it.’
Another voice piped up. Morrison, a sheepshearer from Canberra: ‘What, just us, Sarge?’
‘No, you drongo, Morrison. The whole of Twenty-six Brigade. Morshead’s whole crew. Us and the rest of the 2/48th and the 2/24th an’ all.’