by Roland Perry
One by one the Rebels came out of the tent and all made similar favourable noises when they saw the trees. Some followed Horrie’s lead as they relieved themselves on a replica of a piece of home. Soon after dawn, scores of young Greek children wandered into the camp, but their attitude was at odds with that of the young Arabs. The Greeks looked upon the foreigners as heroes who had come to fight off the Germans and Italians. And Horrie, the barometer of all such invasions of the camps, only barked at them with approval as he weaved his way around them, played fetch-the-ball, and cheerfully greeted the smiling, inquisitive youngsters. This distinction continued to mystify the Rebels, who had disdained the Arabs’ thieving, but still tolerated their cheeky commentary and bartering. The Rebels gave the Greek kids biscuits and bully beef, which were gratefully accepted. A tin was opened for Horrie but his gourmand’s tastes, which had been honed by the cooks at Ikingi and on board ship, saw him screw up his nose and back away as if it was an insult to be offered the thick, chunky, dark brown coagulation. Horrie rushed off to find a cook but seemed miffed when he couldn’t detect a tent harbouring one. Like the men, he would have to get used to the meagre fare that had sustained Anzac armies now in two world wars.
The men could see mighty Athens to the south. It had taken a bit of the overnight battering. But from their hill top at Daphni, it appeared to be its dignified, ancient and historic self, dominated by the ruins of the Acropolis, which had fallen victim to time rather than the Luftwaffe.
Mid-morning the camp was broken up and the battalion climbed into trucks for a winding drive to Athens. Moody took out his camera to capture as much as he could. He wished he was able to spend some time wandering this 3400-year-old city, one of the oldest in the world. He wrote in his diary that he intended to return, explore and learn as much about the place that held the home of Plato’s Academy and Aristotle’s Lyceum. Moody had studied the so-called cradle of Western civilisation and the birthplace of democracy. A poignant comment, perhaps reflecting his own fears, was a note that all this could be under threat very soon. The Germans, if they succeeded, would promise their own version of civilisation based on a military state, not democracy.
The threat from the invaders in the north was now palpable as the German 2nd Panzer Division captured the vital sea port of Thessaloniki, which had caused the Greek forces manning the forts on the Metaxas Line to surrender. The people of Athens turned out with emotion for the convoy, aware of the importance of help from foreign troops. Garlands and flowers were tossed their way from balconies; men and women in the street offered food. The cheering was inspiring as the Gunners responded, touched by the turnout and attitude. The battalion’s departure from Sydney Harbour early in May 1940 had been spectacular when yachts, motorcraft and ferries had given them a wonderful send-off. But this Athens farewell was bigger, louder and more heartfelt. Australia had not then been in immediate danger. Greece was.
Horrie loved being the centre of attention. His barking and whirling tail from atop the Rebels’ truck was all pleasure and he too seemed lifted. He kept jumping to face the well-wishers high above him and below in the street. Whistles had him almost spinning in delight as he tried to focus on the source. After his sea experience, keeping his feet on the top of the lumbering, bumping truck was easy. Horrie could not care why this moveable party was proceeding. He just responded to the smiles, clapping, pointing and yelling. His brain had long since sorted ridicule from love and liking and fun. And this experience was pure joy. Horrie looked to the Rebels, who applauded back to the Greeks and pointed out someone or something in the crowd. The trauma of the night was forgotten by the men and they were consumed by other emotions that were entangled with appreciation and motivation.
Murchison was not far behind Horrie in his enthusiasm, particularly for the myriad dark-haired, brown-eyed Greek women and girls. Most looked fetching in white blouses, and colourful blue and red vests, along with traditional neck-to-feet white dresses. Murchison was quick to respond to their open and closed hand greeting, which was wishing them luck and safe return from their mission. He blew kisses and pointed to taverns and cafes, indicating he would be back to see them all.
A chant went up from the crowd.
‘What are they calling?’ Murchison asked.
‘I think it’s “Benghazi,”’ Moody replied.
‘Don’t they know the Germans have taken it back?’
None of the Rebels could explain the chant as it continued.
‘They must know the 6th took it,’ Gill said. ‘Maybe they don’t care that it has been recaptured. Perhaps our boys’ reputation since then has been good . . . ?’ The chant became louder. ‘I dunno.’
‘I reckon they just want us to be conquering heroes,’ Fitzsimmons suggested. ‘We represent hope that they will not be taken over by the Nazis.’
The convoy wound out of the city and headed north. Only a few high-level former footballers amidst the Gunners had been in front of such adoring, huge crowds. But for the rest, this was a first. Moody could only recall when he was cox for his house’s winning crew at school. That was in front of a modest 300 people. This was a crowd a thousand times bigger. It took the Gunners an hour or two in the crawling trucks to settle their thoughts and to consider what lay ahead. They weaved their way inland and north: always north to the war. The Rebels were taken by the neat villages through which they passed. Moody took snaps of the churches in each little town with their tall steeples, and the white- or rustic-coloured villas. Each place had people gathering around the village square and their ubiquitous white crosses, where the convoy was cheered each time. Cries of everything from ‘Go in peace!’ to ‘Victory will be yours!’ and ‘God speed!’ greeted them.
As they climbed through the country, they noticed that some women cried as they waved to them, which was a sobering sight for the battalion. Skullcapped, bearded men in long sheepskin coats and black trousers offered them bottles of homemade grappa and wine, which were accepted by the soldiers, as were some sharp knives of varying sizes. Horrie became the focus for all the locals, even more than he had been in Athens, as he pirouetted on the roof in response to the waving, blown kisses, laughing and cheering. Only once did he blot his copybook when, passing through a town 100 kilometres north-west of Athens, he barked so hard at something in the heavens that he fell on his back and rolled off the truck. His fall was broken by a black-frocked burly priest and another man, who passed the embarrassed and shaken dog back up to the Rebels. After much fussing about his wellbeing, Horrie continued his jumping about and barking, but with a fraction more caution than before. Just outside a village, Moody and Gill looked up to the source of the dog’s continued excitement and spotted two planes of unknown origin and at a high enough altitude not to cause alarm. Their low rumble was heard as they flew in a wide circle as if noting the extent of the convoy. Then they disappeared.
‘Luftwaffe,’ Brooker said. ‘Reconnaissance. We’ll cop it sooner or later.’
8
THE PRACTICE RIDE
The battalion was close to the battle zone on the night of 10 April when they camped north of Larissa in green fields intermingled with red poppies in an idyllic setting similar to Daphni outside Athens. But there was no avoiding what the Rebels were about to face. They could hear the thunderous booms of the big guns and bombs; they could smell the cordite in intermittent wafts over the region; they could hear and see planes, still well overhead and not yet concerned with the Australian Machine Gunners. Early the next morning it was pouring rain and cold.
Brooker took Moody and Gill aside and told them: ‘You two will go by bike today. Gillie, you are going south to pass a message to oncoming troops. Moods, you are to get a word to brigade’s front HQ through the Thermopylae Pass.’
Both men felt tingles up their spine. They would be travelling alone and more than vulnerable if the Germans decided to attack from the air.
‘Why have the Luftwaffe not come after us, do you think?’ Gill asked.
&nb
sp; ‘It’s been pissing down. The clouds and storms may have made it difficult to achieve missions much beyond the front. Whatever it is, we are spared bombs for the moment. And it is very good luck for you two. When the weather clears they will come after our convoy first, and second, for fun they will come after you riding solo. They will come low and machine-gun you, maybe drop eggs too.’
Horrie sat watching Brooker as he spoke.
‘What will you do with H?’ he asked. ‘Orders may see the lot of you split up very soon.’
‘He must go with us,’ Gill said. ‘He is as important as any soldier.’
Moody reflected for a moment. He had to take responsibility. The Rebels as a group were most protective of Horrie. Each and every soldier enjoyed looking after him. Sometimes they even drew straws for the honour. But this was crunch time in his care. Moody was his master and while Horrie showed stump-wagging attention to all the men, he would go into a loving tail-spin when Moody returned from somewhere after they had been apart for even an hour. ‘He’ll come with me,’ he said.
‘On the bike?!’ Brooker asked.
‘Why not? If he can sit in a kitbag in the desert, he can lodge under my greatcoat.’
‘Dangerous! I’m not sure I should let you take him.’
‘Just as dangerous to leave him here.’
‘Moods is right, Poppa,’ Gill said. ‘If he is going to be any use in the battle zone, he has to become familiar with everything.’
Brooker looked dubious.
‘You saw him at Piraeus,’ Moody added. ‘He wet himself for about 15 minutes and then he was ready to take on the Luftwaffe—once he was used to the bombs and strafing.’
‘All right,’ Brooker said, ‘you take him. But remember, don’t take any silly risks to preserve the little digger. Look after number one first.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Moody reassured him, ‘it’s my arse on the line. He’ll just be there for the ride.’
*
Brooker furnished Moody with a map, which didn’t give him much of an idea of the terrain he would be going through. Thermopylae Pass was on the east coast of central Greece, about 136 kilometres north-west of Athens. Some 2000 years ago the pass had once graced the coast but silting had widened the cliffs so that they were now 1.5 kilometres inland.
‘Its name means “Hot Gates,” ’ Brooker told him, ‘because it had and still has hot sulphur springs.’
‘Got a new meaning now,’ Moody said.
Ron Ford, who had driven a truck to the 6.5 kilometre pass and back, informed him that it was ‘pretty narrow.’
Moody’s guidebook, which he was referring to now much more than in the Western Desert, informed him that the pass had been the conduit for many invasions dating back to the second Persian hostile entry in August 480 BC. At that time, a small Greek force under the Spartan King Leonides defended Attica and Boeotia against the southward march of Xerxes’ Persian army. Moody thought it a bad omen that the invaders had won that battle of Thermopylae and conquered central Greece. But he took solace from the fact that the Persians suffered huge losses in the conflict and that it had become synonymous through history with heroic resistance against the odds.
Moody put on his greatcoat, tying it at the waist with a thick belt, and took two practices to train Horrie to sit inside it. Horrie was content as long as he was close to his master, and his little cranium could poke out between a couple of buttons like a joey in a kangaroo pouch. Moody shook hands with all the other Rebels for, although nothing was said, farewells took on a greater poignancy now. They could not be sure if they would see each other again. Moody donned his goggles and black leather cap, strapped on his pack, revved his bike and was off, heading east on his mission. It was soon a sobering experience as he manoeuvred, skidded and shunted his way through the huge and growing throng of retreating Greek soldiers along with thousands of refugees fleeing the battle zone. Only Horrie’s little face and his yap, yap greeting brought wan smiles on the road and in villages as Moody ploughed on through mud and slush. The rain continued to bucket down, adding minor flooding to the many travails of the fleeing masses. Yet every time Moody grumbled to himself about the conditions, he thought again of the blessing that the weather somehow had thwarted hammerings by the Luftwaffe, which had been seen in its full, relentless devilment at Piraeus when the skies were clear in the evening and into the night. The enemy efforts had destroyed it as a port. Moody rode in a climbing spiral until he reached the mountain top. He stood his bike. Horrie eased free and dashed around, lifting his leg here and there as Moody took in the magnificent vista of green fields dotted with farms, which stretched for miles below. In the distance to the north-east was the dominant Mount Olympus with its cap and necklaces of uneven white cloud. No wonder, Moody noted, that the ancient Greeks had believed that the gods lived there.
It was colder at this height and Moody noticed Horrie was shivering as he snuggled down in the greatcoat. On returning that night, Moody and Gill fashioned a bodystocking out of socks and slipped Horrie into it. At first, he tried to shake it off with a dance that amused them but he soon began to appreciate the warmth trapped around his little trunk. The two men thought of making booties for his four stumpy legs but as neither could knit, the idea was abandoned. So was a plan for a bonnet with a colour patch. Horrie just wouldn’t wear it.
After that first ‘mission’—really a practice run—of 12 April, the Rebels and the rest of the battalion were warned that the Luftwaffe would be at them within days. The weather forecast was good, which meant enemy planes could extricate themselves from runway mud and take off. Nothing could stop a German battering from the air with the Stukas, which were combined dive bomber and ground-attack aircraft. They were two-man planes with a pilot and rear gunner, which had first impacted on populations on the ground during the Spanish Civil War five years earlier. All the Machine Gun Battalion knew what to look for. The Stuka had inverted gull wings, fixed spanned undercarriage and its infamous ‘Jericho trumpet’ or wailing siren. It was the sound as much as anything that frightened its targets, but it was this that could alert any living thing with super-sensitive ears, such as Horrie. He picked up the ear-splitting sound anything up to 120 seconds before humans could see them, let alone hear them. The Stuka had some innovative designs, including pull-up dive brakes that ensured the aircraft recovered from its attack even if the pilot blacked out from the high acceleration. It was sturdy, accurate and very effective against ground targets such as long convoys the battalion would form, or even smaller ones such as motorcyclists.
There would be no British planes to take them on or do retaliatory bombing on German bases. The Germans had come to Greece determined to conquer the country mainly with the Stuka. This efficient dive bomber was taking the place of artillery. The Germans had stolen a march early on the Allies in World War I by putting all their betting chips on artillery. In this war they were ahead of the game again by relying on the Stukas, and the British and Anzacs had come unprepared for them. The Allies’ advance air bases were small in number. Those in place had been blitzed and knocked out of action almost overnight. German Messerschmitt fighter aircraft hedge-hopped over the mountains, hitting one airfield after another and wiping out entire squadrons of British planes. Destructive waves of these German craft, and the Henkel, the first single-seater, turbojet fighter, never stopped. British crews often had no chance to jump in their Hurricane bombers, let alone load them. The Messerschmitt pilots were cunning and well organised tactically. They would fly high drawing ack-ack fire and then slice down beneath it to machine-gun the grounded and helpless British planes.
Many thought this overall masterstroke by the Germans would end the war before it got going. But in full British bulldog spirit, Britain’s Prime Minister Churchill and his planners went through with the Greek campaign. Allied propaganda suggested that the Stukas were cumbersome and had to be escorted by fighter planes. This gave every gunner a sense they could fight back. The Australians were almost al
l gamblers and they liked the chance that they could ‘win’ at least a few encounters from the ground. The Stuka did have some vulnerabilities that had been passed on to all the 2/1 Battalion’s gunners, and which had been exposed first in the Battle of Britain over British skies in the previous year, 1940. It had poor manoeuvrability; it was slow and lacked good defensive armament. The gunners were told that if they fixed their sights on one coming in, and if they could hold their nerve as it roared and whined at them, they had a chance of more than the odd ‘kill.’ Yet it was never easy for defenders on the ground. The ugly truth was that without a fight in the air and protection from British aircraft, the gunners on the ground were in for a torrid time.
Reports of breaking Greek resistance in the north-east were coming in. The battalion knew they would soon be attempting to counter the enemy in the air and on the ground, with German tanks leading the way in their prolonged ‘blitzkrieg’ operations. Brooker was giving orders with a new edge. There were fewer jokes and more repeated instructions as he split up the team for different operations. Featherstone, because of his stripe, would be first sent away to the front with the Gunners’ A Company. He would be in charge of a section of attached signallers. Murchison volunteered to be a spotter on the adjutant’s car, which meant he would ride on a sideboard and scan the skies with binoculars for the Stukas. He thought this might be an easier way to go, for the adjutant would be given privileges, as meagre as they were in the war zone.
The Rebels sat outside their tent smoking and cleaning their equipment as D Company marched off towards the conflict on the Albanian border. Minutes later, A, B and C Companies moved out to find two Australian and New Zealand brigades—a true Anzac force—who were having trouble holding positions just 25 kilometres north at Servia Pass. The Rebels called out words of encouragement but apart from that, said little to each other. There was tension in the group. Even Horrie was less exuberant as he picked up on the serious mood at the tent. He wandered among the group, looking for a pat, a smile or a word, and he received gentle focus, just enough to reinforce he was still wanted. His main attention was on Moody. Would he be sent somewhere and would Horrie go with him again? The thunder of oncoming and defending guns was closer now. Horrie pricked up his ears but was not alarmed enough to respond—not yet.