Summer Times is the Journal of the Old Scarborians Association

weight was considerable. The sun was shin‐
ing brightly, the sea was blue and looked
about two feet deep, so I jumped in ‐‐ and
found the water well over my head; the depth
must have been at least fifteen feet.
Somehow, I managed to throw off all my
equipment, and I half swam, half splashed till
my feet touched the ground, still holding my
rifle and pistol, both now useless, as they
were waterlogged. I shouted to the crew of
the LCT that they must find another place to
land, but it had gone aground.
I thought I had carried out the invasion sin‐
gle‐handed until four members of the Para‐
chute Brigade sauntered down to the beach –
they had been there since dusk the previous
night – and invited me for breakfast of bacon
and egg! It was an hour before my colleagues
landed half a mile away, after an LCT had
come to the rescue of ours and got it afloat
again.
As we moved inland, the Italians we met
must have been the worst troops ever. There
they were in well‐sited pill‐boxes from which
they maintained sporadic fire, but when they
saw us approach, they just stopped firing, a
white flag was hoisted and out they came,
smiles all over their faces.
My platoon took 56 prisoners in less than half
an hour without any casualties on either side.
The Germans, as we soon found, were of dif‐
ferent mettle. About two miles on, we came
under heavy fire from a wood. How the Ger‐
mans had managed to stay in it I do not know
for, after heavy shelling from our warships,
the inside of nearly every tree was burning
red hot. There was the digging in and a two‐
hour pause before the artillery, having
landed, were able to mount, direct and fire
their guns in concert with the fleet’s.
This was to be our first battle, and everyone
was tense. Almost hysterically at the given
signal we ran towards the enemy, being cov‐
ered by Bren gun fire on our flanks. To our
surprise, not a shot was fired in return. We
42
were in the wood, through it and half a mile
on, and no Germans, just a few remnants of
their occupation – spent cartridges, a con‐
tainer of stew and a forage cap! They had
retreated to more suitable defensive ground –
and this was to be the pattern, as we made
our way forward. When, after a week, we
reached the Catania plain, we knew from the
strength of the fire that here they were to
make their big stand.
The vast plain between the undulating hills to
the north and south must have been nearly
ten miles wide. We dug in on the crest of the
hill. It was time to send out night patrols to
ascertain the enemy’s strong positions. Any
movement on the hill occasioned an immedi‐
ate shelling. It did not take long and not
many casualties to discover that the Germans
had deep entrenchments and their small arms
fire was on fixed lines, able to rake with cross
fire almost every yard of ground.
Our Brigade colleagues, the York and Lanca‐
shire Regiment and the King’s Own Yorkshire
Light Infantry, had put in two attacks, sup‐
ported by a most amazing bombardment from
the fleet and every available piece of our artil‐
lery, but had been forced to retire. It was to
be our turn next, we knew.
Overnight, a squadron of heavy tanks had
established themselves on the hill, spaced out
and camouflaged to look like haystacks. They
could not have looked more conspicuous if
they had hoisted flags. The German artillery
put down a tremendous bombardment and,
within two minutes, three tanks were ablaze
and the others scuttled in alarm over the hill,
still carrying their hay! Naturally, we who
were in slit trenches over a hundred yards
behind their front tanks were very angry, for
we got a share of the shells meant for the
tanks.
That night, we were to put in our attack. As
soon as it was dusk, we moved forward a
couple of miles and lay for cover in a ditch
about a quarter of a mile behind the starting