Alamein: The turning point of World War Two. Iain Gale
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not yet found the revolver and her face faded from his mind.
He stopped searching and was aware that the advance had halted, for the moment and in this sector at least. Groups of Highland infantry were assembling around him, eager to attach themselves to an officer. He looked about and saw familiar faces and strangers from other companies. It seemed to him that he must be the only officer among perhaps eighty men. He was still looking at them when there was a shout.
‘Sir!’
It was followed almost instantly by the crack of a rifle. Samwell turned to follow the direction of the bullet and found himself looking back into the slit trench at the body of an Italian. The man he had wounded had dragged himself to the parapet and judging from his position and the rifle in his hands had been about to shoot him when one of the men had spotted him and taken him out with the single round that had made a neat hole in his forehead and the messy exit wound that was all that was left of what had been the back of his skull.
Banishing the thought Samwell saw that the men were looking at him expectantly and pulled himself back to his remembered orders: ‘Consolidate the position for fifteen minutes then move on.’
That was the company order, but where he wondered was Company HQ or for that matter his company commander? They had agreed that he should bring up Company HQ with the reserve platoon with Samwell as second-in-command up front with the others.
‘Follow me.’ Instinctively, the men trailing behind, he turned and began to retrace his steps in search of the HQ.
Suddenly the night air was rent by a series of explosions. He counted four shells and stood still, then looked down and knew that he hadn’t been hurt. He was covered in sand. He brushed himself down and walked on. A shape appeared on the ground and for an instant he raised McCaig’s rifle which he had picked up again after his fruitless search for the revolver. But then he recognized the man, Colin Mackay, the highly-strung Company CO, who was sitting on the ground with the wireless receiver pressed to his left ear.
‘Hello. Battalion HQ. Can you read me? Say again. Come in Battalion. Copy that.’
Samwell spoke: ‘Sir. We’ve achieved the objective, taken several trenches and a good number of prisoners. Perhaps a couple of dozen. Mostly Eyeties. But we’ve taken casualties, sir.’
Mackay ignored him: ‘Hello. Battalion. Come in. Respond damn you. For Christ’s sake, will you come in. Respond, Battalion. Say again.’
Samwell tried again: ‘Sir. We’ve made the objective. We have prisoners, sir.’
At that moment Samwell was surprised to see the Battalion Commanding Officer Colonel Anderson walking towards them: ‘Hugh. Good to see you. You’ve done well. Ah, Colin.’
Instantly the major looked up and like some dog whose master, having ignored it, deigns to cast a glance, leapt up from the sand and moved towards the CO.
‘Sir. I was trying to get through to you. Thank God you’re here.’ At last Mackay saw Samwell: ‘Ah, Hugh. Good you’re here.’ He turned back to the colonel: ‘We’re doing well, sir. First objective taken and a number of prisoners. Anything to report, Hugh?’
‘Just that, sir.’ Samwell turned to the colonel: ‘Sir, give me the reserve platoon and I’m sure that I can make more ground. I’ll detail the right forward platoon to drop into reserve.’
Anderson thought for a moment: ‘Very well, Hugh. Take them and see what you can do.’ In the moonlit confusion Samwell managed to locate the reserve platoon and called them forward then together they advanced.
They were directly behind the forward platoons now, the men who had taken the brunt of the initial fighting and as Samwell looked on he saw stretcher parties weaving their hazardous way back through the advancing infantry and the wire. He wondered for an instant how he had got there and was aware as he had not been before of his legs working independently. Then he heard a noise. The other company’s piper had started to play again and he wondered what had happened to their own, Jock Macpherson.
He turned to the left and found his new runner, a boy from Greenock named White. ‘Get back to HQ and see what on earth’s happened to our piper, will you?’
The runner sped off without question, happy to be heading back. Again he was conscious of walking forward but as he went, there was a sudden whine and a terrific explosion to his right as a shell came in. Men began to shriek and he called out instinctively: ‘Stretcher-bearer!’ Another deafening sickly crump and more shells began to fall. Two more of the boys were down, White one of them, his skull bisected by a gigantic piece of shrapnel. The platoon continued to walk forward and as they did so Samwell became aware of a strange sensation. The shells which were falling around them were coming not only from the front, but also from the rear. They were advancing steadily into their own barrage. A shell landed too close for comfort, not thirty yards in front of him. At that moment the commander of the furthest left platoon of the company deployed on his right came up, a lanky lieutenant named Mitchell who two years before had been full back for Fettes’ first XV.
‘Samwell. Don’t you think we’re going too fast? Those are our shells aren’t they?’
‘You’re right. We should stop.’
‘Yes. I’ll go and warn Major Murray.’
The boy ran off back to the right and Samwell watched as he spoke to the major who shook his head, evidently disapproving of their suggestion. They continued to advance and now their own shells were falling closer still. Samwell walked across to the company commander and looked at him in despair. Samwell spoke above the noise of battle: ‘Sir, we really should stop or at least slow down. Those are our shells.’
As he spoke more shells whizzed over their heads and landed not more than ten yards ahead of them. All three men cowered to protect themselves from the blast but it caught them nevertheless. They straightened up and the major nodded: ‘Yes, Lieutenant. I think we should stop.’
Samwell hurried back to the left to his own platoon and found Sergeant Dawson. ‘We’ll halt here. Those are our shells. Pull the men back a few yards and get out of danger.’
The man nodded: ‘Sir.’
‘And Sar’nt, get word back to Major Mackay will you? Ask him to come up closer. Within the fifty yards.’
Samwell wondered where Company HQ had gone to. It seemed to have lost itself beyond the statutory fifty-yard gap between forward platoons.
Within minutes Dawson reappeared. ‘Sir, can’t find Major Mackay, sir, or the HQ. Reserve platoon’s gone AWOL too, sir.’
Samwell cursed to himself. Had he taken a wrong turning in this damned desert? His mind was addled and he looked across to the right to C Company only to see that they had begun to advance again and were now some fifty yards ahead. He realized that their own barrage had lifted. The men were disappearing into the night and he wondered why Mackay and the young lieutenant had not troubled to warn him that they were about to restart the advance. Now he and his depleted platoon were left alone out in the ‘blue’, as the old desert hands called it. Just him and forty men in the middle of nowhere. He turned to Dawson: ‘Stay here. I’m going to see what’s happening on the left.’
His company had been placed on the farthest left of the Argyll’s line of advance and darting between the wire and the bodies, Samwell ran low across to the left where another regiment, Seventh Black Watch, was advancing. But of them there was no sign. Not a man, save the dead and a party of stretcher-bearers. Christ almighty, he thought, we’re completely isolated. He ran back to the sergeant: ‘We’re on our own. The forty-second have buggered off somewhere and C Company’s gone ahead.’
‘Right, sir. What are your orders?’
For a moment or two he was unable to speak. An unexpected and novel wave of terror swept through him, nauseating and paralysing. He was alone. The company commander and HQ had gone along with the wireless and the ‘pilot’ officer. Slowly he began