Quotes from letters and Cliff’s new diary, with additions from the 1990s.
Monday, 27 July 1942. I’m with 25 Battalion, with Jimmy Grant as my offsider. Our set is installed in a Bren Carrier. Jimmy is most unhappy. His wife is almost due to have a baby and he suffers from claustrophobia. As we’re going to have to spend a lot of time in our trench he is going to suffer. Last night, following an artillery barrage meant to mislead the enemy into expecting an attack from this quarter, the tanks attacked on another sector. The battle and the noise were to terrific. A big exchange of small arms forward of us made us think Jerry was going to attack.
10 am now and a big exchange of artillery fire to our right. Our artillery is busy also. At 8:30 pm Jerry began his usual hymn of hate but nothing landed close to us. Worked from 8 pm until 2 am, when Jimmy took over. BBC news said last night’s affair was confined to patrol activity. A bloody big patrol.
28 July 1942. Hot, and there are thousands of flies. Shellfire and air raids but nothing to concern us. Germans claim to have destroyed 60 fighting vehicles yesterday and captured a thousand prisoners. Slept in the Carrier and had two hourly test calls.
Wednesday 29 July 1942. Weather dull and cloudy. Jimmy left for the main Dressing Station. I don’t know what ails him. Ray Miles is to replace him. Consistent shelling on both sides this morning. Enemy planes are giving us a spell — previously up to six raids daily.
Ray Miles arrived, a reinforcement from Signal School. We spent the morning digging in our radio and ourselves, and John our driver dug in the Bren Carrier with our help later
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Cliff and Ray’s trench was shaped like an upside down U, 20 inches (0.5m) wide and about 4’6″ (1.4m) deep. The transmitter and wet battery were in the centre of the U, raised a few inches above the bottom of the trench, with Cliff on the left side and Ray on the other. They were very exposed, like 25 Bn generally, with the enemy ahead and to their left. John, their driver, had a slit trench of his own. They were apparently there for a long stay.
Cliff wrote later:
We were linked up to Battalion Headquarters by telephone and had a remote control unit established, so that Headquarters could use the transmitter from the safety of their dugout. The lines were buried. No one liked to be close to a transmitter in those days. It was said that the enemy could locate them using direction finding equipment. Our usual upright aerial was considered too conspicuous so we were using a ground aerial laid on a heading towards Brigade Headquarters.
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A Bren Carrier has run over one of our batteries and squashed it. Thank God we don’t have to charge them. They’re charged at Headquarters and delivered to us. I’m sorry for the man who does it. His engine and charging unit run 24 hours a day.
We have a nightly rum issue and occasionally we get two tins of beer. Water ration is one bottle per man per day.
Friday 31 July 1942. About 7:30 pm and we are experiencing a spot of shellfire, and Jerry’s guns sound very close. Quiet until now.
It’s very boring sitting here in the dust and sand and heat and the flies, waiting for something to happen. Mosquitoes are keeping us awake at night. Italians on this front of been replaced by Germans flown in from Crete. It’s over two months since I’ve had mail from Dorothy. Received two letters from Mum on my birthday, and also a cable. Cable from Dorothy two days later.
1 August 1942. Ray went to church. He’s a Roman Catholic. He was transported to Rear Division for the service. We got some pay, and I bought some tinned fruit, tobacco and two tins of American beer from the YMCA truck that appears occasionally. Beer helps one to sleep. 18 Battalion put in a scare raid this morning. Today is quiet except for shelling, which seems to do little harm.
Sunday 2 August. 18 Bn raid was successful. Communications failed though. Corporal Fry’s Carrier threw a track in a minefield. Brigadier’s Recce set also failed to operate because of inefficiency.
I went to the Anglican church service beyond Rear Division, which I enjoyed. Thrilled to receive 10 letters, five from Dorothy three from Mum and one from Evelyn. I was so excited the boys must’ve thought I had gone mad. It took until 9:30 pm to find time to read them and I almost used up a torch battery doing so.
Dad has joined the Home Guard and Jimmy Orr — Cliff’s close childhood friend — has appealed against service.
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Cliff wrote to his parents and sister on 4 August:
Leave starts tomorrow and we have to take it in turns. I hope mine comes up soon. A real barrage has opened up and I hope Jerry is enjoying it. I’m going to give myself a treat tonight and have a bath in a cup of water. I bought myself a sponge, which helps a lot and it is surprising how much fresher you feel afterwards. A bottle of water per day and a cup of tea from the cookhouse gives us plenty to drink, but we are short on washing water. I have a shave every other day and keep myself respectable.
Here is the procedure. With half a mug of water, you first clean your teeth and then use it for shaving. After that you dip in the sponge and clean up as much as you can of the rest of you.
We do ourselves as well as possible, and use the rest of our water to boil up for morning and afternoon tea and supper. We have a Primus. No fancy cakes etc but John our Carrier driver usually has a packet of hard army biscuits and asks us if we would like a piece of shortbread.
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An amusing incident that could have had tragic consequences occurred about this time. Answering a call of nature can present quite a problem. Most of us would grab a shovel and, at a reasonable distance from our trench, dig a hole, squat over it and do our business, then cover it up, all the time hoping that the enemy gunners and mortar men were busily engaged elsewhere. They weren’t always, and the result could be more than a little embarrassing for those so engaged, and in retrospect could be very amusing. Some were killed or injured under such circumstances, so there were anxious moments. In fact Brigadier George Clifton’s Batman had been so engaged when he was killed in Kaponga Box.
For the benefit of the occupants of our Headquarters dugout, refinement had been provided in the form of a large box with a hole in it, so that the box provided a reasonably comfortable seat. The box had a hole dug under it as a receptacle. No covering, it was open to the wide world.
I’m damned if I can remember the Colonel’s name — although we thought he was a very good bloke — but we were watching as he left the dugout and made himself comfortable on the toilet. The enemy had been recently active and we thought, My god, he’s running a risk. We were right. Moments later a mortar exploded about 10 yards behind him. He looked a little anxious but remained seated. Another mortar exploded to his right, well within shrapnel range. He looked a little more agitated but remain seated. My God, the man’s mad. Then another explosion and the Colonel disappeared behind a cloud of dust and smoke. My God, he’s had it. Not so. Out of the dust staggered the Colonel with his pants clutched just above his knees. Into the dugout he went and at last we began to laugh.
Later he paid us a visit and sat in our trench for a yarn, one of only two Colonels I served who took the trouble to do so. The other was Colonel James Allen, who died at Sidi Resegh. He told us about his experiences on the toilet and we had a good laugh about it. We didn’t tell him we had seen it all.
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Friday, 7 August 1942. I’ve been shifted to 18 battalion. God knows why. Here I’m a lone operator — we’re short-handed — but I have a driver for my Bren Carrier, Barney Walker. We’ve been shelled intensively since I arrived. Before that it had been reasonably quiet.
We seem to be prepared for a long stay. Barney’s Carrier is well dug in, as are we. Barney has a separate trench but spends a lot of time in mine, where we enjoy many hours together talking about all manner of things. The transmitter is in the trench with me, and is only used when the lines are broken. There are regular test calls to test the equipment.
Flies are almost unbearable and my mosquito net is very useful. Under it one is very hot and comfortable though.
Cliff wrote later that he missed Barney when he left 18 Battalion, and was sad to hear that he was killed later as an infantrymen in the battle of Alamein.
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Cliff’s next letter to Dorothy was dated 7 August, three weeks after he last wrote. He was definitely back at the sharp end now, and still apologising for writing so infrequently — partly because they were moving around so much, partly because he had no writing materials, but mostly because, “along with almost everyone else, I didn’t think we would be in action for so long, and was waiting until we got out of it. As it is it seems as though it is going to be a long drawn out affair, just like the rest of this war.”
More encouragingly, he said the Fifth Column in the occupied countries must be doing good work. Just now, out of the last six shells they’d sent over, four were duds.
Not bad going, eh? And it’s certainly encouraging. Oh there’s another one. That’s 5 out of 7. He always sends quite a few duds over but never as many as that before. Hello, those two went off alright, and that one, and another — forget it!
One day two planes came over and dropped their eggs, and the entire bomb load from one plane were duds. The shelling doesn’t do much damage, and we give him quite a measure more than he gives us. We have been very lucky here for he seems to drop them all around our position and seldom lands one on it. The situation is fairly rosy I think, and we have great air superiority which saves us many worries. I have been very lucky so far…
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Monday, 10 August 1942. Have a slight dose of dysentery, a complaint several of us suffer from. German planes active today bombing, and this afternoon a German fighter shot down a Kitty Hawk a short distance from here. He came down at a terrific speed and all that was left was a cloud of smoke. Our bombers revenged him later by raining down bombs on enemy lines for some time.
Wednesday 12 August 1942. A ring and then a visit from Len Hunter. Tommy McKenzie has been killed by air exploding shrapnel. It’s going to be very difficult writing to his wife Kathleen. Our former commanding officer Sam Allan has died of wounds. Formerly our Divisional Signals OC, he had taken over command of 21 Battalion. My dysentery has not mended yet. Heavy shelling in this area this afternoon. Our artillery has given support to the Indians, who attacked at midnight.
Thursday 13 August. Enemy shelling is growing in intensity but so far so lucky. Two tins of peanut brownies from Mum and two letters from Ailsa and a lovely photo of her in Air Force uniform. She says Melbourne is swimming with Americans.
Monday, 17 August 1942. No leave. On Friday and Saturday, shelling was too close for comfort and slit trenches were in order. A plane was brought down during an air raid and the pilot bailed out.
A parcel of tinned stuff from Mum. I’ve had three parcels during the last week which are greatly appreciated. We have dinner at about 8 pm and congregate around the Carrier for a yarn. Barney and Ian McCarroll went to high school together. These nightly gatherings are very good. We argue about all sorts of subjects. Dysentery still persists I’m afraid.
Wednesday 19 August. Last two days very quiet. No shell fire until this morning. Our “Iggy” (shake-up, hurry) patrols have been out each night, consisting of Carriers, Vickers, mortars and a small section of infantry.