STEAM AT WAR 10




We were taken by ambulance to the casualty clearing station where we were able to witness the superb efficiency and dedication with which the staff dealt with the severe to not so severely wounded. I was in the latter category and received attention at 22.00 hours that night. I awoke next morning to find my burns skinned and dyed and dressed. There turned out to be small sutured areas on the balls of my thumbs and a skin graft inside one wrist. The largest visible wound was a relatively small area on one forearm from where the skin had been taken for the graft.

Next day my driver was flown to a hospital near Cairo and an ambulance train took me to the then forward hospital at Gerawla about 12kms east of my unit base at Similla. I vaguely remember my admission to the hospital and waking up in what seemed to be next morning feeling good. A patient in the next bed said, "Gee Kiwi what happened to you! You've been asleep for three days. They brought your meals and took them away again". I thought that such a thing could not have occurred, but some days later I was to see a British soldier with no apparent injury but in poor physical shape do just that. When he awoke the ward sister washed and shaved him, cut his hair and trimmed his toenails and fingernails. A man transformed! I used to admire these Tommy soldiers for when enemy prisoners of war were brought out they were escorted by some of the soldiers who captured them. Such escorts often looked more battered than their prisoners. After three weeks I was discharged back to my unit and following two weeks light duties rostered back onto the railhead trains. My driver of the incident a much older man than I did not show sufficient recovery and was returned home. For his attempt at rescuing me he was mentioned in despatches. The Similla-Mashiefa trains were given some protection with the addition of anti-aircraft gun equipped wagons marshalled next to the engines and guards' vans. The tender skin on my hands and wrists chafed and bled and I received dressing replacements at the regimental aid posts at the ends of the trips. Healing became permanent after about two weeks. .

During this time the allied forces commenced the withdrawal to El Alamein. We were the only loads travelling west with mostly fuel to sustain the retreating army. Came the final two days when we withdrew every locomotive and railway wagon possible with as many as five east bound trains occupying a single 13km section. Unclaimed petrol was set on fire and about 150 wagons were left behind. Following four days of start-stop progress over heavily bomb blasted and hastily repaired track the company arrived intact at Alexandria. Our train together with three or four locomotives was shunted into the absentee King Farouk's private station where we camped for a week then moved to a permanent site in a suburb close to the walled railway yards. We enjoyed the experience of living in a luxuriously grassed park that was alive with toads and small lizards that scuttled everywhere.

As the front line stabilised at El Alamein we commenced running supply trains to a temporary railhead at Burg El Arab 56kms west of Alexandria. About four trains a day were run during the early parts of the nights. In anticipation of our return to the western desert railway a fleet of American diesel electric locomotives was shipped to the vast army stores at Suez. 16th and 17th railway personnel were selected for training in their operation. For this group the companies chose the steam locomotive firemen who had accumulated long service on the railhead runs. I became a member of a detachment to a locomotive instruction school at Suez where we had about a month gaining handling experience shunting the rail network serving the stores yards spread out over several square kilometres. We then took several of the new locomotives via the Egyptian State Railways route along the western side of the Suez Canal to El Firdan and across the new army erected swing-bridge to the eastern bank. We then worked trains over a new military line constructed from El Kantara to El Shatt that was another military supply dump at the southern end of the canal opposite Suez. For about six weeks we worked supply trains over this route, some bound for the El Alamein front and others from El Kantara to Gaza on the first leg of their journeys to Turkey. Finally we delivered the locomotives to our base at Alexandria and set about training more drivers over the Alexandria-Burg El Arab section.

STEAM AT WAR 9




Back at the base camp at Similla our commanding officer had winkled out a recreation hut for the company. It was a prefabricated building about the size of a school classroom erected in short time by unit personnel. We were forbidden its use until a 1.5 metre deep slit trench had been dug right around it. A party of us was directed to dig the trench with the carrot that if it was finished to the satisfaction of the commanding officer the company could have the use of the hut that night. We commenced the formidable task with characteristic groans and moans. By 16.00 hours the trench was down to 30cms, and then a lone enemy twin engine fighter bomber made a low pass across the camp dropping a stick of 25kg bombs and firing its nose guns. We flung ourselves sardine fashion into our shallow trench, the men at the bottom feeling relatively secure but the top layer feeling decidedly vulnerable. We clambered out, shook off the dust and dug like hell to finish the trench before evening mess. With some banter, the major passed it OK and permitted occupation. Thus, we came to enjoy a spacious canteen and games room.

During the last few months before the enemy advance to El Alamein the railway had been completed to Fort Capuzzo on the Egyptian-Libyan boarder and set out with train dispersal yards and balloon loop on a smaller scale than the installations at Masheifa. Also, on a stop-go programme the track was extended from fort Capuzzo to within 19km of Tobruk. In the two months leading up to the allied forces retreat from the Western Desert the railway came under increased attention from the enemy. Messerschmidt 109F fighter planes carrying machine guns and 20mm cannon made strafing attacks against locomotives. The machine gum ammunition contained armour piercing bullets that penetrated locomotive boilers through to tubes and inner fireboxes. The cannon shells were explosive and blew fist sized holes in the boiler insulation sheet metal cladding as well as take out cab windows and boiler steam pressure and water level gauges. We had survived strafing runs when the targets had been troops on the ground at the sides of trains at crossing loops. On the night of 6th March 1942 we coupled onto a troop train at Similla and were warned that intelligence had advised that the enemy was about to commence a crippling action against the trains from that night on. We proceeded as usual exercising what vigilance we could and entered the crossing loop at Mazhud, two stations from our destination. We had only just come to a stop at about 10.30 hours when there was a slam that shook the locomotive accompanied by a horrendous roar of escaping steam. I saw my driver pass through a head-high jet of steam, cross the cab and leap out. I dropped to the floor and rolled beneath the coal-shovelling chute of the tender.

While I sheltered there a second plane raked the engine and passed over then I became choked out by billowing hot steam. I groped around until I felt cool air and tumbled to the ground, looked up to see a third fighter beginning its run in. I dived under the tender and clambered up onto an axle and listened to the hellish spat of bullets as the plane completed its run. I was prepared to stay there until satisfied that the attack was over but a rush of hot water from the punctured boiler flowed back between the rails and steamed me out. A plane was making a steep turn and again lining up, so I made a dash for a wheel rut in the sand and hit the ground and watched to be mightily relieved to see the plane fly over without firing a shot. I got up and noted clouds of steam billowing from all over the engine and my driver accompanied by a British officer attempting to discover if I was still in the steam filled cab. I grabbed his arm to make him realise over the noise that I was indeed alive and kicking. We moved clear of the engine and only then found that we had suffered some burns. His were quite severe down one side of his face and neck. Mine were relatively superficial about my forehead and forearms and into the flesh about my hands and wrists. My eyes were smarting badly and a piece of flesh stood proud on the bridge of my nose. The crossing station crew took us to their quarters, brewed us good strong sweet tea and with their limited resources attempted to dress our injuries. Reports came in that three more locomotives had been knocked out, one at a station ahead of us and two at stations behind us. Amazingly there were no fatalities among the engine crews. One driver suffered a severed tendon of a little finger. Of the firemen one lost an eye, one a deep slicing wound across the back of his thigh and the third slight burns to his head.

STEAM AT WAR 8




The frequent dust storms that blew from two to three days duration were a living hell with the only consolation being that the enemy could not operate against us. We kept going albeit a little slower and consumed lots of liquid that kept our innards working more or less normally. The wear and tear on the engine external machinery in such conditions was extremely high with some parts requiring replacement every two weeks. Piston rod packing glands and crosshead slippers suffered the worst.

Various trackside events called for attention. One was an evening raid by the occupants of two German short take-off and landing aircraft that landed beside the track and two crew members alighted from each leaving the motors running while they proceeded to plant land mines beneath the track. They were observed by a Bren gun carrier patrol that sped towards the scene causing the party to flee to the waiting aircraft one of which stalled its motor, so all boarded the second plane and flew off. Mine disposal soon cleared the area and order was restored. While I was not witness to the event I was to admire this example of a German specialised aircraft before it was taken away intact by our air force recovery team. Another track-side distraction was a 500Kg enemy aerial bomb that like many had failed to explode. One of the station crews watched it drop from a low flying bomber, hit the ground and bounce over and over before coming to rest about 20 metres from the track. It remained there for two or three days and we were instructed to proceed dead slow past it. We kept to the far sides of our engine cabs as we trundled past feeling sure that we could see it expanding. Much to our relief a bomb disposal squad eventually removed it.

Enemy activity against the railway was most intensive on bright moonlight nights and our journey times between Similla and Masheifa were slowed accordingly. Out and back trips usually took two days but in bad times four days on our engines were not unusual. After the first 24 hours our eating habits would go haywire and large quantities of sweet tea and coffee became the main sustenance. Train crews were issued with four days food rations at the outsets of their journeys and we supplemented these with tinned foods out of our most gratefully received food parcels. Our thanks went out to all those mothers, wives, sisters, girl friends, clubs and patriotic societies back home. Their tinned savaloys, beans, stews, spaghetti and soups were heated up on boiler back-heads and diesel engine exhaust manifolds. However, on such nights when danger was seen to be lurking we would slow down to a walking pace and listen for aircraft engines. If they were too close for comfort we would stop thereby eliminating the telltale exhaust steam from the engine and move about 100 metres away from the train to listen and watch until the threat had receded. On these nights the railhead would be subjected to repeated attacks and we would make the final seven or eight kilometre approach very slowly to the outer limit of the station yard from where we would observe the apparent mayhem taking place. We were well aware that daylight would reveal very little material damage. It amazed us that attacking aircraft seemed to fly blissfully through the incredible amount of flak being thrown up at them. High and low flying aircraft were met and followed by a barrage from heavy, medium and light anti-aircraft guns and pass out of range to fight another day.

Taking advantage of a respite we would draw into the arrival yard noting all likely shelters in the form of ground humps and hollows, slit trenches and bunkers for ready reference in anticipation of further attacks. We would take a brief spell while a servicing crew took charge of our locomotive, cleaned the fire, filled the lubricating oil reservoirs, turned the engine and reversed the order of the two 4000 gallon water batteries. When ready we would hastily resume duty, couple onto a waiting return train and roll out of there exceeding the regulation speed limit to reach the psychological if not actual safety of the wadhi 19 km distant below the escarpment.