by John Nichol
‘On touching down, the airman was thrown clear and broke his leg. That was all . . .’
* * *
Rommel, having been pushed from the east into Tunisia by the British 8th Army, decided to make a decisive thrust against the untested Americans on his western flank. At the end of January, in the first major battle between Germans and Americans, the inexperienced and poorly led US troops were pushed back. The speed of Rommel’s advance meant his troops were bearing down on airfields that had been behind the front line. By 10 February 1943, the German force had advanced to within sixty miles of the main Allied airbase of Thelepte, just inside the Tunisian border.
When Harry Strawn had arrived at Thelepte a few weeks earlier with the 309th, rumours began to grow that the Germans would soon advance on them. At night Strawn cowered in a dugout, listening to the distant thud and blast of artillery rounds while clutching Marjorie’s letter close to his chest. He had little faith in the Americans being able to hold off the advancing battle-hardened Afrika Korps. On the night of 10 February, he used candlelight to write his diary as he sat shivering in the dugout. ‘They say the Germans are headed this way so we may have to move out of here for our army could never stop Rommel.’
As he wrote he cleared his throat for the umpteenth time. What had started that morning as an irritant at the back of his throat had developed into a constant pain that felt like a razor blade against his tonsils. Worse, his only handkerchief was sodden from constantly blowing his nose, which was beginning to turn red raw from the cold and constant attention. The medic had given him a couple of painkillers but could spare nothing more. He shivered again and ran his hand across his wet nose. Campaign life was turning out to be very different to the nights of champagne, big bands and the pretty girls of Oran.
Four days later the tanks of the 21st Panzer Division began their main assault on American lines, twenty miles from Strawn’s position. For the first time, the Tiger tank, with its formidable 88mm main gun, appeared on the desert battlefield. Allied Sherman tanks were no match. The Germans poured through the front line, threatening the airfields.
On 15 February Strawn wrote: ‘Things are really cooking now. The Germans are moving up closer to us. They are just 15 miles south of here.’ A major tank battle was raging between the German panzers and Allied tanks. The Spitfires of 309th were sent up to help stem the attacks, but there was little they could do against the thick Tiger armour. The best they could do was prevent air attacks on Allied lines. When they returned to base there was little chance of relaxing, with the gunfire growing ominously closer. Strawn began to think more of Marjorie and home, as well as the prospect of being overrun in the middle of the night, taken prisoner or killed.
That morning he had been eating breakfast outside when an AA gun fired off two warning shells and everyone scrambled for cover. Strawn threw down his plate of powdered eggs and had just made it into his dugout when a dozen Me109s came screaming over the airfield, strafing everything in sight.
But the Messerschmitts had failed to notice the twelve Spitfires that were patrolling high above the airfield for just such an attack. They screamed down on the Germans, knocking out two and damaging two more. Harry decided he was far safer in the skies with his Spitfire than in the trenches waiting for his German foe to bomb him.
The next day, 16 February, the sound of enemy gunfire appeared much closer as Rommel’s tanks advanced from both the north and south in an attempt to capture Thelepte in a pincer movement.
‘They say we are laying a trap for the Germans but so far they seem to have avoided the trap and instead have almost encircled us. They are so close now that we can hear the report of their guns as they battle just over the mountain from here.’ Rumours abounded about how fast the Germans could move. Strawn began to double-check his Spitfire’s fuel tanks to ensure they were full. He also got together extra food and water to put in the compartment behind the pilot’s seat. Among these provisions he included one of Marjorie’s letters. He fought back the melancholy as he gave the pale-blue notepaper a final kiss then tucked it into the canvas bag. ‘I got my things together this evening just in case we have to pull out in a hurry,’ he wrote. ‘They tell us we will have forty-eight hours’ notice so I guess they know what the situation is.’
That forty-eight hours’ notice was a little optimistic. Within hours the situation had dramatically changed.
‘I was woken at 2.30am when we were told we would have to evacuate Thelepte by noon that day.’ Strawn had been struggling to sleep anyway. His sore throat throbbed and the artillery from both sides crumped through the night. And he was in a state of constant terror at the prospect of being stuck in his bed when a German grenade rolled through the doorway.
As he stumbled into the night air he could make out the distinct outline of the row of Spitfires parked on the runway’s edge. He went to the one with ‘Marjorie’ lovingly painted on the side and ran his hand over the writing. For a moment he relaxed and forgot about the approaching guns and dull throb in his head.
As dawn approached, he heard a distant crash followed by the dull thud of an explosion and a flash of light. Shellfire. It was just over a mile away. Surely it was time to get out? The order to leave at noon must have been overridden by events on the ground?
He heard a Spitfire engine start. It was just the mechanic checking it over. Around the airfield there were fuel bowsers, trucks and signalling equipment. They would never be able to get that equipment away in time.
More shells landed in the coarse scrubland in the distance. He glanced over his shoulder. The looming bastion of the Atlas Mountains stood behind, barring the way back to Algeria from where they had arrived a month earlier. At least the mountains might hold up the Germans. If we get away in time.
But still no order came. Strawn went to the mess tent for a breakfast of dry bread and thin black coffee. A blast shook the canvas, sending the tent flaps inward.
‘Jeez, time to go boys!’ someone shouted. All the pilots jumped to their feet and jostled their way out of the tent.
Strawn sprinted outside to see a cone of earth spiral upwards from the impact of a shell a few hundred yards short of the airstrip. The German artillery observers knew precisely where Thelepte airfield was and were zeroing in their guns. He ran towards ‘Marjorie’, praying that he would get to her in time, before she became a smoking wreck. One of the ground crew was already in the pilot’s seat firing up the engine. Thank God!
Strawn leapt onto the wing, then stood aside to let the airman get past. He gratefully jumped into the seat and the airman strapped him in. Strawn gave him a thumbs-up and taxied his Spitfire to the end of the runway, away from the incoming shells. He felt his heart pound and his grip tighten on the stick as a salvo erupted just inside the perimeter wire.
‘Buster,’ the squadron leader called over the radio. It was code for emergency boost, borrowed from their Spitfire instructors who were veterans of the Battle of Britain days.9 A dozen Merlin engines rose to a crescendo as pilots threw their throttle levers ‘through the gate’ then hurtled down the airstrip towards the gunfire.
Strawn felt his Spitfire kick forward as he released the brakes and in just a few seconds the speed needle was registering close to 90mph. He pulled back and lifted off, tucking in the wheels as he did so. Then he gave a silent prayer to the plane’s inventor as he flew straight and fast into the sky, the Spitfire spiriting him away from the dangers below.
Down beneath them was the road to their new base at Tébessa, eighty miles to the west. It was packed solid with trucks, tanks, men and equipment.
The Spitfires slipped over the mountains and the 309th headed to Tébessa. It was a town surrounded by snow-capped peaks and steep valleys with freshwater rivers. There was no accommodation, no mess, just the ground under the Spitfires’ wings. After landing, Strawn gratefully lay down under a blanket and tried to forget about his cold and sore throat. He was just happy to be away from the dangers of Thelepte.
It was almost too cold to sleep, but he managed to drift off dreaming of his sweetheart Marjorie, waiting for him back in Oklahoma.
* * *
Two days later, the threat of a major German breakthrough increased dramatically. Rommel’s panzers had smashed through the Americans at Kasserine Pass, just seventeen miles away in the hills north of Thelepte. The entire front line was now under threat.
‘We listened to the news, none of which sounded very good; it seems the Germans are not content with just running us out of Thelepte for they are still coming,’ Strawn wrote on 20 February. ‘We didn’t sleep much for all night their bombers were over the airfield.’
The rain was beginning to turn the landing strip into a dangerous quagmire that could flip a plane on take-off or landing. It could also ground the entire squadron, denying the pilots the most effective escape route.
On 22 February, the 309th’s Spitfires escorted an armada of bombers heading to pulverise German frontline positions close to Thelepte in Tunisia to halt Rommel’s offensive.
‘All day long our air force bombed and strafed the German lines,’ Strawn recalled. ‘I have never seen so many planes operating in one day. If our army can’t stop the Germans at least our air force will give him something to remember. Of course the Spits are always used for top cover, protecting the bombers.’
Under the force of the aerial onslaught, the Allies were able to retake lost ground and the Axis advance was finally halted before they could progress far into Algeria.
Better still, the 309th now had a fresh batch of Spitfires; although still Mark Vs they were at least brand new and had wings with cannon fitted. The Americans quickly spotted that the fighters were fitted with a different type of propeller. They had the Jablo blades from the Castle Bromwich factory, which were wider and made from compressed wood, and gave the fighter much better performance in thin air or at high altitude. They were also fitted with a gun heater intensifier system that piped additional heat into the gun bays, reducing jams.10
Strawn immediately noticed the difference. ‘My new Spit and she really is a honey. The new type of prop gives her much more speed,’ he wrote on 13 March. ‘I had two guns taken out to give it more manoeuvrability and I am going to call this one Marjorie again. Perhaps it will change my luck and get me at least one Jerry.’
His excitement spilled over into a letter to his girlfriend. ‘Yesterday, my ground crew named my Spit after a very lovely girl. Therefore, I have now flown about four hours in “Marjorie the 3rd”. Of course, the 3rd meaning number three Spitfires!’ Even in his letter writing, Strawn was careful to avoid any misunderstandings. ‘My armament man did the painting and it is very good. Of course I had to let him paint his girl’s name on the ship also, for he takes as much interest in my plane as I do.’
With their new aircraft the pilots were warned that they could soon be flying five sorties a day as a major offensive was launched in the west to take the pressure off the 8th Army in the east. The Afrika Korps was pushed back and the Americans advanced all the eighty miles back to their old airfield of Thelepte, which had now changed hands four times in two months. Strawn was heading back there.
As his Spitfire came in to land he felt a shiver. A month earlier the runway had been erupting in plumes of artillery smoke.
In a pause between the near-continuous two-hour sorties he found time to sit down on an empty ammunition crate and pen another letter to Marjorie.
‘We are now at the same field we started out on. It’s rather strange, for I imagine that not too long ago some German boy was probably writing to his girl back home. Of course we have to take many precautions, for they planted mines all over the field . . . One boy went to get a piece of firewood and when he picked up the log, he set off a mine and was killed instantly.’
The Americans were quickly into the action, escorting A-20 bombers targeting dug-in infantry. The Luftwaffe was there to meet them and Strawn knew he was in with a chance of his first kill. ‘At 8,000ft we saw four Me109s on the deck and then four more at the same level that we were. Well, they hit us from above and how they hit. I was shot at three different times, but each time broke soon enough to miss his fire. Once an Me109 passed over my head so close I could see all his markings, white wingtips, white nose, white crosses and grey body. They really have a ship in this new Me109G for they can run away from us in no time at all.
‘They shot down two boys in our squadron, Early and Juhnke. Juhnke crashed in our territory and came back this evening. Early we haven’t heard from and no one saw him go in or get hit. We got three damaged but not by me for I was too busy making sure I wasn’t going to get hit.’
Strawn had been away from the States for almost a year and on continuous operations for seven months yet, despite his best efforts, he had still to close in on his first kill and feel he had contributed something to the war. He was also not being helped by flying the Spitfire Mark Vs.
* * *
Greggs Farish with a Spitfire Mk V, 1944
Despite being brand-new machines, the Mark Vs were proving to be no match for the powerful 109 ‘G’ variant. The Spitfire in North Africa was being outclassed.
RAF commanders recognised that the threat of superior German fighters had to be countered.
Greggs Farish was summoned to his CO at 8pm on 25 March at their new airfield of Souk-el-Khemis, a dusty strip inside northern Tunisia.11 ‘I’ve got a job for you, Spanner. Bags of work now.’ He pointed on the map to where Strawn’s 309th were based at Thelepte, 200 miles by road to the south. ‘You have got to be there by tomorrow morning with a servicing party.’
The new Spitfire IXs of 72 Squadron were flying to the frontline airstrip to replace the now outdated Mark Vs to counter the Me109Gs. With the massive power that the IXs brought to the battlefield, the RAF would have a plane far superior to the 109s and very much on equal terms with the Focke-Wulf 190s. But the battle-winning Spitfires would need immediate refuelling and rearming as soon as they landed at Thelepte.
Farish was ‘pleased as punch’ at the chance of getting some frontline action but he knew he had to move fast – 200 miles overnight was a hell of a way, even along the desert’s straight roads. After a rapid conference with his NCOs, he decided to take forty men and seven three-ton Bedford trucks loaded with ammunition, signalling equipment, petrol and oil. Farish borrowed a rifle and a Jeep then grabbed a quick bite in the cookhouse.
By midnight they were ready to move. Under the headlights of his trucks parked at the end of the runway, feeling the chill of the desert night, Farish gathered the drivers round for a final briefing, spreading his map over the bonnet of his borrowed Jeep. ‘Get these names down – Souk-el-Arba, Le Kef, Kasserine and Thelepte, which is just here.’ The screwdriver he used for pointing at the map thumped down on the location. ‘The kites take off here.’ The screwdriver moved right over the map to their current location far to the north. ‘They leave at 8am tomorrow so we’ve got to move fast. First lorry can use headlights, the rest only tail lights. After dawn keep well spread out so you can only just see the man ahead, at least 400 yards, and have a spotter on top. OK? Right. Let’s get going.’
By 3.30am they had reached Le Kef, the halfway point, and stopped for tea and sandwiches.
As they moved south, with the ramparts of the Atlas Mountains on their right, the sky got lighter.
‘We carried on through the Kasserine Pass and here and there we passed a smashed-up lorry, riddle-holed and burnt-out,’ Farish recorded. ‘In one place there was a Churchill tank surrounded by three German tanks, all wrecked, and nearby a little bed of wooden crosses growing in the desert scrub.’
The convoy was about eight miles from Thelepte airfield when the lead truck stopped for a five-minute breather. As the drivers checked fuel and oil, the rest stretched their legs. A dead donkey on the side of the road attracted the attention of several airmen, some prodding it with their feet. Suddenly there was a blast and half-a-dozen men collapsed to the ground.
&n
bsp; After months of air attacks everyone instinctively threw themselves to the ground. But there was no aircraft. It was a landmine hidden by the Germans during their retreat. Everyone turned to the sound of grunts, groans then screams. One of the mechanics, Aircraftsman Hitt, was writhing in the dirt and dust. His trousers were a ragged mess of material and torn flesh. Bright red blood pumped from his thigh. A severed artery. He needed medical attention and he needed it fast. An armourer who had been an air-raid warden in London wrapped a tourniquet tight around his thigh, managing to stem the flow of blood.
Farish, who’d been driving the last truck in the convoy, immediately took control. He sped down in the Jeep to a nearby American hospital then escorted two ambulances back. As he did so he spotted 72 Squadron’s new, modern Mark IX Spitfires overhead. After giving the ambulance drivers directions, he dashed to the airfield, arriving just as the first fighter taxied in.
For a moment Farish stood back to admire the clean, fresh lines of the brand-new Spitfires. There were no bullet holes patched up, no dents or scratches from AA fire, scrapes from rough landings. Brand spanking new. There was something about them, perhaps the slightly longer nose, that suggested menace.
Farish ensured the Spitfires were refuelled then drove off to check on his wounded. He discovered that an American surgeon had already repaired Aircraftsman Hitt’s severed artery.
‘We found him in a ward of gravely wounded men. On either side was a close row of beds and in them men in all conditions, with limbs, hands, even faces missing. There was a queer smell of chemicals and around the beds there moved American nurses – women! – in smart uniforms who gave hope and cheerfulness to the place. Up and down the middle walked a doctor who, when he saw us around Hitt’s bed, exclaimed: “You can’t kill an Englishman.” ’
