Memoires 04 (1978) - Mussolini, His Part In My Downfall

by Spike Milligan

  “What a bastard, getting you all worked up and then call it off…Where’s Fildes?”

  “He’s already gone on ahead…with the first party.”

  “Sod his luck.”

  He continues his lovelorn missive. “Christ, it’s quiet,” he says. “I can hear the nib scratching on the paper.”

  “Haven’t you got a silencer?”

  “Good night, kind sir.”

  MONDAY, JANUARY 17, 1944

  REGIMENTAL DIARY:

  Regimental OP established at 882960 and line laid by 10.30.

  FILDES’ DIARY:

  This was the hottest time I’ve ever had when we crossed the Garigliano. Shepherd and I in jeeps were two days behind the advance carrying party, who footslogged to the river then crossed in boats. We joined them at 167 Brigade HQ.

  MY DIARY:

  BREAKFAST AT 0800. OP PARTY FOREGATHER AT 0900. WE ARE ISSUED WITH ARCTIC CARRYING PACKS. WE HAVE A ‘DRESS REHEARSAL’, FULLY LOADED, THEN BREAK OFF TILL FURTHER ORDERS, IN WHICH TIME I AM WRITING THIS.

  I had made a note in my diary at this point saying, “I died for the England I dreamed of, not the England I know.” I had a terrible foreboding of death. I’d never had it before. We hang around all day. The waiting is the worst part. I oil my tommy gun, I don’t know why, it’s already oiled. Word that our Major and his OP party are at 167 Bde HQ at Santa Castrese.

  “I suppose,” says Fuller, “‘ees the patron saint of Castration.”

  “They make a damn fine stew,” I said.

  “What do?”

  “Bollocks.”

  I had a great urge to go to the ballet. I had always loved ballet, and was forever in love with ballerinas; it’s something I still suffer from. Somehow I couldn’t see myself going to the ballet today. Going to the Major, under fire, crawling forward to him and saying, “Excuse me, sir, could I have a 24-hour pass to see Coppelia?” It wasn’t on.

  “You’re not going, Milligan, you’re wanted on the WT at the Command Post.” Bombardier Fuller gives me the news. Birch is to go in my place. Christ, what game are they playing? That’s twice! This will drive me bloody mad. Still I was going to be safe. Why was I grumbling? It’s still evening. It’s sunny, and, it’s good to be alive.

  “Christ! You back again,” said Deans.

  “Is it bothering you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, it’s bothering me.”

  I flopped on my bed and dumped my small pack down. Five o’clock. Time for Command Post. I’ve got a sore bottom. The dreaded piles!

  Alf Fildes on the path just outside our dug-out in Lauro. His hands are tied behind his back to stop him going blind.

  The evening in the Command Post was enlivened by some Coon-type singing. Lt. Stewart Pride, Edgington, Deans and I were given to spirituals. Our programme was ‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot’, ‘I looked over Jordan’, ‘Old Man Ribber’. At eight o’clock I flopped on to my bed. I knew there was a barrage going over at 2100 hours. I didn’t want to miss it, so I read a collection of Tit-Bits and Tatlers. I must have dozed off but I was awakened by the Boof boof boof of Beauforts blazing away about four hundred yards from my dug-out. In my diary I write:

  “Barrage not very intense. Beauforts using one in five tracer, I think it’s more a marking barrage for the infantry. Better get my head down, I’m on at 0500! Piles giving me hell.”

  JANUARY 18, 1944

  Somewhere in the small hours I heard explosions in that distant sleep-ridden way; I hard Spike Deans say in a sing-song voice like Jiminy Cricket, “Oh Spikeeeee, we’re being shelleeddd.”

  I remember my reply, “Fuck ‘em,” and dozed off but then…my diary tells the story:

  0220 HRS: AWAKENED BY SOMEONE SCREAMING COMING FROM THE GUNS, PULLED BACK THE BLACK-OUT AND COULD SEE THE GLARE OF A LARGE FIRE, AT THE SAME TIME A VOICE IN PAIN WAS SHOUTING “COMMAND POST, FOR GOD’S SAKE SOMEBODY, WHERE’S THE COMMAND POST?” IT WAS SOMEONE WITH HIS HAIR ON FIRE COMING UP THE PATH, HE WAS BEATING IT OUT WITH HIS HANDS, I JUMPED FROM MY BED SANS TROUSERS AND RAN TOWARDS HIM, IT WAS BOMBARDIER BEGENT. I HELPED BEAT THE FLAMES OUT. HIS FACE AND HANDS WERE BADLY BURNT, I HELPED HIM UP THE LADDER TO THE COMMAND POST AND I BLURTED OUT TO THOSE WITHIN, “THERE’S BEEN A DIRECT HIT ON THE GUNS.” I REALISED THEN I WAS LATE WITH THE NEWS, WOUNDED GUNNERS WERE ALREADY BEING ATTENDED TO. EVERYBODY LOOKED VERY TENSE, BEHIND ME FLAMES WERE LEAPING TWENTY FEET IN THE AIR, I RUSHED BACK TO MY DUG-OUT DRESSED IN A FLASH. TOOK MY BLANKETS BACK TO THE COMMAND POST TO HELP COVER THE WOUNDED. I THEN JOINED THE REST OF THE BATTERY, WHO WERE ALL PULLING RED-HOT AND BURNING CHARGE-CASES AWAY FROM THOSE NOT YET AFFECTED. THEY WERE TOO HOT TO PULL BY HAND SO WE USED PICKAXES WEDGED IN THE HANDLES. LIEUTENANT STEWART PRIDE WAS HEAPING EARTH ON THEM WITH HIS HANDS. GUNNER DEVINE SEEMED TO BE ENJOYING IT, HE WAS GRINNING AND SHOUTING, “THIS IS THE FIRST TIME I’VE BEEN WARM TODAY.’” IT NEVER OCCURRED TO ME THAT SOME OF THE BOXES THAT WERE HOT MIGHT STILL CONTAIN UNEXPLODED CORDITE CHARGES, FORTUNATELY THEY DIDN’T GO OFF AND THAT’S WHY I’M ABLE TO WRITE THIS DIARY TODAY.

  Bdr. Begent in a romantic mood or with heart disease.

  It was a terrible night, four Gunners died and six were wounded. All suffered burns in varying degrees. The work of subduing the fire and tidying up went on until early dawn. It was terrible to see the burnt corpses. There was little Gunner Musclewhite, he’d been killed sitting up in bed. He was burnt black, and his teeth showed white through his black, fleshless head. Sgt. Jock Wilson too, Gunner White and Ferrier…

  A burial party under BSM Griffin were starting to dig as dawn came up. I went on duty at the Command Post. I wondered where Edgington was and wondered if he was a victim.

  “No, he’s on Exchange duties,” said Chalky White.

  I had run over to him just to verify. I pulled back the black-out that covered the little cave that the Telephone Exchange was; I could see he was visibly shaken by the affair.

  “Just seein’ you was still alive,” I said and rushed back to the chaos.

  What had happened need never have been so bad had we all not become careless. The Gunners had dug themselves a dug-out and covered it with a camouflage net, but they had surrounded their dug-out with Charge Boxes. The first shells must have hit the charges, which blew up and ignited the camouflage net that then fell in flames on top of those trapped underneath…

  1605 hrs

  Lauro dive-bombed by seven enemy fighters. The all-night standing had made the piles worse. They started to bleed, it’s all I needed for a perfect night.

  Yes! I have what is called the curse of the Milligans—piles! My father had them, my grandfather had them, I was born with them. I thought they came along with legs, arms and teeth. They were bloody painful, and mine were bleeding down my legs. My father hated, personally hated, his piles; he, a great romantic of all the ailments! he, good-looking tap-dancing he, had to get piles. Why piles? he would rage as he squatted on two bowls of water, dipping his end alternatively into the hot and cold. Why—why like Chopin could he not have the romantic scourge? Consumption—“Look at the sympathy he got, lucky swine!”—he could sit at his piano in a cell of the Carthusian Monastery, composing his Nocturnes, coughing gently: that was music and disease at its romantic best. But how, he asked, how could Chopin, in the sight of his beloved George Sand, sit at his piano, strike the first chords of the E Minor Nocturne, clutch his backside and say, “Oh my piles”—he wouldn’t have got very far like that! My poor father—how he suffered, it wasn’t the piles but his pride that hurt. When he had to cancel a performance at the Poona Gymkana special show for Sir Skipton Climo MC in 1925, he wrote:

  “Dear Lady C, I’m afraid I have been confined to bed, an old war-wound from Mesopotamia, a Turkish sniper got me”, etc.

  When I said to him, “Why don’t you have them out?” he said, “What? and let them escape! Never! when I die I’ll go straight to hell and I want those bastards to come with me and SUFFER.”

  We drove in a 15-cwt back to the Wagon
Lines, and waited outside Dr Bentley’s tent—came my turn.

  Duck into the tent. Dr Bentley. He smiles as I enter.

  “Ah Milligan—haven’t seen you for a while.”

  “It’s not for the want of trying, sir.”

  “You look alright.”

  “You’re looking at the wrong end.”

  “What is it?”

  “Piles.”

  “Piles! At your age.”

  “Yes, sir—I’m advanced for my years.”

  “Yes—they look very sore—”

  “They’re bloody sore—it’s painful to walk.”

  “Well, I’ve no medication for them—I’ll give you bed down forty-eight hours—attend B.”

  Bed! Forty-eight hours! A fortune-teller said one day I’d be lucky!

  JANUARY 19, 1944

  MY DIARY:

  SORE ARSE. GOOD MORNING, EVERYBODY. ALL VERY DEPRESSED ABOUT THE LOSS OF THOSE POOR BLOODY GUNNERS.

  It was a sunny morning again. I could hear some birds singing in the olive trees. Wish I had something to sing about. Can’t sing about a sore arse. Thank God, I’m bed down; but no, here comes bed up, it’s Sgt. King.

  “Sorry, Milligan, you’ll have to go on Command Post, we’re stuck for signallers, that cunt Jenkins took enough of them with him to start a regiment.”

  “But I’m bed down, Sarge.”

  “What with?”

  “Piles.”

  “Piles? That all? I’m not asking you to use that end, just answer the phone and work the wireless, that won’t affect ‘em.”

  I couldn’t say no, we really were short of men. So, with my backside hanging out, I sit on it in the Command Post. Situation reports are coming in, the battle up front is raging; I can’t understand why the guns are so quiet. It must be close fighting. Deans is on duty and so is Lt. Wright.

  “They’ve forgotten about us,” he says, stands up, stretches himself and sits down, a masterful exercise in control. Deans scrapes some chestnuts from the fire and hands them around from his tin hat. “Farm Fresh,” he said. “Laid this morning.”

  The phone goes. “Command Post…it’s for you, sir.” I hand the phone to Mr Wright.

  “Wright here…yes…yesssss.” He hangs up. “That was Regimental OP…they were checking that the line was through.”

  “Of course, I couldn’t have told them that, sir.”

  Wright grins, he’s one of the lads. “Well, Milligan, that’s one of the perks of being an officer.”

  “One day I’ll be an officer, sir,” I said in shining tones, “and I’ll be able to pick up the telephone and say, “Yes, I can hear you.” That will be a wonderful day.”

  The phone buzzes, I snatch it up and shout, “I’m not an officer but I can hear you and that means that the line is through!”

  It turns out to be some poor lost bloody signaller from another field regiment, he’s been following the wrong line.

  “Whose line are you then?” he says.

  I can’t tell him, that’s security.

  “Oh fuck,” he says, and then I’m sure he’s one of us, but I give him a quick security test. “Who says ‘This is Funf speaking’?”

  There’s a giggle on the line. “That’s ITMA.”

  “This is 56 Heavy Regiment so we’re no use to you, mate.”

  “Ta,” he says and is gone.

  Lt. Wright is looking at me. “What was that ITMA stuff all about?”

  “I was checking a signaller’s bona fides, sir.”

  “Were they in order?”

  “Yes, sir, he knew exactly what the answering code-word was for ITMA.”

  “And what was it?”

  “Bloody awful, sir.”

  The phone rings again. “19 Battery Command Post.” It’s the RHQ OP. “Take Post.” I rattle down the Tannoys, “Right Ranging.” Soon we are all immersed in a two-hour Cannonade; we have no time other than to snatch a drag at a fag.

  “Christ, someone’s copping it,” was Lt. Wright’s remark, based on the fact that the target remained static and we just rained gunfire in it. “It’s a crossroads with ammo lorries trying to get through,” he informs us later.

  The OP tell him that several trucks have been blown up and they are trying to detour over adjacent fields, where the 25-pounders plaster them. It ends with most of their trucks blown up and they pack it in, but it took a lot to stop the bastards. They were a tough lot OK. At mid-day I am relieved by Sgt. King himself.

  “Off you go, Milligan, get lunch and be back at—” he looks at his watch “—two o’clock.”

  “Right.”

  “‘Ow’s yer backside?”

  “Out of bounds.”

  I have lunch, then lay on my bed in total discomfort and very depressed. I think I’d better have the operation, yes, I’ll see the Doc in the morning and have the damn things out. Guns are going all around me; in between, birds try and sing, what do they think of all this lunacy? I have a stab at reading a book by another loony, Lord Byron; it’s appropriate, Childe Harold, and it’s being read by Child Milligan, he goes on about Italy and Rome:

  Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste

  More rich than other climes’ fertility.

  Have I got news for him! No I couldn’t stomach Byron today, so I read what must be the most up-to-date newspaper in Italy—the Daily Express, January 7, 1944. It was flown here on an RAF with a contingent of officers, one of whom met Lt. Mostyn at base depot, and in turn it had ended up in the Command Post.

  Lt. Joe Mostyn—an identification photo was given to each member of the battery with warning not to lend money.

  “It says we have ‘Fighter with no propeller’,” I read aloud. “Ah, well that’s due to shortage of parts,” said Vic Nash. “I myself have a razor with no blades, it’s part of a plan to drive us all bloody mad.”

  I read that there is a “Test lighting of street-lamps in Malpas Road, Deptford, a Councillor Coombs pressed a button in a controlling sub station and the lights came on.”

  Nash looks up from de-mudding his boots. “A lot of fucking good that’s going to do for winning the war.”

  “I’ve looked through this paper and there’s not one bloody mention of us.”

  “That’s it mate…we’re the forgotten Army.”

  “Forgotten…FORGOTTEN? Don’t make me laugh…they’ve never bloody heard of us.”

  Smudger Smith and Spiv Convine from B Sub have arrived. They are definitely scrounging. “Got any fags, Milly?” (Smudger always called me Milly.) He’s moaning about not having enough mail.

  “They must all be bleedin’ crippled from the shoulder dhan, I written a dozen bleedin’ Air letters and nuffink back, last one was Christmas…Huh…women…Huh!”

  He was right. “Women huh!”, that summed them up. “Huh.”

  “Good news, Smudger, according to the Daily Express there’s no war in Italy.”

  He borrows the paper; I never saw it again. It would come to the same terrible end that all good newspapers came to in this army, even The Times. At that time, I was dreaming of after-the-war ventures, and I had decided that I would like to have a Club on the river. Edgington, Deans and myself had discussed being partners with Dixie Dean* from Hail-sham. It would be called either Holiday Inn or Ravello’s: Deans would see to the catering, I would have a band, and Harry Edgington would play the piano in the lounge. I had a pad and I was writing down what the requirements of the place were—plates, chairs, etc. Dreams. Dreams. Dreams.

  “Come on, you’re bloody late,” Sergeant King has bearded me in my lair.

  “Sorry, Sarge, I was miles, miles away.”

  “We’re all bloody miles away,” he said. “They’re having a bloody hot time across the river. We’re through to them on the wireless; they’re at Tac HQ where ‘Looney’ is. Lt. Budden and party are up Dimiano trying to establish an OP.’” *He used to play drums with us when we were stationed in Hailsham.

  Lt. E. Wright holding up a set of railings willed to hi
m by his mother.

  We are walking together to the CP. He leaves me at the entrance.

  “Hurry up, Milligan,” says Lt. Wright, “we’re off again.”

  Bdr. Edwards has been working the phone, the wireless and the Tannoy.

  “What’s it feel like to be fully employed, Eddy?” I said, taking over the earphones.

  Bombardier Edwards was a gift to the army. He did his job to full measure, never complained, first class at his profession of Specialist, clean, shaved every morning even in cold water, about five foot ten, black-haired, not in any way good-looking, prominent teeth, never said much; when we were all getting pissed out of our tiny minds, Eddy would be doing water-colours and sketches of the landscape. We noticed at dances, whenever he took the floor, he appeared to be on wheels and his lady partner pushing him around. At OPs he was very brave—well, braver than me—he wouldn’t flinch when one dropped near, and I did, I flinched when they didn’t drop near. I even flinched when nothing was happening, I was an inveterate flincher. I flinched after the war whenever a car backfired.

  The weather now is glorious, a faint promise of spring warmth is in the air, the sun is in a cloudless sky, and the Germans must be cursing it as the RAF and the USSAF pound the daylights out of them. Suddenly there are no more fire orders. All round, guns are going, all except us, is it because we’re Jewish? We all stare into the Command Post fire, it stares back, we are all pissed off, and trying to find comfort in dreams.

  “I think I’d like to be walking along the front at Brighton with Margaret,” said Edwards.

  At the hour of five I was glad to see Sergeant King come and take over. I go straight to my bed. My backside is on fire. I swallow six aspirins to try and kill the pain.

  MY DIARY:

  FILDES ARRIVED BACK FROM OP WITH ERNIE HART ALL BADLY SHAKEN, HART IS ALL IN AND CRYING. “THOSE POOR BASTARDS UP THERE,” HE SAYS.