Kirov Saga: Hinge Of Fate: Altered States Volume III (Kirov Series)

by Schettler, John

  At places the cliff was so sheer that it was near vertical, but the mountain troops continued their climb, up 650 feet to the 200 meter line on their terrain maps, taking only sporadic fire from the cattle sheds. The first squad of seven men led by Groth himself flung their demolition charges through the embrasure openings that overlooked the airfield and cemetery, blowing away the rusting iron bars, and then they began to work their way in through those same openings. The Germans were inside the Rock with this single squad, and their mission was to find and destroy any useful enemy facilities they could, and eliminate any observation posts near that location.

  Far below, the 2nd Kings Rifles were fighting for their lives in the cemetery, with the newly dead lying atop the cold stone grave plates in a macabre scene. The batteries at Governor’s Lookout and the Prince William Battery gave them as much support as they could, while under ceaseless attack from the screaming Stukas. It was soon clear to General Liddell that the position was lost, and he ordered his men to begin a gradual withdrawal through the cemetery, across Devil’s Tower Road and through some makeshift facilities that had once been used as an Isolation Hospital. They would reform near the old Moorish Castle, which blocked the switchback road leading up to the tunnel complex entrance. The north face of the Rock itself was a near vertical cliff, which could not be climbed by anyone without special equipment and training. So the action shifted west towards the Land Port.

  By 01:00 the Germans had overrun the two forward defense lines and taken the whole of the airfield. Now the grenadiers of the Grossdeutschland Regiment focused their effort on the inundated area just south of the Jewish cemetery. There was a narrow causeway that crossed the inundation to an area known as the Land Port, very near the position already occupied by the Brandenburgers. As if by pre-arranged plan, the commandos now renewed their assault, fighting their way across the market square against opposition by B company of the 2nd Somerset Light. It was their intention to clear the area south of the causeway and so allow the grenadiers to cross the inundation.

  With ruthless efficiency, the Brandenburgers stormed the Grand Casemates, silencing the guns there. The grenadiers surged over the causeway, led by their tough recon battalion, and the Germans built up enough strength to force B Company back towards the old Moorish Castle where the exhausted King’s Rifles were taking up new positions.

  By 02:00 the Germans were preparing to attack this position, as the remaining two battalions of the Grossdeutschland Regiment rolled south and heavily reinforced the area taken near the Grand Casemates. Soon their assault teams were working their way in to the north town area, opposed by the 4th Devonshire Battalion and elements of 2nd Somerset Light in house to house fighting. It was here that the training and recent combat experience of the Germans made all the difference. They had fought in Poland, and in the lightning dash across France, all while the Devonshire Battalion languished at Gibraltar. The German troops were among the best in their army, and they pressed home a relentless attack, pushing past the Post Office to the Civil Hospital where they flanked the end of the 2nd Somerset’s line at the Moorish Castle, which climbed the hills behind it in fortified tiers of tower and wall.

  First built in the 8th century and then restored again in the 11th century, the castle walls and complexes once reached to the edge of the sea. Yet by 1940 only the prominent square Tower of Homage and the Gate House below remained, climbing the steep knees of the towering mass of Jebel Tarik, the name of the mountain which was once called the Rock of Jebel, and has since come to be known as Gibraltar. Its tower stood higher, its Kasbah Keep bigger than any other Moorish fort built on the Iberian Peninsula. It had endured numerous sieges over the years, shrugging off the cannon fire of previous eras. Now the Germans brought up light infantry guns and began to systematically blast away at the old castle walls and abutments, but the tower stood stolidly unbroken, the crenulated teeth of the stony walls now manned by British troops firing from above. There the proud Union Jack flew from a tall flagpole and the 11th siege of the castle was soon well underway.

  The Germans saw that their 75mm infantry guns would make little impression on the hard masonry of the gate wall, and so they called for bigger guns, waiting an hour while troops brought up a 150mm battery from the rear. The Gate House was the first obstacle, which stood as two imposing squarish legs of stone built up in layer after layer of limestone brick. The center receded to a walled off gate with a single vertical embrasure where the barrel of a Vickers machinegun spat fire and steel at anyone approaching. Yet the gun could not be rotated left or right, which made it easy for engineers to approach from the sides of the embrasure and lay demolition charges. The troops that had demolished the massive impregnable fortress of Eben Emael were now about to be tested again.

  A massive explosion shook the Gate House, blasting away part of the wall that surrounded the embrasure and shocking the gun crews behind it senseless. Dust and smoke billowed up in a huge mushroom, and engineers pushed on through the soot and broken rock to penetrate the breach.

  High above, the wail of a diving Stuka was heard, which delivered a 500 pound bomb to score a direct hit on the nearby Queen Charlotte’s Battery. By 03:00 the ancient fortification that had stood for over 1200 years was being reduced with the fire and steel of modern weapons it had never been built to oppose.

  Meanwhile, Groth’s mountain troops had gained access to the upper gallery but, as the alarms went out, Liddell rushed a platoon of the Black Watch, his reserve force inside the Rock, to block their migration down to the Middle Gallery. The pipes played the quick march with drum and skirl, and the strains of “Highland Laddie” echoed through the labyrinth, giving heart to the defenders outside. But as the sun fell lower and the long shadows of the mountains behind Algeciras began to creep over the waters of the bay toward the harbor, it was clear that the weight of the German forces was becoming decisive.

  They now had three battalions of combat engineers, the 98th Mountain Regiment and the Grossdeutschland Regiment all on the line, with the Brandenburgers mixed in and fighting their way down the west coast to take the King’s Bastion near the old Coaling Island. Sir Clive Liddell was evacuating the Governor’s residence where he had set up his headquarters, and heading for the relative safety of the tunnels under the Rock.

  Outnumbered three battalions to one, the 4th Devonshires were slowly pushed back, and Liddell had to make a crucial decision. Should he order them to fall back through the town, continuing to bar the way to the main wharf, or should he pull them east up the switchback roads that climbed to Devil’s Gap and the Signals Station beyond? That choice would see his entire force pressed back against the Rock itself, and eventually shut inside. It would also leave the Destroyer Camber, Main Wharf and docks, and the whole of Rosia Bay open to the enemy advance. All the service troops, shore batteries, and AA guns on Windmill Hill and Europa Flats would be effectively thrown to the wolves, along with any hope that the Royal Navy might land reinforcements in the south. He was literally between the Devil and the deep blue sea, now, or more to the point, between the Rock and a hard place.

  Liddell was not yet ready to concede all that ground and lock his infantry up in the fortress tunnels, and so he ordered the 4th Devonshire Battalion to fight for every building, store, and house in the town. The one burning question in his mind now was what had happened to the Royal Navy? The force that Gibraltar was there to support and maintain had seemingly deserted the men of the Rock in their hour of greatest need.

  Yet that was not so.

  Part XII

  Valiant

  “You are well aware that it is not numbers or strength that bring the victories in war. No, it is when one side goes against the enemy with the gods' gift of a stronger morale, that their adversaries, as a rule, cannot withstand them.”

  ― Xenophon, The Persian Expedition

  Chapter 34

  Lieutenant Dawes had spent two hours at the hospital and finally had his shoulder wound cleaned up, stitched
and bandaged. The medic seemed upset to be bothering with him, and Dawes had the distinct feeling that the man bore him some animosity. This was confirmed when he slipped on his officer’s jacket and began making his way to the door, pressing through the crowded room past men with much more serious wounds.

  “Bloody officers,” he heard the medic mutter under his breath. “Sit about while the rest of this lot carries the burden, eh?”

  Dawes gave the man a look over his shoulder, but said nothing. In fact he felt a bit wilted by the remark, and resolved to try and find something more to do. There were men here that looked like they would surely lose an arm or leg, and others with head wounds that still darkened the bandages with clotted blood. Then there were those silent stretchers, where men lay with their faces covered with woolen blankets, and all too many of them.

  Dawes had retreated from the hospital as the Germans closed in, the harsh tang of blood and death on the air, and was soon swept up in the general withdrawal south through the town towards the Main Wharf. It was there, by Dock Number 3, that he finally came across a senior officer, a colonel in the 9th AA Regiment. He stepped up smartly and saluted, but the Colonel was too busy shouting at a 3.7-inch gun crew to notice him. Finally he gave him a sour look.

  “Yes?”

  “Lieutenant Dawes, sir. I was Duty Officer on the North Mole Tower, but have no assignment now.”

  “North Mole? The German’s took that this morning.”

  “Right sir. Well I’ve been pushed out with all the rest, and I’m looking to take a new post.”

  “Well you might get up Breakneck Stair, or down to Europa Point to see what’s going on. They’re moving the 25 pounders north, and you could lend a hand.”

  “Good enough sir. I know the Windmill Hill area fairly well.” Dawes saluted again and was off, feeling just a bit better now that he had some sense of direction and purpose again. He remembered there was a battery of 25 pounders sited near the Georgian building known as “Bleak House,” which had become the R.A. Officer’s Mess. He had eaten there a few times, but had come to feel it was too posh for his liking. Some of the officers even took to dining in their dress uniforms, which he felt a bit odd given the more casual atmosphere of Gibraltar, where one was just as likely to see a subaltern running about bare headed and shirtless on the job.

  Breakneck Stair was well named, a circuitous and sometimes steep route up the flanks of a long plateau that sat beneath Saint Michael’s Cave. As the road doubled back on itself, you would just keep craning your neck and looking up to see how much more of a trek it was before you got to the top. But Dawes decided to head for Windmill Hill by taking the road down past the other two military hospitals, and the Naval Signals Station. It would take him right up through a notch to the Windmill Hill, and from there he knew of a rickety old ladder down the side of the ridge that would land him very near the battery he had in mind.

  The farther he got from the town and docks, the better he felt, and he realized the sound of the fighting, and sight of the wounded men, had jangled his nerves a bit. He went down the road past Buena Villa east of Rosia Bay, mixed in with a stream of men slogging their way towards the Naval Hospital. The sun was low and dusk at hand, and he realized how very hungry he was. It was worth taking a peek at Bleak House to see if anything was being served, and he didn’t think anyone would be swanking about there with a war on today.

  Before he got there, however, he passed by the Naval Signals Station where there seemed to be quite a stir. Men were cheering and seemed well worked up over something, so he stuck his nose in through the door to see what was happening.

  “What’s up here?” he ask a ranker by the door.

  “Royal Navy’s coming, sir!” The private gave him a toothy grin. “Just got the signal in a moment ago. There’s to be no searchlights switched on after midnight.”

  Dawes raised an eyebrow. “Good show,” he said. Then he was on his way again. The Royal Navy had scooted out 24 hours before the Germans launched the attack. That told him the up and ups knew what Jerry was about, and now, with this news, he realized the move must have been well planned all along. He smiled, his steps just a little lighter, and soon became part of the news bustling south along the cobblestone roads as he made his way towards the ladder down to Europa Point.

  The Royal Navy was coming home again! Let’s see how the Germans like it when old Rodney and Nelson let loose with those big 16-inch guns.

  * * *

  Admiral Somerville had taken Force H out into the western approaches to the straits, where the twelve fighters off HMS Hermes had sparred briefly with the Luftwaffe that day. When the Germans had achieved their primary goal in driving the British fleet off, they then turned the weight of their air power on Gibraltar itself. As darkness fell on the first day Somerville paced on the bridge of the battleship Nelson.

  The news coming from the Rock was grim after the first day of battle. The Germans had overrun the airfield and cemetery, seized the North Mole, Grand Casemates, and were blasting away at the old Moorish Castle. Some few had managed to scale the precipitous north face and were inside the upper gallery, though that incursion had been contained by the timely arrival of troops from the Black Watch. It was the British position along Devil’s Road and the high ground behind it near the old Windsor Battery that seemed to be the focus of German attention now, along with continuing house to house fighting in the town itself.

  To make matters worse, the French had sortied with the battleship Normandie from Dakar, and this ship had sailed north with lighter escorts to join with Jean Bart off Casablanca. Somerville believed the move to be defensive in nature, and an attempt to forestall any possible British move against Casablanca, but the fact remained that these two dangerous ships were at large to the south, and Force H would have to post a watch. The Admiralty had already been forced to cancel O.A. and O.B. series convoys out of the UK, and several already at sea had been ordered to disperse over 100 ships. There were also 97 merchantmen at sea in three northbound convoys in the SL series out of Sierra Leone and bound for Liverpool. That was a lot of merchant traffic to look after, and there would be no help coming from Home Fleet. The Germans were also on the move.

  Now the Admiralty was in a quandary over what to do about Gibraltar. The situation reports, and plans already underway to occupy the Azores, were ample testimony to the fact that Their Lordships did not believe Gibraltar could be saved. Though Churchill bristled at the thought of losing the Rock, a long time symbol of British power, the practical necessities of war now weighed heavily in the matter. He first lobbied to advance the scheduled October departure for WS3, a “Winston Special” troop convoy planning to deliver reinforcements to Egypt. Might these troops get down to the Rock instead?

  The Admiralty was of a mind that they would be at grave risk trying to reach Gibraltar and laid out the situation in no uncertain terms. The convoy was comprised of fast troop liners, like Georgic, Duchess Of York, and other smaller liners like Oropesa, Dorset, Highland Brigade and Perthshire. The harbor was presently contested, and so the ships would have only lifeboats available to try and put troops ashore, all under German air attack from Stukas and also exposed to shore batteries in Spanish Morocco.

  The memory of the great disaster during the evacuation at Brest was still too fresh in the Admiralty’s mind. There the liner Lancastria had been sunk by German bombers with her decks packed with troops, and over 5800 died in one awful blow. It could not be allowed to happen again. A reinforcement for Gibraltar was therefore deemed impossible at this time, and quickly put out of the question.

  Churchill then turned his eyes on further operations against the Cape Verde and Canary Islands with these troops, but the Admiralty argued that the reinforcement might best remain on schedule for Egypt, which would now need all the support it could get. What about the forces still lodged at Freetown from the aborted attack on Dakar? Might they have another go there? At this the Admiralty reminded Churchill that the battleship Richeli
eu was still anchored at Dakar from the latest intelligence reports, making a landing there another chancy prospect.

  Churchill was at his wits end. “Here we have two Royal Marine Brigades sitting about on their thumbs in this dire hour, and doing nothing!” He continued to demand that every effort be made to make use of these troops, and so all the plans that had been spun out for Operation Puma and the Canaries, and Operation Shrapnel for the Cape Verde Islands were suddenly being put in motion.

  In the meantime, Somerville rankled at the thought that he had been forced to slip away with Force H just when Gibraltar most needed him. He knew that he had to keep a strong force at sea, but he had three battleships, and proposed that he send one in a daring night raid to pound German positions and at least make a showing. The Admiralty waffled at this, pointing out that the moon was full and the Germans had been mounting continued night raids with JU-88s. They finally gave their grudging approval, urged on again by Churchill, who saw the move as almost a necessity. “The thunder of the guns of the Royal Navy must be heard to echo through the corridors of that embattled fortress, and will resound on through all the years to come,” he argued with styled elegance. HMS Valiant was therefore selected and ordered to detach on the night of the 16th of September.

  To guard against the possibility of U-boat attack, Valiant would be given a strong escort of destroyers, and a light AA cruiser, Coventry, for added air defense. The mission was to make a quick run through the straits, let the guns roar in reprisal against German positions in the north and La Linea, and then get out with equal alacrity. They were on their way at 20:30, just after sunset, with the full moon already rising low above the horizon to the east and painting the way in a shimmering glow on the sea.