Airborne

by Robert Radcliffe

  ‘Gammon!’ the corporal roared. Their tank was trying to reverse, its turret ablaze, engine protesting. Crack went the Boys again. Frantically he unscrewed another bomb and held it for the corporal, who hurled it at the monster, before vanishing round the corner in pursuit.

  Then it was over, the attack repulsed. Gradually the sound of gunfire and engines receded; soon it petered out altogether, leaving only the crackle of flames, the occasional parting shot, and the triumphant cries of the Scotsmen. He ventured from behind the shed. Thick smoke drifted over the field; two tanks stood stranded, furiously ablaze, while a third limped away trailing smoke. The remaining three had escaped to the trees. The infantry too had vanished, leaving their casualties scattered about the yard. He counted at least twenty, with indentations in the grass showing where more had fallen. To one side a gaggle of survivors stood under guard, their hands on their heads. He propped his unfired rifle against the wall and picked up his satchel. Report, he muttered to himself doggedly, I’m supposed to report the situation. But all he could think of was the Scotsmen. Like savages, he thought, brave and honourable, but with so much fury it had scared him, as it had scared the enemy who had withered before it. Like bloodlust. If that’s what’s needed, he reflected, opening his notebook, if that’s what you need to fight a war, then I don’t have it.

  ‘All right, laddie?’ The corporal reappeared. A-reet, it sounded like.

  ‘Yes, thank you. Um, I suppose we won.’

  ‘Aye, we did that.’ He cupped a lighter to his cigarette.

  ‘And so what happens now?’

  ‘We fall back.’

  ‘Back? But if we’ve beaten them…’

  ‘We’ve done no such thing, laddie. We’ve driven them off. But they’ll be back, and double the strength’ – he eyed the sky – ‘soon as they’ve called in the Stukas.’

  ‘What do we do?’

  ‘We? We pull back to the railway, dig in, get some scoff and await orders. You go see the lieutenant and be on your way.’

  ‘Oh.’ He stared at his notebook, shaking in his hand.

  ‘It’s called a fighting retreat, laddie. Stick that in your report.’

  ‘Right. Yes, I will.’

  ‘You did all right. With the Gammons and that.’

  A-reet, he found himself writing, then remembered Wilson’s instruction: Get some bloody names. ‘Thank you, um, Corporal…’

  ‘Guthrie. Niall Guthrie, the Gordon Highlanders.’

  *

  He pedalled back to Blangy to make his report. Dusk was descending; a fine rain fell. On the way he noticed that the positions he’d seen soldiers in earlier were now deserted. Some showed signs of fighting: empty shell cases, an abandoned mortar, a burned-out truck. By the time he reached Blangy it was dark and he was wet through. He had not eaten since his sandwich of the morning. Dimly he wondered about Kenny, and what he’d make of his day.

  But Kenny was gone. He turned along the track to the command post, only to find it empty. Everything – tents, caravans, lorries, motorcycles – all packed and gone like the travelling gypsy fairs of his childhood. He stared around the darkened clearing. Somewhere above the hiss of rain came the rumble of motor traffic, then distant shouts and the revving of engines. He set off towards it, pedalling head down along a woodland track until he broke out on to a main road.

  A column of men and machines filled the road in both directions as far as he could see. Lit by torchlight and slitted headlights, it moved slowly through the night like a giant shadowy insect. The sound was of trudging boots and grinding gears; the smell was dank woodland, engine exhaust and cigarettes. Here and there a hoarse laugh or ribald curse rose above the murmur, and far up the column he thought he heard singing. Mostly they moved in silence.

  A dispatch rider sped up on a motorcycle. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Trickey. I was supposed to report to Major Wilson.’

  ‘Wilson? What unit?’

  ‘I… I don’t know. He was at the command post, back there.’

  ‘CP’s long gone, mate, Christ knows where. You’d better fall in with this lot.’

  ‘Where’s it going?’

  ‘Back.’

  ‘Have you seen Private Rollings? He’s—’ But the rider sped off.

  He found himself amid a company of Sherwood Foresters. They were not Scottish, they explained emphatically, but merely attached to 51st Highland Division ‘for the duration’. After teasing him about his name, accent and strange manner, they welcomed him into their midst, feeding him ration-pack stew and hoarded chocolate.

  ‘So, Tricky-dicky, where you sprung from, lad?’

  ‘Well, it’s a place called Bolzano, in the South Tyrol.’

  ‘That’s Ireland, ain’t it?’

  ‘Um, no, it’s…’

  ‘Not where, I mean what unit, you tit!’

  ‘Oh, sorry. I’m from 2/6th Territorials, the East Surreys.’

  ‘Christ, they’re sending up the useless mouths.’

  ‘We must be in the shite.’

  It was an expression he’d begun to hear, to describe non-fighting support staff, like him. Useless mouths. It was not meant appreciatively.

  They walked all night. After a while the rain stopped and the clouds broke to a ragged overcast. Weariness overcame him and he fell into a trance-like rhythm beside his bike which rattled and clicked at his side like a mechanical pet. Towards dawn the column faltered to a halt. Immediately the Foresters began boiling water for tea. Theo slumped down on the verge and dozed off.

  A strident voice woke him. ‘D Company fall in!’

  ‘That’s us, lads, come on, jump to it.’

  He struggled groggily awake. Gradually the memories came: the miles of cycling, the mortar bombardment, Corporal Guthrie, the Gammon grenades and the battle with the tanks, and finally walking all night in the rain with the Sherwood Foresters. He was still among them, he noted, gazing sleepily around, perhaps a hundred men strung out on a road beside a wood. But the rest of the column was nowhere to be seen.

  He yawned. ‘Where is everyone?’

  ‘Oh look, it’s Sleeping Beauty!’

  ‘Come on, Dicky boy, shake a leg.’

  He rose to his feet, brushing moss from his tunic. Around him the others were assembling their kit. ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘Column left two hours ago. We’re covering the rear, lucky us. Oops—’

  A sergeant was striding up. ‘Who the hell’s this?’

  ‘Dunno, Sarge, runner from HQ gone astray. Latched on to us last night.’

  ‘HQ? Fuck’s sake, what’s his name?’

  ‘Ted Dicky. He’s Irish. Useless mouth from the East Surreys.’

  ‘Right, Dicky, who’s your commanding officer?’

  ‘I, well, there was, um, Captain Wells, back in Caen, then sort of a Lieutenant Somebody at General Fortune’s HQ, then, oh, Major Wilson yesterday, but then another lieutenant at Saint-Léger, I wrote down his name here—’

  ‘STUKAS!’

  They fell from above like gannets from a cliff, the screaming engines, the whining sirens, the whistling bombs, just as before. The Foresters moved fast, diving under vehicles and into ditches, but the Stukas were faster, dropping their loads with deadly precision before pulling round to attack with machine guns. Theo, face down in the ditch, felt the earth jump beneath him, and the deafening concussion as the two bombs hit, and then the spattering of earth and stones on his back and legs. The engines receded; he looked up to see the two black shapes banked hard over, circling round for the second pass. On the road lay the wreckage of man and machine: a three-ton lorry blown on its back, a radio truck ablaze, weapons and equipment scattered. And where seconds before men had stood, joked and chatted, now they lay strewn about a smoking hole in the ground. Some were dead; some to his horror were not. He saw a man crawling, both legs blown to bloody stumps; another staggered to his feet holding a gaping wound in his stomach; a third lay on his back screaming for help. But the Stukas wer
e returning and there was no time to help. Even as he watched, the Foresters were running for the trees, but also for position, he realized, many of them hastily manning weapons – a Vickers machine gun on a trailer, a Bren recovered from a ditch, rifles and small arms everywhere – and as the Stukas thundered in for their second pass, the Foresters opened up with them all. But to no avail, and in seconds the bombers were gone, and silence descended on the road once more.

  There was nothing to do but continue as before. The dead were buried, the wounded attended to, smashed equipment discarded, then the company finally formed up into its three platoons, and an officer appeared to address them. Meades, his name was, Theo recorded, a captain, also noting he looked youthful, and world-weary beyond his years.

  ‘These air attacks will only get worse.’ Meades glanced at the bloodstained road. ‘We must be more vigilant and not get caught in the open. So now we’re ordered to hold out here until tonight, then withdraw to a new line being formed ten miles west. The 51st will stand and repel the enemy advance from there.’

  ‘That’s what they said last time!’ someone quipped.

  ‘And the time before that!’

  ‘I know.’ Meades held up a hand. ‘I know, but there it is. Now, I want everyone well dug-in. Number 1 Platoon, you cover the road from that copse over there. Number 2, you’re the other side: set up a mortar section behind that mound…’

  The briefing went on; then at the end Meades asked for questions.

  ‘What about the BEF, sir?’ someone said. ‘I mean, what’s happened to it?’

  ‘Well, there’re rumours – unconfirmed, mind you – coming over the radio that some sort of evacuation’s taken place. By the navy, off the coast somewhere up north.’

  ‘What, all of them?’

  ‘Most of them, apparently.’

  ‘Except us!’

  ‘Quite.’

  ‘And we’re supposed to stop the whole German bleeding army.’

  ‘Indeed, so dig in well. Now, I gather we’ve a runner from Divisional HQ with us. A Private Dick from the Irish Fusiliers, is that right? Dick, could you see me please.’

  Theo, it transpired, would not be staying with the Sherwood Foresters. Instead he was to rejoin the main column, taking two orderlies and three seriously wounded with him. On a pushcart.

  ‘I’d let you have a vehicle but we’ve none to spare,’ Meades explained, handing him a bundle of papers. ‘Now listen, these are for my battalion commander, Colonel Graveney, and there’s duplicates for Div HQ just in case. Stick to the back roads, don’t tangle with the enemy, and for God’s sake watch out for Stukas.’

  Departure was delayed. As the cart was being loaded, one of the wounded, the man with severed legs, died, so there was a pause while he was unloaded and buried. Then, with the remaining two casualties, their kitbags, weapons and Theo’s bicycle piled aboard, they set off. A hundred yards up the road he heard a cry: ‘Ta-ta, Dicky boy!’ and turned to wave, touched suddenly by the poignancy of the scene. A single company of Foresters, fewer than a hundred men, with orders to hold off forty divisions.

  They walked all morning. The sky was clear, the summer sun hot, so soon they were shedding clothes, tying handkerchiefs on their heads and arranging shade for the two wounded, who remained unconscious from morphia. The cart had rubber tyres and two handles which the orderlies took turns at, while Theo was told to push from the side. They were regulars, both privates, called Foley and Stitt. Foley was from Derby and given to grumbling; Stitt came from Newark where he’d worked as a cobbler before joining up. A good pair of boots, Theo learned, was all a man really needed in life, while army boots apparently were ‘cack’. Neither showed any regard for Theo, who as a ‘useless part-timer’ was fair game for abuse. Insults flowed, and while Foley and Stitt alternated between pushing and walking, he was given no rest. ‘Put yer back in it, boy!’ was a frequent rejoinder. Fortunately the cart moved smoothly and the terrain was mostly flat, varying between open countryside and shady woodland, but when presented with an incline the efforts of all three were needed, and twice they had to unload one of the wounded to surmount a hill. As instructed they kept clear of major roads and stuck to lanes and tracks, using Theo’s compass for guidance, yet signs of war – discarded baggage, plodding refugees, abandoned military equipment – were never far from view. Towards noon they crested a rise to find they were travelling parallel to a main road about five miles to the south. Long lines of traffic moved along it in a westerly direction, throwing up clouds of dust that stretched for miles.

  ‘Civvies,’ Foley said, mopping his brow. ‘Refugees and that.’

  ‘You sure? Looks like military to me. French army probably.’

  ‘I tell you, Stitty, them’s civvies! Making for the city – what’s it called? – Rouen.’

  Theo took out his binoculars and steadied them on the cart. ‘They’re German.’

  ‘Don’t be bloody daft! How can they be?’

  His hands were rock steady this time, his breathing calm and even. There was no mistake: what he was seeing was a German armoured column, trucks, tanks and artillery, several miles long, moving at speed. They weren’t bothered about confronting the Allies, he realized, they were racing to overtake them. And cut them off. Again. He reached for his notebook. ‘They’re definitely German. Looks like a whole division.’

  The mood in the afternoon was subdued. Heat, fatigue, hunger and the realization that the enemy was not just behind them, but beside and also in front, curbed the urge for talk. Which remained mostly speculative.

  ‘So what d’you think, Stitty?’

  ‘Christ knows. The rate they’re going they’ll have us all surrounded.’

  ‘Yes, but our lot’ll send the BEF back to relieve us, surely.’

  ‘Re-equip a whole army? Then ship it over? It’d take weeks.’

  ‘They’ve got to do something. They can’t just wash their hands of us.’

  Theo only half listened. He was watching the casualty nearest him on the cart. He’d become restive as the morphia wore off; after a second injection he was now quieter, although his lips moved and his eyes sought Theo’s. Theo murmured reassurances as best he could, his mind pondering Stitt’s question. What if France goes? He thought back to Caen, to the carefree days of the 2/6th and 2nd Platoon and Kenny, to Thérèse and Georges and hot chocolate at the Café Gondrée. And Jeanette. How she came to him at night, walking beside him as he paced the bridge, and pressing herself to him when they kissed goodnight. What would happen to her if France fell?

  By evening they were catching the main column. Or scattered elements of it. They passed a stranded lorry, its crew busy changing a wheel, then an emplacement of Bofors anti-aircraft guns pointing skyward, a cluster of tents, and then discarded vehicles shoved in a field. A dispatch rider roared by on a motorcycle. More men appeared, until finally they arrived at a road junction controlled by a Transport Corps corporal wearing armbands.

  ‘Unit, lads?’

  ‘Sherwood Foresters, 2nd Battalion.’

  ‘Brigade?’

  ‘Christ knows.’

  ‘Blimey, more strays.’ He glanced at the injured men. ‘Right, there’s a dressing station a mile up the road. Get them dropped off, then report to Captain Willetts at the Logistics CP nearby. He’ll sort you from there.’

  ‘Um, I’m not with them.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m not a Forester.’

  ‘What are you then?’

  ‘Well, I’m a runner. Sort of. With Division HQ. I’ve got messages, and a report.’

  ‘Right. Division’s another five miles, straight on, follow signs for “Osmoy” village. They’re set up in some old pile back there.’

  He retrieved his rifle and bicycle, said goodbye to Foley and Stitt, and his casualty, who gripped his hand so tightly he had to ease it free. Then he pedalled off into the dusk. An hour later and after several false turns, he found the building, a decaying château set at the end of a drive. H
e parked his bike and entered a musty hallway with trestle tables set up for clerks, typists, telephonists and radio operators. About twenty people were busy working; he gave his name and Meades’s papers to a receptionist who sent him to the kitchens for food, then to a tattered armchair by the stairs. ‘Wait there,’ he was told. Within minutes he was asleep.

  He awoke to the sounds of exasperation.

  ‘The French are doing what?… But that leaves us wholly unsupported!… Supplies! Everything: ammunition, food, fuel, transportation, the lot, especially ammunition!’

  An officer was speaking angrily on the telephone. Portly of bearing, about forty, with red face and moustache, Theo recognized him as the general he and Kenny had seen two days earlier. General Fortune, officer commanding the 51st. Two aides stood at his side taking notes.

  ‘Le Havre? But that’s sixty miles, we’d never make it before… Hello? Hello!’ He slammed down the receiver. ‘We’re on our own,’ he fumed. ‘French are detaching most of the 10th Army to save Paris. They’re leaving us a division.’

  ‘What about the 2nd BEF?’

  ‘Too late, too far west. They’re pulling out through the Atlantic ports. Meanwhile we’re supposed to fall back to Le Havre for evacuation.’

  ‘As long as Jerry doesn’t get there first.’

  ‘Precisely. Rumour is they may already be north of Rouen. Although I find that hard to believe.’

  ‘Um, it’s true. I saw them.’

  Fortune looked up. ‘Who on earth are you?’

  ‘I’m Trickey.’

  ‘Hey!’ One of the aides stepped forward. ‘Don’t be bloody impertinent! Give your full name, rank and unit, and stand to attention before the general, damn you!’

  ‘Sorry, sir. Trickey, um, Theodor, 2/6th East Surreys. Private, well, Officer Cadet, um, Acting, that is, as I never finished—’

  ‘Stop mumbling! What the hell are you doing here?’

  ‘I, well, I was doing supplies, then was a runner for Major Wilson…’

  ‘Wilson? Who’s he?’

  The second aide spoke. ‘Isn’t he intelligence officer with 152 Brigade?’