The Long Range Desert Group in World War II

by Gavin Mortimer

  A group of recruits on their way to their first parachute jump from an aircraft. (Courtesy of Jack Valenti)

  The aircraft approached the DZ at a height of 500ft, the LRDG men making their final preparations for the jump. Murphy heard the engine throttle back. Any second now. The despatcher yelled ‘Action stations!’ and the men began shuffling towards the despatch door, their eyes fixed on the red light as they waited for it to turn green. The moment it did, the first man, Captain Greenwood, was out of the door. His comrades followed in quick succession. Murphy had made several practice jumps from a plane, but this was his first combat drop. ‘The slipstream hits me with terrific force,’ he wrote in his diary. ‘I am picked up and tossed about like a cork on the ocean. After what seems like an eternity – but is actually less than two seconds – there is a tug on my shoulders and I am airborne, swaying gently from side to side.’14

  The surge of relief at seeing his chute open was fleeting. As Murphy looked down and picked out the village of Lama to his right, he heard a sound. Was it a shot? The next moment ‘red and green Verey lights are seen going up in all directions’. Horribly exposed on the end of his parachute, Murphy willed the ground to come up to meet him. Then, to his further dismay, he saw that he wasn’t landing in a field but on an orchard of small trees. ‘I endeavour to protect myself as best I can against the branches,’ he said. ‘There is a sharp crack as my feet strike a branch and it breaks away from the tree and the next instant I am lying in a heap on the ground.’15 In a second Murphy was up and wriggling out of harness, listening to the ‘noise of motor cars and track vehicles’ approaching. With his parachute rolled up and under his arm, Murphy set off to find his comrades, but despite a thorough search of the orchard he found no one. In the meantime, the Germans were pouring out of their lorries and conducting an extensive sweep of the area. Within a short space of time they had captured four of the seven LRDG men.

  Two of Eastwood’s patrol take a break from calling in RAF strikes on German targets in Albania. In one such aerial assault 1,500 enemy soldiers were killed. (Courtesy of the SAS Regimental Archive)

  Murphy was spotted as dawn broke on 15 November, just as he was looking for a suitable spot in which to hide for the rest of the day. He turned and fled in the other direction towards a cornfield, ‘when lo and behold seven Germans armed with automatic rifles popped up from the other side of the hill’. He ducked instinctively as the Germans opened fire, but ‘fear of capture lent me wings and I was soon out of sight’. He sucked in some air, then made a sharp turn to his right for 100 yards before doubling back in the hope he would throw the Germans off his trail. ‘It was successful,’ he wrote. ‘I heard them shouting below me and firing as they went. Now to get over the hill and I should be safe.’16 Murphy quickened his step, anxious to be clear of the Germans as the sun began to rise. He was almost at the crest of the hill. Once over, he would be out of sight and on his way back to the Allied lines. Suddenly, figures rose from the cornfield. Murphy started and then ‘my heart sank’. They were Germans, all pointing their weapons his way. ‘I was a prisoner.’17

  Murphy didn’t know it, but he was the last of the patrol to be captured. Greenwood and another soldier, Ford, had independently evaded the German net and in due course reached Allied lines. The other four LRDG soldiers had been rounded up before dawn, and when Murphy was marched back to the village word had quickly spread of the drama that had unfolded during the night. For the Italian villagers the sight of a British soldier, even a captured one, was like the first drop of rain after a long cruel drought. Soon, surely, the deluge would arrive. ‘The whole village turned out to gaze silently upon me as I was marched past,’ wrote Murphy. Most of them appeared sympathetic and tried to show their sympathy by a wave of the hand when my captors were not looking in their direction.’18

  Like all recently captured soldiers, Murphy would have felt a sense of disorientation and apprehension, a man who for the foreseeable future would eat, sleep and talk at the discretion of his captors. But he had no reason to fear for his life. Fortunately for him and the rest of his LRDG comrades, the Germans believed they were aircrew who had baled from their aircraft. This assumption was partly based on the fact the patrol sergeant, Gordon Harrison, was wearing a USAAF (United States Army Air Force) cap that he had swapped with an American airman in Italy for his LRDG beret. It was probably just as well, for German forces had been under instructions for more than 18 months to liquidate all captured Commandos and paratroopers once they had been forcefully interrogated by the Sicherheitsdienst (SD, the intelligence service of the SS). The Commando Order came from the Führer himself, Adolf Hitler’s response to an instruction allegedly issued by Allied commanders prior to the ill-fated Canadian raid on Dieppe in August 1942 to ‘bind prisoners’ captured in the operation. The Order was a closely guarded secret within the German military, but already a dozen SAS soldiers had been executed following their capture in Italy in 1943, and a fortnight after Murphy fell into German hands 34 SAS soldiers were murdered and buried in a mass grave in central France after their forest hideout was overrun by SS troops.

  The Allies learned of the Commando Order in the spring of 1944 after the escape of an SAS officer from captivity. A sympathetic German doctor had informed the British soldier of his likely fate, and then connived in his flight from a military hospital. Yet the prevailing view among the Allied high command was one of scepticism, that it was probably nothing more than a scare tactic, ‘an interrogation technique’.‡

  Murphy was taken into an upstairs room in a house in Lama. Nothing was said to him, and nor was he manhandled. But a German guarded the window and another the door. Appreciating that there was no chance of escape, Murphy ‘sat on the floor with my back propped up against the wall. I soon found thoughts wandering back over my many and varied experiences since I had joined the Long Range Desert Group. It was a good life … there had been plenty of thrills and a great deal of excitement.’19

  A local woman fetches water watched by members of Eastwood’s patrol. (Courtesy of the SAS Regimental Archive)

  C HAPTER 16

  VALOUR AND VERSATILITY

  The responsibility for the failure of three of the four patrols dropped into Italy rested largely with Lloyd Owen. Understandably keen to see the unit back in action after the events of November 1943 on Leros, he had thrown caution to the winds in selecting drop zones too close to the enemy front line. He should have remembered the old maxim from the desert days: 500 miles behind enemy lines is safer than 50 miles. When a special forces soldier is 500 miles inside the enemy’s territory his opponent’s guard is down because they assume themselves to be safe, but at 50 miles they’re on alert. In addition, what had been asked of the LRDG patrols in Italy wasn’t what they’d been trained for. They had done a brief parachute training course, but landing in enemy territory with several canisters of weapons and supplies required experience. The brutal truth was the LRDG still had a desert war mentality; operating in vast uninhabited regions where survival more often than not depended on a man’s will, wit and initiative. In Europe, one never knew what lay round the corner and one never knew who one could trust.

  The LRDG pose for a photo with locals at Bolabani on the Istria Peninsula. (Courtesy of the SAS Regimental Archive)

  As for A Squadron, the Rhodesian Squadron, by the middle of June their role changed from carrying out purely reconnaissance operations on the Dalmatian Islands to combining them with offensive action against enemy targets. Wishing to have the self-sufficiency and independence that the LRDG had enjoyed in North Africa, Lloyd Owen procured the unit’s very own vessel, the motor fishing vessel La Palma, which allowed them to operate without having to rely on the Royal Navy, who might not always be able to meet the LRDG’s requirements. La Palma’s maiden voyage was to the island of Vis in June, her crew of nine taking seven and a half hours to cover the 70 miles. It was the first of many such trips, the aim of which was to either report on enemy shipping so that the RA
F or Royal Navy could launch an attack, or so that small raiding parties could harass enemy shipping or installations on lightly held islands.

  In the same month, Captain Stan Eastwood and five men, including an interpreter and Albanian guide, landed at Orso Bay on the Albanian coast. A German observation post was believed to be located somewhere on the stretch of coastline, and Eastwood was ‘to liquidate it’ because it was reporting the movements of Allied shipping. They located the target, but it was too much for their party to tackle, comprising ‘a rectangular concrete building of seven rooms with a flat roof camouflaged to look like an ordinary house with a pitched roof, the eastern portion giving the appearance of having fallen in’.1 On the roof, noted Eastwood, was a square lookout with slits for guns, and one, sometimes two, sentries were also on duty in the tower. Additionally two corners of the buildings were augmented with pillboxes, ‘the gun slits in which would permit their combined fire to cover a 360-degree radius’. If that wasn’t formidable enough, a double apron barbed-wire fence encircled the position at a distance of 40 yards.

  Eastwood radioed a report to Force 266 and it was decided to mount a combined operation with three RN Hunt-class destroyers as well as a couple of rapid Italian torpedo boats. David Lloyd Owen delegated command of the land operation to Captain Tony Browne, one of the original New Zealand contingent in the LRDG, who had just wangled his return to the unit after several months away. Then, at the last moment, Lloyd Owen came along for the ride. ‘I had not been on active operations for so long,’ he said, ‘and I was beginning to feel stale and tired. I wanted a breath of fresh air again.’2

  In all, there were 35 men from the LRDG in the torpedo boats that raced east across the Adriatic from Brindisi. Stan Eastwood signalled them in and when dawn broke at 0415 hours they were safely ashore. ‘We had to get away from the beach and it took us nearly five hours to move a few miles over rough and rocky country to where there was thick cover under some trees,’ recalled Lloyd Owen.3 He, Eastwood and Browne left the rest of the party among the trees and climbed to a boulder-strewn ridge 1,200 feet above sea level. In the far distance they could see the town of Valona bathed in morning light. Nearer, just 1,000 yards across a scrub-covered ravine, was the target. It was indeed formidably defended, said Lloyd Owen, observing the target, but he was confident all the same that its obliteration wouldn’t pose much of a problem. The plan, he said, was simple: ‘We would move to within seven hundred yards of the target at dusk and then await the blitz of the three destroyers. When these had done their best the final assault would be led by Stan. We were to be in touch with the destroyers by wireless, and had brought a trained gunnery officer with us to control their fire.’4

  LA PALMA

  La Palma was the motorized fishing vessel acquired by the LRDG in the summer of 1944 so they would not be reliant on the Royal Navy to transport them to targets. (Courtesy of Jack Valenti)

  The maiden voyage of La Palma was to the island of Vis in June 1944 with the boat taking seven and a half hours to cover the seventy miles. (Courtesy of Jack Valenti)

  La Palma had a crew of nine and proved invaluable through the second half of 1944 and early 1945 as the LRDG stepped up their shipping watches from remote Adriatic islands. (Courtesy of Jack Valenti)

  The traditional Albanian headwear kept the LRDG warm during their time in the Balkans, as did the captured German helmet of this soldier. (Courtesy of the SAS Regimental Archive)

  They spent the day under cover, checking their weapons, checking their watches, eating, dozing, thinking. At sundown Eastwood led the assault force into position, while Lloyd Owen and the gunnery officer climbed to a point where they could see the three destroyers. It was a moment of high suspense, one where the LRDG were at the mercy of the Royal Navy’s guns. A few hundred yards of inaccuracy could have deadly consequences. ‘The silence was a little weird, but fascinating at the same time,’ reflected Lloyd Owen, as he stared at the ‘dark and sinister forms on the gentle ripple of water’.5

  At 2325 hours Lloyd Owen flashed the agreed signal, and the officer confirmed their position and that of the target by radio. Five minutes later, bang on time, a star shell illuminated the coastline, followed a few seconds later by ‘the first ranging shot [which] tore through the air and struck the mountainside a little below the target’. Then the bombardment began and 12-gun salvoes from the three destroyers screamed down on the observation post. The ground shook beneath the LRDG men and great chunks of rock cascaded into the ravine. As for the target, that was obscured in a storm cloud of dust. Eastwood radioed for some more star shells. As they burst overhead, he saw that the observation post ‘needed another dose’. After the second short bombardment, Eastwood and his men moved towards the target in a line abreast. Through the dust they saw 150 yards away four Germans staggering from the post. Eastwood called on them to surrender. They didn’t respond, so they were shot. Three other Germans emerged with their hands above their head and were taken into captivity. Eastwood grabbed one and together they entered the ruins of the observation post. But there was no further resistance, and from the doorway of the house, Eastwood fired three long bursts of tracer into the air and then flashed three times with the torch towards Lloyd Owen’s position. It was the signal for the successful completion of their objective. By 0300 hours, the LRDG were on the beach with ‘three miserable weeping Germans’, and half an hour later a whaler arrived and transported them onto one of the destroyers, HMS Terpsichore.

  A change of clothes, a hearty breakfast and then a moment to reflect on the mission. Three prisoners, one casualty (a slight ‘friendly fire’ wound to one of Eastwood‘s party from a naval shell splinter) and the destruction of the observation post. It was hardly a major setback for the Germans, acknowledged Lloyd Owen, but the principal result of the first Allied raid launched from Italy ‘lay in the uneasiness which the enemy was to feel along the whole of their Adriatic coast’. What was more, the Royal Navy had had a good time, the captain of HMS Terpsichore sending Lloyd Owen a letter thanking him ‘for a good evening’s entertainment and for providing the live exhibits in the form of the first Germans many of my sailors have seen’.6

  There was a minor reorganization in August, with the LRDG being placed under the operational command of the Land Forces Adriatic [LFA] on the 14th of the month. The HQ of the LFA was in Bari, and it was here that missions and raids were planned. ‘The prime task of the LRDG was to provide reconnaissance for the striking forces of all three Services [army, navy, air force],’ wrote Captain Stuart Manning. ‘When the LFA attacked targets, the LRDG had to be prepared to mark landing beaches or dropping zones and provide guides to lying-up places or targets.’7

  One such target was a railway bridge over a gorge inland from Gruda, a village approximately 20 miles south of the port of Dubrovnik in Croatia. On 19 August, an LRDG patrol of five men, commanded by Captain David Skipworth, left Italy in a motor launch to reconnoitre the area. One of the men was Sergeant Fred Leach, erstwhile of the Scots Guards, and a veteran of the LRDG’s desert days. ‘Having found suitable landing 10 to 15 miles south of Dubrovnik [we] moved off inland to a thick wooded area,’ he remembered. They made contact with a group of partisans who invited them to their camp. ‘The offer was accepted,’ said Leach. ‘Trouble was to understand each other, but they had plenty of food, mostly British, and the site was ideal for the patrol’s purpose.’8 The next few days were spent surveying the area, and observing the target. ‘The peace and quiet was uncanny,’ recalled Leach. ‘There was no sign of troops, army trucks or heavy weapons anywhere. The local farmers and others just carried out their work as usual.’9

  Satisfied that the bridge was a viable target, the LRDG communicated the fact to the LFA HQ in Bari, and on the evening of 27 August a 12-strong raiding party came ashore from a motor launch. Eleven of the men were from the SBS, the twelfth a demolitions expert from the Royal Engineers. They were commanded by Captain Anders Lassen, a fearsome and fearless Danish officer who had three mi
litary crosses to his name, and also among their number was Sergeant Dick Holmes, a recipient of the Military Medal for his courage during an SBS raid on Crete the previous year. ‘We were all carrying two rucksacks,’ recalled Holmes. ‘One contained our own kit and the other fifty pounds of plastic explosive.’10

  The route inland was treacherous, particularly at night, but the SBS were guided to the partisans’ camp by the LRDG. The next day the SBS observed the target in the presence of the LRDG and it was agreed that they would destroy it on the night of 30 August. Reaching the target without obstruction, the raiders attached electric charges to each of the bridge’s abutments while the Royal Engineers’ corporal made a junction box with a primer cord to each charge. Within a few minutes, 500lb of explosive were in place and ready to blow. Once the wiring from the charges to the plunger was in place, the men sheltered behind a large rock 200 feet from the bridge. Holmes was given the job of blowing the bridge. ‘On the count of three I pressed down on the plunger but nothing happened, there was no proper connection,’ remembered Holmes. ‘I tried again but [had] the same result.’11

  Three LRDG soldiers lunch at Chersicia on the Istria Peninsula. (Courtesy of the SAS Regimental Archive)