A Doctor at War

by Matthew Hall

  On 23 January Herford learned that he had been promoted to the rank of Acting Major, and was posted as OC to the 16 Motor Ambulance Convoy. He felt that with only 12 months of service behind him, and given his almost complete ignorance of the King’s Regulations, the promotion was due in no small part to Johnny Johnston, who had recognized his 2nd I/C as a highly competent soldier.

  The last week of January did not augur well for the British campaign. Rommel was regrouping to the south-west of the area around Tobruk and Benghazi which were newly captured by the Allies. However, unknown to the Allied commanders, due to British misfortunes at sea, the German Army was being rapidly re-supplied via Tripoli. On 21 January Rommel sent three columns, each of approximately 1,000 motorized infantry, to test the Allied defences. The columns succeeded in slipping through the gaps left by the front-line infantry who were gathered together in strongpoints. This was an embarrassing gaffe for General Auchinleck. He had been caught napping, and now Rommel’s forces drove forward with a sudden ferocity which necessitated a rapid retreat. On 23 January Auchinleck wrote confidently to Churchill in a telegram:

  … it may well be that Rommel may be drawn on into a situation unfavourable to him… Am confident that General Ritchie is waiting for opportunity to force encounter battle in conditions which may be more favourable to us than those obtaining around Aghelia, with its swamps and bogs and bad going.

  The next day the news was a little worse. Auchinleck was forced to concede in his daily communication that:

  … [Rommel’s] initial advance seems to have disconcerted temporarily at any rate our forward troops… The situation has not developed quite as I should have liked, but I hope to turn it to our ultimate advantage.

  These shreds of hope were built on a total lack of appreciation of the extent to which the Germans had improved their supply lines. In the next few days they pushed forward with a vengeance, and re-took Benghazi, and much of the land to the south-east of Tobruk they had lost the previous year. It was a humiliating loss. Auchinleck tried hard to rationalize the defeat in his telegram to Churchill on 29 January:

  … It must be admitted that the enemy has succeeded beyond his expectations and mine, and that his tactics have been skilful and bold… Rommel has taken considerable risks and so have we. So far he is justified by results, but General Ritchie and I are seeking every possible means to turn the tables on him… There is no disorganisation, or confusion, nor any loss of morale as far as I can see.

  The latter statement contrasted markedly with the situation on the ground. The British retreat had to be as rapid as the German advance. Roads were cluttered with hundreds of retreating vehicles fleeing from the enemy with little organization or cohesion. Herford noted, in one of the few brisk diary entries he made, that the retreat was ‘Not impressive. Sloppy discipline and bad organisation.’ Herford had himself to organize a night retreat of an ambulance convoy. This was an exercise which was normally avoided at all costs in the desert, due firstly to the dangers of straying off course, and secondly to the problems of vehicles losing sight of one another in the darkness. The convoy was over 100 vehicles long. Herford decided there was only one technique which would work, which was to travel at no more than a few miles an hour. This was the only way to ensure that the tail vehicles did not get left behind. Without the use of headlights he had to navigate by the moon and stars alone. At one stage the column was bombed but the next morning they arrived at their destination, Charruba, having only suffered two casualties due to the aerial attack.

  The Allies held the line at Gazala and Tobruk, where they glared at the enemy until the end of May, neither side making a decisive move until Rommel again made a forward drive. Churchill cabled to Auchinleck:

  I am reluctantly compelled to the conclusion that to meet German armoured forces with any reasonable hope of decisive success our armoured forces as at present equipped, organised and led, must have at least two to one superiority.

  In fact British forces were inferior to the German forces at that stage, and so began a frantic effort to pour weaponry into the Middle East in time for the major confrontation which was to take place later in the year. The intervening months until May were a time of frenetic preparatory activity for the entire British Army. Although there was no large-scale confrontation, there was a constant background activity of aerial bombardment, and skirmishes at the ever-fluctuating front lines. Herford’s unit was kept busy constantly channelling in supplies to field ambulance units and removing casualties. Often these journeys were made over trackless desert where known locations were nothing more than a set of coordinates. These expeditions were a challenge in terms of navigation, but also a test of mettle in the sense that the risk of running into a German forward unit was constant. The desert was full of unknown quantities, and would not oblige at attempts to tame its ferocity.

  In all these excursions, Herford had the reputation of a man with limitless energy who would constantly drive others on to match his stamina. But this relentless pace could not be maintained indefinitely, and in late February he suffered a rare bout of illness. Suddenly his temperature rose to 102 degrees, he found himself sweating profusely and suffered acute abdominal and glandular pains. There was little treatment for these passing fevers other than bed rest, but time spent in inactivity, especially when accompanied by physical weakness, angered him considerably.

  The usual pastimes for men in their precious leisure hours were listening to the radio for news of developments at home and the progress of the war elsewhere, and writing letters home. Every word written by servicemen had to be censored, so although Herford wrote countless letters, he wrote virtually nothing about his work or the progress of the campaign. Interestingly, he was not nervous of committing to paper his personal and transient thoughts, which, in the hands of a more repressive regime, might have been taken to count against him. In February 1942 his sister Sylvia wrote, and spoke generally of her agitation at the wartime bureaucracy, and her amazement at the fact that conscription of labour should have taken so long in coming. In philosophical mood, Herford replied:

  … Total conscription of labour should have been introduced long ago. All employed by the nation. The Russians must find us incomprehensibly indefinite and slip-shod. How will it work out afterwards? Will home affairs tend to run in the same grooves as after the last war? ‘Anything for a footing anywhere’ and a mad rush to make money, spend madly and enjoy recklessly. I hope there will be a very advanced degree of Socialism. British Communism. However, we shall each have our little worlds, homes and interests. Humanity is very stupid in the mass, but the world is still young…

  Herford was not an overtly political man, and never became one. The hopes he expressed in this letter were not based on any political dogma, but an intense desire for the tools of organization and good management to be brought to bear on the country as a whole. There was a feeling that the free for all in the 1930s had blinded politicians and public alike to the darker forces which were building up elsewhere in the world. There was an equal desire that the same mistakes would not be repeated once the war was over.

  That the British troops in the desert were fully expecting victory is beyond doubt. Major Johnston wrote to Herford’s father on 19 March 1942, ‘We’re all in great heart here, and I for one expect this war to be all over bar the cleaning up – and that will be a longish job – by late autumn of this year.’

  Herford’s letter to his parents of 15 March 1942 gives a more detailed insight into feelings at that moment:

  … Soon the hot weather will be here and then everything will dry up – till next year. Who, looking at the desert, would think that flowers were hidden? A little rain and the magic growth recurs.

  Days pass quickly and there is quite a lot to do although there is a general quiet. Soon I hope for events and for a success which has merely been delayed. Taking into consideration the whole world position, I am very optimistic. I think there are excellent reasons for thinking that German mor
ale and strength is on the ebb.

  It is the shape of things to come after the war that bewilders me. It seems to me that then may be the time we shall reap the evils of war. The transition from a war organisation to a new order of normal life will be a fearsome business.

  A final comment made in a letter to his parents dated 22 May 1942 provides an insight of a different kind into the preoccupations of soldiers out of touch with developments at home:

  When we hear of the freedoms and equality which have been granted to women, one cannot help thinking that great things will develop in the future. I firmly believe that the future of humanity is largely in the hands of the women!

  The optimism displayed by Herford and Johnston in their letters of the earlier part of 1942 turned out to be a little misplaced. The next decisive moves were to be made by Rommel. A strategic blunder by generals Auchinleck and Ritchie led to the situation whereby the port of Tobruk was instated as a major supply port for the Allied forces, yet was not considered sufficiently important for proper defences to be installed to ensure its safety. The Allies’ main priority was the defence of the Egyptian frontier, some 70 miles to the east, but Tobruk was a forward position; there was nothing of significance between it and the Egyptian border. Auchinleck did not want his army besieged in Tobruk, with the possibility that they would be destroyed and driven back into the sea.

  Unbeknown to the British War Cabinet, Auchinleck gave orders in February 1942 that should they be forced to withdraw from Tobruk, ‘… the place will be evacuated and the maximum amount of destruction carried out in it.’ As a result of these orders the town’s defences were allowed to dwindle. Mines were lifted for use elsewhere, anti-tank ditches silted up with drifting sand, and the wire perimeter fences were breached in many places for vehicles to pass in and out. The South African General Klopper, commanding the 2nd South African Division, was placed in charge of the town with 90 days’ supplies. In total about 35,000 men were in occupation. In the second week in June Rommel went vigorously on the offensive, driving the Allies eastwards. Herford’s 16 MAC moved back 20 miles in intense heat in which every metal object became unbearable to touch. There was a heavy air of pessimism as they were pushed further back towards Egypt. They had not been led to expect that the enemy had sufficient morale and resources to inflict this level of damage.

  Tobruk was swiftly surrounded by Rommel’s tanks and pounded with heavy gunfire. To the south-east all remaining British tanks were thrown into battle at the road junction in the desert known as ‘King’s Cross’, but the opposition was overwhelming them. Only a handful of tanks escaped and all British batteries were overrun. The Germans simply swamped the Allied forces with superior firepower. There was no realistic prospect of a relief column penetrating through to Tobruk for some days.

  General Klopper found himself in a bind. If he continued to resist he would lose many men, but if he tried to break out of the besieged town he would lose many more, due to an acute shortage of transport. Auchinleck urged him to keep on fighting, but on 21 June at dawn, to the amazement of many of his own officers, he offered the Germans his surrender, and 33,000 Allied troops were taken prisoner.

  The news of the fall of Tobruk was deeply galling to Herford and his colleagues. On the morning of the 21st a Kitty-Hawk pilot landed near their unit and told them the news. He had been ordered to reconnoitre the area still held by Klopper for a landing strip, but had aborted when he received a message that the surrender had been made. The next morning a jeep containing eight soldiers and a sergeant arrived. They looked exhausted and dejected. Herford asked the sergeant what had happened. He was almost incoherent with anger and frustration. ‘Tobruk’s fallen,’ he said, ‘and that South African in command gave an order that none of the vehicles were to be destroyed, but our Brigadier said, “To hell with this” and told us to break up into small groups and see how many of us could escape. Nobody put up a fight. We were just ordered to surrender.’ The impression gained by Herford and others in the theatre of operations (though whether it was rumour or based on fact remains uncertain) was that the South African troops and their leader were of doubtful loyalty. Many were Boers who still harboured a long-standing grudge against the British, and didn’t see why they should perish for their old Imperial enemy. There seemed no other credible explanation for why Klopper allowed so many provisions and equipment to fall un-destroyed into German hands. Rommel’s Chief of Staff recorded:

  The booty was gigantic. It consisted of supplies for 30,000 men for three months and more than 10,000 cubic metres of petrol. Without this booty adequate rations and clothing for the armoured divisions would not have been possible in the coming months. Stores arriving by sea had only on one occasion – in April 1942 – been enough to supply the army for one whole month.

  The fall of Tobruk was seen as a godsend by Hitler, who immediately wrote to Mussolini:

  Destiny has offered us a chance which will never occur twice in the same theatre of war… The English Eighth Army has been practically destroyed. In Tobruk the port installations are almost intact. You now possess, Duce, an auxiliary base whose significance is all the greater because the English themselves have built from there a railway leading almost into Egypt… The Goddess of Battles visits warriors only once. He who does not grasp her at such a moment never reaches her again.

  Following the fall of Tobruk, Rommel was immediately able to push on towards the Egyptian frontier without having to wait for supplies to be transported 1,500 miles from the west. For the remaining days of June and the early days of July the British were in disarray. Herford’s unit fell back to the Alamein line inside Egypt, but the retreat was in chaos, not aided by the need to detect gaps in minefields laid to repel German tanks and heavy strafing from German planes.

  Once 16 MAC was installed in its new camp, Herford had to return westwards to oversee the continuing evacuation of casualties. On the night of 3 July he was asked to reconnoitre an evacuation route through the Quattara depression, but he soon became hopelessly bogged down in the loose sand and it took many hours and exhaustive effort to rescue his jeep with the patient use of sand tracks. By the time he was making the return trip over 200 casualties were being evacuated by this route, and many lorries became marooned. The evacuation was becoming a disaster. Herford forged another path across the desert to the south which was eventually followed, but the casualties were transported to safety more by good fortune than good planning.

  In mid-July Churchill paid a visit to the United States where he made an urgent plea for armaments, and was in the most part successful. Meanwhile the British took what advantage they could of the fact that Rommel had come so far so quickly, and launched a number of counter-attacks from the Alamein line. The battle swayed backwards and forwards until the end of the month, by which time both sides had fought themselves to a halt.

  On the afternoon of 23 July, Herford was driving across the desert en route to visit the New Zealand and 2 MAC when he drove over a recently laid German mine 8 miles south of El Alamein. The car was badly damaged, but he was visited by good fortune, and escaped with fragments of shrapnel in both legs and knees and a perforated left ear drum. He was patched up, splinted and sent to hospital in Cairo. The day after his accident he wrote to his parents telling them that he hoped only to be out of the fray for a few days, but it was to be November before he was well enough to return to his unit. The shrapnel wounds themselves were not serious, but he was physically exhausted, and they became septic. By 3 August he was discharged to convalesce, but a week later ran a temperature of 103 degrees and suffered swollen glands. He was re-admitted to hospital, and it was 9 September before he was well enough to get out of his bed. The timing of his accident could not have been more frustrating.

  Herford was fully aware that a major Allied offensive was planned, but it became increasingly clear that he would not be playing any part in it. In August, Auchinleck was replaced by General Montgomery, and a massive re-arming of the Eighth Army with Americ
an hardware took place. On 18 September Herford returned to the RAMC HQ, but Brigadier MacFie insisted that he should not return to the desert. He was convinced that Herford was battle weary and not yet physically strong enough to cope with months of little sleep and hard physical labour. Instead he was posted to No. 15 (Scottish) general hospital, where he remained until November.

  The last week of October saw the battle of El Alamein. The Allies had increased their armoury so that they now outnumbered the Germans two to one in firepower. The German line, approximately 15 miles to the west of Alamein, ran 40 miles to the south and was heavily fortified with minefields and anti-tank trenches. Hitherto they were adequately supplied, but several German oil tankers were destroyed in the Mediterranean causing a severe shortage of petrol. The German generals had little idea of the magnitude of the attack being prepared against them, and when it began on 23 October they were taken almost completely by surprise.

  When battle commenced, Rommel was in hospital in Germany and General Stumme had taken his position. But within 24 hours of the start of the battle Stumme had died of a heart attack, and Hitler personally ordered Rommel to leave his sick bed and resume his command. This he did, but his forces were no match for the massed Allied guns. Like Napoleon, Montgomery went by the maxim that ‘cannons kill men’. He launched relentless bombardments on key German positions, all of which had been accurately pin-pointed thanks to the de-coding of German secret messages transmitted using the Enigma machine. Rommel was in an unenviable position. Due to lack of fuel he could not hope to organize a successful retreat across the desert without being annihilated, but meanwhile he was suffering massive losses under Allied fire. He had no choice but to stand and fight. But after 12 days of heavy fighting the Germans and their Italian allies broke loose and went into full-scale retreat (though the Germans gave themselves priority in transport and left many thousands of Italians in the desert with little food or water, to be picked up by Allied patrols). At the conclusion of the battle, four German divisions and eight Italian divisions had ceased to exist as fighting formations. Thirty thousand prisoners were taken together with countless items of transport and rations. Churchill described the victory at Alamein as ‘the hinge of fate… Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat.’