Eastern Approaches (46 page)

A few days later we had further confirmation of this. I had climbed to the top of the hill that overlooked the harbour and was looking across towards the mainland when suddenly out of the sun there came with a roar a dozen Stukas. There was no mistaking those disagreeably tilted wings, that wasp-like undercarriage. In other theatres, perhaps, the Stuka had had its day, but for us, in our kind of warfare, without fighter support or anti-aircraft defences, it had kept all its old terror.

They took their preliminary run high over the harbour and out to sea again. But immediately they turned and came back and, as I watched, their leader peeled off from the formation, and, with the sunlight flashing on his wings, came screaming downwards past where I was standing, to send his bomb crashing amidst the shipping in the harbour. Almost at sea level, he pulled out of his dive and turned back out to sea, as the next and then a third and a fourth Stuka after him followed him down. Soon high columns of water were twisting up into the air from all over the harbour, matched by clouds of dust and
rubble from the shore. Then, as quickly as they had come, the raiders were gone and silence followed, broken only by shouts for help and the wailing of frightened children which rose from the town at my feet. Korčula had had its first experience of aerial warfare.

The days passed. And still there were no signs of the Navy. The wireless was dead and no message had come from the mainland, where the military situation seemed to be deteriorating. I was out of touch both with G.H.Q. Middle East and with Tito.

I decided to give them another twenty-four hours and then, if nothing happened, to start back for Jajce.

That night I was wakened at about two by a confused shouting outside the house. My first thought was that the Germans had landed from the mainland. Then, as I was reaching for my pack and my automatic in preparation for a quick move, our Partisan guard burst excitedly into the house, followed by three naval officers and David Satow, the latest addition to my staff. One of the sailors I recognized as Sandy Glenn, an old friend with a number of adventurous exploits to his credit in the less orthodox branches of naval warfare. The Navy had arrived.

I was delighted to see Sandy, the more so as I had reason to know that he was not supposed to be there at all. But that was not likely to deter him. Nothing could have been more deceptive than his mild, even slightly owlish appearance, as he peered at you benignly from behind a large pair of round spectacles. In fact he possessed gifts of determination and ingenuity which enabled him to get the best of almost any staff officer — enemy or Allied — however obstructive. From now onwards he was never to be far away from us. His next assignment was in enemy-occupied Albania where he lived mysteriously in a cave looking out over the Adriatic and waited upon by a retinue of Italian prisoners. Thence he emerged to rescue an aircraft load of American hospital nurses whose pilot had lost his way and crash landed in the interior, after which they were smuggled down to the coast by the Partisans under the noses of the Germans, marching for days in high-heeled shoes and silk stockings. Finally, towards the end of the war, he was to be dropped by parachute on the banks of the
Danube, with the task of blowing up barges, or something of the kind, for which he was awarded a much-deserved bar to his D.S.C.

Sandy and his friends had, it appeared, taken a chance that Korčula was still in Partisan hands. Having brought their M.L. into a cove on the other side of the island they had then made their way across country to where I was living. I gave them some
rakija
and we discussed what to do next. They had brought several tons of arms and supplies for the Partisans and these needed to be unloaded. It was also essential to ensure that the M.L. was properly camouflaged against air reconnaissance before daylight.

Fortunately, the cove which they had picked was admirably suited for both purposes, with high, wooded sides and a path running down to the water’s edge, by which the supplies could be got away, so that a move was not necessary. The Partisans were wildly excited at this impromptu naval visit. We collected as many of them as possible and started work unloading the M.L. and camouflaging her up. By dawn the last case of ammunition had been carried on shore and camouflage nets, all stuck about with leaves and branches, had been ingeniously stretched over the M.L. and from her side to the shore, so as to break up her outline. From the top of the nearest hill, whither we retired to survey our handiwork, she might have been part of the island.

We were not a moment too soon.

As I stood on the deck of the M.L., looking out from under the bowers and trellises of the camouflage, the beat of aircraft engines fell once again on our ears and two little black ‘hedge-hoppers’ — Fieseler Storchs — came poking inquisitively over the hill. But the M.L.’s camouflage was too good for them and they flew away without noticing us and did not come back. It was tempting to think what a shock we could have given them, had we chosen, by suddenly opening up at close range with the M.L.’s Oerlikon.

They had scarcely gone when the Partisan brigade commander arrived from Pelješac. Things, it seemed, were going very badly indeed in his sector. German reinforcements were pouring in and according to his latest information the enemy were collecting a regular invasion fleet of small craft at the mouth of the Neretva for purposes which were all too clear. Unless we could do something to help, the Partisans
would be swept off Pelješac and the way would lie open for a German invasion of the islands. Thus, our new-found supply channel was likely to be shut before we had had time to use it.

Bogdan, the Brigade Commander, was generally a merry little man, but that morning he had a worried look and his long moustaches drooped dismally. I took him on board the M.L. and his eyes, accustomed to the bare hillside, opened wide at the shaded lights and polished brass and mahogany of the chart-house. Then, as maps were produced, the strangeness of it all was forgotten and he was soon completely absorbed in his task of explaining the position and showing us how he thought we could best help.

By now I was accustomed to Partisan demands for air support, which in general showed little comprehension of what could and could not be done from the air and bore but little relation to reality. But this time it looked as though, if the R.A.F. could only spare the aircraft, we might really be able to give decisive tactical support. There was also a chance that the Navy might be able to help, though not, as Bogdan seemed to expect, then and there by means of our one and only M.L.

Sitting down at the cabin table, I wrote out two signals to which I gave the highest priority I could. The first was to Air Vice-Marshal Coningham, who was commanding the old Desert Air Force in Italy, explaining the position and asking him if he could spare some aircraft from the battle in Italy to attack the German troop concentrations at Mostar and Metković, their advanced positions on Pelješac and their invasion barges at the mouth of the Neretva. I added that, to be of any use, the help would have to come at once.

The second signal was to the Flag Officer Taranto, or F.O.T.A., as he was called, suggesting that, if he could spare some M.T.B.s, they would be well employed patrolling off the mouth of the Neretva, in case the enemy should decide to try a landing.

The M.L. had instructions to keep the strictest wireless silence as long as she was in enemy waters, but we had decided that she should leave again at nightfall, and her captain promised to send off my signals as soon as he got out to sea. Bogdan seemed impressed by so much activity. The galley was out of commission, but we gave him
some bully and biscuits and he went off back to his hard-pressed men, much more cheerful than he had come and clearly hoping for great things. I only hoped that my signals would have some effect.

The M.L. left that night and next day we, too, having established contact with the Navy, started to prepare for our return journey. It took some time to plan our journey and make the necessary arrangements for it, and, before we finally left, we had the satisfaction of seeing a number of Spitfires flash overhead in the direction of Pelješac and the mainland and of hearing a little later that they had played havoc with the enemy’s preparations for a big attack. The Navy, too, came up to scratch and patrolled so successfully that, for the time being, nothing more was heard of the enemy’s invasion fleet. By the time I left, the German advance on Pelješac had been temporarily checked and the Partisans were holding their own.

But this temporary tactical success had not solved the much bigger, strategical problem. Everything showed that the intention of the enemy was, first to consolidate their hold on Dalmatia and the coast, and then to push across to the islands. They would use whatever forces they considered necessary to achieve this purpose, and, in an encounter of this kind they were clearly in a position to bear down the Partisans by sheer weight of numbers and armament. For the Partisans to make a stand, either on the coast or on the islands, for them to attempt, in other words, to hold fixed positions would be to flout the first principle of guerrilla warfare, and, to my mind, could only end in disaster.

On the other hand, if we lost the islands, we should be losing a very valuable asset. The secure possession of even one of them would provide a link with the outside world, a kind of advanced supply base, from which, even without a firm foothold on the coast, it should be possible, by judicious gun-running, to send a steady trickle of supplies over to the mainland and up into the interior. It might well be possible, if we could somehow manage to hold an island, to use it as a base from which M.T.B.s could raid enemy coastal traffic and shipping up and down the Adriatic. The first M.L. had after all shown the way and the success of her venture would, I felt, serve to reassure the Navy and encourage them to experiment further. Perhaps, though at that early stage the thought seemed almost fantastic, we might be able to find,
somewhere among the crags and woods and olive groves, a flat strip from which fighter aircraft from Italy might operate, thereby greatly extending their range.

These were ideas which, if they were to come to anything, must be followed up at once. First I must see Tito. Then I must come out of Jugoslavia to report. My signals, it is true, had produced results. But before we could go any further there was still much that needed saying, many points that needed clearing up, the question of the islands among them. And the sooner they were cleared up the better.

That night we left for the mainland.

T
HE
Padre and his friends from the Odbor came down to the harbour to see us off. The news that the German advance was being held had cheered them up, but they were still worried about the future, knowing full well what a German occupation would mean for a civilian population which had sided so whole-heartedly with the Partisans.

I felt mean to be leaving them at such a time and tried to reassure them by saying that I would do what I could to help. They wished us God speed. It was beginning to get dark. We fitted ourselves into our little boat. The engine spluttered and chugged. We were off.

Baška Voda, the point from which we had crossed to Korčula, was now in German hands, and this time our destination was Podgora, another little port further to the north. At first we hugged the coast of the island. Then, when it was quite dark, changed our course and made straight for the mainland. Clearly the visit of the M.L. and the events which followed it had put the enemy on their guard, for now their patrol-boats were more active than ever. One of the Partisans had brought a concertina, which he played in a disjointed sort of way, the tune tailing off uneasily as the roving eye of a searchlight came swinging across the water in our direction. We were all suffering, I suppose, from the sensation which it is so difficult to escape on such occasions, and which leads so many fugitives from justice to betray themselves unnecessarily; the unpleasant feeling that you have no business where you are, that everyone is looking for you and that you are immensely conspicuous.

What, I remember wondering, would happen if they spotted us? Would they hail us and come and investigate? Or would they simply open fire down the beam of the searchlight? It would depend, I supposed, on how much they could see from where they were. Neither prospect was at all agreeable. But fortunately we seemed to be getting
out of the stretch of water where the patrol-boats were most active.

Then, all at once I became aware of the chugging of a powerful engine unpleasantly close on our port bow. Simultaneously the accordion player, who had been in the middle of a spirited rendering of ‘Alexander’s Ragtime Band’, broke off abruptly. With startling suddenness, the searchlight was switched on and, from quite close to us, a broad white beam started methodically to explore the surface of the sea. In a matter of seconds it caught us, and then, instead of continuing its search, stopped dead and held us dazzlingly illuminated while our little boat bobbed pathetically up and down in the choppy water.

Never have I had the feeling of being so utterly, so hideously conspicuous. Everyone, I felt, for miles round could see me, and I could see no one, except my immediate companions, also brilliantly illuminated: the accordion player, clutching his instrument as if his life depended on it, John Henniker-Major, looking faintly sheepish, and David Satow, looking, as he always looked, however unpromising the circumstances, every inch a professional soldier.

There was clearly nothing that we could usefully do except sit still, and so we sat still, counting the seconds and enduring the leisurely scrutiny of the anonymous German sailors at the other end of the beam. Would they, I wondered, notice my Balmoral, and David’s very English and very military-looking hat and the Partisan flag fluttering so unnecessarily at the stern. Seen from close to, we did not look at all like fishermen.

But I suppose that a guilty conscience made us feel more noticeable than we really were, for, after examining us for what seemed an eternity, the patrol boat switched off its searchlight and chugged off busily to look for evildoers elsewhere. Once again darkness enveloped us; the accordionist struck up a new tune, and we continued on our way, shaken but thankful. The outcome had been an anticlimax, but it was an extremely welcome one.

We took as a matter of course the usual burst of machine-gun fire which greeted us as we entered the harbour of Podgora and flashed our little lantern what our steersman insisted was the prescribed number of times. Amid a string of oaths, followed by an animated discussion
as to the merits and validity of different types of ‘signals’ we scrambled out of our boat and announced that we wished to continue our journey inland that night. We were told that this was inadvisable. At the moment a battle was in progress with a mixed force of Germans and Ustaše from Makarska, a village about a mile up the coast; the situation was confused; the exact position of the enemy was uncertain, and we should do much better to wait until morning before trying to move. As he spoke, the rattle of machine guns and the crash of mortar bombs from further up the road lent force to his words.

We still had some chocolate brought over by the M.L. and with this we decided to make some hot cocoa, before going on. Having repaired for this purpose to a nearby house, we were about to open the door of the living-room when we were stopped by a worried-looking peasant. There were some very important foreign officers inside, he said. They must on no account be disturbed. Clearly the situation had all kinds of fascinating possibilities and, ignoring the owner’s panic-stricken protests, we pushed past him into the room.

Two prostrate figures, muffled in German-type sleeping-bags and snoring loudly, were stretched on the floor. We prodded the nearest one gently. It grunted resentfully and, on receiving a further prod, sat up, revealing the tousled head and unshaven chin of Gordon Alston. The other bag contained his wireless operator.

Gordon had, it appeared, just arrived from Jajce on his way to the islands, bringing me another wireless set and the latest news. He had completed the greater part of this journey in a one-horse shay, driven by a Bosnian Moslem, wearing a tarboosh and looking for all the world like a Cairo
gharri
-driver. He had had the greatest difficulty in communicating with this strange character and to this day is not sure whether the route they followed led them through country occupied by Partisans or not. As they drove along the inhabitants could be seen peering at them through the cracks of their doors. Nothing he could say or do would make the driver stop in a village for the night. To all Gordon’s entreaties his only reply was to wink broadly, point at the village, and draw his hand meaningly across his throat, at the same time emitting an unpleasant guttural sound. Then he would whip up the horse and they would jolt relentlessly onwards. By the time
they reached Podgora both Gordon and the horse were completely exhausted. It had, he said, been a very Balkan journey.

With them they had brought some mail from home which had been dropped in by parachute. They were the first letters to reach us and soon we were sitting round the stove drinking cocoa and reading them, while outside the sounds of the fighting up the road alternately receded and drew near again. The scenes and memories they evoked seemed somehow very remote.

Meanwhile there was one problem which needed clearing up immediately. ‘What,’ I asked, ‘about the King?’ ‘What King?’ said Gordon. ‘King Peter,’ I said. ‘Have they dropped him in yet?’ Gordon looked at me as if I had gone mad. Then I told him about the telegram. ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘that wasn’t about King Peter. That was about your new signal officer. His name is King.’ I felt foolish, but relieved.

When we set out next morning, the fighting had died down and the enemy had withdrawn to Makarska, which we could see from the road, lying below us in the pale morning sunshine. A little further along we found some Partisans, lobbing shells into it with a captured 150-mm. gun, while from time to time the enemy rather half-heartedly returned the compliment from somewhere below. The remainder of our journey was by Partisan standards uneventful, though enlivened by the usual doubts as to where exactly the enemy was, whether we were on the right road and whether or not we should be able to get through.

As soon as we arrived at Jajce I went to see Tito to give him the latest news from the coast and to find out how the Partisans were faring elsewhere. He was fully alive to the threat to the islands and we discussed at length how it could best be countered. The conclusions we reached were not particularly encouraging. Clearly it would be a mistake for the Partisans to attempt more than a series of delaying actions, and this meant that sooner or later first the coastal strip and then the islands would fall into the hands of the enemy. Thus the only hope lay in direct and immediate Allied intervention, which, from all I knew, it would be no easy matter to secure.

I told Tito of my plan to return to Cairo to report, explaining that this would give me an opportunity of finding out for myself what prospect there was of securing effective Allied support in Dalmatia. I added that I would return as soon as possible. He agreed that this was a good idea and asked whether I would like to take two Partisan officers with me as emissaries of good will. I replied that I should be glad to, provided my twin masters, the Commander-in-Chief and the Foreign Office, agreed. After some discussion, two delegates were chosen, Lola Ribar and Miloje Milojević, and that night Tito brought them round himself to share our evening meal. When they had gone, we agreed that Tito’s choice of delegates had been a good one.

Miloje Milojević was a fighting soldier. A regular officer in the old Jugoslav Army, he had joined the Partisans at the outset. In the years that followed he had lost an eye and been wounded in almost every part of his body. In recognition of repeated acts of gallantry, he had been made, in an army of brave men, the first and (at that time) only People’s Hero, an award equivalent to our own Victoria Cross. A fierce little man, with a black patch over his eye and a scar on his face, he lived, as far as I could judge, only for fighting. No one who met him could doubt for long that the Partisans meant business.

Lola Ribar, whom I had met on my way down to the coast, was a different type. He, too, had had his full share of fighting. But his role in the Partisan movement had been primarily political, and, still in his twenties, he was one of the handful of men round Tito who seemed clearly marked out for fame in the new Jugoslavia. His father, Dr. Ivan Ribar, a venerable-looking elder statesman with a fine head of white hair, was one of the Movement’s few links with the old regime. But Lola was an out and out Communist, and now, in a tattered German tunic, with his burning intensity of manner, his bronzed features and his characteristically Slav cast of countenance, he might have served as model for the portrait of a soldier of the Revolution. Once again I welcomed the choice. Young Ribar enjoyed Tito’s confidence and was near enough to the centre of things to know the Party line on any given subject instinctively. He would be able to speak for the Partisans with assurance and authority. At the same time, his personal charm, which was great, and his knowledge of affairs would help to fit him for the
task of emissary to the outside world which was totally strange and unfamiliar to most other Partisans, who were only at home in their own forests and villages.

Next morning I dispatched a signal asking for permission to come out to report, bringing two Partisan representatives with me. I added that it seemed likely that before long we should be completely cut off from the coast and that I hoped that it would be possible to send me a very early reply.

This, I realized from the start, was a pious hope. Politically, the decision which I had asked the Government to take was not an easy one. For the British authorities to receive Partisan representatives, although in a sense it was the logical sequel of the dispatch of my own Mission, was a step which would arouse the fiercest opposition on the part of the Royal Jugoslav Government, who were our allies and with whom we were in official relations. I pictured to myself the embarrassment which my signal would cause at home, did my best to explain it to Tito and settled down resignedly to a long wait.

As the days went by, the news from Dalmatia became more and more depressing. The Germans were steadily consolidating their position in the coastal strip and pushing along Pelješac in preparation for an invasion of the islands. Even our carefully prepared but never used landing-strip at Glamoć seemed unlikely to remain in Partisan hands much longer. Soon we should be completely cut off from the outside world. And still there was no reply to my signal.

In the end I decided to go back to the islands and await developments. Once there, I could easily make my way across the Adriatic by light naval craft or by Partisan schooner to Italy, and, in the meantime, while I was waiting for an answer, I could at any rate watch the military situation from close to. Ribar and Milojević stayed behind, ready to follow as soon as they knew they were wanted.

I started back to the coast in the first light of a chilly autumn morning. Of the journey I have no special recollection and therefore assume it to have been uneventful. In this I was lucky, for by now the German occupation in strength of this whole area was far advanced and we were fortunate to slip through with so little trouble.

This time our ultimate destination was the island of Hvar. We reached it after the usual midnight crossing in a fishing boat, landing just before dawn at the town of the same name at the western end of the island. The eastern end was occupied by a small force of the enemy, who had landed there from the mainland and whom it had so far proved impossible to dislodge.

Hvar was a pleasant enough place. On a hill overlooking the harbour the Spanish fort, a romantic looking castle built by Charles V, stood guard over the town. At its foot clustered crumbling palaces and churches, an arsenal and an ancient theatre — small, but of a magnificence recalling the splendours of Venice and surprising in what is now only a fishing village. Across the bay stretched a chain of small islands and black jagged rocks, sheltering the harbour from the westerly gales and squalls of the Adriatic. It was warm and sunny, a Mediterranean day, typical of Dalmatia and very different from the bleak, wintry weather which we had left inland.

Just as I had waited on Korčula for news of the Navy, now I waited on Hvar to know whether or not I was to come out and bring the Partisans with me. This time, at least, my wireless was working. We hitched our aerial to a convenient tree and soon a series of plaintive reminders were winging their way to Cairo and London. Would the answer come in time for Ribar and Milojević to reach the coast before it was too late?