Clearing Minefields: By Jack Stace
With the arrival of Generals Alexander and
Montgomery, the battle of Alam Haifa had already taken place and the El Alamein
line made secure. The work on the emergency bridges on the Nile came to an end
and dismantling started to take palace. We moved into a training area to prepare
for the coming battle at El Alamein. The 8th Army was being reorganised,
reinforced, and new equipment arriving in the Middle East.
You may be familiar with the line of forces at El Alamein
for the 23rd October, however I will just run through it. In the North was 30
Corps where the main effort was to take place. In support of 30 Corps was a new
armoured force known as 10 Corps, which was to carry on right through to the end
of the war in Italy.
My company was allocated to 10 Corps. On the night of the
23rd October we came under the command of the 10th Armoured Division's Chief
Royal Engineer. A number of tracks through the minefields had to be made for use
by the two armoured divisions. “Sun”, “Moon” and “Star” were tracks
to be used on the 51st Highland Division sector.
“Battle”, “Bottle” and “Hat” were to be used on the New
Zealand Division sector.
My 573 Field Company was ordered to clear 'Bottle' track
on the NZ Divisional front.
In the training area we made ourselves familiar with the
type of mines we would be likely to find inthe minefield, most of which we had
seen previously during the eighteen months we had spent in the desert before
this time.
The most frequently encountered mines were anti-tank. We
could be expected to find the German teller anti-tank mine (I understand the
word 'teller' means plate). It was something the size of a large dinner plate,
which was of a fairly long box type construction. Not a very pleasant object to
defuse.
Actually, the main mine used by both sides was
German. We had captured a lot of their mines in dumps at Mersa Matruh and Tobruk.
These were made locally and were known to us as the Egyptian mine. It was of
fairly simple construction and was filled with sticks of gelignite.
The anti-personnel mine to be aware of was the German 'S'
mine. This was the mine which jumped into the air some 46 feet before exploding,
scattering a large number of ball bearing type projectiles in all directions.
There was also the odd picket type anti-personnel mine, consisting of a grenade
fastened on a picket just above the ground and detonated by contact with a
trip-wire.
A drill had been devised for clearing a gap 18 yards wide
through the minefield. Two men would be tied together with tape 18 yards apart
and an N.C.O would stand in the centre and guide the two men forward in a
straight line through the minefield. The two men would lay behind them a tape.
This tape marked the edges of the gap and would be secured by other Sappers
following behind. Once the gap was marked three teams with mine detectors moved
forward a short distance behind each other spread over the 18-yard gap. When a
mine was detected it was marked with a disc and the mine detector operator then
moved on. A member of the team behind then carefully lifted the mine from
the ground and took out the detonator. He then moved forward whilst a further
team member removed the mine from the minefield to a safe place for disposal
later. This procedure carried on until the whole of the minefield had been
cleared.
In the meantime other members of the team started to put
in place pickets along the edge of the minefield. These pickets had a small
plate fixed at the top which was approximately 2 feet across 4 inches or so
wide, painted red on one side which pointed in the direction of the minefield
and white on the side for the gap. An old fashioned bicycle lamp was also
attached, modified to show a red and green light approximately an inch in
diameter. These were positioned with the red light on the minefield side and
green on the track side. The idea was that when you approached the minefield you
had a clear vision of rear lights on each side of the minefield to lead us
safely through.
Once this was completed the party then moved forward to the next set of mines to
be cleared. A party was also left behind to secure the gap in case of any enemy
action or damage to the marking of the gap.
At this stage we had no mine detectors. The plan was to
use the prodding method with a bayonet. I don't know what date this was but it
must have been into October. On the 20th October we moved to our forward
assembly area. Once you entered this area no one was allowed to move out of it
to a rear area. During the last three days before the battle we did receive mine
detectors from South Africa and known as the Polish Type. Where this name came
from I don't know. However, they had been
made for use by crawling on the ground. This was no use to us and they had
supplied longer poles and extra cable so we could convert them for use in a
stand up walking position.
We also changed our Lewis machineguns we had brought from
the U.K. for Bren Guns, which was quite an upgrade to some of the equipment we
had. We had a new Commanding Officer, a Major Grimsmead, for we had been without
a C.O. since January/February 1942 when our previous C.O. was taken prisoner at
Benghazi. (Since then a Captain acted as C.O.). There was a great deal of
transport and equipment movement each evening and it was then that we first saw
the new Sherman tanks, appearing in the middle of the night running into our
area which they were unaware of. We were quite amazed of the size of these tanks
compared with those that had previously been in use.
So, we now come to the 23th October. We spent the day
checking all our equipment to be used in the evening. Mine detectors, Bran-guns,
and making sure we had all the necessary tape, pickets, wire etc. The day was
spent very quietly. There was not a lot of movement or activity other than the
odd gun would go off on either side, but in the main it was a fairly quiet day.
As the evening came we had our main evening meal (before sundown of course, as
we were not allowed to use any fires or lights of any description once it had
gone dark). I don't remember what the meal consisted of; it may have been a stew
or something of that nature. However, I don't think there were any complaints!
During the evening we moved forward to a point by our
forward minefield and beside a Bofors gun which was to fire tracers on a fixed
line during the night from time to time, marking the direction of the route we
were going to clear i.e. Bottle track.
We had been told that the guns would start firing at 9.40pm (21.40hrs) and would
continue for some 15 to 20 minutes on counter battery shooting to knock out any
known gun positions of the enemy. I don't know what time we started moving
forward but we were somewhere out in `no man's land' when the guns did open up,
and this was quite an impressive roar and display of fire behind us! The guns
carried on, and then suddenly they stopped. We were then somewhere in 'no man's
land' and I can tell you felt very lonely and there did not seem to be any one
else in sight apart from our column which included a fair number of people, most
of the company. Fortunately we did not bump into any German columns going the
other way. Once the guns stopped firing we continued moving forward, but soon
the guns began the main barrage, which never seemed to stop for the next seven
days.
We had almost reached our start line, which was the wire
on the German ford minefield when a machine gun opened up to our left. I don't
think he had actually seen us but I can imagine in the forward position he was
in he was feeling very nervous and may have caught sight of something and was
firing almost in an arc covering the ground in front of him. Fortunately we
received no casualties. About this time New Zealand infantry appeared in line
abreast at the high port, walking forward. They just passed us and carried on
walking through the minefield, their objective being some distance beyond the
forward position of the German minefield. To avoid confusion everyone was
dressed the same on that evening. I think it was battledress trousers, KD shirt,
with a pullover on which was a sort of grey colour, tin hat, boots and that was
about it. But we were all dressed the same so there was no confusion as to who
was who.
We moved forward and commenced the operation of removing
the wire, starting clearing the minefields, using the drill previously
described. This work continued quite successfully and the position secured and
moved forward. I believe the second objective of the NZ troops was the ridge,
which was across the front, the name of which I have forgotten.
These tanks were Shermans.
At the Blackpool Reunion a few years ago I spoke to one of the crew. He
remembers that fateful evening quite well, could anyone forget? The tanks were
unable to stay in their forward position after daylight broke because they were
too exposed. The surviving tanks
started to come back through the gap and dispersed to the rear of the German
minefields.
As our duties were completed we were instructed to make
our way back to our position, which had been the start near the Bofors gun. It
was now broad daylight. There was a certain amount of shelling from the German
side. The guns on our side never seemed to have stopped.
There was a casualty forward dressing station with a
number of covered over stretchers outside which was rather chilling. However, we
safely returned to our assembly area were we made some breakfast consisting
of....I don't now recall? We certainly had some tea which I can assure you, went
down quite well!
There were a number of hits by German artillery and
aircraft on British transport bringing up supplies, petrol, ammunition etc. and
the confusion was quite considerable. The Germans also moved up some very heavy
artillery and when these landed it caused quite a stir, I can tell you.
As the days went by we could feel that there was movement
forward and eventually as we moved into November one afternoon, we just kept
going and moved directional towards the road and carried on going west. From
that day we never went back again in an easterly direction until we got to
Tunis. One thing I can remember, soon after the first breakout day, as we pulled
in for the evening there were some huts and I don't know how they had survived
the shelling, air raids etc. When we went to investigate what was in/one of them
was full of Germans who had given up and were just waiting for someone to take
them away. One had a broken arm and an officer was quoting the Geneva Convention
asking for a doctor. This was not possible as traffic on the road was only
moving west and it was not permitted for our chaps to drive down the road back
to base areas. No doubt they got help the next day but as soon as it was
daylight were again back on the road moving west.
I believe the total Allied casualties during the Battle
of El Alamein were some 13,000 including killed, wounded and missing.
This account is related to the best of my memory.
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