LEFT BY GERMANS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 32, 8 February 1943, Page 4

LEFT BY GERMANS

IN TRIPOLI HOSPITAL WOUNDED AUCKLANDER N.Z.E.F. Official War Correspondent TRIPOLI, February 4. For two days a severely wounded New Zealand officer, captured by the Germans, waited anxiously in hospital at Tripoli for the arrival of, British troops after the fall of the city. He had been left behind with one companion when all the other patients had been evacuated. The officer is Major Murray Reid, of Auckland, who by now will be experiencing all the comforts of the New Zealand base hospital in Egypt. It was at Nofillis, following the second of the New Zealanders' desert sweeps designed to cut off the enemy's retreat, that Major Reid, officer commanding a field company of engineers, was wounded when on reconnaissance in a Bren gun carrier. With his left arm shattered by a bullet, he was being sent back in an ambulance to the main dressing station when his vehicle was captured by a retreating enemy column. Soon denied the comparative comfort of a commandeered ambulance, he was transferred to a three-ton truck in which, after several days of travel, he arrived at the German hospital in Tripoli. There the wounded officer received the best of attention from the sole hard-worked surgeon in charge—attention just as good as that accorded the enemy's own wounded. The state of his arm necessitated amputation. Major Reid made a splendid recovery from the operation, and was able to converse with the surgeon through a German nursing sister, who acted as interpreter. He speaks highly of the efficiency and organisation of the enemy hospital. The evacuation of patients was completed two days before the arrival of British troops in Tripoli. It was done without haste or complications. Stretcher after stretcher was removed, but, to Major Reid's surprise, he was left behind with a seriously wounded flight-sergeant of the R.A.F. Both men were removed to an Italian civilian hospital, their wounds newly dressed, and with rations. Full records of the two cases were handed to the Italians. It was at this hospital that they were found by the British medical authorities. They were taken to a

British hospital, which was quickly established after the fall of the city, and Major Reid was soon sent by air ambulance to Egypt.

Speaking of his experience, Major Reid, who had just returned from a walk to the front door of the hospital, said he had not conversed much with the German wounded, but they shared with him their cigarettes-. Because of his wound he was not issued with cigarettes. The German surgeon worked day and night, but always found, time to visit every patient in the hospital each day. The food was quite good and sufficient.