ENEMY ELUDED

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIII, Issue 28, 3 February 1942, Page 6

ENEMY ELUDED

N.Z. SURGICAL UNIT

GAME OF CHASING IN LIBYA

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.) '(Rec. 1.45 p.m.) CAIRO, February 2. A New Zealand mobile surgical unit in Libya ran the gauntlet of General Rommel's advancing forces for 200 miles, reports Ronald Monsoh, war correspondent of the Sydney "Daily Telegraph.".

In relating the story, the commanding officer, who comes from Christchurch, said that the unit had gone out from Jedabaya to El Neisci, 40 miles to the south. They were just erecting a tent hospital when they saw German tanks approaching. The Germans started firing, and the unit struck camp, taking wounded who had already come in. ■ ■ ■ ,_,, "We bumped along through the night," he said, "with our lights out. By midnight we had covered 40 miles. Some of the patients needed surgical treatment, so we set up a hospital in the darkness, and by the light of lamps operated on men who had been badly hit by shell fragments. We struck camp just before dawn and made for a windmill marked on a map. On reaching it in the afternoon we again set up our hospital, but an* artillery officer whose battery was covering the Allied withdrawal told us that we must leave.

"Next morning retiring troops .told us that the Germans were then in the camp we had just left, and were coming. We were making north for Saunu, 40 miles north-east of Jedabaya, but on nearing it we saw that it was being shelled by the enemy. We turned back, but did not dare to go far for fear of running into the Germans behind us. After running for a while we decided to stand fast. German armoured cars came over a ridge and looked at us, but did not fire.

"Now we had the enemy on our left, in front, and behind. We turned and went parallel with an enemy column which was moving east a few miles south of us. When we attempted to turn north again German armoured cars in front opened fire on us, and we were forced to turn east again. Some South Africans joined us in the dark.

"We finally reached Msus, and we worked there all next day until German shelling and machine-gun fire interrupted us, indicating that the enemy was very close. We hastily loaded our ambulances and travelled for 12 hours until we reached the safety of a British outpost.

"It had been tough going, but we made it, with'all our patients safe."