SIDI REZEGH BATTLE

Evening Star, Issue 24138, 7 March 1942, Page 7

SIDI REZEGH BATTLE

NEW ZEALANDERS' CHARGE FORGED CORRIDOR TO TOBRUK (N.Z.E.F. Official War Correspondent.)’ SIDI REZEGH, Eeb. 28. On an. escarpment which command* a view of the wuoleof.the surrounding country at Sidi Rezegh stands a blockhouse, formerly the desert home of au unknown Italian. It is just a blockhouse in the desert, but it was the scene of probably the most desperate action throughout the whole of the .New Zealanders’ Libyan campaign. Battex-ed from the air by bombs of the R.A.F., pounded by New Zealand 25-pounders, the blockhouse to-day is a shattered wreck. ' I wx’ite this despatch among the debris, with my typewriter perched on an ammunition box, with the driver’s chair from a German truck for a seat. Above me on the inside wall is a strip of wood from a benzine case. Printed on it in blue pencil and in letterings of perfect formation are these words: “ A ti'ibute to the offieex-s and men of the 26th Battalion, Second N.Z.E.F., who were killed in action, taking this blockhouse on November 23, 1941.” Whoever the author was, he was wrong in his date, but it matters little—this simple ti'ibute to a gallant fighting battalion will probably remain in the shattered blockhouse in the middle of the. Libyan desert when this war is only a memory. ROUTED BY BAYONET. Opposed by an enemy well dug in and equipped with every known firearm, tfie fearless 26th Battalion, led by its All Black battalion commander, Lieutenant-colonel J. ii. Page, advanced unfalteringly against a heavy curtain of enemy lire, it was here that another All Black, a captain,-although badly wounded, rallied his men and urged them on. He was killed as the attack went forward. Into this hail of fire went the battalion with the bayonet to rout the Hun and capture ttxa blockhouse, a vital point essential to the success of the New Zealanders’ task of creating a con-idor to Tobruk. They were subjected to a terrific hammering, but they brilliantly gained their objective. Their losses were heavy. To-day I have been all over the Sidi Rezegh battlefields. I saw again the slit trench in which 1 Was pinned for two days when the enemy stood on Point 175 crashing artillery and mortar fire at the New Zealand headquarters ceaselessly from dawn to dusk. I saw again the areas over which, two gallant New Zealand brigades attacked at night with the bayonet to take Sidi Rezegh and Bel Hamid Ed.Duda, thus to link up with the men of the Tobruk garrison. On the Sidi Rezegh aerodrome were 19 Axis fighters, stripped of every .piece of equipment of any value. They hadbeen caught on the ground by our Breix carriers during the height of the Sidi Rezegh battle. The Breu carriers with machine guns spitting charged across the aerodrome and crashed into the tail of each plane to wreck the tail and render the machine useless, i On the escarpment and down on the flats xvas evidence of terrific tank battles. lit one area just south of the blockhouse there were 12 Italian tanks wrecked by gunfire. Alongside were Italian graves. Now recovery sections of our armoui'ed divisions and tank brigades are at work in the desert, drag-, ging our battered tanks away and send--ing them back behind the lines for repairs, so that they can be sent back to crack at Rommel’s panzers again. • CEMETERIES IN DESERT. Not far from the blockhouse I oame across members of a South African graves unit. They were looking after New Zealand graves, making neat but barren, desert cemeteries. They’ were lifting hastily-buried dead and placing them carefully in planned, neatly-laid-out cemeteries. I looked at the names on small wooden, crosses. There were men with whom I went through the ranks in the first few weeks of the war. There were officers with whom I had trained. This is Sidi Rezegh, where two brigades of gallant New Zealanders smashed and routed Rommel’s positional troops, forced the corridor to Tobruk and made imperishable history. ,