30-MILE MARCH

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20572, 4 June 1941, Page 5

30-MILE MARCH

IMPERIAL TROOPS

CRETE MOUNTAINS

FOUGHT WHOLE WAY

MAORIS ROUT HUNS

(Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (From Oliicial War Correspondent with the N.Z.E.F. in Crete.) (Reed. June 4, 9 a.m.) CAIRO, June 2.

After the most strenuous battle of the war, and with rest snatched at only odd hours, the New Zealanders in Crete marched over 30 miles across the island to embark from the southern coast. Tired and bearded, and with the drone of the Luftwaffe still ringing in our ears, we were placed again, for the second time, in the hands of the navy, and the swift voyage back over the Mediterranean spelt relief from the toughest campaigning any soldier ever dreamed of experiencing.

The Germans dogged us all the way, in the vain last hope of cutting us to pieces before we could reach the beach, and our men, side by side with the Australians and Britons, fought them off continually. Once they scampered nearly a mile away before the bayonets of the indefatigable Maoris, and we left more German dead among the rugged'southern hills. The New Zealanders once more helped to form the rearguard for the British withdrawal along the entire length of the southern evacuation route. Just as in Greece, they bestrode the road while thousands of other troops made their way to the beaches, and they spent the last days dispersed along the rocky coastal mountains, fighting off forward enemy elements. Our fighting men set another magnificent example in the way they marched back as ordered, cohesive forces, always able and ready to turn again and fight should the necessity arise. Even when their feet became lumps of lead and their shoulders ached and eyelids dropped wearily through the long night treks, they kept their columns intact and clung to their weapons as the last possessions they would ever part with, to make the journey easier. What a first-hand story I can write of the “Glorious Fourths,” as this veteran brigade lias been called. It cannot be the full story of the evacuation, since for the first time the brigade was not the last of the last, but it will be in many ways typical of the endurance and fortitude shown by the New Zealanders even in the grim closing days of the battle for Crete.

“Dropped Everything and Ran”

So far from their minds were thoughts of giving up the struggle that few connected the first 12 miles of the night march back from the Suda Bay area with the idea of evacuation. We tramped past the bomb-torn port and southwards over the hills into the wooded valley as it entering some new stronghold in which to make a fresh stand. Behind us, even then, brilliant rearguard actions were being fought. The enemy followed up our gradual withdrawal from Galatos and met a line of Maori, Wellington and Australian infantrymen. Fresh as if it was their first engagement, the Maoris led a bayonet charge so spiritedly that, after a most strenuous battle, the Germans “dropped everything and ran,” falling back nearly a mile before our men decided that it was far enough. With breathing spaces made for us like that, we tramped southward again b> night after the Germans had tried to blast us out of our shelter beneath the olive trees with two hours’ systematic machine-gunning. In the nine hours between dusk and daylight we crossed one mountain range and reached the top of another, marching steadily over a rough metal road which twisted upwards for miles through wild gorges. All around me and against the rhythmic beat of feet i could hear our men joking and singing in chorus until their sentimental songs and witty quips dwindled into deep silence that means sheer weariness.

Extraordinary Move

In broad daylight, our battalions made the most extraordinary move I have ever seen. We filed off the road on to mountain tracks which wound to the crest of a steep 1500 ft. drop to the fertile basin north of the coastal town of Sphakia. Then, to avoid the vigilant eyes of the German air spotters circling periodically above the road, we slithered one by one, in intervals of about five minutes, down the slope and gathered under cover on the flat in small parties. When my turn came, I stood at the top watching these parties filing independently across the cornfields towards the defensive line--a scene which again struck me as symbolic of the orderliness for which our men always seem able to be depended upon. The night of the following day, we trekked on to the rugged mountains overlooking the sea and then moved down to be ferried to two awaiting destroyers. The German guns were even then pounding the road at the mountain’s top, and the rattle of machine-gun fire echoed for miles through the hills. This brigade struck a last blow at the Germans when a small party climbed 2000 ft. into the hills just before we embarked. The party saw a dozen Germans driving about 50 English soldiers down a valley When the Australians, who were in the rearguard, opened' nr< the Germans withdrew and were picked off by the New Zealanders. Unbounded Hospitality And next day, as the yellow Egyptian skyline rose above the sea ahead of us, we tried to make ourselves believe it was all over. The Australian crews of our ships helped us to do that with their unbounded hospitality, and in the morning, when German dive-bombers made one last attempt to stop our escape, we handed the war over to their naval guns. A day later than the units with which I travelled, the second half of the New Zealand fighting force in Crete was landed after spending 24 hours on the hills near the beach. The Australians, who shared the rearguard role with them, inflicted heavy German casualties on the last day. These New Zealanders remained 1500 ft. up in the mountains, with no food and little water, on the day we left. Then next day they descended to the beach. There the Australians reported that a German force wa~ moving down the valley towards the sea. While the Australians engaged the enemy with a frontal attack, a party of Maoris was sent into the hills in a flanking movement, and the Germans withdrew when they appeared. The New Zealanders held the perimeter delcnces //ith their backs to the sea for the rest of the day, falling back by stage: and embarking under cover of night