CANADIANS’ TEST

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21305, 18 January 1944, Page 4

CANADIANS’ TEST

ORTONA BATTLE

GRIMMEST FIGHTING

ROOM-TO-ROOM struggle

(By Toletn-nnh—Pres* Assn.—Copyright.) (N 7, El’. Official War Correspondent.) (9 ami.) DIV. HQRS., Jan. 16. With lire Canadians who are pushing slolidlv towards 1-esoara, on the right flunk of the Eighth Army, there are several New Zealanders. I met one of. them Sergeant L. B. Poppell. in a bullet-scarred street in Ortona as he wac returning from duties connected with a platoon of Canadian Highlenders of which he is a sergeant. Though he speaks with an accent which New Zealanders come to recognise as Canadian, he was keen for news of his native land and the divison and was quick to note my New Zealand flashes. He was born in Ponsonby and educated in New Zealand which he left in 1931. He first vent overseas with the Canadian forces in 1939 and was, on service in the British Isles until the attack on Sicily. Since then he lias seen action throughout the Sicilian campaign and also in lighting which has enhanced the reputation of the Canadians and so far has culminated in the capture of Ortona. . In his experience the task which faced the Canadians in taking the fortress town of Ortona was by far their most difficult yet. The Sicilian camnai“n provided bitter mountain fightv'ft in conditions very strange and trying to the troops who came straight from Scotland to the head of the Mediterranean summer and who found themselves for the first time embroiled in a war of peaks and ridges. They became acclimatised and battlewary as they forced the Germans northwards, acquiring on active service technique of improvisation very rapidly. Canadians Show Mettle It was a keen and experienced formation which took over the coasta position once vne Eighth Army crossed thv Sangro River and the Canadians soon showed their mettle again m the sneed of their advance over the hilly country to San yito^nd- San Leonardo Then came the battle of Oitona. it was not just another town; it was a fortress within which were countless other fortresses, each sell-contained and each hotly disputed. Once toey won their way up the exposed hillside in the face of the heaviest file, the mfantry found their task was only just beginning. - The battle raged from street to street and house to house in narrow lanes. Tanks, oe tracked in the cobblestoned : byways were targets for streams of Spandau f n e which ricochetted in all directions. “I never knew that bullets could Turn so many corners,” saicl Sergean Poppell. Added to the crossfire from the houses was the constant presence if vehicle and anti-personnel mines, 88 and 75mm. guns mounted m bulldogs and a key-points, ancl determined defence by the mortar crews. “When Canadian correspondents said he fighting was from, room-to-room. t was literally true,” said Sergeant Poppell. “At times we were penned n a room with the Jerries separated from us by six inches of wall. Shells would crash through one wall and out the other. It was not pleasant waiting to see whether the shell was armour-piercing or high explosive. Ho often followed one with the other. “The cry among the infantry was look out for the house with the gieen shutters.’ There were hundreds ot them and every one seemed to be inhabited by Germans..” Another device adopted by the enemy war ! - mine buildings in which were their o. troops. When,, after fierce fighting -the Germans were driven out the observation post would report its occupation by the Canadians and then the building would be blown up by remote control. Not even .churches were immune from this type of warfare. Remarkable Christmas Dinner

Sergeant Poppell attended the most remarkable Christmas dinner of the war- It was laid out in a church building in a manner worthy of the Lord Mayor’s banquet with the best linen, cutlery and glassware. Food and drink were in abundance and the organ played throughout, but it could not drown the noise of machine-gun fire and the bursting of mortar bombs falling around from the fighting a mere 400 yards away. Often, weary men covered with dust and grime of lighting a counle of blocks away, came in and ate their fill. Then they went out again to carry on the battle —some of them to die with the meal undigested. It was 'the strangest and bitterest irony of modern war—incrediable but undeniably true. Ortona was not taken till the afternoon of December 27. Many were the adventures of members of a single small formation. Two men found themselves separated • from the others and sought information from a priest as to whether it was safe. Following his advice one of our men opened a dpor and was killed by a burst of sub-machine-gun fire. As the Germans entered, the other took shelter behind a crowd of civilians. They denied the presence of the Canadian, who afterwards walked out into the street dressed in a woman’s clothes and carrying an abandoned baby. So garbed he appeared before the commander of another company, left the baby and fc joined his own company. This is another example of the incredible stories, the evidence of which is irrefutable and which came to be regarded as commonplace in those desperate days. Sergeant Poppell looks forward to the day when the Canadians and New Zealanders have the opportunity to become better acquainted. I-Ie is sure that they will find they have a similar outlook and philosophy.