Whangarei Man Joined Partisans

Northern Advocate, 23 August 1945, Page 5

Whangarei Man Joined Partisans

(Special.) LONDON, August 22. Gunner H. J. Banton, of Whangarei, and Private S. B. McFarlane, of Wellington, who are now in London awaiting reptariation, joined the Italian partisans and waged guerilla warfare against the Germans and Fascists, after escaping from a prison camp at Arro, in Vercelli Province, on September 8, 1943.

Both were captured at' El Alamein and taken to North Italy. They escaped with Privates G. A. Schultz (Tara-

naki), R. V. Howe (Devonport), W. J. Clements (Masterton) and two Australians. All linked up with Biella partisans and fought and sabotaged behind the enemy lines. Later, they joined a British military mission for Upper Piedmont, with which they remained until the Allied occupation of Northern Italy. Gunner Banton, dressed in “civvies” and aided by his knowledge of the Italian language picked up in prison camps, lived for a long period in Biella, then garrisoned by Germans and Fascists, slipping out at frequent intervals to transmit information to the mission’s mountain headquarters. The work of Gunner Banton and his fellow escapees was highly commended by the commander of the mission.