MALTA FORTRESS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 76, 29 July 1941, Page 2

MALTA FORTRESS

WILL WEATHER THE STORM HARD IIIT MANY TIMES i Malta has been hard-hit many times 'during this war, but the belief that it | will weather any storm in the Mediterranean is expressed by an Australian who is stationed there. "Supply, of course, is the key to this j fortress." hi' writes. "That and an efficient air raid shelter scheme for the civil population. The man in charge (J that scheme has done wonders, and i ably assisted by Xuereb, the big conIractor, who takes no pay. That shows the excellent spirt. "Stone production and the distribution of engineering materials became a [ matter of importance, as did transport. A Director of Transport was appointed and the buses, the Service ’ l ' -ations and the public had never before seen such efficiency—r such ruthles.sness! There were more : than 6000 private cars—lo 4 are left. "Taxis don't exist. Carrozzin (the j awning-covered horse-drawn cabs) flourish. All these come under the ‘•supply scheme, which works to a policy of achieving, the maximum of efficiency with the minimum of imports. "Utilising shipping space to the best possible advantage is the basis of the v hole scheme. It interests us all here J immensely, because we find ourselves working with the services and ufflfhal authorities all over the place— Durban. Vancouver. Ankara, Bagdad. Australia. India and then, we ! arrange fo»- delivery here. "So far this scheme has been a com—- [ ” !ot 2 ?uccess ’ my window I can j I i-ee .0 000 tons being unloaded in shifts, i Soon our object will have been attain- | ec. the creation of the strongest forj,i 0 " s in the world. I have been in- ! glibly lucky to have had a hand in i (, oing back to the beginning of ■ war. we soon began to get I ;; ur house in order. We don't lack hisf-class men in the key positions l ere and we are well advanced with al' defence arrangements Everything is very quickly going underground. Raids have done very little damage. Malta rock is too hard. Shelters for the civil population are going ar.Ciici well, and our object now is a bombproof shelter for f veryone. AI) MIR A L UUN\INO H AM We have been wonderfully lucky. I think this place wlil be worth looking ! n ' vhen il »s finished.—People, espec'•'Hy the senior ones—are kindness it-! • se| f- The Commander-in-Chief’s staff cculdn t have been kinder. I saw them a" 10 days ago—all working like the! m\.l. well, happy and delighted with; Taranto. “A.B.C. (Admiral Cunningham) was I of course, himself. Everyone in thej whole fleet worships him and believes) lr ' lllnl completely. It is interesting loi hear senior captains talking of him as ! the best Admiral since Nelson. That ! has come from several sources and has i not been said lightly ‘‘No personal xcitements. Two j bomos have been too close for the -.-ond ! of m - v health, and they nearly wrote me off m n Wellington—but I’m still ht-ie and finding viy work more and more exhilarating every day It will f>r 0 ,on 6 ifb in my estimation If we weather this winter fo shipping, and Alr Force during summer, tick' 1 1 thm * we Wlll see l he turn of the I flew past the Dodecanese the other or.y °n one of my expeditions and got !*. np bt when ni*-e shades came hurthng at our Sunderland Onlv Blenheims. What relief! I think Malta wil. weather nnv s,nr m in the Mediterranean.” A BOMB BEHAVES We had 112 raids i February, the longest being 9i hours by night, very ! boring. 300 bombs were dropped No military damage, thro • civilians slight- i 1> hurt. 30 goals killed. The latter were sold m the market n xt morning—no waste! Bn one can't be as lucky as that all the time. W. have had our black days. When Illustrious wa:, first attacked ' v f . t* 3 ? 3 , merchant ship near her j which had brought us very valuable rergo, including more than 3000 tons of ammunition She was hit during the raid and ammunition was missed by 25ft. A 1500-pound time bomb landed m a store ashor. and ended up ' pie middle of a lot. of valuable mateiial. The exper. looked at it and sa'd it could not be touched for 60 1 "We were thus left with three major ambitions—to get Illustrious out. unload the munition ship, and pray that the lime bomb would behave itsell ; "We didn’t give ourselves much hope for .my three at the beginning i ; God was kind to us. The bomb C was made safe, we got the Illustrious ' away four days later (just when the i ' a rim Radio Iv .' said that she was j 1 lying on the bottom in Grand Harbour). and finally unloaded the munition ship with the loss of onlv 2 per cent, of the ammunition through water damage. ’’We've had some wonderful captains I in many of the merchant ships here i One of tiie 'Clan' ship captains—Amins , Campbell by name, six feet two and ] built like an ox took one of his Lewis . euiis „tr n. mourning during the ri _ j lustrums blitz and used it as a Tommy gun! "His Indian servant got him bv the : coat-tails anti tried to drag him off the i bridge—Angus subsequently said that : he was invaluable as a brace! He loos- ( cti off 10.000 rounds, all he had dur ; ing the afternoon and said that lie had I never had a day's shooting like it in 1 his life before! Oh! Lif t's been full of f incident. , BOMB IN CINEMA "They have maintained a very heaw 1

I attack on us ever since, and it has been a very difficult test for both the fortress as a military organisation, and the civil population. They have dropped mines, too, and their results on land arc very devastating. We had one example of one landing in a cinema, the mine (lung a steel girder, weighing between tour and live tons, more than 4(JO yarsd away. "The night raids have been long, but everyone is standing up to them remarkably well. The Maltese are very good. We are at present on a plan of bomb-proof accommodation for the whole population, and then we are going on to sleeping accommodation tor all. It i ambitious, but I am con - vinced that it is the right answer for these long night raids. “As I have stressed. Malta is the exception to all places which suffer from nii raids because you can’t get away. If you get to<j, much in England, you can slip to the North of Scotland for a lew days to revive, but we have no solution. As this war is obviously going on for at least another two years, we must give the Maltese the best in shelter.*'. “Despite all its bombing and accompanying strain under fairly difficult conditions, 1 don’t think 1 shall ever conceive such an affection for a place as I have for Malta. I have grown to feel that it is part of me. And it is. I am sure, the world’s strongest fortress, and one that will take a very great deal i.f cracking.”