SURGICAL UNIT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24832, 4 February 1942, Page 6

SURGICAL UNIT

NEW ZEALANDERS IN LIBYA SEVERAL TIMES UNDER FIRE SAFETY FOUND AT OUTPOST . ■ CAIRO, Feb. 2. A New Zealand mobile surgical unit In Libya ran the gauntlet from General Rommel's advancing forces for 200 miles, reports Ronala Monson, war correspondent of the Daily Telegraph. . L, Sydney."': '■■'./■■ :- .■'. ~■; Relating the story, the commanding officer, who comes from Chrjstchurch, said: "The unit had gone out from Jedabaya to a place 40 miles south. < They were just erecting a tent hospital when they saw German tanks approaching. The Germans started fifing, and the unit struck camp, taking the wounded who had already come in. We bumped along through the night with lights out. By midnight We had covered 40 miles. Some of the patients needed surgical treatment, so We set up hospital in darkness, and by the light of lamps operated on the men who were badly hit by shell fragments. "We struck camp just before dawn and made for a windmill marked on the map; On reaching it in the afternoon we again set up hospital, but an artillery officer whose battery was covering the Allied withdrawal told us that we must leave. Next morning /retiring; troops told us that the Germans were then in the camp we had just left and were coming on. "We were making north for a locality 40 miles north-east of Jedabaya, but on nearing it we saw that it was being shelled by the enemy. We turned back, but did not dare to go far, for fear ! of running into Germans coming from the rear. After running for a vvhile,iwe decided to stand fast. German armoured cars came over the ridge, looked at us, but did not fire. Now we -had the enemy on the ; left, in front, and behind. We turned and , went parallel with an enemy column moving "east a few miles south of us. we attempted to turn north again German armoured cars in front opened fire at us, and we were forced to ..turn .east again.. Some South ; Africans joined ,us in the dark, and we finally reached Msus. We worked there all next .day until. German shelling and machine-gun;.fire; interrupted us, indicating,that the enemy was very close. 'W* hastily loaded the ambulances and travelled for 12 hours until we reached the safety of a British outpost? It had been, tough: going, but we madeit'with all our patients safe."