Nearly a week of peace passed by, but then on the 7th <\/sup>June, we were on the move again \u2013 into a military vacuum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The German withdrawal from Rome had been so swift that, for practical purposes, the enemy had broken contact. As a military operation, their break back from the Liri to their next string of defences had been carried out brilliantly and mainly by night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the longer term, Kesselring\u2019s purpose was to hold the hill positions round Florence indefinitely but, in the meantime, he had decided to dig in on the flanks of Lake Trasimene and put all to the test on Hannibal\u2019s famous battle ground \u2013 to fight and win, or to delay as long as possible. And to check the impetuous onrush of the Eighth Army, he flung out a mobile screen across the western part of the country round Orvieto. The task of this slender line of covering forces was to hold off our spearheads for the few days necessary, while his main force organised themselves for battle at Trasimene.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The brigade orders came in at nightfall and, as usual, our men were breakfasting at 0300. The following morning, the whole battalion was on the move again at 0530 in the comfort of troop carriers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nothing worse than boredom afflicted us during this Thursday, the 8th<\/sup> of June. The traffic congestion was quite appalling as the elements of three divisions struggled to get forward over the same route. Ten hours later, we had only reached Valmontone, thirty five miles out, after moving through a sea of destruction. Mile after mile on either side of the road lay the smouldering capsized wrecks of what once had been transport vehicles or tanks. Mile after mile, their drivers had struggled on, while our airmen had sat up there in the sky, watching and obliterating anything that moved in daylight. The road onwards was also lined from end to end with slit trenches, so that the wretched German drivers, at least, had had a hole to dive into when the fighter bombers came pounding in on their tails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For us, this was one of those journeys when no one had the least idea where we would finish up. But, as it happened, we drove through Rome effortlessly and without pausing, with our police at every intersection. The city, never having been defended, was quite undamaged and, once through and north of it, the pace quickened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the last evening, we found ourselves directed up into the eagle\u2019s lair itself by the dazed, though still cheerful, 78 Division military policemen \u2013 San Oreste, the abode and HQ of Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring until forty eight hours previously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On arrival, I was greeted by our brigadier, who had gone on with his Tac HQ ahead of the brigade. I think he was feeling nearly a foul as I was. We had both been suffering from some violent internal upset off and on for the last week \u2013 probably due to switching from a rum based diet to one mainly of cherries. On getting out of my jeep beside him, he grinned and handed me a fistful of aspirins. \u2018John, you look like death warmed up,\u2019 he remarked cheerfully. Then, jerking his head in the direction of the mont, he added, \u2018And I shall be expecting a substantial discount for this.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Later, I understood what Pat meant, when Murphy and Ivan had ascertained the contents of the vaults. The place was a labyrinth \u2013 like the Rock of Gibraltar \u2013 and its dark tunnelling was filled to capacity with wine and tableware of every description. The Wehrmacht certainly looked after its chiefs. They could now look after us. I gave Desmond and H Company the task of guarding this Aladdin\u2019s cave – Quis custodiet….<\/p>\n\n\n\n San Oreste had only fallen the previous night and driving up the winding track to the top of this extraordinary feature, the view around us on that lovely summer evening was enchanting. But below and beyond, to the north east and north, there were the same serried explosions \u2013 and the rasping scream of machine gun fire as some lunatics on one side or other loosed off hundred round beltfuls; Vickers or spandau, they were as bad as each other and equally futile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here in the valley of the Tiber, our forward troops were contesting the odds with the German outposts. Winking lights and the dancing fire flies of tracer embroidered the misty dusk. Part of another world, they were just not real in this fairyland \u2013 nor were the bright glow of flares and the dull thudding of our guns firing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What must Albert Kesselring have thought as he sat in this lookout? \u2013 And kept his charge for the Fuhrer over these long months. He had done so to the bitter end and his epic defensive battle would be remembered in history. That, at least, he could chalk up, whatever men might say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Somewhere over there, 56 Recce was busy. Kendal\u2019s men could be relied on to make nuisances of themselves in fluid situations like this one. Quite a number of the enemy were still on the move immediately below us and the situation all round was a jolly good mix up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A good many of our own men were still on the move too. Breakdowns and blockages always took a toll on this kind of journey and dealing with the laggards was a grim task for Ivan Yates under these circumstances. Ivan was inevitably the last to report and the job of MTO was never a sinecure with the regiment in transit. None of the carriers came in until the small hours and until their arrival, we lacked both machine guns and mortars. The carriers were never built for that kind of track and, after four years of war, it was still never safe to trust them. However, we had our six pounders. The anti-tank platoon were rarely in trouble nowadays. Towed by our jeeps and portees, they made light of most journeys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Later that night, Clanachan came up and said, \u2018I have found you a better bed, sir.\u2019 And he certainly had \u2013 a light metallic bronze structure and obviously costly. Whether or not Clanachan had actually found it or whether it had been handed to him by Dave Aitkenhead, I was never really certain, but both assured me that it was the property of the field marshal himself. It served me well until ground up under one of our vehicles several months later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We put our hilltop fort in to a state of defence that night, but there were a further two days of hiatus at San Oreste before we again found ourselves earning our keep. The following morning, Mike Everleigh, and most of his squadron officers, appeared for breakfast and it was comforting to see the dull snouts of his tanks, where they were tucked away on our spiral stairway approach \u2013 as well as having the pleasant company of their owners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then to my great delight, Paul Lunn Rockliffe poked his nose round the door. As we waited for Corporal Telfer to bring in some of Kesselring\u2019s comforts, Paul explained that he had been stitched up by the professors down the line and, having healed to his own satisfaction, if not theirs, he was now reporting for duty. So Ian went back to his battery \u2013 but for how long. He would reappear in the next crisis. It was a pity we could not keep both of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pat chose this moment to pay a courtesy call on the Pope. He had a good many other powerful reasons for doing this besides that of courtesy, but one would have to have a perfect understanding of the Irish mind to appreciate them \u2013 and nobody has ever had that. I raised my eyebrows when Pat mentioned this, in view of our role and circumstances but, for once, he gave me a foggy answer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The call duly took place in no mean style on the 12th<\/sup> of June and Pat took with him the drums and pipes and a large representative gathering of the faithful, liberally mixed with heretics, from all three battalions. Personally, I was quite unable to understand the frenzied zeal of our protestant warriors to meet His Holiness, when they and their ancestors had, for centuries sought only his obliteration \u2013 so maybe there are still inner sentiments at work, or dim recognition of something that I could only guess at. I asked Pat for an explanation but he only said something like, \u2018John, you will never understand anything,\u2019 and, after a pause, \u2018and you\u2019ve got no imagination….\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Being a disinterested Sassenach, I was accordingly left behind to conduct the war on Pat\u2019s behalf and so found myself commanding the brigade for forty eight hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pat wrote in his narrative,<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAt a quarter to nine, we fell in in military array and marched behind the pipes and drums to the steps of the Vatican. We were then led by gorgeously dressed officers through courtyards and ante chambers until we arrived in the audience chamber….where we formed up with the officers on the flank, the pipes in front and the soldiers behind…there was something was very impressive \u2013 and such wealth of history lies behind it.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n …The Swiss Guards, the Noble Guard and the Primates, all in medieval garments, added to the atmosphere….At nine o\u2019clock, the Pope entered surrounded by the guard…and said in excellent English:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018Dearly beloved Sons,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n We bid you welcome. You belong to the nation, which has ever belonged to God\u2019s church since St Patrick.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n We are well aware of the good, which the Irish have done in spreading the Faith from the shores of their green isle into …many nations.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n We greet you and bless you with all our heart\u2019s affection, and your dear ones at home. God be with you always…\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n He then gave the Papal Blessing.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I then presented His Holiness with a scroll in memory of the visit…and asked him if he would like to hear the pipes…..\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Pope evidently accepted and was then edified by a selection of our favourite rebel tunes. These included \u2018The Wearing of the Green\u2019. \u2018The Minstrel Boy\u2019, and to crown all in the square, \u2018The Boys of Wexford.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pat also said our padre, Dan Kelleher, had played a leading part in the proceedings and, \u201cI think he hopes to be made a cardinal out of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The day ended with the drums and pipes beating Retreat on the steps of St Peter\u2019s, and \u201c…the Irish priests there went made with excitement.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n While these festivities were going on, we were called in to the lead again and I took the brigade and its supporters on fifty miles ahead to Colleno. We were minus most of the Faughs during this period as they had been split up on flank detachments by army direction in what seemed to me a thoroughly unnecessary and wasteful fashion. However, we had the Skins just behind us if we ran in to bad trouble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At Colleno, Charles Keightley was waiting for us. Our own scouts of 56 Recce were in action a few miles ahead and the general then requested me to seize Civitella, a further five miles on, immediately. The general made no remark as to which capacity I was being addressed in, that is as CO or brigade commander, so to save bother I just told Jimmy at Brigade Tac HQ what I was doing and asked him to keep the Skins in close reach. I then went ahead with the Rifles and our hussar squadron.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While we talking, the sounds of battle came drifting back to us as Kendal\u2019s scouts tested their luck with the German skirmishers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We had reached Civitella at noon on the 12th<\/sup> after driving fast over deserted roads. That was always a sinister phenomenon, invariably indicating that only the enemy lay ahead and devilment could be assumed as a matter of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As soon as the general had finished with me, I called in the O group, dismounted the battalion and, within minutes, they were on the march for our new assignment. Mike\u2019s tanks tailed along behind, and as one could drive Shermans about like Ford cars, under such conditions, there was no problem in their keeping station with us. However, I sent one of F Company\u2019s platoons ahead of us, followed surreptitiously by a pair of six pounders towed by jeeps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill Gentle, the platoon commander, was in to Civitella within an hour, having compared notes with one of the scout car detachments on route. Warned to be cautious as they had only just lost contact, Bill went up the ditches thereafter. On reaching the place, he probed quietly forward round the backs of the houses and, finding them devoid of life, pushed on boldly to the western exits of the village. Here, the scene changed in a flash and his own scouts were greeted with a storm of musketry as soon as they showed themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For a few mad minutes, rifle bullets smacked off the streets and splintered glass and brick chippings flew in all directions. Then, the enemy formed up by shelling the approaches quite heavily. A short distance back, we watched the string of explosions as the German gunners searched along the road and knew that Bill had been lucky to get in there unscathed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Half a mile short of Civitella, I found Kendal Chavasse waiting for me \u2013 as usual at the point of decision. \u2018You\u2019ve got a fight on your hands, John,\u2019 he said. Kendal had been up to the village with armoured cars, but he could not do much owing to the broken and semi precipitous nature of these parts. His boys could hardly go far from the roads \u2013 and they could do nothing among buildings without infantry to back them. \u2018Get into Civitella quick,\u2019 he said, \u2018else they will probably come back in to it.\u2019 He went on, \u2018I think they are fairly thick on the ground, but we\u2019ve beaten them to it by a whisker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kendal had not been our chief scout all these years for nothing and like his friend and contemporary, Pat Scott, he possessed that power of intuition so often found in our Irish warriors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During the rest of the afternoon, from 4 pm onwards, we pushed forward and outward to either flank, but the opposition were sitting round Civitella in a semi-circle on the series of ridges, which overhung the little town. They were also thoroughly alert and fired at us incessantly for the rest of the afternoon. It became rather desultory and tension hung over the place as we waited for the night to fall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As the dusk came down, I got Colin Gibbs to send Bill out with a few of his platoon to test the position. But unfortunately, our patrol collided with an enemy one in the dark and they did not learn much in consequence. Both parties shot together and Bill left two of his men on the ground though, as we subsequently learned, they had killed one of their opponents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Colin sent out another party later and found the chap \u2013 finding also that we are dealing with the 1st<\/sup> Paras again. But no trace could be found of our own men at the time, though one of them crawled back in to our positions in the morning. Shot through the stomach, he was mortally injured and died soon afterwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill was a very good chap and much upset by the incident \u2013 made more so as I felt Colin had been a little hard on him. Such accidents are quite unavoidable and I mentioned this to Colin afterwards. Conscientious to the last degree himself, occasionally he could be severe if anyone fell short of his own exacting standards \u2013 or if he thought they had. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Nearly a week of peace passed by, but then on the 7th June, we were on the move again \u2013 into a military vacuum. The German withdrawal from Rome had been so swift that, for practical purposes, the enemy had broken contact. 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