The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (Princess Louise's)

A Tin of Biscuits © Tom Barker

"But up strode the soldier to the fore.
With one shot he quelled the loud uproar."
H Marshall

Since there was only one gate to enter or exit the compound, this was guarded by a Bren gun mounted in a 15 cwt truck and a guard of five men all armed with rifles. Anyone trying to exit the compound had to obtain permission first.

There had been a tug ordered to tow three dumb barges from the jetty at Sollum, but it could only take about three hundred Italian P.O.W. at one time. One day the tug was pulling the barges full of P.O.W. and they were strung together like a string of beads, until the bloke in the tug, who was having a leak over the side of the tug, spotted a mine floating past. He screamed at the bloke on the wheel, but it was already too late as the first barge hit the mine with its bow and sank, pulling the other two barges with it. The blokes in the tug were too late cutting the rope and the tug joined the unfortunate 300 Italian P.O.W. plus some of our lads who had volunteered to act as Guards.

No one got ashore from that mishap, but there was also more grief in store for the Italians behind the wire. Some idiot threw a tin of unopened Army issue biscuits into the Italian wired-off enclosure. It was as if someone had thrown a cured ham into a pond full of voracious sharks. There was a scrum for the tin that was about 14inches by 14inches and 20 inches tall.

To open the tin, there was a metal handle attached to a tin disc that had been soft soldered to keep the tin air and water-tight. Since the hole being covered by the tin disc had razor sharp edges, once the disc was ripped off by pulling at the handle, it was obvious that only one hand could enter the six inch hole and remove the 3 inch square packets of biscuits that were tightly packed inside.

But the starving Italians were now fighting each other to obtain a packet of biscuits. Three blokes now had one hand inside the tin trying to secure a grip on a packet of biscuits and other hungry mates were trying to wrest the tin from them. Since the sharp rim of the hole was now lacerating the three wrists jammed in the hole, there was blood spurting everywhere.

I saw what was happening and shouted to a Sergeant, who looked, then shrugged and bellowed, “Stuff ‘em, ler ‘em gerron wiv it!” and he walked away.

The bloke on the Bren gun mounted on the Morris truck shouted, “Oy, mate! Yu can’t go in theer on yer own!” I went into the compound anyway and some on-looking Italians were pleading and wringing hands as I walked past them. I shouted at the blokes still struggling with the biscuit tin, which was now awash with blood. But I was ignored, so I put a round up the spout and pointed my rifle at the sky and pulled the trigger.

It was magic. The tin was dropped as I reloaded, and all the Italians stood still wondering what was about to happen. I motioned one Italian bloke to get a packet of biscuits from the tin and give it to one of his mates and made another bloke go stand with him. Another Italian latched onto what I was doing and spoke loudly to his mates, who all lined up in pairs to share a packet of biscuits, now being removed one at a time from inside the bloodied tin, and passed on to other Italians.

Incidentally, there were not enough biscuits in that one tin to go round over a thousand Italians in that P.O.W. compound that day, but I was informed that more were on the way.

After the incident, one Officer said he had been walking past and had watched the whole thing, then demanded angrily, “On whose authority did you fire that shot?”

I replied, “I merely used a bit of common sense to take charge of a dangerous situation and it worked, Sir. We are supposed to be fighting Fascist and Nazi behaviour, not condoning it.”

“I have a good mind to put you on a charge!” retorted the Officer.

Then on realising that he was about to drop himself in it, so to speak, he waffled, “Well done anyway, what!” and waddled off in a huff muttering to himself.