Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Knocked out tanks at Retimo airfield

The two tanks had been moving forward at dawn o9n 27 May 1941. They were both commanded by Ausralian infantry officers. Lt. Lawry's tank on the left was the one hit by a shell and set on fire. Lawry and one of his crew managed to escape the tank, although they had wounds and burns. The other crew, where Bedell had lost fingers due to a mortar bomb hit, stayed in the tank until darkness fell. Honner had decided that without the tanks, he should not attack Perivolia. What changed his mind was that he was missing Robert's platoon. The platoon was either in trouble or had succeeded in breaking into Perivolia. In either case, Honner decided to attack, knowing that there would be losses. There were, and they ended up going in with a Red Cross flag to get the wounded out. Most were killed, it turned out. Campbell decided that the 2/11th should attack Perivolia in the dark. They immediately had a problem when the Greeks started shooting at St. George's church. This is based on the account in Vol.II of the Australian Official History.

No comments:

Amazon Ad