Solo.

Stage 5

Solo

My fathers character was of an independent and self sufficient bent. I suspect that he probably relished this separation from his companions. He was also a man of the countryside… his pleasure was to be with horse and dog, out and about, and I think that the wilder the landscape the more he took delight in it…. While he very rarely spoke of his wartime experiences I have not infrequently heard him rhapsodise about both the Libyan deserts and the Italian wildernesses through which he had walked.…. And what a landscape he was now in!

The fighting further south had by now developed into much slower rhythms, more akin, in places, so one reads, to the trench warfare of the first war. No one was getting anywhere fast. And so for the (now lone) traveller the finish line had hardly altered from a month ago. The thing that had changed as they had come further south, though, was the likelihood of encountering Germans..it was now high.

Dick Carver and the Dean had been finding this out for themselves.

The morning after a couple of close encounters on the roads with German forces “they were chased out of a barn before dawn by the owner who claimed that a German convoy was approaching. The farmer said that German patrols had recently raided the village across the river. … they fled up the side of a hill and eventually arrived at a small farmhouse belonging to an elderly shepherd and his wife. All this couple could offer them to eat were chestnuts and lard. She was about to wrap them in an official-looking piece of paper when Richard noticed the signature of Kesselring on the paper.

“What is this?” he asked.

“It’s a notice from the Germans,” said the shepherd’s wife, “we were ordered to pin it up in the village last week.”

The poster described a long list of forbidden activities and offences. The punishment for assisting British or American prisoners was death by firing squad and the burning of any farm that had harboured them. As they read it out, the shepherd’s wife laughed and finished rolling up their small gift. Richard was stunned by the unflinching bravery of these people. When they had eventually eaten the lard and the chestnuts, Richard and the Dean used the poster as toilet paper.”

24th October

I got up about four a.m, leaving Peter and Van still there, as I was being shown across the main road by some Italians. After waiting for half an hour in a house while the chestnut collecting party gathered, I set off with one youth for the next village on the way to Arquata, as otherwise I might have waited indefinitely, many of the party having decided to go to mass -  it was a Sunday – at the last minute.  In the next village we joined another party and went on towards Arquata.

Near the main road we passed a line of stationary German transports: its crews were preparing to move and walking about in the road. An Italian lent me his coat to put over my shoulders and a girl carried my pack. Thus disguised, we passed in the half light without trouble.. We walked along the main road for half a mile, only turning off south when practically in Arquata. I parted from my guides soon after, and continued along a mule track in a south-easterly direction. The main road was running below me about two miles away. I made good progress, passing through two small villages, and crossing many roaring mountain streams and cascading waterfalls.

By midday I was in sight of Amatrice, where Germans were said to be. I had now left the mountain side, and was at the head of a fairly extensive plain, with high hills on my left, and the beginning of the Gran Sasso range visible between south and south east. During my midday halt I had a bath and washed my clothes in a cold green stream. By now my socks were practically useless, and my boots were rapidly disintegrating: my feet were in good order except for a sore spot on my heel, which so far had not slowed me down at all. I moved along lanes and foot paths during the afternoon and got on well. A religious procession caused me to leave the road at one point, and a few miles further on I could not avoid having my photograph taken by some enthusiastic but harmless youths. I aimed to reach Campotosto for the night, and had to press on for the last five miles or so to avoid being left out in the dark. This last stretch was over rough and sparsely inhabited sheep grazings: from a ridge above Campotosto I saw beyond a long lake directly in my path and from where I was, I could see no convenient way around it

In Campotosto I soon found a billet and had a good meal of mutton stew. This, it seemed, was entirely a sheep country, and in normal times they moved their flocks to the Roman campagna for the winter. Now however they were afraid to do this, but did not know how they were going to feed their sheep. Hence, I suppose, the mutton stew. Some women had brought back a story that hundreds of Germans were lurking near the lake which I had seen, and consequently everyone said that it was impossible to go anywhere near the lake. The stories were, however vague as to location, and varied considerably. I had no doubt that some Germans had been seen somewhere, but doubted whether a cordon had in fact been thrown across all approaches to the lake. I spent the night in a barn with three Australians and a drunk Italian.

25th October

Next morning the Australians started off in an easterly or even north easterly direction, on account of the stories about the dangers of going anywhere near the lake, . I continued on my course to the east end of the lake, using a covered approach through woods. I was able to overlook the dam by which the road crossed: a few hundred yards short of the dam was a powerhouse, and near the powerhouse a working party, supervised by what appeared to be armed and uniformed guards, was digging a ditch. They seemed intent on their own business, so I walked across the dam, and was soon out of sight behind the ridge.  In the valley below me was now the Teramo - Aquila main road, and beyond this was the Gran Sasso itself, looking very craggy and immensely high. I planned to cross the main road a few miles further south, but before it went over the pass between me and Aquila and then to get into the rough country to the west of the Gran Sasso and to the east of the Aquila valley. I intended to cross the Pescara in the neighborhood of Popoli. Accordingly I went parallel with the main road for a few miles, calling at a farm for lunch about midday.  Here I was given some very old bread, and about a gallon of fresh milk, which was most welcome. They had apparently been searched by the Germans the week before: also, they said, the Germans had recently made a big drive over the Gran Sasso area, and had collected a number of prisoners.

I crossed the main road soon after this, and began the laborious and intricate ascent of one of the subsidiary peaks of the Gran Sasso: the path was at first through scrub, then beech woods and finally emerged near the top onto open down land. I saw two men and their mules ahead of me on the skyline, and soon caught them up. They showed me Assergi, which I was making for, about seven miles to the south and then we parted. I descended into a stony briar-covered valley  which eventually brought me to the head of the Valley running directly down to Assergi. At this point there was the shooting lodge of a Roman Marquesa who owned all the land round about – a delightful white house, with green - though ill kept - lawns and a charming old keeper who gave me walnuts and would no doubt have put me up for the night, if I had not wanted to get on to Assergi. After a short pause here I set off down this valley – a narrow little valley, with a small stream, bordered on one side by strips of meadowland and pasture. Beyond, the hills rose abruptly and were soon thickly wooded. On my side of the stream, there were no fields, only the steep and boulder covered hillside, with occasional deep caves, in which the old keeper had said ‘escapati’ had been lurking until the recent German drive had turned them out.

As I got nearer to Assergi I heard gunfire, fairly heavy and about four miles distant. Not wishing to walk into a German field firing range, I slowed up, and delayed my entry into Assergi until after dark, by which time the canonading had finished. An Italian youth told me that the range was above  Assergi, i.e to the east of it, the villages either side of Assergi had German billets, and that naturally the traffic between the two all came through Assergi.  As I was approaching the town from the north, this road, which ran up into the hills from Aquila was at right angles to my line of advance. In Assergi I found a most kind and helpful Italian officer and his wife,  who were already looking after three South Africans, one of whom had been laid up with a bad foot for three days. This couple took me in as well, and gave us all food, and a place to sleep in the deserted house. The town, they said, was clear of Germans, and the motor road was actually just to the South: in any case, the place was such a warren of narrow streets, tall houses, and sudden turnings, that I don't think the Germans would have found anything there, even if they had come in

26th october

I left Assergi next morning at dawn with the three South Africans. We crossed the main road and climbed the hillside beyond it. We could plainly see a German convalescent hospital just north of the town, and behind it, high up on one of the slopes leading up to the Gran Sasso, the hotel and meteorological station from which rumor said Mussolini had been recaptured by German parachutists.

I parted from the South Africans at the top of the hill, and, after breakfasting continued on my southward course. The weather was overcast and it looked like rain: clouds were forming around the higher peaks and the wind had dropped. I found some shepherds in a sheep fold in a small green valley, and a mile or two on two men chasing some cattle, which seemed to be going in the wrong direction. One of these men was most eager to talk, but the only positive information he had was that Germans were in one of the villages I had meant to go through: there was in addition a lot of vague talk about German gun positions in the hills, but from past experience I anticipated this to be much exaggerated. I had, however, slightly to change my route, keeping a little more into the hills and away from the Aquila valley.  Another hours march brought me to the head of a long valley, running approximately south. Here I talked with another shepherd for a while – a friendly sensible man – and had a drink from a spring, which he was practically sitting on. While waiting here I saw the three South Africans to the west about a mile away: also four escaping Italian soldiers; these latter came up to the spring, looking nervous and apprehensive,  and went on down the valley ahead of me. My heel was now rather troublesome, making it necessary for me to go a bit short to save it.  When the Italians were out of sight, I went on after them.  The valley was about five miles long, heavily stocked with sheep, and with one herd of about 20 ponies: at the north end it was a mile wide, narrowing down to a few hundred yards at the other extreme. The hilltops on either side were now hidden in heavy, scarcely moving storm clouds. The narrow southern end of the valley debouched into a wide shady plain, and here I could not avoid catching up the four Italians. It seemed we were all going the same way, so we went on together: they had been with the Fourth Army in Southern France in a cavalry regiment, and quite soon became friendly and helpful.   A couple of miles to the east, in complete isolation, was a range of large buildings, which they said was either a factory or a mine -  I could not gather which. The shaley plain merged into rough boulder strewn country, traversed by gorges, and gradually becoming more wooded and mountainous..

I came across a party of British ORs who had been living here for some time, and had no intention of moving. The Pescara, they said, was impossible to cross, and the British would arrive soon. The country became worse and worse, and soon was one-mile-an-hour stuff: precipitous gorges, steep, wooded or rocky hills, and, for a time, no tracks of any sort. Eventually, maintaining our southerly direction, we struck carbonieri’s tracks, and then met the charcoal burners themselves. They put us on the track for Carpineto, a village at the foot of the Gran Sasso hill system, and not far from the Pescara. We walked on at a fast pace through beechwoods, emerging in an hour into a wide clearing, perhaps a mile square, where we saw a shepherd's hut and many sheep.  Large white sheepdogs, with steel spiked collars – an anti wolf device – barked at us. We talked with the shepherds, but found that they were busy lambing, and were unable to house us for the night. So after a drink of water, we went on again, and just as it was getting dark – and beginning to rain heavily – we came to the head of a track leading steeply up from the valley below: we couldn't see how far below because of the rain and mist but I was soon to find out.  Here we met a man with a mule, and, as the result of much talk my four soldiers went on and the man with the mule said he would take me to his house for the night - ‘10 minutes walk down the hill’, he said. He would be ready to go in a few minutes, he said, and was just going to collect some faggots. in the meantime I could wait with some Yugoslavs, who had a hut nearby. I sat with them over a good fire for half an hour, and as it was just getting really dark and raining extremely hard, my man reappeared. We started off down a steep rocky track, with an almost precipitous fall on one side. In a few minutes I could see neither man nor mule at more than two feet distance, but kept touch by sound. We went on steeply down for rather more than an hour, as it turned out, and eventually, after crossing a rocky stream bed arrived at the man's house full. The time, after we had been in for a short while was, I noticed, 8:30: i.e about two and a half hours after sunset.

We had a good meal, and not very long after they made me up a bed of sheets and blankets in front of the kitchen fire, and I went to sleep. The next day I spent in idleness.

27th October

This was Carpineto, just off a motor road, and well stocked with British. A Signals Sergeant visited me during the morning, and gave me the news. There were many parties, both of officers and other ranks in the neighborhood: there was a feeling, it seemed, that the Pescara was an impossible obstacle – 80 yards wide and a 15 miles an hour current: also Germans in boats. many, the sergeant said, had tried and come back: others have been captured and some had just disappeared; (they had probably succeeded, I pointed out). Also, yesterday, the Germans had recaptured an OR half a mile from where we were standing. Morale in fact seemed low, and having informed the sergeant that I was crossing the Pescara the next day, I was glad to see the last of him. My host, named Rocky, did his best to persuade me to stay and offered to house me indefinitely, but, when I had got him to understand that I was going on, he gave me much useful information as to the best route to the river. There were, it seemed, many Germans in all villages, and addition patrols and sentries in the area of Forca di Penna. His wife gave me an almost new pair of good socks – a fine leander pink – and made me up some excellent egg sandwiches. I went to bed early and, and got up next morning about four a.m. 

28th October

I was given breakfast and then accompanied by Rocky for the first half hour: on parting, I gave him my leather belt, a gift which pleased him greatly. The ground was very wet and heavy from the recent heavy rain, being a particularly sticky type of clay. I continually fell over going downhill having no heels and found great difficulty in getting uphill at all. This was all the valley of the Pescara; all cultivated land, cut up by deep little gullies, many villages and small motor roads.

 I had a midday snack in a village about three miles from the Pescara, and an hour later I was concealed in a wooded eminence overlooking the river and about one mile from it. The river looked broad and green: there was a main road and railway just beyond it. The railway was not functioning, but there was much German traffic on the road. It was obviously quite impossible to cross by daylight. Accordingly I ate some of my egg sandwiches, and amused myself by watching occasional German transport and staff cars moving about on the roads in my immediate neighborhood. I could see also a gorge, containing the river to the west which I took to be Forca di Penna. There was a small town and river bridge just my side of the gorge. To the east, about two miles away, was a large dam and hydroelectric works. This, doubtless, accounted for the breadth and apparent depth of the river to my immediate front.

After a time the sun went in, and it looked like rain, so I moved down to a farm just below, and sufficiently far from the motor Road. Here three highly respectable old things, looking like retired cook-housekeepers, fed me on sheep's cheese and bread: they gave me much more than I could eat and insisted on putting what was left into my bag. Towards evening I walked carefully down to the riverbank, now in heavy rain. It looked much wider from close-up, and, as reports had said, had a fairly strong current. There was no sign of any German patrols or sentries. I went to a nearby farm, thinking to ask for something which would float on which to put my clothes. They gave me a meal, and an old coat, but didn't seem to think much of my plan of swimming across. They directed me instead to the dam, where they said I would be allowed across. Near the dam I went, as directed, to the house of an American speaking Italian: he took me to the dam-keeper, who led us both past the powerhouses and over the dam itself by a footbridge. There was a big volume of water coming over, and the noise made one forget that it was raining so hard.  It was by now extremely dark. My Italian guides soon took leave of me, being himself somewhat lost, and rather put out by some movement which we could not identify. I crossed the railway and main road, and found myself in a ploughed field.

I set off in what I hoped was a southerly direction with a touch of east in it, so as to avoid the gorge, which was placed on a big bend of the river. After an hour or so of very heavy going, I struck a hamlet. I reconnoitred this carefully for Germans, but finding no motor road, no vehicles and hearing no German voices, I knocked up an outlying cottage, and was taken into a good fire. After partially drying my clothes, I spent a good night in their potato shed, except that my insides were now rather upset again.

29th October

I had left this Hamlet by an hour after Dawn, having had some rather inconclusive repairs done to my boots. I crossed a motor Road leading up into the Maiella mountains, which lay due south of me. Now, as formerly, these considerable hills looked dark and forbidding, the higher peaks being withdrawn in heavy motionless cloud. I ate my breakfast in a green lane - the last of Rocky’s wife's egg sandwiches by now a trifle stodgy – and surveyed the villages perched on the lower northern slopes of Maiella. The sunrise was watery, and the thin wet light made everything look most unpleasant. I planned to go east and then South, along the eastern face of Maiella. The country was closely cultivated and fairly populous: this, with very heavy, sticky going, made my progress slow. Within a couple of hours, however, I had crossed a river, and was ascending the slopes of one of the more northerly spurs of the Maiella feature. It was here that I first began to hear gunfire, at first intermittent and then continuous, from the southeast: it did not sound more than a dozen miles away. I soon consulted an Italian: his opinion was that it was the English. This was unexpected, as the front should still have been at least 50 miles away.  In another hour I had reached a crest, from which I could see the Adriatic: I could make out the town of Chieti on its hill, shining white in the clear sunlight, and below I thought I could distinguish the square compound of PG21.  There was gunfire to the east of me, and what looked like two burning vehicles on a ridge south of Chieti: down below me Germans were pouring out of a small hill town – Manopello I believe – and forming up on the road with their transport and guns. Was this another seaborne landing like Termoli – or perhaps a commando raid?  I could see no shipping, but something was clearly up. Gunfire was still to be heard - certainly not more than 20 miles away, and apparently to the east of me. After watching for a while, and seeing nothing which helped to elucidate the problem, I went on again, now southeast and climbing steeply. I was soon in the clouds, climbing across small terraced fields sown with winter corn. I met a shepherd who showed me a spring, and soon after I laid down for an hour in a sheltered corner and ate my lunch – the last of the sheep's cheese and bread which the three housekeepers had given me on the afternoon before crossing the Pescara. The shepherd had vanished in the mist, and the track I had been following became less and less distinct as the ground became stonier and rougher: there was no sign of life and visibility was about 50 yards. I continued on my course, guided by a light breeze and occasional glimpses of the sun: the gunfire had now, inopportunely, ceased. Before very long I got into beech and hazel thickets and here I found a track which seemed to go in the right direction, more or less southerly and descending slightly.

When eventually I had come down below the cloud level, I found myself, as I had hoped, on the east of the Maiella feature, and overlooking a valley, in which was a switchback motor road, at the nearest point about 1500 feet below me. As I watched, I saw three armoured cars coming up the hill, towards this point: I could hear their engines as they toiled up the slope in bottom gear. they were four wheelers, but at that distance might equally well have been English or German. As they approached a building near the road, a black speck which had been standing in the road, apparently watching them, ran into the house, and soon emerged at the back, accompanied by a dozen other black specks. They all ran across a field, and quite obviously hid from the approaching armored cars. The cars halted near the house and were soon joined by a staff car, which again might equally well have been English or German. I descended the hill as quickly as I could, wanting to get a closer view of this party but they moved off again down the hill, before I could get clear of the hazel thickets. I heard them shouting to each other before they went, but could distinguish no words.

I reached an unfinished road, the continuation of the one they had come up, and made a reconnaissance of the area. From the tyre marks it seemed that they had gone a little way up the new road, and had turned round and gone away again when it became too rudimentary. While I was looking around the mist came down again and a drizzle began: I met a small boy on a pony and asked him what had been happening. He said, and I did not misunderstand him: ‘the Germans have gone away, and the English are in the village: the officer says he is going to stay the night there’. I could get no more out of him except that the village was about three miles away for stop. I now could hear machine gun fire in the direction of the village. I considered the matter, and concluded that it was a bit fishy, and probably had some explanation other than the British had arrived. 

I therefore continued south:  it was now raining extremely heavily and I was soon wet. In a few miles I came upon a woodman's hut, in which were three yugoslavs, bedding down for the night, and some wood cutters, about to go home after their day's work. None of them had heard anything of any British landing, and, after a short rest, I refused their invitation to stay the night, as there was an hour’s daylight left, and went on.  It was now raining slightly less violently, and I could make out a village to the east, across the valley, which was almost certainly Guardiagrele. Germans were reported here, and machine gun fire from that direction supported this: it was now beginning to get dark, and no shelter of any kind was visible.  I was in fact in an area typical of Maiella – uninhabited, bleak and wet. I suddenly heard above me women's voices and the lowing of cattle: I could see absolutely nothing there, but thinking there must be a farm in the fold of the hill, I made my way to the noise.  I saw no building and at last realized that there was a large cave, the entrance to which was covered with wattle and brushwood, from which the noise was coming. I pushed my way in and found an assorted company gathered around two large fires – in all about 20 men and women. In one corner ponies and mules were tied up, and in another cows and oxen.  It appeared that two or three farmers were hiding here with all their transportable possessions until the Germans should go. They looked a villainous lot, and I felt they might quite well have been in hiding, Germans or no Germans. Nonetheless, the Germans provided a link, and we conversed amicably. They were frankly incredulous of any English forces being in the area, and they were probably right. I spent a cold damp night in spite of the fire and the coat which they lent me, and was glad to find the sun shining in the morning.

30th October

We made a good breakfast of boiled potatoes. After breakfast, I was taking the air in front of the cave, when I observed a certain restlessness in my hosts: outlying women were being called in, and mules were being saddled and loaded up. I observed also, about two miles to the east, a file of about 10 men, obviously soldiers, advancing in our direction, or rather performing what might well have been one half of a pincer movement on the cave, they being the southern half of the movement. I therefore quickly got myself moving – I had my bag to pack and boots to put on - and made my way south along the face of the mountains, keeping to charcoal burners tracks through the woods.

I met quite a number of people – many charcoal burners, and several |Yugoslavs: many of these latter looked at me with suspicion – they thought perhaps I was one of the Gestapo, who was said to be snooping around the hills – but one of them told me that a short way ahead the Germans were digging a defence line, and that it would be difficult to get through. The going became more and more difficult - deep, almost precipitous gorgeous cut their way into the mountains;  it was impossible to go much to the east, as I could see quite close below me the motor road, with considerable German traffic on it – some of it horse drawn – and it was clearly undesirable to go much to the west, as this meant extremely difficult climbing. Nonetheless, I was eventually forced up the hill by an impassable gorge, until, after a couple of hours of very heavy going indeed, I decided that I was merely scaling Maiella itself, which rises to nearly 10,000 feet, and would therefore do better to try the valley. On my way down, I met parties both of Americans and English. This was the same phenomenon I had encountered before the barrier of the Pescara – a conglomeration of would-be escapers, and it did not encourage me much. There was by now a thick mist, and I found myself rather unexpectedly just above a village at the foot of the gorge which I had been unable to cross. I heard quite near the clink of a pick on stone: I approached carefully and saw two Italians digging a hole. I made myself known to them, and asked if Germans were in the village. They said they were, in subdued, excited voices, and told me to go away quickly. ‘We are working for them’, they said, ‘look there they are’. I looked, and saw a man in a dark uniform approach another working party about 50 yards down the hill. I withdrew behind my rock, and when occasion offered, moved away a little. I found a good vantage point overlooking the village, and the river which ran from the gorge to the sea. To the north of the river was a steep escarpment, and it was here that the Germans were making their line, according to my Yugoslav friend – roughly from Guardiagrele to Ortona on the sea. These Italians just below were clearly being forced to assist in the work. From my vantage point I mapped out the course by which I intended to cross the road and river after dark, making a slight detour around the village.

As the light began to fail, I approached the road, and, waiting for a German wagon and pair to pass, slipped across. I was moving carefully through an outlying corner of the village when my efforts at secrecy were largely nullified by a deep hole in the path, into which I fell with a reverberating crash. I moved on as quickly as possible, undamaged except for a cut thumb and,  not without difficulty, made my way towards the river. I had to cross a mile or two of cultivated land, which from above had looked quite flat, but but which now proved itself to be steep and rough to a degree.  I confirmed my direction at a house, listening at the door for some minutes to make sure no Germans were inside. Eventually I reached the river and crossed it by a ford. On the other side, I went through a garden, close to a house. There was a man moving about who appeared not to notice me:  seeing he was Italian, I went up to him. He took me in and gave me some food, which I was glad to have. He had not, he said, taken any notice of me, because he thought I was a German. ‘They are always coming through the garden’, he said, ‘they make me work for them and don't pay anything -  they give us a piece of paper, which they say is as good as money’. He advised me not to go along the road towards Palombara, which had been my plan, but to keep to the old road, which ran between the new road and the hills. He also said that the Germans were guarding the bridge, which was a few hundred yards upstream. When I started off again, therefore, I kept to the old road, and made fair progress. After an hour or so, I began to look for somewhere to spend the rest of the night: I tried two or three steadings, but they were all securely locked, the animals being inside. I heard sheep up in the hills, sounding as if they were folded, and for a brief moment I saw a light in the same direction, but it was gone before I could get a satisfactory bearing on it. I saw car lights on the road below me, and noticed that all the dogs in that direction were barking. I eventually came to the edge of a small hamlet: I went up to a house and listened: there was no sound here, though a dog nearby was barking hard. I knocked on the door, first gently and then loudly. There was no reply: I walked around to the side and heard a clock ticking in a room, then rustling of bed clothes and whispering in Italian. I went up to the window, and asked if there were any Germans there. ‘Si, si’ came the whispered answer, then complete silence except for the clock. I was too tired to go any further so I lay down by the side of an out house, and slept for a while .

31st October

I went on again before dawn, and, as light was breaking, I came to a farmhouse. I found a boy milking the cows, and asked him the routine questions about the whereabouts of the Germans. He said, in an agitated whisper,  that Germans were billeted at the farm: they were, in fact, sleeping in the loft above the cowshed in which we were standing. He also he told me also that yesterday they had been digging machine gun posts in the neighborhood, which they had not yet finished. Accordingly, I decided to retire up the mountain for a bit to consider the situation. I climbed up a rock face for about 40 minutes, and then had my breakfast - bread and bacon which I had been given last night. Maiella was now free of cloud, and I could see right across to the Adriatic. I was thus able to plan my route southwards in the direction of Civitella: the country was heavily wooded and hilly,  but nonetheless I was able to see roughly where I should have to go: I proposed to start after nightfall. I found that I would have to retrace my steps slightly to get off the mountain.  The idea of going down the cliff I had come up was not attractive, and further south it became worse. Therefore, after a couple of hour’s sleep in pale and deteriorating sunlight, I set myself up in a cave some hundreds of feet above the village I had slept near last night. Woolly clouds were floating over the valley beneath me, and by midday it was raining again.

At about this time an Italian joined me: he too was avoiding the Germans. He said they had arrived in the village below us – an outlying portion of Palombara – at about 10 o'clock last night – about two hours before me – and were now forcing the inhabitants to work for them. As the afternoon wore on I became very hungry, but eventually the Italian went off home to get himself some food, and I persuaded him to bring me some back as well. Bearing in mind that he might bring the Germans back with him, I kept myself ready to move, but he was no traitor, and in due course brought me bread and hot vegetables.

I left the cave as the light began to fail, and made my way south in heavy rain. There were many scattered houses, all potentially occupied by Germans, so I could not go very fast. In any case whenever I tried to go faster, I fell over, my practically worn out boots affording no grip whatever on the slippery mud tracks. After two or three hours I came to a steep escarpment: I couldn't see, in the utter blackness, whether this was precipitous or merely steep. I threw stones over it and did not hear them land, so assumed it was precipitous. I therefore made a detour and approached it again a mile or two lower down: here I could hear the stones land, so I started clambering down, using handholds of trees and bushes. The weather was now improving, clear patches of sky becoming visible. I shortly emerged at the head of a little stream, the whole area being deep in slippery mud, fissured by water channels, and overgrown with patches of tall wet grass. I slid and fell down this for a hundred yards or so, until, when the gradient became easier, I once more was able to take to my feet. Ahead was a motor road, down which I had intended to go. I now, saw, however, that a couple of miles to the southwest, near the edge of the mountains there was a defile and a light. This may well have been a German control post, as it was just about there that the road I was on should join the main road between Casoli and Palena. Accordingly, I continued across country due south – the country was marshy, overgrown and dank. In a mile or so I emerged onto a lane running east and west and banded by a millstream. Ahead of me was a hill, behind which I hoped was the main road and river, the crossing of which was my immediate objective. I cast about here for a while, as I was not sure of my position;  I found a hydroelectric works about a mile down the millstream, and so retraced my steps. Eventually, being satisfied as to where I was, and abandoning the idea of crossing the main road that night, I forced my way into a small hut, and slept for a time on some damp bean straw. my insides, however, caused me to get up six times before dawn, so I did not really have a very comfortable night.