Evening star., 1942-10-06
Allen
Continued From First Page.)

November IL. 1910, will always re-
main one of my most thrilling trips
to sea.
The feet had splashed about for
q week, almost within sight of the
italian coast line. trying to draw
Mussolini's much-vaunted warships
out for a showdown fight. But they
refused to bulge. So Admiral Sir
Andrew Browne Cunningham, then
commander in chief, said, IF they
won't come out we'll go in and blast
them out
The world knows the rest of the
story. Aboard the aircraft carrier
Illustrious. saw nine torpedo bomb
ers skin off her broad flight deck
in the moonlight, sWoop into Ia
ranto's land-locked harbor, shove
their "tin fish" into three bat
tleships and two cruisers and safely
return to the Illustrious. That, for
the time being, broke the backbone
of Mussolini's battle fleet.
In December of that year Admiral
Cunningham took his battle fleet
into the mine-dotted waters of the
Adriatic and 15-inch guns poured
more than 100 tons of high-ex-
plosive shells into II Duce's Albanian
base of Valona.
Advent of Luftwaffe.
The year 194l brought new phase
In warfare in the Mediterranean.
It marked the advent of the Luft-
waite in force in this sea for the
first time.
After Admiral Cunningham's fleet
had thrown hundreds of tons of
shells into Bardia and other Lybian
positions, clearing the way for the
British Army's advance and the
capture of 100000 Axis prisoners, the
men-o-war were sent westward to
Just of Pantelleria to pick up q
convoy coming through from the
Western Mediterranean.
I saw an Italian destroyer which
attempted to interfere with the con-
voy blasted to bits on the morning
of January 10 and two others put
to flight by British destroyers and
cruisers.
BY noon a hundred Nazi Stukas
we're over the fleet, concentrating
their attention on the Illustrious.
That was one of the most ter
rifying experiences of my life. For
seven solid hours Nazi dive bombers
droned over the Illustrious, drop
ping more than 100000 pounds of
bombs. The carrier received seven
direct hits Of 1,250-pound bombs.
Lashing about like a wounded
tiger, the Illustrious flung tens of
thousands of pom-pom and 4.5-inch
shells at the diving Stukas. Burn
ing furiously and listing badly, the
carrier finally made the port of
valletta, Malta, where for another
week she was kept busy firing her
guns at Stukas determined to sink
her at all costs.
Blown by bomb blast from the ad :
miral's bridge to the air intelligence
quarters nearly 80 feet below, !
prayed that afternoon. But I got
out of it with few cuts and bruises
and considerable shock.
TripOlf Harb0r Bombarded.
was of to sea again on the next
big trip and so on to April %, 194l
That night, Admiral Cunningham
boldly sailed into the mine laden
waters of Tripoli Harbor and plas-
tered that Barbary Coast nest o1
Nazis and Italians with 1000 tons
Of high-explosive and armor-pierc-
ing shells. Tripoli's water front wal
ablaze when we saileo away.
Then the battle OF Crete when tn,
Nazis hurled millions Of pounds o.
bombs on the fleet, trying to destroy
every warship and prevent the evac.
uation Of 1900 British troops tron
the island in May. 194l. The Who'll.
sea around Crete was turned into {
great mass OF geysers with HUNDREDS
Of bombs crashing into the water
The navy evacuated the soldiers,
but lost four cruisers and eight de-
stroyers under air attack.
III needed anything after the n
ltlstrious to convince me that . nee
must have air protection to carr!
out 4 successful operation. all doubt!
were dispelled after seeing warshipe
having exhausted their ammunition
picked Oh like sitting ducks by dron
lne stukas making their kill. Their
were heated demands that adequate
air protection be provided to stol
this slaughter Of warships and per
eonnel.
All through the summer Of 1o4
HE fleet was busy bombardtng alonl