[Image] 2/13th goes through the wire at R27.

8th September, 1941. Tobruk, Libya.

Men of the 2/13th go through the wire.

These two men of the 2/13th are preparing to go through the wire on a small patrol out from post R27 in the Red Line. On the left holding Lee-Enfield .303 rifle with fixed bayonet is NX36511 Sgt. William F. Kubank. To his right is NX36399 Pvt. Stanley C. Hutton with the Thompson submachinegun.

Post R27 in the Red Line is opposite the El-Adem Escarpment, behind which camped the Afrika Korps. The low ground in front of the escarpment was covered extensively by German machine gun posts but these were regularly monitored and dealt with by nocturnal patrols into no-man's land.

image 020784 Australian War Memorial.

[Image] Wounded 2/23rd patrol returns

17th September, 1941. Tobruk, Libya.

2/23rd Patrol returns through the wire.

This patrol from the 2/23rd Battalion returns through a gap in the wire in their Red Line posts. At this time the 2/23rd had just relieved the 2/48th the night before in their positions on the Western salient.

This seven man patrol returns with two wounded. One carried on a collapsible stretcher the other with a bandaged thigh wound is carried by a mate piggy back style. Casualties in this part of Tobruk were high.

image 020669 Australian War Memorial.

[Image] Post R49 Tobruk Explained

Post R49

Red Line Outer Defenses.

Tobruk, Libya, 1941.

This German aerial reconnaissance image shows the outer perimeter defenses at post R49. This post is one of those built in the early 1930's by the Italian occupation force. It consisted of concrete trenches and weapons pits, an anti-tank ditch and even a underground bunker for when you were under artillery fire. All this surrounded by miles of razor wire and fields of landmines.

The numbers in the picture refer to the following;

1. Main anti-tank ditch
2. Barbed Wire
3. Barbed Wire
4. Weapons pit with connecting trench and bomb-proof shelter
5. Local anti-tank ditch
6. Supply road

9th Division troops would occupy these posts for weeks on end. Some of the posts were within 400 yards of German lines and even raising your head two inches above the sandbags would draw intense fire from German snipers.

Days in the line would often be spent resting due to the intense heat and the lack of usable cover in the desert. Exposing yourself in daylight hours would often be fatal. In Tobruk, it was said that the Australians owned the night. Once the harsh African sun set it would be time for the nightly patrols to commence.

Patrols would leave posts like the above one pictured to venture thousands of yards beyond the wire to gather intelligence (usually by capturing prisoners for interrogation) or to destroy a known objective. At this activity the Australian's excelled.

image #44246L3 by Ullstein as scanned from "The Rats Remain - The Siege of Tobruk, 1941" by J.S. Cumpston, Grayflower Productions 1966.

[Image] Tobruk Patrol by Day

Image taken from "Active Service - with Australia in the Middle East". Australian War Memorial 1941.

A patrol of 9th Division troops goes outside the wire of Tobruk's defenses into no mans land. Patrols like this constantly harassed the enemy at Tobruk. It was commonly felt amongst Australian troops that they "owned no-man's land". Major-General Leslie Morshead, commander of the Tobruk garrison implemented a series of relentless patrolling around the besieged troops in a constant source of concern for both Germans and Italians alike.

The patrol pictured appears to be a standard section patrol of 8 men. 6 with Lee-Enfield .303's with fixed bayonets (a constant source of fear amongst Axis troops) and two with the American Thompson submachinegun. The man in front, the leader of the patrol has the larger 50 round drum magazine whilst the other "Tommy Gunner" appears to have the smaller 20 or 30 round box magazine. All men wear the standard commonwealth tin hat helmet, shorts and carry only extra ammo, grenades and field dressings.

Morshead organised two different types of patrol around Tobruk. Reconnaissance and Fighting. A Recon patrol would often go out after dark, lightly armed for thousands of yards to often lie for hours in the cold desert within yards of enemy positions to gather intelligence about enemy troop dispositions and movements. Often a recon patrol would return, report the night's findings and return to their positions after up to 6 hours in the desert without a shot being fired or a word spoken.

The other type of patrol, the Fighting Patrol, would often go out the next night to attack targets watched the night before. These patrols were often larger in number and more heavily armed than usual. They would often sneak up on the enemy and toss grenades amongst the unsuspecting foes only to charge them with fixed bayonets or blazing Tommy Guns. There was even a report of a fighting patrol of 11 men who attacked 188 Germans with fixed bayonets at night and killed over 20 and captured the rest, including a dreaded Flak 88 gun and many Spandau MG's without a word being spoken or a shot being fired.

The patrols wreaked havoc amongst the Italians around Tobruk with their own leaflet campaign. 9th Division recon patrols would sneak into the Italian positions and stick leaflets with the words "V per Vittoria" (V for Victory) written on them all over the place. There was even a report of an Italian soldier waking up in the morning in his dugout with a "V per Vittoria" leaflet neatly tied around his bootlaces at the foot of his bedding.

image 009394 Australian War Memorial.