WADI EL
SENAB - WESTERN DESERT 1941
Written by
Sgt Arnold Johnson whilst awaiting the commencement of Operation Crusader.
18th November 1941
The summer
heat over the last few days had been building up. until today it became overpowering.
I sat writing letters just clad in PT shorts and plimsolls on my bare feet. The
sweat trickled off my body in rivulets. I thus became an obvious target for
pestilent flies that were out in huge swarms in the blistering heat.
They crawled
all over my face, eyes. mouth and bare body in their never ceasing quest for
moisture until I was at the limit of my endurance and patience. They were so
persistent, returning to the attack every time they were disturbed. The
continual buzzing gave me a headache, especially when a fly actually crawled
into my ear, and for a time I was unable to remove it- The buzzing was
maddening. As I write this last sentence three flies are joy riding on my
forefinger holding the pencil as it moves across the page.
It was to be
a day of torments as shortly after Tiffin the wind blew up from the south
bringing clouds of dust and fine sand. The swirling sand blotted out the sun
and the fierce heat was stifling, it was as if the blizzard of sand and dust
had replaced the oxygen in the air. Dust blew into the tent smothering me and
everything else, whilst outside was like a November fog.
Towards
teatime the wind gradually died down and the sand and dust, violently flung
about all afternoon, slowly settled down on the desert again. The sun appeared
somewhat apologetically as if it was sorry’ we had been so inconvenienced.
After tea I
gladly watched the fiery sun squeeze itself below the western horizon, knowing
that I would be free from the plague of flies and the heat. As I lit the lamp
and cleaned away the dust and sand that lay everywhere like a pall, an Indian
orderly appeared in the tent opening, with a message for my attention. At least
I had some work!
3rd
November:
The heat
wave continued. Once again the wind blew up from the south with almost gale
force, bringing the inevitable sandstorm. It was at times like this we became
fed up with the desert and its choking sand. The wind blew in fierce gusts that
visibility was soon down to two yards. Life then all but stopped. The wind tore
at the tent, blowing in dust through every little crevice until I looked like
an old man with white hair. Slowly bedding. kit and chairs disappeared beneath
layers of fine powdery dust. Going out of the tent in this sandstorm today
reminded me of Capt. Oates’ gallant gesture during Scott’s expedition to the
South Pole when he left his companions in the tent and walked out into the
blizzard to die. The conditions must have been very similar, but for snow read
sand!
Battling and
groping my way against the flying particles of sand that pricked my face like a
thousand needles, I reached the mess tent, only to be told by the Indian cook,
“No Tiftin today, sahib”. Conditions were impossible. So, hungrily and with
smarting eyes I made my way back to the flapping tent where I sat
disconsolately in a dust-laden atmosphere chewing gritty fruit gums for the
rest of the afternoon. By teatime the wind had sufficiently abated to allow the
dust and sand to settle, but our tea of bread was smothered with sand. It was
like chewing sandpaper!
4th
November:
Another long
hot day. The shimmering heat was almost unbearable. The weather was as hot as
last July in Cairn, but there I was able to cool down with the aid of cold
showers and iced drinks. All we had here was salt- water tea. The more you
drank the thirstier one became. Our water ration was one pint of brackish water
a day. I tried to have a bath in half a pint of water that I had saved by
denying myself of water to quench my thirst. The water just covered the bottom
of my improvised washing bowl. By the time I had finished very little water
remained. Pulling one sock in the water completely absorbed this. It was
hopeless. I needed a gallon of water to wash my shirt, so it would have to
remain dirty.
5th
November:
Phew it was
hot! Another scorching day. I sat stripped to the waist fanning myself with a
piece of cardboard. But oh, the flies, they tormented me beyond endurance. The
sweat dripped continually off my body, and my bare feet where myriads of flies
gathered to buzz around and settle on them like wasps around a jar ofjam.
Why, oh why
do we have to put up with this wretched misery day after day? If only we had
some drinkable water to quench our thirst and water for washing our sweaty
bodies and clothing? The nearest pure water was in the Alex-Matruh pipeline a
hundred miles away across burning desert. To think of water taps being turned
on back home where water in abundance was taken for granted and even wasted was
like twisting a knife in an open wound.
For a short
while I wallowed in despair and became an object of misery and self-pity, but
the resilience of human nature quickly overcame this mood and, armed with a
ruler I vent my anger against the persistent flies, notching up a record score
of kills.
6th November:
An even more
gruelling hot day. The sun always rose at 6am and as the day wore on it beat
down upon the harsh arid waste and rocks of the wadi. The fierce rays of the
sun turned the rocks into hot plates burning to the touch. The heat was at its
worst a little after mid-day when the sun reached its peak overhead. Inside the
tent the heat became unbearable and I once again dissolved into a mass of
sweat. I looked back with nostalgia to the days spent at Bagush where sea
breezes moderated the fierceness of the heat. Luckily it was a dry heat and no
moisture in the air as in Cairo when the Nile was in flood there there was none
of the enervating lassitude.
By evening
the hot sand quickly gave up its heat and a cooling wind sprang up. The stars
shone down as darkness fell and the moon rose in the East. With the dry
atmosphere the moon appeared so much brighter than the faint moonlight in
England. Under its white glow the wadi assumed a softer and less harsh glare of
the sunlight. As I looked round the wadi with a new appreciation of the scene
by moonlight, I quickly forgave, and forgot, the heat and torments of the day.
Borne on the cool evening breeze from across the wadi came strains of eastem
music and singing. The Indians were chanting songs of India which sounded so
strange to western ears. Now and again above the music I heard the garbled
tongue of Urdu as the Indian troops conversed with one another.
That
evening, when writing a letter home by the yellow glow of the hurricane amp, an
Indian appeared at the tent flap, “Salaam Sgt-sahib,” he said. “Have you some
ink?” As I poured out a few drops in his inkbottle he saw the letter I was
writing. “Sgt-sahib, forgive me, but are you writing to your Mem-sahib!’ For a
brief moment I was transported to India serving under the British Raj.
8th
November:
The weather
changed at last!