DAY OF THE MULE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 31 December 1943, Page 4

DAY OF THE MULE

ON THE ITALIAN FRONT TRANSPORT ON NEW ZEALAND SECTOR. TANKS SUPPLIED WITH SHELLS. (Official War Correspondent, N.Z.E.F.) DIVISIONAL HEADQUARTERS. December 27. As heavy rains sink into the thick grey mud of the countryside, paralysing mobility, the New Zealanders are relying more and more on the most primitive means of transport. Where four-wheel-driven three-ton trucks bury themselves to the .axles, where jepes dig in with a flurry of flying mud, supplies and ammunition continue to flow forward in an uninterrupted stream. The answer is mules. Before we ever - crossed the Sangro, members of the division whose tradition in this war is one of mobility, saw a sight which was to them strange and anachronistic. It was that of mule teams by a side road, tended by soldiers in the uniform of our newest cobelligerent Italy. They were there against a contingency which was not long in arriving. Soon these sturdy Italian mules with their cumbersome pack-saddles were making their slow, sure-footed way across country impassable for wheeled traffic. The forward element on the ridges round the hillotp fortresses of Ttessa. Perano and Archi were glad to hear the sounds of hooves and the jangle of harness in the darkness before the river crossing. When our machine-gunners first established themselves across the Sangro, the animals made the perilous journey in spite of mines, enemy fire and the treacherous stream, to keep the guns firing. Quite early in the campaign, muleteers who operated under English officers, suffered casualties. All the Italian soldiers employed on this work volunteered for the task and are treated as our own troops. They have been reinforced by New Zealanders, English and French troops as the mule teams grew in strength and as scope widened. Before the crossing our men had a healthy respect for the efficiency of this means of transport, but this was to increase as the division struck better mountain fighting and winter rains. Steep tracks covered with a film, of greasy mud and open country soft from the plough quickly became impassable to wheeled vehicles. Possibly the strangest spectacle of modern war is that of tanks being supplied with ammunition by a mule-train. This has frequently happened where our armour has moved with difficulty beyond the reach of wheeled supply columns.