Horrie the War Dog Page 2

  But for the moment, early in 1941, two close mates and despatch riders of the Gunners’ Signals Platoon, Jim Moody, 29, and Don Gill, 22, were doing their best to make their experience in the wilderness more lively by combining their love of motorbikes with practice for their fast-approaching role in delivering messages from headquarters to the front and vice versa.

  Fit, lean-as-a-drover’s-dog Gill gunned his Norton motorcycle through the desert looking for Moody, maintaining a top speed of more than 100 kilometres an hour. Every day, while waiting for their call to the battle zone further east, he and Moody went through a riding routine that they hoped would stand them in good stead for what lay ahead. For, although they would not always be on the front-line with their machine-gun–toting mates, they would be expected to ride into the war zone and deliver vital messages to commanders. Similar to ambulance men and others, they would risk their lives as much as the soldiers perched in trenches behind their weaponry. On open tracks, wadis and oases, through ravines, down and up hills and mountains and into trenches, the despatch riders would attempt to deliver their often vital messages. They would run the gauntlet of planes spitting bullets and dropping bombs, hidden snipers and the pot luck of running into an umbrella of artillery shells, along with the even more hideous stretches of landmines. Somehow on their roaring bikes, pushing them to the limit, and ‘hidden’ behind goggles, they had an instant sense of invincibility, in a similar way the Australian troopers had on their mighty Walers two decades earlier. Those hardy horsemen trotted, galloped and thundered through the deserts of the same region with a similar increased sense of bravado or courage afforded by their fearless mounts. Now the horses had been overtaken by mechanisation: by speedy motorcycles, cars, trucks, armoured vehicles, tanks and planes. It made the war zone seem far smaller—and more dangerous.

  Gill and Moody had both ridden motorbikes in Australia since they were young teenagers. They competed in racing competitions in the decade before the war and were members of ‘bikey’ clubs, the more innocent forerunners to the later ‘gangs.’ Moody had developed exhibition tricks and they both loved their jobs now. If they were going to be in the thick of war, they very much appreciated the thought of hitting it, being in it and at times running from it, on bikes in what they regarded as ‘sport.’

  ‘Better than sitting in a bloody trench waiting like my uncle did on the Western Front through freezing winters,’ Gill said often, ‘or stuck in a sea of mud unable to withdraw while artillery rained down on your skull.’

  He and Moody loved speed and feeling some wind against their faces, even in the near breezeless desert, as they bounced over rocks, ploughed on sand or zoomed over gullies, unworried by a crash or breakdown, for each despatch rider knew his bike better than his own body.

  They spent hours each day fixing, rebuilding, polishing and nurturing these most precious two-wheeled vehicles, among their best ‘mates’ in the desert, nearly as important to them as the lifeblood of the desert itself: water. Motorbikes were the Walers of World War II.

  On this day, 19 January 1941, Gill was pushing his machine harder than ever to catch up to Moody in their daily game of acclimatising to the desert. The lead rider would charge ahead on a dead straight course and after a specified time put compass instructions on a piece of yellow lined paper under a pile of six rocks—always six. The follower would have to find the rocks and pursue the course again, dead straight until the next rock pile and so on.

  Gill spotted Moody’s bike first as he careered over a dip in the desert. Then he saw him standing, pipe in hand, about 80 metres away examining something. At first Gill thought it must have been a rock. The nuggetty Moody, an amateur geologist, had a fascination with any formations, even carrying stone fragments in his kit in the hope of taking them back to Australia. But this time Moody was stock-still, watching. Gill approached. Moody turned and waved as he heard the roar of the oncoming bike.

  ‘What’s up, mate?’ Gill asked as he stood his bike and removed his goggles.

  Moody pointed to a small white animal about twenty metres from him.

  ‘Looks like a . . . ’ Gill began, ‘a pup.’

  ‘Yeah. It’s got floppy ears. I’d say it’s only a few months old.’

  ‘I saw one like that in Alexandria. Some sort of Gypo terrier. Got bowlegs like a bulldog, but the face says terrier. And that long body looks like some sort of sausage dog. That stub of a tail says he’s been doctored.’

  The dog was no more than a foot high. It seemed oblivious of the company it had attracted. His mind was on catching geckos. He would lay flat and wait until he noticed movement in the sand. His floppy ears straightened and fell as it picked up sound in the near-soundless terrain. Then he would pounce. But his quarry seemed to be too quick. For a moment the dog had been distracted by a bird of prey circling high above. It would have been looking for snakes, asps or other reptiles. Or perhaps it was waiting for the little dog to tire.

  ‘What’s the bloody little beggar doing out here, miles from anywhere?’ Gill asked.

  ‘Might have been abandoned by Bedouins.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Or Italian refugees fleeing west?’

  Gill moved close.

  ‘Eh, bambino!’ he called in a nasally drawl. The dog ignored him and did not look his way. ‘Can’t be Italian.’

  ‘With your vowel-crunching Aussie accent?’ Moody said with a laugh.

  They moved close. The pup noticed. It looked up. He was alert. His body language was defensive as he backed away a few paces and then stood his ground. He growled. He bared sharp, strong incisors for such a modestly sized mutt. Experiences with humans may not always have been good.

  Moody took a sandwich from his pack and offered it to him. The dog was suspicious. He didn’t even sniff it.

  ‘I like his attitude,’ Gill said, ‘this little fella can’t be bought, even if he’s starving and by the look of his rib cage, he’s not far off.’ Gill dropped to his knees, as if he too were searching for lizards. Soon both men were copying the dog in its predatory games. They noticed the anguish in his face as his attacks proved fruitless. He was weak but determined. Yet he persisted trying to lift stones with his nose to find the disappeared geckos, which were several wriggles ahead of him. After a few minutes, he took a breather, looking plaintively at his new companions whom he was still not prepared to trust. There was a frown of frustration in his look. His tongue was out.

  Moody took a water bottle from his kit and a small bowl. He put water in it and placed it a few metres from the dog. He looked at it, then back at Gill and then the dish again. He waddled over to the bowl. He sniffed it for several seconds before drinking in such haste that it was obvious he had not had water for some time.

  ‘Flat-out like a lizard-hunter drinking,’ Gill commented with a gentle laugh. ‘I really like the little bastard.’ He looked at Moody. ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’

  Moody nodded. The drink had won over the dog. He wagged the stub of his tail and licked both men in turn, who sat in the sand with him. The dog rested his tired little head on Moody’s arm. This sign of affection, but also pathetic resignation for his plight, touched both men.

  ‘Can’t leave him out here,’ Gill said, looking up at the hawk-like creature, circling lower. ‘That damned buzzard is easy big enough to whisk him away in his claws.’ He glanced at Moody. ‘What do you reckon?’

  ‘Let’s take him back to camp,’ Moody smiled.

  ‘Good idea,’ Gill said, ‘we can work out what to do with it there. At least we can give the little bloke a decent feed and drink.’ He looked up at the big bird above. ‘And deprive something else of a very decent feed.’ They wandered close to their bikes. The little dog waddled after them, his tail wagging. He looked up with a querulous, even hopeful expression.

  They decided that it would be dangerous to ride with one hand free and one holding the dog. Instead Moody picked him up. The dog did not object but instead tried to lick Moody’s
face. Then Moody rode pillion with the dog as Gill started his machine with a roar that had the big bird above winging away higher.

  They would come back for Moody’s bike later.

  3

  THE REBELS AND

  THEIR DOG

  Gill and Moody introduced the pup to the members of their tent of Signallers, who called themselves ‘The Rebels.’ This title was more wishful thinking than fact, although several of them were daring to the point of being foolhardy. They all shared either distaste for any form of authority or a downright hatred of it, and in this sense they were rebellious. Their main overall crime was to be AWL—Absent Without Leave. But their reputation preceded them and had consequences. If the cook-house was raided during the night, police came to the Rebels’ tent first to make enquiries. At least one member of the ‘gang’ seemed to be wearing a black eye after a day’s leave, indicating that the individual had been in a brawl. They were an undisciplined bunch, and it was this that bound them.

  The engineering genius of this specialist communications group was also the quietest: 30-year-old, brown-eyed George Harlor, who had dark hair and a complexion to match. He was the group’s techno-nerd. He could scrounge around for odd bits of metal and wire and put a wireless together in no time. The lean, 176 cm Harlor renamed himself ‘Gordie’ because he was irritated by all the Arabs calling each of the gunners ‘George.’

  New South Wales farmer Bert ‘Fitz’ Fitzsimmons, 24, was the tallest of the group at 182 cm, and the sharp-witted one who had a quick reply or observation in any moment. Fitzsimmons was obsessed with running two-up schools. The 175 cm Lance Corporal Brian Featherstone (‘Feathers’), solidly-built and with his hair the colour of straw, was the youngest at 19. A shipping clerk in civilian life in Victoria before the war, he had the look of a callow yet bright youth. His conscientiousness and outstanding ability as a signaller had seen him gain a promotion early. But his tendency to fool around had made his holding on to that one stripe a tenuous thing.

  There was also South Australian former barley inspector Bill Shegog, 26. ‘The Gogg,’ at 178 cm, was a wry-humoured character and the best signaller among them. He was also a good sportsman who, it was claimed, could kick an Australian Rules football over a wheat silo and hit a cricket ball out of sight. When any footy or cricket team was picked, he was always everyone’s first choice. He had a real talent for alcohol consumption, and in a culture which lauded ‘big drinkers,’ he was reputed to be the biggest of the entire battalion to the point where some dared call him ‘The Grog.’ Just to balance things, he was the battalion’s champion chess player. Shegog also had a creative bent, and was a fine artist with pencil or paintbrush, and everyone had their portrait done by him. All were astonished at their likeness and Shegog’s capacity to capture the subject’s ‘personality.’ When asked by Fitzsimmons if his creativity at chess and painting came from his drinking, he replied: ‘Nope. I just happen to be a drunk who paints and plays chess. I’d get out the easel and the chessboard even if I didn’t drink.’

  ‘Just like Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald? They were drunks and creative writers . . .’

  ‘I’d give a qualified “yes” to that. But please don’t accuse my paintings of being bleak, humourless landscapes like their books, which I believe is because they drink.’

  Finally there was sandy-haired, rough-shaven and unkempt Malcolm Gordon Murchison, 22, who was never too far from trouble or danger. The 180 cm former car salesman ‘Murchie’ was the wildest and most slovenly of an untidy bunch, the exception being the neat and well-pressed Featherstone. Murchison had the habit of idly playing with his revolver and firing a bullet into the roof of the tent. Apart from being unnerving for the others, it let in little rays of hot sun that irritated those trying to avoid the heat of the day. He also kept everyone ill at ease by keeping several 40 to 50 centimetre-long desert snakes—asps—in a kerosene tin under his bed. Every so often he would bring them out and play with them, causing much displeasure with his tent-mates, who would scatter.

  The not-so motley crew was under the charge of Sergeant Roy ‘Poppa’ Brooker, the 47-year-old veteran of the group, who served under General Chauvel with the 9th Light Horse Regiment in the Middle East in World War I. He and Moody were the only two married men. The lean yet sturdily framed, 172 cm Brooker was partially bald. He preferred the comb-over to the brush-back of his dwindling hairline, which was the only sign of insecurity or mild self-absorption in an otherwise natural and generous leader. He would say in defence of his men that the first Anzacs were the wildest men on leave, but ‘once on the front-line and in battle, they were the most disciplined and alert of all armies.’ This tough former Victorian railway clerk wasn’t sure this steadiness under real pressure translated to his lot, but he said he ‘lived in hope,’ and he was often found defending the indefensible among his Rebels for their range of minor misdemeanours. While Brooker complained they were a ‘useless bunch,’ he had a hidden pride in them and was respected and loved by each man, who knew that he had their interests at heart. They described him as a fair dinkum Aussie, which, coming from them, was the highest praise an NCO, or any enlisted man, could receive. Brooker had endeared himself to the Rebels early in their stay at the Ikingi ‘resort’ when Moody, the Rebels’ amateur geologist and archaeologist, found a battered skull in a cave, which may well have been an ancient grave. He took it and a chunk of marble from the cave back to the tent and suggested the skull would make a fine mascot (before Horrie).

  ‘It has a real grin,’ Fitzsimmons observed, and this caused much mirth in the tent as each man agreed it was a smiley, if bony face. They called him ‘Erb’ and placed the skull above the tent door. The camp’s most unpleasant member, bespectacled Queenslander and Sergeant-of-the-Guard Ross ‘Gerry’ Fitzgerald, a brutish drunk, abused the Rebels for keeping it, saying it was ‘bloody sacrilege’ to take an ‘ancient’ from his desert tomb. He tried to take ‘Erb’ from the top of the tent door. Brooker confronted him.

  ‘I’ll fight you for him,’ Brooker told Fitzgerald, rolling up his sleeves as if ready for a fisticuff. The 188-centimetre Fitzgerald was the camp tough-guy bully but, for once in a sober state, he was not prepared to take on the fierce-looking Rebels’ sergeant.

  Fitzgerald backed off, saying: ‘I wouldn’t want to hurt you, old man, not over a grinning bloody skull!’ This caused howls of derision from the onlooking Rebels. From then on, Brooker had greater respect from his men.

  *

  The day Horrie was found, the Rebels were all lying around in the tent, some happily preoccupied; one or two were reading and writing letters, while the others were fiddling with guns, radio sets or other pieces of equipment to do with signalling. The little canine wandered in and galvanised interest. Moody and Gill explained his plight. After offering him bully beef, which he ignored, biscuits, which he crunched through, and water, he played up to anyone who garnered his attention with a whistle, a snap of the fingers, a word or even a smile. His stump of a tail gyrated. He was an instant hit. All the Rebels had some ‘country’ in their backgrounds and they loved animals, especially dogs. They all had an instinct about him. The dog with no name at that moment except ‘doggie,’ ‘mate,’ ‘little fella,’ ‘cobber’ or ‘boy’ moved from bunk to bunk as if acquainting himself with every one of them by sight and fragrance. He was sensing them and his position in the scheme of things.

  ‘What’s his name?’ Harlor asked as he oiled a piece of equipment.

  ‘Didn’t tell us,’ Moody replied, which elicited smiles from all of the others.

  ‘What are you gunna call him?’ Featherstone asked.

  ‘Make a darn good mascot, I reckon.’

  ‘’Bout time we had a mascot,’ Fitzsimmons said, ‘instead of Erb or Murchie’s bloody reptiles.’

  ‘They are not “reptiles,” ’ Murchison said, ‘they are my pets.’

  ‘Nar,’ Gill said with a rueful look, ‘they can hardly lead our unit on a march.’

 
‘So it’s agreed then,’ Brooker remarked as he hoisted the dog up onto his bunk, ‘he’s with us and he’s our mascot.’ He noticed a flea jump from the dog, then another. ‘Once he’s had a good bath.’

  ‘Why?’ Gill asked. ‘He’d be cleaner than most of us.’

  ‘Speak for yourself,’ Brooker said.

  ‘Okay, fellas,’ Moody interjected, ‘let’s name him.’

  Each man proffered a name or two. First, there was ‘Anzac’ but that was dismissed. One of the other battalions had a cat of that name. Second, there was ‘Gypo,’ the nickname for Egyptians, which was not always expressed with endearment. That was discarded. Murchison commented that such a name linked him with the locals when this dog might become a ‘dinkum Aussie.’ A third suggestion was ‘Wog Dog,’ which brought a ripple of approval. Some repeated the name and liked the rhyme. But once more Murchison thought that this linked him to Arabs in general, and they were not popular with the diggers, who had not come to terms with the locals and their ways, which were so different from those ‘back home.’ This blatant racism was common among troops of all nationalities but the anti-Arab attitude had roots deeper than simply a sense of superiority, often unjustified, because of different cultures and mores. The troopers of the Australian Light Horse during the Great War had had a deep and abiding distrust of all Arabs, who were lumped together, whether city dwellers or desert nomads. The thieving of items such as rifles and the sly murdering of troopers in the camps throughout the Middle East had set the original Anzacs hard against all Arabs. The massacre of British cavalrymen in the Sinai at Oghratina on 23 April 1916 had begun the detestation. Continued pilfering, throat-cutting and shooting of Anzacs in the night over the next two years had set a level of wariness and hate that lasted for the war’s duration. It had carried over two decades into this war, and was reinforced by renewed thieving experienced already by Anzac troops. Nevertheless ‘Wog Dog,’ which sounded good to the men and had a resonance of fun, in keeping with this funny little animal and his playful, alert ways, looked likely to win the naming ‘contest.’