The Battle for Malta Page #2

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The Germans used to make sure

that they dive on the place that they want,

and they never used to

come in threes and fives.

They used to come in big rows.

Meme Turner was a 19-year-old nurse

working at Imtarfa Military Hospital.

We used to watch them right from our mess,

coming over the Grand Harbour, rows of ten,

and they used to come right

down, boom-boom-boom.

They'd do it and off they'd go,

and then the other lot comes.

Concentration of force had been

key to German success in the war.

With the Luftwaffe over

Malta, nowhere was safe.

This place may have been

designed as a military hospital,

but no-one had ever imagined that

it would come directly under fire.

Like much of the island, this

hospital was now on the front line.

Malta was now dependent on convoys

from Alexandria and Gibraltar,

convoys the Luftwaffe had to stop.

While Britain was trying to supply Malta,

Germany was about to follow

Italy into North Africa

and had to protect troops being sent there.

It was becoming clear

the war in North Africa would

be a battle of logistics

and that Malta was at the crux.

In January 1941, the Luftwaffe

attacked a convoy to the island.

Badly damaged,

the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious

steamed to Malta for urgent repairs.

From the blitz of the Illustrious,

it really bombed the

engine room quite direct,

and that's where the fire starts.

And so many that died come in to hospital

or as soon as they got into the bed.

And we always used to remember -

lie a Union Jack over them

to take them down to the mortuary.

We were in the next berth to Illustrious

when, um... she was bombed

pretty heavily.

We watched these aeroplanes come in

and saw the bombs coming

down over our heads,

and all we had was a little Lewis Gun,

which wasn't much good.

We knew they were aiming at Illustrious,

but we knew that some

might miss Illustrious

and, um... come fairly close to us.

Lots of things were hammering away,

but the Stukas got through all right.

The Luftwaffe struck hard,

but Illustrious had been well

protected by British reinforcements.

Six months in, Malta's anti-aircraft

guns were formidable.

With Britain now safe from invasion,

Malta continued to be rearmed.

Among the reinforcements was

Battle of Britain ace Tom Neil,

leading a flight of

Hurricanes from Gibraltar.

Following a guide from an aircraft carrier,

but still over water, fuel was running low.

We'd been going for almost six hours,

and I said to the bloke in front,

"If you don't get us down within ten

minutes, we're all in the water. "

And then, magically,

Malta appeared by my left elbow.

It suddenly appeared out of the cloud.

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