He Who Dares

Recollections of Service in the SAS, SBS and MI5

David Sutherland

• Publisher: Leo Cooper
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781526782229
• eBook ISBN: 9781473814844
• Topic: Sozialwissenschaften
• Subtopic: Militärische Biographien

A British Army veteran offers a glimpse of the action undertaken by special forces during World War II in this memoir.
With so few survivors of the Second World War military generation alive today, it is extremely fortunate that men like David Sutherland recorded their experiences for posterity. There can be few veterans whose contribution to victory can rival Sutherland's as readers of this superb memoir will discover.
Much of the action is set in the Aegean where the author served with the Special Boat Service, an off-shoot of the infant SAS, raiding airfields on the German-held islands. This is really thrilling stuff, made all the more moving by the author's profound and lasting admiration for the Greek resistance fighters who risked not just their lives, but those of their families and entire villages, by giving their support.
David Sutherland has written a true adventure story. But it is one which raises that age-old yet acutely disconcerting question: "When men have lived lives like this, what am I doing catching the 8:15 from Woking?!"
Praise for He Who Dares
"If you have any interest in Special Forces, the war in the Aegean or just to marvel at the courage and adaptability of that rare breed who fought in "non-standard" formations this is a book for you. Well written, full of detailed stories of action but also the intimate details of a young officer with all the concerns and complexities of a dangerous job with the added responsibility for other people lives. For those of us who are armchair warriors, this is essential reading of a biography from that unique breed of men." — Surrey Constabulary History Journal

Contents

Foreword

Preface and Acknowledgements

Glossary

1. Origins
1920–38

2. Sandhurst, The Black Watch and Dunkirk
1939–40

3. Joining the Commandos
1940

4. With 18th Indian Cavalry in Tobruk
July–September, 1941

5. The Rommel Raid
November, 1941

6. With the SAS in the Western Desert
March, 1942

7. The Aluite Plan
April–May, 1942

8. Attacking German Airfields in Crete
June, 1942

9. Operation Anglo
September, 1942

10. SBS Reorganization and Operation Albumen
June, 1943

11. With the SBS in the Aegean
1943–44

12. A Shipwreck and a Turkish Bath
March, 1944

13. Hitler’s Commando order and the Alimnia Patrol
April, 1944

14. With the SBS in the Adriatic
1944–45

15. With Greek Raiding Forces in the Civil War
1948

16. MI5

Bibliography

Index

Foreword

by
LORD JELLICOE

I count it a rather special privilege to have been invited by my wartime comrade-in-arms and very old friend, David Sutherland, to contribute a brief Foreword to his fascinating recollections of a full, varied and exciting life of no mean achievement.

I did not know the young David, not having had the privilege of an Eton or a proper Sandhurst education. Likewise, post-war, our professional paths did not cross. However, it was always a pleasure to meet this friend whom I admired so greatly and to talk about our wartime years together in the Special Forces. And I was, of course, well aware of the important role which he had played as Colonel in command of 21 SAS, one of the Territorial SAS Regiments to which David Stirling, the Founder of the SAS, rightly attached so much importance.

Again, I did not meet David in the first year of the war, although I have read with admiration and pleasure his understated account of the role he played as a nineteen-year-old Black Watch Platoon Commander in the Retreat to Dunkirk. It makes good reading.

However, from the autumn of 1940 until the end of the war I saw a great deal of David. We were together in No. 8 Commando. We travelled out together to the Middle East with the great David Stirling, who, since he seldom left his

cabin, we christened ‘The Great Sloth’. And when our Commando was disbanded I kept abreast of his subsequent and daring activities – his participation in the abortive raid on Rommel’s Headquarters and his exploits in Tobruk. Thus when we met early one June morning in 1942 in German-occupied Crete, David was someone I knew pretty well and about whom I knew a good deal. In his book he states, ‘One always remembers most clearly the first encounter with Crete.’ True. But I shall also always remember that Cretan encounter with him.

Soon after that David played an outstanding role in the successful, albeit costly, SBS attack on enemy airfields in Rhodes, an episode brilliantly, albeit modestly, recounted in his book.

Given that background, it was a very real pleasure for me to know that David was to be one of my three Squadron Commanders, when, on April Fool’s Day, 1943, following David Stirling’s capture, the small SBS was re-formed under my command and became the enlarged Special Boat Squadron.

David tells superbly well and with great accuracy (I wish I had his memory!) the raiding role which his ‘S’ Squadron and indeed the Special Boat Squadron itself (later to become the Special Boat Service Regiment) played in 1943 and 1944, be it in Crete, be it in the Aegean, be it on the Mainland of Greece or be it in the Adriatic, and the contribution that those continuous raids, together with the activities of the Long Range Desert Group and the Greek Sacred Squadron, made towards containing German forces in South-East Europe when they were needed elsewhere.

I shall not elaborate on his account. It speaks, and speaks well, for itself. And it is shot through with the generosity of its author. This is apparent in the tributes which he pays to those who helped us – to the Navy, be it the more regular naval forces, British or Greek, or be it the remarkable Levant Schooner Flotilla. It shines through in his gratitude to all the

Greeks who supported us in those days, often at grave risk to themselves. As he writes: ‘They guided us, they fed us, they sheltered us and they died for us. No one in the SBS will ever forget this.’ And of course this generosity of spirit, this feeling for those under his command, is clear from all he writes, not least of his thoughts as he returned from his successful ‘S’ Squadron mission in the Aegean in early 1944 when he said to himself, ‘These officers and men are special. One can take them on SAS operations anywhere in the world and they will perform well. I am incredibly lucky to be leading them.’

Yes. David Sutherland was incredibly lucky to have those chaps, both officers and, very much, men, under his command. I was lucky, too, to have under my command many remarkable men – Ian Patterson, John Verney, Walter Milner Barry and the heroic Dane, Anders Lassen, to name but a few. I was also quite particularly fortunate to have had David as one of my leading Squadron Commanders – a born commander, supremely professional, calm in a crisis, utterly courageous and one who had a very special feeling for everyone under his command. Thus, when I was required to nominate my successor to command that unique unit, the Special Boat Service Regiment, I have never in a fairly long life been faced with an easier decision. Clearly David Sutherland was the right man for the job. And so he proved, as he has proved in his many subsequent assignments which he recounts so well.

JELLICOE

Preface and
Acknowledgements

My tall, extrovert, teenage grandson James approaches. In his hand is a well-worn copy of The Filibusters by John Lodwick. By common consent this is the best account published so far about the wartime activities of the Special Boat Service. James has read it from cover to cover. I know I am about to be quizzed closely on its contents and my part in the SBS story. Originally, SBS was a small enemy-held beach reconnaissance and inshore sabotage unit, using canoes. In December, 1942, SBS in the Mediterranean was taken over by David Stirling and became part of the SAS.

With a wry smile, James asks, ‘Why were the SBS Adriatic operations so disappointing?’ I explain the political and military difficulties and frustration when highly geared, trained and motivated Special Forces are injected into a raging Civil War between Royalists and Communists in Yugoslavia and Albania, and cannot take sides. A Balkan nightmare, repeated in Bosnia.

This book is for my grandson James and his generation. They are interested, I am pleased to say, in the wartime history and tradition of the Special Air Service Regiment and its operational development since.

After the war I had 25 interesting years in the Security Service, MI5. Also, I commanded 21 SAS Regiment (Artists Rifles) TA from 1956–60. I was able to change the role of SAS in the Reserve Army to behind-enemy-lines reconnaissance and reporting. It is now time to include something about this.

The idea of writing this book has substantial support from my sister Susan Collins, family and friends. A whole raft of amusing SAS Regimental Association characters and colleagues with whom I have close wartime operational links agree.

At the start I must thank particularly the distinguished Commander of HM Submarine Traveller, Michael St John, and his crew. By his skill in placing his submarine in enemy-infested waters, and waiting a long time for the redoubtable Marine Duggan and me to swim out, we made a quick getaway from Rhodes. If we had failed to reach Traveller, the Italian depth-charges would have killed us. Next morning our mangled bodies would have been found floating in the sea, amid much Italian jubilation.

The other person who has given me a lot of valuable original material about Operation ANGLO is George Vroohos, the well-known lawyer and historian living on Rhodes, a bright and delightful man whom I first met when visiting Rhodes in 1986 to look over the ANGLO deadly open ground. He has become an expert on Operation ANGLO and its local impact. He sent me two interesting documents: Italian Governor General, Admiral Inigo Campioni’s report to Rome on ANGLO – Sheila Gruson has kindly translated this – and Vroohos’s own detailed report on ANGLO which the attractive Greek ladies C. Variadis and B. Niotis have translated into English. Both are included in the book complete.

Some years ago the distinguished military historian, Barrie Pitt, who had served in 21 SAS Regiment, got in touch with me. He wanted to write a book about the SBS in the Mediterranean during the last war. He felt that The Filibusters did not provide the strategic background into which SBS operations fitted. We had long talks at 51 Victoria Road about the early 1942, 1943 and 1944 SBS operations in Rhodes, Crete and the Aegean. He asked for and I lent him three volumes of Operational Reports, personal accounts and photographs.

His book, Special Boat Squadron – The Story of the SBS in the Mediterranean, was published in 1983 by Century Publishing, London. It contains a lot of the original material I gave him. I am grateful to him for writing this book. I have used some of the details in his book in mine.

I would also like to thank Drs Carritt, Zilkha, McKeown and Thompson for keeping a watchful, jovial eye on my health, and Tanky Smith and Jason Mavrikis of the Special Air Service Regimental Association for keeping me straight on dates, places and people.

Above all, my sincere thanks to Mary Young for transforming my totally baffling handwriting into a fine manuscript.

Glossary

A/C	Aircraft
A/T	Anti-tank
BLO	British Liaison Officer
BMMG	British Military Mission to Greece
DCLI	Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry
DLAW	Directorate of Land/Air Warfare
GRF	Greek Raiding Force
HDML	Harbour Defence Motor Launch
JRRU	Joint Reserve Reconnaisance Unit
KKE	Greek Communist Party
LFA	Land Forces Adriatic
LRDG	Long Range Desert Group
LSF	Levant Schooner Flotilla
MG	Machine gun
MTB	Motor torpedo boat
OP	Observation Post
RFHQ	Raiding Force Headquarters
RHN	Royal Hellenic Navy
RTU	Returned to Unit
SAS	Special Air Service
SBS	Special Boat Service
SLO	Security Liaison Officer
SOE	Special Operations Executive
SOP	Standard Operating Procedure
TSMG	Thompson sub-machine gun
VCDS	Vice Chief of the Defence Staff
VCIGS	Vice Chief of the Imperial General Staff

1

Origins

1920–38

I am a lucky Scorpio and an unconventional, adventure-seeking Scot. My roots lie in two very different places – the rich farms and tidal estuaries of East Suffolk and the remote and heather-clothed upland hills and pastures of Peeblesshire in the Borders.

My links with Suffolk lie via the Quilters – a bright, influential land-owning family then living in great style at Bawdsey Manor, a hideous, Victorian clifftop mansion overlooking the wet and windy ‘German Ocean’. Norah Quilter, with a ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents