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pre-El Alamein trivia

• Message 1.Β 

  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Tuesday, 25th October 2005

  this is a minor...but i would like detail and clarified. i've read in a couple of accounts (diarys in the IWM) of servicemen arriving in North Africa to find the desert was staked out with "scrim" or "white tapes". my uncle also mentioned this as being a sight that he and his fellow men gazed upon in disbelief(but he sadly passed away very shortly after our intial conversation and i was unable to enquire further). presumably this was to order the large numbers of troops girding up for the battle of El Alamein. was this usual military practice in landscapes with few natural land marks? did these tapes merely form a grid and rough how much desert are we speaking about?

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• Message 2

  , in reply to message 1.

  Posted by expat32 (U2025313) on Tuesday, 25th October 2005

  Hi hoi, chances are it was to indicate areas free of mines

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• Message 3

  , in reply to message 2.

  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Tuesday, 25th October 2005

  Hi hoi, chances are it was to indicate areas free of minesΒ 
  
  hi expat
  
  maybe...but it didn't sound like it.

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• Message 4

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  Posted by colonelblimp (U1705702) on Tuesday, 25th October 2005

  hoi-polloi
  
  From Barry Pitt's "Year of Alamein 1942":
  
  "Start and guide-lines were laid out on every divisional front during the four nights before the attack - nearly 9 miles for every division - accurately surveyed, meticulously plotted, and laid down in near invisible telephone wire, to be covered during the last hours by white tape."
  
  So I imagine you'ld be looking at a start line, parallel to the German front, and approach routes forming an angle with it.

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• Message 5

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  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Tuesday, 25th October 2005

  cheers very much.

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• Message 6

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  Posted by DL (U1683040) on Thursday, 27th October 2005

  Hi all,
  
  Similar procedures were used in the First World War, particularly during attacks which were launched from the middle of no-mans-land, the jumping off tape was laid at a point where the infantry were to wait until time to attack. The idea was that any point beyond the marker tape was under artillery bombardment, so to go too far forward was to risk being hit by friendly fire. I haven't heard of it being used in Alamein, but I would imagine that the markers served a similar purpose, particularly given the massive, almost WW1 style preparatory bombardment used at Alamein.
  
  Cheers
  DL

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• Message 7

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  Posted by Mark E (U204575) on Thursday, 27th October 2005

  The white tape was definitely used to mark clear lines through minefields.

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• Message 8

  , in reply to message 6.

  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Thursday, 27th October 2005

  Hi all,
  
  Similar procedures were used in the First World War, particularly during attacks which were launched from the middle of no-mans-land, the jumping off tape was laid at a point where the infantry were to wait until time to attack. The idea was that any point beyond the marker tape was under artillery bombardment, so to go too far forward was to risk being hit by friendly fire. I haven't heard of it being used in Alamein, but I would imagine that the markers served a similar purpose, particularly given the massive, almost WW1 style preparatory bombardment used at Alamein.
  
  Cheers
  ¶Ω³ΆΜύ
  
  
  thanks very much DL...my uncle told me that the push forward was signaled a few minutes too early. thus his company were indeed hit by friendly fire leaving the corporal dead, my uncle to pick up the bren, along with the other "push forward boys" had to struggle back the way they came.
  
  cheers

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