Many of the partisan groups in the Mediterranean lacked the punch of heavy weapons. That was where the Raiding Support Regiment came in.

By SEPTEMBER 1943 the land war in the Mediterranean theatre had moved from North Africa to Italy and Sicily. This left only about 800 suitably trained men available to GHQ Middle East when it was given the task of harassing the Germans still occupying the Balkans and Greece. These 800 men mostly belonged to small units such as the Special Boat Squadron and the Long Range Desert Group, so the decision was made to gather them into a new formation called the Middle East Raiding Forces. To this organisation was soon added a new unit: its role was to support commando raids and underpin partisan activities with heavy weapons.

The name of the new unit, the Raiding Support Regiment (RSR), described its role exactly and a call went out from Middle East Command for volunteers for duties of a hazardous nature’. Over 3000 men from 60 different regiments applied and one of the first tasks of the newly appointed commanding officer, Lieutenant‑Colonel Sir Thomas Devitt, was to interview and select suitable officers. Being an international rugger player, he not unnaturally chose those who were keen on that game. One Jack gage, was an Irish international, while others had played for clubs in Britain and South Africa. A training camp at Azzib in Palestine was established, a programme of strenuous physical training, including 24‑hour mountain marches with heavy loads, was instituted, and all were given parachute training. By the end of the year a motley collection of men had become a disciplined and energetic unit that was raring for action.

The regiment was organised into a headquarters commanding five batteries, and it is safe to say that never before in the history of the British Army had a regiment of this nature been formed with such a mixed complement of weapons. A Battery consisted of 12 Vickers and MG‑42 medium machine guns, B Battery contained 18 Sin mortars; C was a light anti‑aircraft battery with 18 0.5m Browning machine guns; D was an anti‑tank battery with four Italian 47/32mm anti‑tank guns; and E was a mountain battery equipped with four 75mm pack howitzers. This, at least, was the theoretical establishment, but weapons and equipment were m desperately short supply and when C Battery, in February 1944, was sent to support No. 2 Commando on the island of Vis, off the Yugoslavian coast, it was still untrained m the use of its weapons as none, up to that point, had ever issued to it! Later, this battery was joined by a Troop from E Battery. Both supported numerous commando raids on the Dalmatian Islands, to such good effect, that three RSR officers were decorated with the Military Cross (MC).

On 11 April the regiment was moved to Bari, situated on the southeastern coast of Italy. From there it helped support a number of raids into occupied territory, under the aegis both of Land Forces Adriatic and Force 266, the cover name given to SOE (Special Operations Executive) operating in the area. Raids were carried out on the Albanian mainland and the Dalmatian Islands

All these commando raids landed from the sea. But while they were taking place, some members of the RSR became involved in what originally had been considered one of its main roles ‑ that of dropping behind enemy lines in support of partisans who were engaged in harassing the Germans. In April 1944, six men of the unit were parachuted into Greece to contact both the Military Mission officers from Force 133 (the cover name for SOE controlled from Cairo) and the partisans; after that they were to make preparations for the arrival of the rest of the force. This last was to include both Troops of A Battery, the two remaining Troops of B Battery and the one remaining Troop of D Battery, all of whom were to be divided in mixed proportions over three different areas. Eventually, nearly 200 RSR personnel were infiltrated from the sea to support the partisans.

The officers chosen to parachute into these three areas were Major Douglas Unsworth, Major Norman Astell and Captain Jack Gage, each one to be accompanied by an NCO. Astell dropped into the northern area, north of Salonica; Unsworth into the central area in the vicinity of Mount Olympus, and Gage further south into countryside around Lamia Devitt told them:

`Your orders are to reconnoitre the main roads and railways in your area To ascertain the strength and morale of the enemy to build a is food supplies for your men when they arrive; and finally to check for suitability certain targets which have been chosen by British liaison officers who are already in Greece, for a final assault on the Germans when they withdraw.’

The small party was given 10 days of intense briefing in Cairo They were to live off the land, and their diet was to consist mainly of beans and black bread although on rare occasions, they might be supplied from the air. Medical supplies were very limited. They would be given gold sovereigns and some drachma, with which mules and food could be bought. To travel around they were only to walk or ride their animals The liaison officers from the Allied Military Mission already established in the areas would do everything they could to help, but the six men had to be entirely self‑sufficient and could expect to be completely cut off for at least six months They were also beefed on the complicated situation in Greece where the Military Mission of around 100 officers was attempting to conciliate between the two largest guerrilla organisations. These were the communist‑inspired ELAS, led by General Serafis, and the pro‑British EDES, commanded by General Zervas, and they were already fighting each other rather than the Germans. Additionally, the relationship between the villagers and the partisans was not always a cordial one.

Unsworth and Astell were dropped in April and were soon followed by their detachments. One bombardier later described how each man’s kit was carefully compiled.

‘One quarter‑pound tin of tobacco, one toilet roll, one book, thin, which would give a Troop library of 25 volumes. The book was a very good idea. My copy was a wartime edition on very flimsy paper and I was able to use the leaves to roll cigarettes with when our proper fag‑paper became exhausted. My idea of the perfect reading for a lonely mountain residence was “The Life and Impressions of Ethel Mannin”, so that my cigarettes were practically self‑igniting … We even had an escape kit, complete with everything that the well‑dressed escaper could desire. In it were compasses, gold sovereigns, a map and files.’ The compass was in two parts and as each could pass for a button it was sewn onto the flies of the men’s trousers.

All three parties were soon to be harassed by big sweeps carried out by crack German troops. One group was hunted by over 12,000 of them moving into the mountains of central Greece from nine different directions. The search went on for 11 days, forcing the Allied detachments to march by night and hide by day, covering in all nearly 130 miles to escape capture. But the Germans did not have it all their own way, one large group was surrounded m a mountain village and plastered with RSR mortar bombs and machine‑gun fire.

Because of the intense pressure on them, the two northern groups were not able to be as active as the RSR group fighting with the guerrillas m the mountains around Lamia, even though Gage’s group was the last to parachute in. Adverse weather conditions had delayed his drop until the beginning of May, but the subsequent actions of his group well illustrate the kind of war in which all those fighting behind the lines in Greece had to engage.

During the weeks following his arrival accompa­nied by his faithful interpreter Dimitri, Gage recon­noitred his area and prepared rim way for the men who were later to loin him. In mid‑June he crossed to the west coast to meet a small force of Americans and RSR personnel who needed to be guided to their destinations The following month his own troops arrived and it was quite a task to move a convoy of 200 mules, 200 muleteers and 50 British personnel across a half‑starving and devastated enemy‑occupied country. But somehow, with the aid of both ELAS and EDES ‑ and the £5000 in gold sovereigns that the whole undertaking cost ‑ he managed it without being detected by the Germans.

After being involved in a few skirmishes with the enemy including an ambush of a German armoured train. Gage re­ceived from Cairo the codeword ‘Noah s Ark. This was the signal to set up his small force in ambush positions by the main Salonika ‑Athens road. Where the maximum damage would be done to the retreating Germans.

The withdrawal started on 9 September, and with the help of the partisans Gage and his men shot up any German convoys that teed to negotiate the road that wound through their pass. This went on for some time, the Germans trying first one tactic and then another, but on the whole being thwarted in them attempt to withdraw northwards m any numbers.

The actions of this long‑running ambush are well described in Gage’s report for 16 September:

‘MG sections have fired about 7000 rounds and mortars about 750 bombs. Still cold and wet. Convoy of 50 trucks delayed all day by sections It is difficult to say what damage we are a inflicting on the Hun. We must be causing more than we realize as he takes all sorts of precautions before attempting to get past our ambushes. Puts out 88mm guns, mortars and MGs and plasters the hills. Then always waits for whole convoy to get through each ambush before moving on. The whole operation takes him seven or eight hours for a normal half an hour. Also he has wasted a couple of days trying to spot us. Mines and demolitions are also doing considerable damage. ‘

Those that did escape still lead the other RSR detachment to cope with as they drove towards Yugoslavia. But after 10 days, despite constantly blows holes in the road and shooting up anything that moved on it, Gage’s group was obliged to withdraw for the Germans had built up an overwhelming superiority in numbers in order to remove them. However, the men continued to harass the eves with lightning strikes on their convoys.

One of Gage’s officers, Lieutenant Hoey, was especially audacious during this time. On 22 September he took his section of heavy machine-guns forward to an exposed position north of the town of Dhomokos. From this vantage point, he shot up a German convoy of battalion strength, preventing from moving for 12 hours and inflicting many casualties. In the following days his section penetrated the German positions guarding the road no less than three times, again inflicting heavy casualties. For these actions, and for entering Lamia while it was still occupied and firing a Bren gun into two truck‑loads of troops, he won the MC.

The following month Gage received orders to move into Lamia immediately it had been evacuated. Accordingly, on 19 October he and his men moved down out of the mountains and took over a hotel for the night. The next day they were joined by British paratroopers and the SBS, who were moving up from Athens. It was later reckoned that Gage’s men had held up a complete division for a week, and Gage himself calculated that during the seven months he was in Greece he had walked over 2000 miles) For hits leadership he was later awarded the MC.

The record of the RSR in Greece is an outstanding one. Its casualties had been light ‑ four killed, four wounded and six taken prisoner ‑ but it had man­aged to wreak havoc among the enemy. Seventeen vital bridges had been destroyed, as had a mine, a dam, and five petrol and ammunition depots, while hundreds of yards of railway line had been torn up on 18 separate occasions. Five trains had been shot up and 150 vehicles knocked out. The total enemy killed amounted to 300, with many more being wounded. Most of the personnel from the original RSR groups in Greece were withdrawn at the end of November, though some were moved to Athens in anticipation of the trouble that was to come. On 4 December civil was erupted, with the ELAS and EDES forces fighting each other in the streets of the Greek capital. Now British troops were also regarded by ELAS as the enemy and it is a tragic fact that more members of the RSR, including Major Astell were killed by Greeks than by Germans.

One of those who were involved m the conflict was an RSR captain Peter Street Since the previous April he had been leading his sections of mortars and anti-tank guns in ambushes against the Germans in central Macedonia and was to be awarded the MBE for doing so, but by December he had joined a small detachment of the ESE In Athens The fighting was bitter, but on 4 January 1945 he was able to write:

‘Big attacks with 2 Indep Para Bde RSR again spearhead attack Hard going but objectives reached and captured. Lieut. Keane killed 12 ORs wounded. 16 ELAS killed including two Germans, 31 prisoners. Attack a great success. ELAS finished as fighting force in Athens area.’

The war was now nearly over for the Raiding Support Regiment, but some members still saw action when supporting the commandos at Lake Comacchio and joint SBS/LRDG operations in Istna on the Italian­-Yugoslavian border. Another of the RSR’s officers, Captain Newton was awarded the Military Cross for bravery during a the battle for the Argenta Gap.

Within three months of the German surrender the regiment had been disbanded. In the decades that have followed it has become perhaps one of the least known fighting units of the British Army‑ and yet it had more than measured up to its motto, ‘Quit You Like Men.’