Some Crete prisoners were rescued by submarine

Bella Johnston frequently met fellow escaped prisoners as he hid in the mountains of Crete. One was an Australian, Joe Bertie, and together the pair tried to track down information about a rumoured evacuation by submarine.

The first submarine, the Thrasher, arrived in July 1942 and evacuated 78 men to Alexandria, including Charlie Smith from Pt Chevalier and Stan Onyen from Devonport, who still remember it vividly today.

In his captain's report, Joe Cowell tells how he put the bow of the submarine on the beach, attached a line to the shore and ordered the 70 men to swim the short distance to the submarine's control tower, guided by the line.

The operation was supposed to be covert but they had not taken into account that most of the British troops could not swim.

As the troops tried to board the submarine, a melee ensued. The operation continued amid shouting for help and cheering. The noise was alarming and impossible to stop.

The lieutenant came to report the situation but he did not get ashore again for some time because every time he set off he had to rescue someone and pull him to the ship. The skill of these men in forcing their heads under water when they were properly dressed in lifebelts was remarkable.

Two months later the Torbay boarded another 130 men. Together with her crew this was the largest number of men ever crammed into a submarine at that time.

Although rescue by submarine had been rumoured for many months before Johnston and his crew sailed out of Crete on their borrowed caique, these were the only two submarines to attempt an evacuation while Crete was still held by the Germans.

It is not known which of the two subs Johnston guided into that Cretan bay, and after the operation there were still thousands of men trapped on the island.

But one thing is for sure. Without Johnston, armed by his years at the Herne Bay Yacht Club messing about on the Nomad, his nerve and inspiring sense of humour, 10 men at least would not have sailed from Crete that night.