Wartime Wanderings

Reprint of a privately published memoir of 1993. After serving in the Navy - first as a cadet in 1932 and subsequently a lieutenant, Peyton Jones (1918–2000) DSO, DSC joined the Submarine Service and his first, and last, patrol was in 'Sahib', which was depth-charged and forced to the surface by the Italian corvette Gabbiano north of Sicily on 24 April 1943. Peyton Jones and the ship's company, all but one of whom survived, became PoWs. He was imprisoned in PG 35 Padula, near Salerno. He later escaped from a train taking him to Bologna but was recaptured. After the Armistice in September 1943, he escaped from PG 19 Bologna and set off on an adventurous walk of over 300 miles, through the winter of 1943-44. He travelled with a variety of other PoWs, of several services and nationalities, avoiding German patrols. Much assisted by the kindness of Italian families en route, he finally reached Terracina on the coast south of Anzio in April 1944. He put to sea in a rickety boat and was rescued by an American DUKW. For his escape from enemy hands, he was appointed MBE in 1944. Pages 162-–267 cover the “Italian Interlude” in his wartime career. See also Warren & Benson, 'Broken Column: The Story of James Frederick Wilde's Adventures with the Italian Partisans' (Wilde was an Able Seaman on 'Sahib').