VN081 pairs two SAS patrolmen in different camouflage clothing. The pointing leader wears an ERDL-style pattern; his companion wears tiger stripe. Both carry modified SLRs with extended magazines, and the leader’s rifle has a shortened barrel and forward grip. Their faces, equipment and clothing are prepared for concealment.
Before Eighth Army tried to break the Axis line, it tried to make the enemy look in the wrong direction. Dummy vehicles, disguised tanks and a false pipeline helped create a battlefield that could be misread from the air. El Alamein began not only with guns in the night, but with weeks of work on what an observer would think he was seeing.
“I was scared stiff,” Sapper John Haines remembered in an account preserved by NZ History. Private Ivan Divehall remembered excitement. The same parachutes could produce both reactions. On the morning of 20 May 1941, German troops descended over Crete, and the men watching them had only moments to turn astonishment into action. The invasion would be decided by airfields and command decisions, but it began as a profoundly personal encounter with an unfamiliar way of war.
Kain’s story belongs to No. 73 Squadron in France. The scarf, goggles and shoulder strap identify the figure; his June 1940 death rules out a Battle of Britain scene.
Explore King & Country AL086 New Zealand Mounted Rifles Officer, its historical setting, distinctive details and place in an Australian Light Horse collection.
Explore King & Country AL075 Mounted Kiwi Charging with Rifle No. 2, its historical setting, distinctive details and place in an Australian Light Horse collection.
Explore King & Country AL074 Mounted Kiwi Charging with Rifle, its historical setting, distinctive details and place in an Australian Light Horse collection.
Explore King & Country AL073 Kiwi Flagbearer, its historical setting, distinctive details and place in an Australian Light Horse collection.
Explore King & Country AL072 Dismounted Rifleman, its historical setting, distinctive details and place in an Australian Light Horse collection.
FW182 NEW ZEALANDER STAND-AT-EASE BY KING AND COUNTRY Overview Introduction History of New Zealanders in WWI Collector Notes Collectors focusing […]
