'Mac e Ganna'

I was lent the family record (Hullis, Shaun, Captains Courageous: Gunner Gregg, Donny MacKenzie and the liberation of the Nure Valley, Author 2014) of an extraordinary story of two individuals who became known to their partisans as ‘Mac e Ganna’. They first met in a Prisoner of War Camp called PG29 Veano, near Piacenza in Northern Italy. Archibald ‘Donny’ MacKenzie was born in 1914. He never knew his Father who had died of wounds received at Gallipoli. Donny was educated at Winchester and after reading Classics at Oxford, in 1936 joined the Cameron Highlanders. He was quickly assigned to the 2nd Battalion in Egypt. From there he served as a staff officer in ‘W’ Force during the Greece and Crete campaigns, before in 1942 returning to his battalion as a company commander. He was taken prisoner during the fall of Tobruk in June that year whilst attempting to get back to Allied lines with a small group of his fittest soldiers – a 6 day 120 miles march. Tresham ‘Gunner’ Gregg was born in 1919 and had a peripatetic upbringing living in South Africa, Switzerland, Germany and Malta. As was common at the time he returned to England for his education; for him at Bedford School. He was commissioned from Sandhurst into the Royal Tank Regiment and was wounded at Dunkirk before being taken prisoner by the Germans in North Africa in December 1941. Sadly only one of them was to survive the Second World War.

By late 1942 both officers were in PG Veano. They were immediately drawn to each other as both shared the urgent desire to escape. Gunner was part of a group who tunnelled out but was eventually picked up 25 miles from Rome trying to get to the Vatican. The next opportunity came when the Italian Armistice was announced on 8 September 1943. Gunner stated in the family record that guards and prisoners listened to Prime Minister Badoglio’s announcement, and all cheered together. The prisoners were told by the Allied High Command to stay put, however as reports arrived of the Germans moving quickly to secure the camps, the Senior British Officer told everyone to scatter. Donny, Gunner and a group of other prisoners planned to head north to Switzerland, however Donny was seriously ill with a recurrence of malaria and unable to travel with the rest of the group. As a consequence he and Gunner lived rough in the woods surrounding the Nure Valley whilst Donny recovered. During this time, they fell in with a group of Italians, some who had deserted from the Italian Army and others who were avoiding conscription. To these Italians Donny and Gunner became known as ‘Mac’ and ‘Ganna’.

The fledgling resistance movement they helped form operated from the Nure Valley to the south of Piacenza. The Italian members were opposed to both the Germans and the Fascists and were coordinated under the Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale, which divided the region into several brigade areas. CLM had emerging links with the Allies but needed the professional advice of British officers to become an effective partisan force. The group in the Nure Valley was known as Stella Rossa had responsibility for area 60 .  A nearby British Liaison Officer with a radio organised supply drops. The partisans were organised into two 80 man teams, wearing red scarves, known locally as ‘Squadra di Mac’ and ‘Squadra di Ganna’. Collectively CLM called them the 60th Garibaldini Brigade. They set about the liberation of the Nure Valley by capturing weapons, attacking radio stations, and creating no-go areas, and in July 1944 the town of Bettola was captured where the local police and carabinieri were not strong enough to stop the partisans seizing control.

By Autumn 1944 the Fascists on the far side of the important bridging point across the Nure River at the town of Ponte dell’Olio were surrounded and barricaded into their barracks and the primary school. They numbered slightly fewer than 80 but were well armed with automatic weapons. It was this group that Donny sought to overwhelm. He had a force of approximately 500 partisans, who were a mixture ofCommunists, Socialists, Anarchists and Monarchists all united by their desire to fight the Fascists. Ponte dell’Olio was in a poor state as the Government was not providing any services from which the partisans might benefit. Donny was conducting a recce of the bridge on 6 October with two Italians when they came under fire and were all killed. The esteem in which Donny was held was demonstrated by the arrangements the Mayor of Bettola made for his funeral. He lay in state in the church for 2 days during which time the whole population of the valley walked past. His funeral on 8 October was attended by thousands. Gunner was a pallbearer. When interviewed in 2014, he said it was the saddest moment of his life. Donny ‘s place as the leader was taken by an Italian but the name ‘Squadra di Mac’ lived on.

Not long after Donny’s death the Allied campaign was halted for Winter 1944/45 as both the 5th Army and the 8th Army offensives has ground to halt as the weather deteriorated. Instructions from Alexander’s HQ told the partisans to go into hibernation for the winter and prepare for the anticipated Spring 1945 offensive. It was during this  period that SOE decided the Nure Valley should be more fully supported and sent an SOE trained officer to take over from Gunner. Gunner left Bettola on 29 November at the orders of the SOE’s No1 Special Force and went south crossing into 5th Army’s area of operations on the night 5/6 December. He made for Florence where he was then flown to Bari, which was the Headquarters of No 1 Special Force. He eventually returned to London for debriefing as there was particular interest as to whether the partisans intended to take over the Government at the end of the war. Much to his frustration he never received orders to return to ‘his partisans’, as he described them. Other SOE trained personnel had replaced him and when the offensive began in April 1945 the Allied axis of advance was towards Trieste, and not up the Po Valley. During the interview the author conducted with Gunner in 2014 the latter found it hard to explain why he and Donny had not continued to try and return to Allied lines in 1943 once Donny was fit enough to travel. One sensed the dilemma continued to exist as to where the two officers felt they could make a greater contribution to the war effort against the Germans; by returning to their Regiments or helping the Italians behind enemy lines. The Nure Valley partisans Donny and Gunner had helped create  liberated Piacenza on 28 April but by then they had been much affected by infighting over their intentions post war. There was discussion over the level of award Gunner should receive for his leadership, courage and bravery and eventually in 1945 he received a Mention in Dispatches to go with the one he had already received for his actions at Calais. Donny’s body was moved from the Bettola Cemetery in November 1945 to Commonwealth War Graves Commission Staglieno Cemetery, near Genoa. In 1969 a memorial was erected at Albarola 25 years after the death of Donny and the two partisans with whom he had been with on the recce at Ponte dell’Olio, ensuring his  memory lived on in the Nure Valley.