HUNTING STURMTIGER

Many who wargame the Second World War have a fascination for the weird and wonderful, and the Sturmtiger is one such. A heavily armoured platform for a 38cm naval mortar firing a 330kg bomb! The fact that this was entirely the sort of weapon the German army did NOT need in 1944-45 does not reduce its appeal for the wargamer. Nor does the fact that only a tiny number were even produced (*) deter wargamers from seeking accounts of Sturmtiger apprearing in action.

(* up to 18, of which barely half may have been completed)

One account that has been quoted by various people concerns the 1st Oxf & Bucks, at Gyhum, near Zeven, on 24 April 1945. While researching the use of the British Universal Carrier, this author became briefly intrigued by this tale and traced it to its origins. As is so often the case, all published accounts turned out to stem from one single source.

The source: 'View From a Forgotten Hedgerow'. The author: Desmond Milligan (comedian Spike's elder brother).

24 April found Corporal Milligan wading through a muddy field, weighed down by the Bren magazines he was carrying forward to the Carrier Platoon. British artillery shells and mortar bombs were streaming overhead while German mortar bombs were impacting all around. Then, Milligan became aware of something bigger 'incoming': 'With a mighty roar it spewed a giant column of earth and smoke that appeared large enouhg for an erupting Vesuvius.'

Then, the key to the story. 'Looking back today,' (i.e., 1993,a half-century later!) 'I believe that this was a 365mm mortar mounted on a Tiger tank.' Maybe it was. When I spoke to Desmond (on the telephone, to his home in Australia), he confessed that this was pure supposition, based on his reading long after the event.