When stocks were running low

The month of June 1941, a year after the first raids by the Regia Aeronautica and soon after the Luftwaffe left Sicily for the invasion of the Soviet Union by Hitler on June 22, are recorded in the latest issue of Malta At War.

During this period the Royal Air Force and Fleet Air Arm squadrons operating from Malta were taking on an offensive role attacking convoys with troops and supplies for the Axis forces in Libya. The submarines based on Manoel Island also took a heavy toll of enemy shipping.

The Regia Aeronautica's raids were carried out by bombers flying in formation at great height. There was some contempt among the civilian population at what was then seen as incompetence by the enemy after the mass bombing sorties of the Luftwaffe but these attacks were to claim many dead among people who remained at home and did not take cover.

At the time, only a handful of people knew that the RAF fighters had orders from the Air Officer Commanding, Air Vice Marshal Hugh Lloyd, to shoot down Italian rescue aircraft carrying the red cross as there was a suspicion at the time that these - and even the hospital ships - had been used to ferry military personnel. The pilots from Malta did so with reluctance. Later Count Galeazzo Ciano, Benito Mussolini's Foreign Minister and son-in-law, confirmed this was in fact true. This admission was made in his diary, published by his wife Edda after her father had shot her husband.

With Crete now in German hands, it became difficult to send convoys to Malta from Alexandria and supplies and personnel were carried to the island in submarines.

The blockade was making itself felt and stringent cuts were introduced in the supply of petrol with the result that private cars went off the road and public transport was severely curtailed. An enterprising person who had two omnibuses - popularly know as nemnebus - started operating horse-drawn 12-seater cabs between Valletta and Birkirkara.

Flour was also in short supply and the wheatato - between 20 to 30 per cent of cooked peeled potatoes being mixed with flour for each loaf - was introduced. There was increasing scarcity of meat and housewives fell back to buying poultry and rabbits, the price of which tripled.

This being summertime, restrictions on swimming were partially lifted and gaps were opened in the barbed wire to enable people to bathe in certain areas.

These stories are extensively illustrated with photographs rarely published before, some even published for the first time. One of these photographs is of Gloster Gladiator N5520, which is carried on the cover. The aircraft is shown at Hal Far when it had been diverted to meteorological flights. This photograph is of special interest as the aircraft is Faith, the only one to survive. Its skeleton was retrieved after the war from a quarry where it was dumped and was partly restored. It is now on exhibition at the War Museum in Valletta.

Malta At War is published by Bieb Bieb Publications and sells at Lm1.85 per issue. It is printed by Progress Press. The first two bound volumes are available from bookshops and stationers.