Kiwi soldier faces firing squad

After enlisting in 1939, David Russell fought with the Second New Zealand Division in Greece and Crete before being evacuated to Egypt. Captured by the Germans during the disastrous defeat at Ruweisat Ridge, Egypt, in July 1942, he was sent to Campo PG 57 in northern Italy. When the Italians capitulated in 1943 he escaped from his work camp and joined the partisan Bataglione Lepre (Hare Battalion).

After moving around northern Italy evading the German forces, in 1944 Russell made contact with a British team at Tramonti di Sopra who were organising partisans and sabotage in the mountains. He could easily have escaped to safety through Yugoslavia but chose to return to the plains of Véneto to find and assist other escaped prisoners.

He had a series of narrow escapes, often eluding capture by speeding away on his bicycle, but in February 1945 his luck ran out. Arrested by Fascist forces, he was beaten, chained to a wall in a stable, deprived of food and water and threatened with death if he did not reveal what he knew. Russell kept his silence. He was executed at Ponte di Piave, north of Venice, on 28 February.

The locals later erected a memorial to him. Even a German officer was impressed by Russell’s courage. His Italian interpreter reported: ‘The behaviour of the Englishman [sic] was splendid, and it won the admiration of [Oberleutnant] Haupt himself’.

In 1948 Russell’s heroism was recognised by the first award of the George Cross to a member of the New Zealand military forces. The following year the David Russell Memorial Ward at Napier Hospital (where he had worked as an orderly before the war) was named in his honour.

Image: a George Cross (BBC)