Those who took part in the raid on Sidi Haneish never forgot the unique excitement and adventure of the operation, surely one of the most daring of the war in North Africa. Though the raid was insignificant materially in influencing the course of the campaign, it nonetheless inconvenienced the Germans and Italians, causing them to divert men from the front line to help hunt for the raiders and to strengthen airfield defences. When Stirling fell into German hands in January 1943, Rommel wrote to his wife that with his capture ‘the British lost the very able and adaptable commander of the desert group which had caused us more damage than any other British unit of equal size’.
So what was the subsequent fate of the men responsible for the first mass jeep attack of the World War II?
David Stirling: Imprisoned in the notorious Colditz Castle, Stirling was released in April 1945 and began planning the SAS’s deployment to the Far East. Two atomic bombs curtailed that operation and in October of that year the SAS was disbanded. Stirling emigrated to Rhodesia in 1946 and two years later formed the Capricorn Society, hoping to promote racial harmony in the colony. The end of colonisation interfered with his grand scheme and he returned to the UK in the 1960s, becoming in involved in the security industry. Knighted in 1990, Stirling died a few months later, aged 74.
Paddy Mayne: Unable to resume his rugby career postwar because of a troublesome back, Mayne was a lost soul in Ulster. Though he became president of the Northern Ireland Law Society, his reputation was tarnished by several drink-fuelled incidents north and south of the border. A few days before Christmas 1955 Mayne, aged 40, died in a car crash as he sped through the streets of his native Newtownards on his way back from a bar.
Carol Mather: Captured by the Italians in December 1942, Mather spent nine months as a POW before escaping in the wake of Italy’s surrender. He later served on Montgomery’s staff during the invasion of France and was awarded an MC during Operation Market Garden. Leaving the army in 1962, Mather became the Tory MP for Esher in 1970 and stood down in 1987. He was knighted later that year and died in 2006.
Gen Bernard Montgomery, commander of the Eighth Army, addresses the SAS in 1943 from the steps of a troopship prior to the invasion of Sicily.
Stephen Hastings: Invalided out of the SAS in late 1942 with bronchitis, Hastings joined SOE the following year and worked undercover in both France and Italy. He left the army in 1948 and was recruited by MI6, for whom he worked for a number of years. Elected Tory MP for Mid-Bedfordshire in 1960, Hastings served 23 years in Parliament and died in 2005.
Johnny Cooper: Commissioned in 1944, Cooper spent three months in Occupied France in the summer of 1944 helping wage a guerrilla war against the Germans. He became a career soldier and was awarded an MBE for service in the jungles of Malaya. He finally retired from soldiering in 1966 and died in 2002, aged 80.
Bob Lilley: Fought with the SAS in Sicily, Italy, France and Germany, and a decade later re-enlisted when the SAS was reformed for the Malayan Emergency. Upon leaving the army, Lilley ran a pub in Folkestone and died in 1981.
Malcolm Pleydell: Dr Pleydell left the SAS at the end of the desert war and worked for several months in a hospital in Malta before ill health compelled him to return to the UK. He spent the rest of his working life in the National Health Service and died in 2001.
David Lloyd-Owen: Assumed command of the LRDG at the end of 1943 and later fought in the Balkans where he injured his back during a parachute operation. Though the LRDG was disbanded at the end of the war, Lloyd-Owen became a career soldier, retiring with the rank of Major-General. He died in 2001.
Nick Wilder: Wounded during a raid on Barce in September 1942, Wilder finished the war a Lieutenant-Colonel with a DSO. He later returned to his native Waipukurau in New Zealand to farm 1,600 acres. He died in 1970, aged 56.
David Russell: He didn’t remain long in the SAS, transferring to SOE. In August 1943 Russell was parachuted into Yugoslavia from where he crossed into Romania to make contact with partisans. He was subsequently killed. According to Mike Sadler, ‘he was murdered by some partisans for his gold sovereigns he carried.’
Jimmy Storie: Captured in October 1942, Storie spent the rest of the war as a prisoner in the dreaded Stalag VIIIB Lamsdorf and survived a 500-mile Death March in the spring of 1945. He returned to his native Aberdeen on his release and became a tiler. He died in 2012, the last survivor from the inaugural SAS raid of November 1941.
Sandy Scratchley: Upon the reorganisation of the SAS following Stirling’s capture, Scratchley’s vast experience was transferred to the incipient 2SAS, for which he led several operations into Italy in 1943. After the war he became a highly regarded breeder of racehorses. He died in 1973.
Mike Sadler: Promoted to 1SAS Intelligence Officer in 1944, Sadler was awarded the Military Cross for operations in France. In 1946 he and Paddy Mayne were among the members of an expedition to Antarctica. After a hiatus sailing the world, Sadler spent the rest of his working life with the Diplomatic Service. As of early 2014 he is the sole survivor of the raid on Sidi Haneish. Alas, the camera that he used to take photographs of the raid didn’t survive the operation.