The second instalment in the exploits of Jack Hennessy and his section of the 2/4th Battalion of the Australian 6th Division follows the men from the heat and hard fighting of North Africa into the mountains, roads and shattered villages of Greece. The book is now available on Amazon.

After their successes against the Italians, Hennessy and his mates are given little time to rest. The war has moved again, and the Australians are rushed across the Mediterranean to help stop the German and Italian invasion of Greece. What begins as another campaign soon becomes something very different. The enemy is faster, stronger and better supplied. The air belongs to the Luftwaffe. The roads are crowded with refugees, retreating columns and exhausted soldiers trying to hold one more line before falling back again.

For Hennessy and his section, Greece is not a story of easy victories. It is a campaign of withdrawal, endurance and sacrifice. They fight in cold mountain passes, under constant air attack, and along roads where every delay may save men further south. The Long Withdrawal is a story of mateship under pressure, courage without glory, and the cost paid by ordinary soldiers when grand strategy begins to fall apart.

Back Page Blurb:

The desert taught them how to advance.

Greece will teach them how to withdraw.

Jack Hennessy is not a hero in search of glory. A fitter by trade and a quiet leader by necessity, he has learned that survival depends less on bravado than on reliability, discipline and the men beside him. Around him remains a section of ordinary Australians: larrikins, labourers, boys barely grown, and veterans already marked by war.

After North Africa, they are no longer raw volunteers. They have faced heat, dust, fear and fire. But April 1941 carries them into a different campaign, one of mountain roads, broken passes, refugee columns, delayed orders and skies ruled by German aircraft.

As the Allied line bends south through Greece, Hennessy’s men are caught in a fighting withdrawal where positions are held only long enough to be abandoned, rumours outrun truth, and every mile costs something. From Servia Pass to Brallos, from burning roads to the dark embarkation beaches, The Long Withdrawal follows soldiers learning that retreat demands its own kind of courage. Survival is not victory. And Crete is not the end.

I hope you enjoy it.