First Battle of El Alamein

The First Battle of El Alamein took place near railway depot near the sea, between 1 and 27 July. The British Commonwealth forces, under General Claude John Eyre Auchinleck, emerged victorious in the battle, having stopped the Afrika Korps under General Erwin Rommel in Egypt. The battle marked the end of several Axis victories obtained at Gazala, Tobruk, Mersa Matruh, Fuka and elsewhere, and was the first in a series of battles which would result in the liberation of French Algeria and Tunisia from Axis forces, and the invasion of Italy.

The Afrika Korps had been successfully fighting their way ever closer to the Egyptian border. Italian "battleship convoys" personally commanded by Admiral Angelo Iachino, and good solid intelligence from the Italian Military Information Service (Servizio Informazione Militare or SIM) obtained through theft from the US Embassy in Rome, had greatly assisted Rommel in winning battles at Benghazi, Tobruk and Mersa Matruh. Unfortunately for Rommel, the British discovered this and the deciphered daily reports to Washington coming from Colonel Bonner Fellers (US military attache in Cairo), stopped almost a week after the fall of Tobruk. To make matters worse, his divisions were now running very low on fuel. The scenario was soon set for a major Allied counteroffensive, that aimed to completely break through the Italian divisions and the panzer divisions sent forward to assist them.

El Mreir

On 1 July 1942, the Axis forces commenced their advance. However, the Afrika Korps encountered disorganized but spirited resistance from the Indians and South Africans, forcing the Trento Division and supporting 7th Bersaglieri Regiment to take up defensive positions, and defeating the attacks from the 21st Panzer Division and 90th Light Division.

On 3 July, the 4th New Zealand Brigade, supported by four artillery batteries, attacked the Ariete Armoured Division forward positions, taking 350 prisoners and capturing or destroying 24 field guns and six or eight tanks. Rommel lambasted the performance of the Ariete and in a report to General Albert Kesselring, would claim the Italian armoured division had lost one-hundred tanks in the New Zealand infantry attack.

Determined to encircle and capture the rest of the Ariete, the New Zealander infantry attacked again on 5 July, but were repelled by heavy fire from the Brescia Division dug in near El Mreir.

The Allied attacks continued, and the Indian 5th Infantry Division in the form of the 9th Brigade and 7th Motorised Brigade, pushed north into Rommel's flank and in three days of fighting almost reached Deir el Shein. A Maori battalion from the 2nd New Zealand Division overran part of the Brescia, but were unexpectedly counterattacked by the Pavia Division and forced to retreat. The Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War confirms that "enemy forces seeping south threatened to outflank the Division" but reveals nothing else.

During the initial fighting, Major Terence O'Brien-Butler from the 3rd Regiment, Royal Horse Artillery, displayed enormous control when surrounded by German armour, saving his battery from capture and winning the Military Cross (MC) for his courage.

Tel el Eisa

On the night of 10/11 July, the Australian 9th Division attacked the 60th Sabratha Infantry Division defending Tel el Eisa. The German 621st Radio Intercept Company and 835 Italians from the Sabratha are captured. The attacking 2nd/48th Battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Heathcote Hammer, had been greatly assisted by the supporting fire from 100 artillery guns. The night, the South Africans also attacked and captured Tel el Makh Khad.

The next morning, a battalion from the 7th Bersaglieri Regiment, under Lieutenant-Colonel Ugo Scirocco, counterattacks and recaptures part of Tel el Eisa along with thirteen Australians. The Bersaglieri suffers heavy casualties, but their attack allows the 15th Panzer Division and Trieste Infantry Division to send forward a company, under Captain Vittorio Bulgarelli, from the 11th Armoured Battalion that halts the Australians.

On 14 July, Colonel Erminio Angelozzi's 1st Battalion (85th Infantry Regiment) from the Sabratha, counterattacks the Australians dug in on Tel el Eisa and succeeds in recapturing the position. The defending battalion withdraws, but the 2nd/23rd Battalion and the British 8th Royal Tank Regiment (8 RTR) attempts to push out the Italians on 16 July, overrunning a good part of the Sabratha before being forced to withdraw.