Members at the Saturday Club bar. Picture by Rashbehari Das

(Continued from the previous week, when the author sailed down martial memory lane throwing light on a shadowy tale of heroism featuring the Calcutta Light Horse or CLH, the inspiration behind the naming of Saturday Club?s Light Horse Bar.)

In the meantime, the two CLH commandos who had got back to Goa from Belgaum made friends with the local populace and co-opted their help in arranging a ?mother of all parties? on the shore for the crew of the three German ships that were in anchor. Special invitations were sent out to these ships.

The response from the German sailors who were under strict instructions not to venture ashore was a foregone conclusion. Leaving a minimum guard detail on each ship, these swashbuckling bell-bottoms made a beeline for the venue of the party. Wine, women and song abounded aplenty and the Goan hosts ?funded by the CLH of course ? went out of their way to ensure that their guest seamen had a ball.

While all this merrymaking was going on, the Phoebe silently crept up to the Ehrenfels? side at around 1 am under cover of darkness, unobserved by the German ships. The CLH Strike Team clambered up the Ehrenfels at a given signal and attacked the startled German sentries.

A no-holds-barred fight followed and as the hand-to-hand combat reached its climax, the Strike Team ignited a large quantity of explosives that it had brought up on board. The Ehrenfels caught fire and its fuel lines got torched, resulting in the German flagship turning into a virtual inferno.

The other two ships realised that something was wrong but could not make out what it was with their flagship. The German seamen who were enjoying themselves on shore heard the siren calls emanating from the two ships and tried to get back but found that all the boats had disappeared, courtesy the two CLH commandos.

As the all-round chaos intensified, the CLH radio officer on the Phoebe began to transmit a message for German ears to the effect that the assault on the Ehrenfels was the opening round of a major imminent Allied sea-borne attack on Goa?s harbour.

Expectantly, the three German ships in question picked up this message and faithfully following the Wehrmacht?s standing orders, scuttled their ships in order to prevent classified material from falling into Allied hands!

Mission accomplished, the Phoebe withdrew from the scene and along with the Strike Team made its way to Bombay from where it chugged back to Diamond Harbour. GHQ at Delhi was no doubt elated at the CLH mission?s success in destroying the German spy network but was in a spot as to how to acknowledge this officially.

The issue was that this daredevil job was done not by a regular military unit executing a formal operation order but by an auxiliary one on its own steam. A debate took place but overriding all doubting Thomases, GHQ bestowed a number of well-deserved war medals on the CLH for their valiant endeavour, topping it with a Victoria Cross.

So, the next time you visit the Light Horse Bar, do raise a toast to the CLH and its wholly unusual exploit. They exemplified that well-known saying, ??.only mad dogs and Englishmen?!?