Soldier of Fortune Magazine The Journal of Professional Adventurers
In 1942, Jack Sillito found himself alone in the Libyan desert, more than 100 miles from camp, with a flask of water that soon ran dry. What he did next became the standard every SAS soldier after him was measured against.
by Gatimu Juma
He raised the rock above his head, ready to strike. He had been walking for days through the Libyan desert, and he wanted to die. He brought the rock down against his own skull. It didn’t work, so he did it again. It didn’t make a dent.
Corporal John “Jack” William Sillito had started the week blowing up railway lines. He was part of a four-man SAS patrol tasked with hitting a strategic line deep behind enemy lines in Libya, just before the Allied offensive at El Alamein. The 1942 operation was the type of work the SAS was built for; fast, violent, and surgical.
Near Tobruk, the group was attacked at night by a German patrol. When the sand settled and the sun came up, Sillito found himself alone in the desert. He had only a revolver, a compass, a box of matches, and a small flask of water. If he went north, he would walk directly into German hands. If he headed for Alamein, he would have to dodge enemy forces while heading for British lines. Somewhere to the south was the SAS camp, across some of the most featureless terrain on earth.
He set out on foot.
Sillito drank from a couple rain puddles before they evaporated, and was left to rely entirely on his own water supply. On the second day, his flask ran dry. He began to store and drink his own urine. He walked by the stars, navigating towards an emergency SAS supply cache that lay between him and the camp.
Jack Sillito after several days in hospital following his trek. Photo by Sgt. Harry Berkshire. Courtesy, Imperial War Museums.
After several days in the desert, his feet cracked open and his tongue swelled. His muscles cramped up. He began to hallucinate. The desert offered him no sustenance, no respite, and nothing to see but what his brain invented.
At some point Sillito decided to die. He picked up a rock, and tried to crush his own skull. He couldn’t bash himself hard enough to make a dent.
“I found I hadn’t even the strength to commit suicide,” he later recalled. “I couldn’t even give myself a headache.”
He began to cover himself in the sand. He collapsed and fell asleep. When he woke, he got back on his feet and resumed walking
He found the wadi he had been navigating toward. The SAS emergency supply cache was not there.
After a week on the edge of survival, Sillito saw jeeps moving in the distance. In order to get their attention, he pulled off his shirt and set it ablaze. The smoke signal went unnoticed, and the jeeps disappeared. Sillito pressed on, without a shirt to provide even a minimal shield.
Around 40 miles from camp and on the eighth day of the ordeal, an SAS jeep team stopped to make repairs. The men later described finding “a skeleton with sore and bleeding feet.” The team scooped him up and brought him to camp.
The entire journey was 180 miles, according to British military assessments. He had traveled most of the distance on cracked feet, drinking his own urine, through hallucinations, and past the moment he tried and failed to kill himself. He was carried the last miles by the men who found him.
A photo from the Imperial War Museums shows Sillito a few days later, standing outside a tent. Both his feet are bandaged to the ankle. The photo is labeled, “Corporal’s Amazing Escape.”
Within a fortnight, Jack Sillito had recovered. He returned to duty. For decades his march stood as the SAS benchmark for desert escape and evasion. It was the standard every man who came after him was measured against.
Gatimu Juma reports from Africa.
