Gunners of the Royal Australian Artillery at Tobruk.
Australians demonstrated characteristic ingenuity during the siege of Tobruk, employing all kinds of captured Italian equipment, including artillery.
Here gunners of 2/12th Field Regt RAA - one wearing an Italian pith helmet - are using an Italian 75mm gun. All the Australian and British defenders of the besieged port reveled in the nickname ‘Rats of Tobruk’, derived from the sneering claim
of the German propagandist ‘Lord Haw Haw’ that they were trapped like rats. (Australian War Memorial P01260.008)