The following will be from 1984 book, The Gurkhas by Byron Farwell, pp 288-292. Byron's book was highly laudatory of the Gurkhas as I recall and this section on the Falklands war is no exception. I hate to be quoting from this anti-Argie writer after JL has been subjected to so much recent humiliation from the Lit-Ideas Autocracy. He may recall that I resisted looking for this material on the Gurkhas. The author "served as a captain of engineers attached to the Mediterranean Allied Air Force in the British Army during the Second World War. . . he is a fellow of the MacDowell Colony, the Royal Society of Literature, and the Royal Geographical Society. During 1978-80 he was the Wallerstein Fellow of the Institute of Government at the University of Virginia. . . Farwell is the author of seven books, the most recent being Mr. Kipling's Army." : "When Britain decided to recapture the Falkland Islands in 1982, the army sent in its first team, its finest, which included, of course, a battalion of Gurkhas - the First Battalion of Duke of Edinburgh's Own Gurkha Rifles, which was on duty in England at the time. The 1/7th formed part of 5 Brigade with a battalion each of Scots Guards and the Welsh Guards, all under the command of Brigadier M. J. A. ('Tony') Wilson. "It was Wilson who, leading his men cautiously toward Port Stanley, hit upon a novel time-saving notion. He had reached Swan Inlet, a small hamlet about thirty miles from Port Stanley, and had found that the telephone lines were still operational. He stopped at a house and telephoned ahead to Fitzroy, the next Hamlet. 'Any Argies there?' he asked. Ron Binnie, a farmer, told him that the Argentines had been there but had gone. 'In that case,' said Wilson, 'I think I'll join you.' Mr Binnie assured him that he would be welcome. Wilson then swiftly pushed a hundred of his soldiers ahead in helicopters. "Argentine troops were apprehensive about the Gurkhas, and they had many misconceptions about them, some of which were encouraged by the locals. An Argentine captain inquired about the Gurkhas of Eric Goss of Goose Green: 'What do you pay them?' 'Oh, a handful of rice a day,' said Goss. 'We will pay them three handsful if they will fight for us,' said the Captain. "A general on Buenos Aires television reported that his men were eager to come to grips with these famous fighters. However, at one point in the fighting some three hundred Argentines were retreating before the Scots Guards when they encountered an advanced patrol of the Gurkhas. They at once reversed direction and surrendered to the Scots Guards. "It was widely believed by the Argentines that the Gurkhas killed their own wounded. Father Vicenter Martinez, an Argentine chaplain, was reported as saying that Gurkhas had slit the throats of some forty Argentine soldiers at a place called Moody Brook, near Port Stanley. These false stories of their prowess amused the Gurkhas, who delighted in their bloodthirsty reputation. 'They knew we were coming and they feared us,' said Lieutenant-Colonel David Morgan, Commandant of the 1/7th Gurkha Rifles. 'Of course, I think they had every ground to fear us,' he added." ". . . So it was in the early morning light that the Gurkhas moved forward on a six-and-a-half-kilometer march along the northern slope of Tumbledown. "The first objective of the 1/7th was easily taken: there were no Argentines there. As the Gurkhas were deploying for an assault on the second objective, the enemy suddenly bolted for Port Stanley, leaving behind their guns and throwing away their rifles. The 1/7th rapidly advanced and captured Mount William, finding only three live Argentine soldiers there. It was an easy victory, but during the approach march the Gurkhas were shelled by accurate enemy artillery fire and suffered eight men wounded, two seriously. There was a further loss of two more men wounded to make a total of fourteen: all recovered. "The Argentines fled when they realized that they were being outflanked and that those outflanking them were Gurkhas. In a letter to the author, Lieutenant-Colonel Morgan, who strode through the entire campaigned armed only with a silver-headed rattan cane which his grandfather had carried in the Boxer Rebellion in China, wrote that 'it was desperately frustrating and exasperating for us to find no enemy on an objective, but when all is said and done, if we can win by reputation, who wants to kill people?' "The only Gurkha killed by the Argentines was twenty-four-year-old Lance-Corporal Buddhaprasad Limbu, a signaler in the 1/7th. He was killed after the battle while engaged in removing the many mines which the 'Argies' had indiscriminately laid in the area. Many civilians attended his funeral in the local cemetery at Darwin, some coming in on tractors and Land Rovers to mark their appreciation of his sacrifice." Comment: Farwell has nothing to say about any Argentine casualties, or for that matter any casualties in the other two battalions. I was already familiar with the idea that Spartan wives urged their husbands to come back with their shields or on them and I thought that just had to do with fighting to the death if necessary, but I learned that a fully armed and armoured hoplite carried 70 pounds of gear. No hoplite could be part of a disordered rout and save his gear. If he wanted to flee, he divested himself of those 70 encumbering pounds. Thus, he would be returning to his wife without his shield. If memory serves me, Henry Fleming in The Red Badge of Courage threw his rifle away. Spartan Hoplites could engage in an ordered retreat where they remained together protecting each other with their shields and moving away from the enemy, but it was unacceptable for a Spartan to "lose his shield." I remember in boot camp hearing that often. A Marine does not lose his rifle. Lawrence Helm San Jacinto