Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
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H/t to Sarah Johnston

A series of recordings made by the New Zealand Broadcasting Unit, in which Frank Jopling [Military service number 1314], a young soldier serving with the Long Range Desert Group, reads entries from a diary he kept during a patrol into the desert interior of Libya in December 1940 and January 1941. [This was the Fezzan operation which aimed to raid Italian positions at the town of Murzuk.] Frank himself reads some excerpts, which commence on 26 December 1940. New Zealand Broadcasting Unit commentator Doug Laurenson also introduces and summarises some of the diary entries. [At the time of recording, military censorship prevented Jopling’s surname being mentioned.]