This bear's necessity? A ciggie and a decent pint

WOJTEK THE BEAR BY AILEEN ORR (Birlinn £7.99)

Firm friends: Wojtek the soldier bear pictured at Edinburgh Zoo

The Polish army produced more than its fair share of heroes during World War II - none more extraordinary than Private Wojtek, of the 22nd Company of the 2nd Polish Corps.



A key member of his regiment, Wojtek (pronounced Voycheck) saw action at the battle of Monte Cassino in Italy, in 1944, where he did his bit under fire.



Ok . . . So? Well, Private Wojtek wasn’t a human soldier. He was a 500 lb bear.



Wojtek joined the Polish army as a motherless cub, when he was bought by a truckload of soldiers in 1942. He cost a tin of corned beef.

Raised by the infantrymen of 22nd Company, Wojtek liked to wrestle and drink with his comrades, and he slept alongside them. He considered himself one of them - the clinching proof of that demonstrated at Monte Cassino, where Wojtek joined in the battle.

£3.75 The daily pay for L Cpl Derby, the ram mascot of the Mercian Regiment



No, I’m afraid Wojtek didn’t actually storm enemy lines, taking mighty clawed swipes in hand-to-hand combat. What he did was more prosaic and actually even more extraordinary.



Having watched the soldiers unloading artillery shells from a truck as the battle raged, Wojtek copied them, holding out his paws to take 100lb boxes of shells and carrying them as though they were boxes of feathers.



First assigned as a private and then as a corporal, Wojtek stayed with his comrades after the war when they found themselves pitching up in Glasgow. Thousands of people lined the streets to greet the Polish war heroes, and the famous bear who marched alongside them in their victory parade.



The Poles’ new postwar base was a camp in rural Berwickshire. The humans were housed in Nissen huts, Wojtek in his own custom-made, straw-floored accommodation.



Here, Wojtek found a new group of friends in the locals, including the author’s own grandfather, who lived next to the camp and would often pop in on Wojtek to share his cigarettes. But Wojtek didn’t smoke - he’d just eat his lit cigarette.

His stay at the camp in Berwickshire lasted only a year but, in that time, Wojtek became a local legend - no longer as a war hero but as a gentle giant, who liked to eat sweets with children and, most unbear-like, took great delight in gently touching and stroking the face of anyone brave enough to let him.



Battle: Polish soldiers resting in the remains of the monastery at Monte Cassino

As well as eating sweets and cigarettes, Wojtek’s third vice was beer. He was rationed to two bottles a day but was always on the scrounge for more.



He was also very keen on Saturday-night dances in the local village halls - one attraction was the home baking, the other the music. The bear would sit down, legs splayed, facing the band, and sway along to the jigs and reels. Wojtek did take up a lot of dancefloor space, but the Polish soldiers were keen to take him with them to dances - because he was very useful in attracting girls.



He had proved his abilities in that direction the previous year in Italy, when he would swim underwater towards a group of women in the sea, then emerge in the middle of them and lark around until any strangely available Polish soldiers could jump in and gallantly ‘rescue’ the victims.



But the bonds between the soldiers and their unusual mascot went deep, as Aileen Orr explains in this engaging book - and it was a two-way process, with the soldiers caring for Wojtek and Wojtek returning their love. Whenever a soldier received a letter, which, this being World War II and the soldier being a Pole, would invariably bring terrible, tragic news, Wojtek would sit close to the soldier, offering the comfort of his sheer physical presence.



When they were dispersed in 1947, the soldiers handed Wojtek over to Edinburgh Zoo, only because there was no alternative.

Immortalised: A statue to Wojtek at Edinburgh Zoo

By all accounts, Wojtek was depressed by the loss of his freedom and his old comrades - though he’d always perk up if anyone spoke to him in Polish.



It was at Edinburgh Zoo that the author herself saw Wojtek. When she shouted a Polish greeting, he did, indeed, wave a paw at her.



Like many an old war hero, Wojtek eked out a meagre retirement. He died in the zoo in 1963.



But this book offers much more than a singular bear’s life - it’s also the story of the men who cared for Wojtek and who fought with such bravery even though they knew their own country had been lost.

