way through barbed wire up the steep rocky surface to the lighthouse courtyard unchallenged. Once in the courtyard the group dispersed to their prearranged objectives. Appleyard and Sergeant Winter dashed up the spiral staircase to the tower light only to find it unoccupied. The garrison was totally surprised. Appleyard said, "I have never seen men so amazed and terrified at the same time." Three were sleeping, two were just turning in and two others were on duty, the seven Germans were taken prisoner without a shot being fired. One German, who was in charge of the lighthouse operation, fainted at the sight of the commandos. Another was initially thought to be a woman because he was wearing a hairnet. Weapons found included an Oerlikon 20 mm cannon, rifles and stick grenades, which were all dumped in the sea. The radio was smashed with an axe. The boat they had arrived in was designed to take a maximum of 10, now with 19, it was difficult, but they managed. Appleyard suffered an accident and fractured his tibia as he re-boarded their boat. Setting sail at 01.35 hrs, the seven prisoners, some still in their pyjamas, were taken to England, arriving at Portland at 04.00 hrs. Several codebooks, logs, diaries and letters were found and taken back for analysis. The code books proved to be of little value, given that the code had already been broken, and indeed the Germans, realising that these books had been captured, increased their wireless security. The effect of the raid may have been counter-productive. Aftermath It was a few days before the Germans were aware of a problem. When a boat arrived, they found the lighthouse deserted. An order to remove all lighthouse crews did not last long when it was realised the benefits outweighed the risks. The Casquets lighthouse was re-armed with a 2.5cm Pak, five machine guns and had a larger crew of 24 installed. The next raid for the SSRF was 12/13 September Operation Aquatint. The raiding party led by March-Phillipps would all be killed or captured. Winter and Hayes were captured, Hayes after having succeeded in crossing the French–Spanish border was later executed in Fresnes prison. In October 1942 Appleyard now in command of the SSRF was in charge of a raid on Sark Operation Basalt where four German prisoners who had been tied up were shot and killed as they tried