THEY were tough and ruthless and one of their number was legendary safecracker 'Gentleman Johnny' Ramensky.

Now 90, Dennis Whitcombe of Cwmbran fought a clandestine war behind enemy lines and tells Mike Buckingham his story.

THE finger trembles slightly but the voice is firm as it points to a figure on the edges of the photograph.

"That's Johnny Ramensky, the notorious safebreaker and one of the bravest men I've ever met."

No small compliment coming from the mouth of Dennis Whitcombe who in the picture is also amongst the group of men of 30 Commando Assault Unit, one of the toughest and most secretive units to have been formed during World War Two.

It is now almost 70 years since Dennis and 'Gentleman Johnny' fought behind the German lines in Italy viciously harrying the enemy with gun, knife and grenade and in Ramensky's case, breaking into German headquarters to steal their secrets.

"They called him a gentleman and so he was" Mr Whitcombe, now 90 and living at Cwmbran recalls fondly as he gazes at the photograph.

"When he died in 1972 even the police who had put him behind bars turned up at his funeral.

"He was a hero."

In the context of total war it is not a term to be used lightly and Mr Whitcombe does not use it about himself although he must be ranked among the toughest and most resourceful soldiers ever to be put into the field of combat.

As war approached young Dennis's story was normal enough.

Born in Pontypool he went to school locally and like thousands of others in 1940 went into the South Wales Borderers.

When the battalion landed on the Anzio beaches - the Allied invasion of Italy that prefigured D-Day- the young Dennis fought as an infantry soldier to establish a beachhead.

"We'd got our foothold in Italy when I read a notice saying that the Army was looking for volunteers for its commando force.

"I thought 'why not?'

"I knew the work would be dangerous but at that age you don't really have much sense of what danger means so I put my name down."

Britain's war, perhaps more so that any of the other powers involved, was fought not only with military muscle but with a guile and inventiveness bordering on eccentricity.

In the smoke-wreathed clubs of Pall Mall schemes of varying degrees of plausibility were put forward, the one for an Army commando force to fight behind enemy lines from no less a colourful personage that Ian Fleming, naval intelligence officer and creator of James Bond.

"I'm sure Ian Fleming drew inspiration from the unit" Mr Whitcombe muses.

"Years after the war at a reunion I met Patrick Dalziel-Job who may have been the inspiration for the James Bond character.

"Bond definitely would have approved of our training which was in all sorts of techniques needed to survive and fight behind enemy lines linking up with the partisans who had risen against the Germans.

"Johnny Ramensky was one of our number, a pleasant bloke you never would have guessed was one of the most notorious safebreakers in British history.

"From time to time he would disappear for several days.

"Even we didn't know precisely what he had been asked to do although it wasn't hard to catch the general drift of things."

The 120 men selected for the commando team used the village of Impruneta near Florence as their base and it was here the picture of Mr Whitcombe with other soldiers including Ramensky was taken.

With the end of the war those of 30 CAU who survived returned to their civilian lives which in Ramensky's case meant his native Glasgow and a life of burglary and safe-blowing.

In 1990 Mr Whitcombe who regularly attended reunions at the Special Operations Executive Club in London returned to Impruneta.

His daughter, Anne says "We found the Villa Nobile where they had been billeted and where the pictures were taken.

"It was a bit tidier than dad recalled it but in essence the place had changed hardly at all."

Still a trim figure Mr Whitcombe still has the dress uniform with its sergeant's stripes.

Two grandsons served in the Royal Regiment of Wales into which the Borderers were amalgamated in 1969 and a great-grand-daughter served with the Military Police.

"The family has always supported the Army " he says.

"The lads in Afghanistan and all who have fought since my day are every bit as determined as we were."

Mr Whitcombe has given his approval to the Heroes' Return 2 programme run by Big Lottery which pays for wartime veterans to return to what were war fronts in Europe and North Africa.

"It's important to each and every one of us that these men and women be remembered for what they did" he says quietly as he goes to close his picture album.

But before he does so his hand brushes the face of Johnny Ramensky, brave and yet tragic; the enigmatic hero.

Gentleman crook was war hero

AT RELATIVELY SAFE interludes during their time behind German lines Dennis Whitcombe and the infamous Ramensky would have something in common to talk about.

A Lithuanian Jew, Ramensky had been down the Scottish pits where he had learned to handle explosives - a talent he was to take into the even darker underground world of safecracking.

Even before the war Ramensky was established as a folk hero who stole only from businesses and when arrested would hand himself over without trouble.

It was for this reason he was known as “Gentleman Johhny”.

Once in prison though, he was disinclined to stay there and in one famous escape bid from the grim Barlinnie prison in Glasgow threw off his boots and climbed the prison wall by means of toe and finger-holds in the cement.

The decision to release him to join 30 CAU was inspired.

As the enemy retreated Ramensky blew 14 safes in one day - a feat which earned him the Military Medal (now Military Cross) and a free pardon.

But Johnny was a pro, born to his precarious calling.

After five times escaping from Peterhead jail - the most secure in Scotland - he was in Perth prison where, at the age of 68, he collapsed and died.

His obituary appeared in every Scottish newspaper.

Detective-Inspector Robert Colquhoun said of Ramensky "I found him an engaging character.

"Had he turned his mind to a more acceptable occupation" he might have made good."

But the ranks of special units are not always filled by men who are predictable and cautious.

Ramensky's high wartime decoration was never taken away.

For all his faults, his part in overthrowing the greatest evil to blight the 20th century could never be denied.