The Liberation Trilogy Box Set

by Rick Atkinson

  For Hewitt, the storm: Alfred M. Gruenther to GSP, Oct. 13, 1942, NARA RG 218, CCS 381, section 1–1a, box 325; Dickson, “G-2 Journal: Algiers to the Elbe,” ts, MHI, 21; AFHQ msg, Nov. 7, 1942, NARA RG 492, MTOUSA, box 1388 (“Very poor”).

  “I hope to God”: Mountbatten, OH, n.d., HKH, NHC, box 6.

  The choice: diary, Oct. 28, 30, 1942, GSP, LOC Ms Div, box 2, folder 13.

  “We are to be congratulated”: Blumenson, Patton: The Man Behind the Legend, 168; Farago, 9, 13 (“Some goddam fool”).

  Despite their early antipathy: Blumenson, Patton: The Man Behind the Legend, 112, 121 (“War is the only place”); DDE to GSP, Jr., Oct. 13, 1942, Chandler, 618; NWAf, 44–45; “Reminiscences of Rear Adm. Elliott B. Strauss,” 1989, USNI OHD (“when things get overturned”).

  In the smallest hours: weather reports, HKH, correspondence, NHC, box 1; Tuleja, “Admiral H. Kent Hewitt,” in Howarth, ed., 319–20.

  Hewitt studied: Clagett, “Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, U.S. Navy,” 76 (“velvet”).

  A solitary banana boat: AAR, “Trip of Honduran SS Contessa,” March 22, 1943, in Wheeler, ed., 76.

  With new urgency: Harmon, Combat Commander, 81; Franklyn E. Dailey, Jr., Joining the War at Sea, 1939–1945, 137 (“resembled a fraternity house”); memo, HQ Task Force A, Oct. 10, 1942, NARA micro, Western Task Force, AFHQ G-3, R-24-C (first-day battle casualities); Harry McK. Roper, “Report on Observations Made as Observer with Task Force Brushwood,” n.d., NARA RG 337, Observer Reports, box 52; AAR, Hewitt, March 1943, NARA RG 218, JCS, CCS 381, section 1–1a, box 325 (wetted down); Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 71 (“pretend they’re Japs”).

  Commanders with an impulse: F.E.M. Whiting, correspondence, 1972, USNI OHD (“Ense petit”); Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 92 (“glory enough”); Emily Morison Beck, ed., Sailor Historian: The Best of Samuel Eliot Morison, 205 (“gangway for a fighting ship”).

  Patton napped: Patton directive, Oct. 14, 1942, NARA RG 165, Office of the Director of Plans and Operations, General Records, corr, box 1229 (“Get off that damned beach”); GCM to DDE, n.d., NARA RG 492, MTOUSA, box 1387 (“avoid firing”); NWAf, 45, 70 (“superiority complex”).

  On the darkened bridge: msg, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 229 (“We come, among”); AFHQ msg, NARA RG 218, JCS, box 325 (“Vive”); Farago, 17 (“Mes amis”).

  “God’s most favorite”: Hatch, George Patton: General in Spurs, 138.

  Only rebels: Brooks, “Casablanca—The French Side of the Fence,” Proceedings, Sept. 1951, 909; “Memorandum for Colonel Donovan,” OSS AAR, Jan. 1943, NARA RG 226, E 99, box 40 (scheme by Moroccan Jews); “TORCH Report,” Sept. 6, 1944, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40 (Leroy the Badger); AAR, Émile Béthouart, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40 (“a juvenile enthusiasm”); letter, Auguste Paul Noguès to G. F. Howe, n.d., NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225.

  After that, nothing: Macmillan, The Blast of War, 197 (“No-Yes”); AAR, Michel Despax, July 15, 1944, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40 (his mistress’s bed); AAR, Béthouart; letter, Noguès to Howe; Philip H. Bagby, “D-Day in Casablanca,” American Foreign Service Journal, March 1945, 16 (Senegalese soldiers); NWAf, 95.

  “The sky is dark”: letter, Dave Murdock, Arizona Republic, Dec. 6, 1942, MCC, YU. Soldier letters collected by Mina Curtiss frequently indicate the date and newspaper or magazine in which the correspondence was published.

  The lieutenant was deceived: Morison, “The Approach to Fedala,” ts, n.d., SEM, NHC, box 16 (“One plot showed”); “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 426 (“center of Times Square”).

  Despite this irrefutable evidence: 3rd ID, “Brushwood Final Report,” Dec. 8, 1942, NARA micro, AFHQ G-3 Operations, R-24-C; “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 426 (“as though one switch”); AAR, U.S. Atlantic Fleet Amphibious Force, n.d., NARA RG 407, E 427, box 24430; Morison, “The Approach to Fedala,” ts, n.d., SEM, NHC, box 16; Truscott, Command Missions, 93 (“To be perfectly honest”).

  Destroyers tacked: “Operations, 3rd Bn., 60th Combat Team, 8–11 Nov. 1942,” NARA RG 407, E 427, box 7540; Ernest D. Whitehead, Sr., World War II: An Ex-Sergeant Remembers, 33 (impaled his thigh); Wallace, “Africa, We Took It and Liked It,” 20; Randle, Safi Adventure, 27 (“Don’t harass”).

  Then the loadmasters bellowed: AAR, U.S.S. Charles Carroll, n.d., U.S. Atlantic Fleet Amphibious Force, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 24490.

  At Fedala, the first wave: “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 430 (“indescribable confusion”); “CSI Battlebook 3-A: Operation TORCH,” CSI, 53; AAR, J. T. Hagglove, “Report of Operation at Fedala,” U.S.S. Leonard Wood, Nov. 28, 1942, NARA RG 407, E 427, Box 24490; “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 436; Kerwin, SOOHP, MHI, 123 (scavenging life jackets).

  Eighty miles north: Truscott, Command Decisions, 97; Mittelman, 48 (“like a yacht race”); AAR, Henry T. Allen, n.d., SEM, NHC, box 16; “Western Task Force: Attack on Mehdia and Port Lyautey Airdrome,” 1945, ts, 2–3.7 AEI, CMH.

  The third and final: Karl Baedeker, The Mediterranean, 109; Justin McGuinness, Footprint Morocco Handbook, 203; Oscar Koch, ts, n.d., MHI (picture postcards); lecture, Louis Ely, Feb. 5, 1943, SEM, NHC (Jew’s Cliff).

  To seize Safi port: AAR, 47th Infantry, n.d., NARA RG 407, E 427, box 7514; Karig, 184 (“sawed-off”); SEM, NHC, box 4, folder 2; George Bastedo, “K Goes to Africa,” ts, n.d., in Chester H. Jordan file, 3rd Bn, 47th Inf, ASEQ, MHI; Randle, Safi Adventure, appendix A (“Violent, rapid”).

  The usual muddle: Harmon, 84 (stretched a huge net); “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 408.

  Machine-gun rounds: lecture, C. G. Richardson, “The Attack on Safi,” Aug. 20, 1943, NARA RG 334, NWC Lib, box 164.

  Unsettled, the troops: James Adams, “Observer’s Report on Landing Operations of Task Force BLACKSTONE,” Jan. 1943, NARA RG 337, E 15A, box 52 (They flopped); Bastedo, “K Goes to Africa” Wilhm et al., “Armor in the Invasion of North Africa.”

  Three more waves: Adams, “Observer’s Report” (“A soldier would snake”); Randle, Safi Adventure, 45, 58.

  By early afternoon: Mittelman, 65; Erbes, “Hell on Wheels Surgeon,” 15 (“with a welder’s torch”).

  It was all too much: “Official Report Submitted by Commander of the Safi Garrison,” Nov. 14, 1942, NARA RG 338, Fifth Army, box 1; NWAf, 109.

  Eisenhower had trusted: Three Years, 173–76; DDE to GCM, Nov. 8, 1942, Chandler, 673 (“Everything appears”).

  Besides that: DDE to John S. D. Eisenhower, Oct. 13, 1942, Chandler, vol. I, 617.

  “this business of warfare”: Three Years, 176–77; DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 9, 1942, Chandler, 678 (“That I do not believe”).

  “Worries of a Commander”: DDE memo, Nov. 8, 1942, Chandler, 675.

  CHAPTER 3: BEACHHEAD

  A Sword in Algiers

  This was war: Martha Gellhorn, quoted in Paul Fussell, Doing Battle: The Making of a Skeptic, 298 (“our condition”); Matthew Arnold, “Dover Beach.”

  East of the Algerian: Destruction, 144; The Landings in North Africa, 13; “5 Corps Lessons from TORCH,” extract from letter, Nov. 26, 1942, NARA RG 334, NWC Lib, box 472 (“all very friendly”).

  Lieutenant Colonel Edward J. Doyle: letter, John O’Daniel to OW, Jan. 1951, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225; Berens, 36–37 (Ignoring orders and “at the beach”).

  Luftwaffe pilots: The Landings in North Africa, 104; Baltimore Sun, Dec. 17, 1942; Karig, 220; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 213.

  Pleasing as such retaliatory: AAR, Jan. 3, 1945, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40; Pendar, 112.

  In Juin’s limousine: Charles W. Ryder, OH, March 1949, SM, MHI (“I will go anywhere”); Murphy, 132.

  A bugler perched: AAR, July 17, 1945, and Jan. 3, 1945, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40 (“I don’t like blood”); Pendar, 114; Hougen, The Story of the Famous 34th Infantry Division (hunting trophies); Ryder, OH, March 1949, SM
, MHI (“Are you”); AAR, C.W. Ryder, Nov. 19, 1942, NARA RG 407, E 427, AG, box 244; Murphy, 133.

  At dawn on Monday: Roskill, 325; Fergusson, 213; S.W.C. Pack, Invasion North Africa 1942, 80 (“Everyone lie down!”).

  So, too, did General Giraud: Langer, 350 (“his presence”); DDE to GCM, Nov. 9, 1942, Chandler, 680 (“stupid Frogs”).

  The authorities in Vichy: Langer, 356 (“a rebel chief and a felon”); memo, J. J. McCloy to L. J. McNair, March 31, 1943, NARA RG 165, Plans and Ops, box 1230; Funk, 234; Tompkins, 116 (uniform had gone missing).

  Three hours later: Murphy, 135 (“messes things”); Darryl F. Zanuck, Tunis Expedition, 39, 48.

  The Hôtel St. Georges: Baedeker, 221; Middleton, 191 (spinsters touring).

  Clark found General Ryder: Berens, 38 (“shoot their butts off”); “Record of Events,” Feb. 22, 1943, NARA RG 338, Fifth Army, box 1, 1–13; Clark, Calculated Risk, 108.

  “We have work”: Clark, Calculated Risk, 108–13; “Record of Events” (“All my associates”); Langer, 352 (“Pétain is nothing”); log, Nov. 10, 1942, Jerauld Wright Papers, LOC, box 2 (“That is your decision”); Murphy, 138 (“Would you mind”).

  The Americans retreated: Murphy, 138 (Clark’s tacit threat); Funk, 243 (“in the name”); Tompkins, 121 (“J’accepte”); “Record of Events,” 13.

  He immediately: Alan Moorehead, The End in Africa, 61 (“He appeared”); Funk, 240 (“I issued”); Tompkins, 123 (“I am lost”); “Record of Events,” 13; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 217; Dickson, “G-2 Journal: Algiers to the Elbe,” 29 (“Mon Admiral, by order”).

  At Gibraltar, Eisenhower thumbed: Chandler, 679 (“War brings”); Butcher diary, Nov. 8 (“good assassin”) and 13 (“in a neutral country”), DDE Lib, PP-pres, box 165.

  But it was Oran: DDE to GCM, Nov. 9, 1942, Chandler, 680 (“My biggest”).

  A Blue Flag over Oran

  American soldiers had converged: Field Order #1, Oct. 11, 1942, 26th Inf., MRC FDM (Brooklyn, Brockton).

  Terry Allen and a larger portion: Rame, 16 (“scrofulous”); author interview, Eston White; Downing, 92 (When the mule).

  A wounded soldier lay: Downing, 89 (“Don’t kick”); Fred W. Hall, Jr., “A Memoir of World War II,” ts, 1997, Eisenhower Center, University of New Orleans (“The fallen wire”).

  St. Cloud was a buff-tinted: NWAf, 220n; AAR, Leland L. Rounds, July 13, 1944, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 40; Field Order #1, intel. annex, Oct. 11, 1942, 26th Inf., MRC FDM (“second- or third-class”); Rame, 16.

  At 3:30 P.M., the battalion: Marshall, ed., Proud Americans, 31–40 (“Keep going, Mac”); Robert W. Baumer, Before Taps Sounded, 64.

  Now French artillerymen: Marshall, ed., 26 (“Please, please,”), 31 (“Stop!”), 35 (goats stampeded).

  Night slipped down: Russell F. Akers, OH, July 27, 1949, SM, MHI.

  By seven A.M. on November 9: Parris and Russell, 193; Rame, 28–31.

  “I’m going to put”: Rame, 29; Knickerbocker et al., 46.

  At that moment: Rogers, “A Study of Leadership in the First Infantry Division During World War II,” 14, 16; “Nothing Stopped the Timberwolves,” Saturday Evening Post, Aug. 17, 1946, 20; Frye, “‘Terrible Terry’ of the 1st Division Is Getting Tougher as He Goes Along.”

  Standing beneath a fig tree: John K. Waters, SOOHP, 1980, William C. Parnell III, MHI, 683; Mason, “Reminiscences and Anecdotes of World War II,” MRC FDM; “A Factual Situation and Operations Report on the Combat Operations of the 1st Infantry Division,” n.d., TdA, MHI (“There will not be”); “Terry Allen and the First Division in North Africa and Sicily,” n.d., TdA, MHI; Ramsey, 55 (“I just couldn’t do it”).

  The circumvention of St. Cloud: Rogers, 15; Knickerbocker et al., 50 (“You will not talk”); Rame, 40; Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 45 (flood the port). (George Marshall later sent FDR a copy of Allen’s field order no. 3 as a model of brevity.)

  Festive crowds: Joseph S. Frelinghuysen, Passages to Freedom, 26; letter, William B. Kern to PMR, Jan. 1950, NARA RG 319, OCMH.

  For more than five hours: “18th Infantry, Draft Regimental History,” n.d., Stanhope Mason Collection, MRC FDM; Lida Mayo, The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront, 117 (a large blue pennant).

  Beyond the killed: NWAf, 227, 228n; Observer Report, #41, March 5, 1943, NARA RG 337, Box 52 (Allen and Roosevelt also relieved); author interview, Juskalian, Feb. 25, 2000.

  The liberators immediately: McNamara, 22; Pyle, Here Is Your War, 83 (“to make them feel”); Waters, SOOHP, 171; Edward J. Josowitz, An Informal History of the 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion, 7 (threw a jolly party); Pearlman, 249; author interview, Juskalian.

  Almost 37,000 men now occupied: Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 47 (“Everything is rosy”); DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 10, 1942, Chandler, 686 (“rush and rush”).

  “An Orgy of Disorder”

  Casablanca provided: Landings in North Africa, 27–39; Auphan and Moral, 230–36; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 93–114 (“fire-away Flannagan”).

  hardly a syllable: Three Years, 182.

  Hewitt considered: New York Sun, Jan. 30, 1943, HKH, LOC Ms. Div., box 9, folder 6; Clagett, “Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, U.S. Navy,” part 2, 83; U.S.S.

  Brooklyn war diary, Nov. 8, 1942, SEM, NHC, box 15 (“Have noticed”).

  Within ten minutes: Brooks, “Casablanca—The French Side of the Fence,” 909.

  The Jean Bart: AAR, Carl E. Bledsoe, Jan. 27, 1943, NARA RG 337, E 15A, box 51; Mason, 181; Godson, 51.

  The commander of the French: Auphan and Moral, 230; Tompkins, 162–65 (black cassock and wives and children).

  French shells: AAR, R. E. Ingersoll, “TORCH Operation, Comments and Recommendations,” March 1, 1943, NARA RG 407, E 427, “Special Files,” box 24486; AAR, USN, “Participation in Operation TORCH Action off Casablanca,” Nov. 19, 1942, NARA RG 407, E 427, “Special Files,” box 24488; Landings in North Africa, 35; “Signal Communication in the North African Campaign,” ts, 1945, Tactical Communication in World War II, Part I, Historical Section, Office of the Chief Signal Officer, MHI, 17.

  concussion: HKH, “Reminscences of a World War II Admiral,” ts, NHC, box 21; letter, Edward S. Johnston to SEM, Apr. 1947, SEM, NHC, box 16; Farago, 35–36 (“I hope you have”); Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 103, 105 (“I was on”).

  Hewitt was too busy: Landings in North Africa, 37; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 100–101 (“grasshopper with a rock”), 104; “Reminiscences of Rear Adm. Joshua W. Cooper,” OH, John T. Mason, 1975, USNI OHD (galley trash can); AAR, Daniel F. Seacord, U.S.S.

  Ludlow, n.d., NHC; Harley Cope, “Play Ball, Navy!” Proceedings, Oct. 1943, 1131.

  Four miles: AAR, “Aircraft Operations During the Execution of TORCH,” CINCLANT, March 30, 1943, NARA RG 38, OCNO, WWII Action, box 3; Wordell and Seiler, 133 (Scotch tape).

  Patched and vengeful: C. T. Booth and M. T. Wordell, OH Dec. 4, 1942, NARA RG 334, E 315, NWC Lib, box 476 (“The first pass”); Wordell and Seiler, 93.

  The air attacks and weight: “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” ts, 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 449; Wordell and Seiler, 93 (“heeled over”); Auphan and Moral, 233; Landings in North Africa, 35–36; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 107.

  The most operatic death: AAR, translated from French Naval Historical Service, n.d., in Ludlow file, NHC; Auphan and Moral, 233; Landings in North Africa, 36; Collier, 146 (Terrified pigs).

  Of the French ships: AAR, “Aircraft Operations During the Execution of TORCH,” CINCLANT, March 30, 1943, NARA RG 38, OCNO, WWII Action, box 3; Wordell and Seiler, 93 (sweeping, ceremonial turn); letter, C. V. August, Chicago News, Jan. 28, 1943, MCC, YU (bathed in champagne).

  Diehard French officers: Ellsberg, 271 (“We Come”); Tompkins, 165.

  Patton finally reached: letters, Edward S. Johnston to S. E. Morison, April–May 1947, SEM, NHC, box 16 (“I cannot stomach”); D’Este, Pat
ton, 435.

  That would be: Blumenson, Patton: The Man Behind the Legend, 128 (“orgy of disorder”); Observer Report #37, Feb. 10, 1943, NARA RG 337, box 52 (“Had the landings”); “Western Task Force: The Attack on Fedala,” n.d., War Department, CMH, 2–3.7 WE; “Signal Communication in the North African Campaign,” ts, 1945, Tactical Communication in World War II, Part I, Historical Section, Office of the Chief Signal Officer, MHI, 59; Kenneth G. Crawford, Report on North Africa, 45; letter, Arthur R. Wilson to GCM, Dec. 12, 1942, NARA RG 165, E 13, OCS, box 106; Joseph A. Watters, “The Invasion of North Africa at Fedala and Casablanca,” ts, n.d., ASEQ, 3rd ID, MHI; Three Years, 148.

  While trapped: Hatch, George Patton: General in Spurs, 138 (“I wish”); Charles R. Codman, Drive, 22; Harry H. Semmes, “George S. Patton, Jr.’s Psychology of Leadership,” Army, Jan.–Feb. 1955, 1 (“words of fire”); Harmon, 94 (useful rumor).

  Five French infantry battalions: Wilhm et al., 71; “History of Regimental Landing Group 30,” March 30, 1943, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 245 (“Rendezvous!”); “Western Task Force: The Attack on Fedala” decoration affidavits, Mackenzie E. Porter, Robert D. Henriques, NARA RG 338, 7th Army Awards, box 2; William Ellsworth, OH, n.d., SM, MHI (“For God’s sake stop”); Coffin, “Operation TORCH: A Perilous Preview,” 42; Donald G. Taggart, ed., History of the Third Infantry Division, 23.

  A white handkerchief: “History of Regimental Landing Group 30” (offered water).

  Patrols pushing: Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 65 (“the greatest setback”).

  Rommel was still: William Ellsworth, OH, n.d., SM, MHI; Franklin M. Reck, Beyond the Call of Duty, 27 (“Good day, my friends!”); Taggart, ed., 20; Morison, Operations in North African Waters, 86, 110; NWAf, 128; Farago, 39 (“determined to slug it out”).

  The fight would be: “Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet,” ts, 1946, vol. I, USNAd, 443; letter, Arthur R. Wilson to GCM, Dec. 12, 1942, NARA RG 165, E 13, OCS, box 106; Farago, 200 (“My theory”); Codman, 35 (Patton strolled); Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 106 (“God was”).