The Day of Battle

by Rick Atkinson

  Gunners draped wet rags: Olgierd Terlecki, Poles in the Italian Campaign, 1943–1945, 73; Lida Mayo, The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront, 211 (174,000 shells); Mountain Inferno, 749 (“bridge of iron”); Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 7, 769 (“Zip”).

  At midnight on the Allied right: E. D. Smith, The Battles for Cassino, 153, 162 (“no Germans could possibly outlive”); Fred Majdalany, Cassino: Portrait of a Battle, 231.

  “Soldiers! The moment for battle”: W. Anders, An Army in Exile, 174; Raleigh Trevelyan, Rome ’44, 269, 273 (Troops surged up Snakeshead Ridge); “Operations by 2nd Polish Corps Against the High Ground, Monte Cassino,” June 1944, possession of Roger Cirillo, 26–31 (Nine German battalions).

  “Many of us had lost”: Janusz Piekalkiewicz, The Battle for Cassino, 169, 172–73; Majdalany, Cassino, 246; Anders, 175–76 (“small epics”); CtoA, 44; Dan Kurzman, The Race for Rome, 235 (“If they do not obey orders”); “Operations by 2nd Polish Corps,” 29 (of twenty engineers”); Robert Wallace, The Italian Campaign, 164 (“how dreadful death can be”).

  At dawn, the rising sun: Charles Connell, Monte Cassino, 186 (“sitting birds”); memo, “Flamethrowers and Napalm,” July 1944, HQ, 2nd Polish Corps, NARA RG 492, MTO chemical warfare section, 470.71, box 1756; Trevelyan, 271 (“I was working on my knees”).

  Yet even Polish valor could not win: Terlecki, 75; Battle, 233; Piekalkiewicz, 171 (“costly reconnaissance”).

  “Let’s pick some cornflowers”: Ryder, 166.

  “What do we do now?”: Kurzman, 215.

  Vehicles crept forward, hauling boats: newsletter, 8th Indian Division, March–Nov. 1944, Dudley Russell papers, LH, 5; The Tiger Triumphs, 73 (banged angle iron).

  Fire they drew, but so did the rest: Dharm Pal, The Campaign in Italy, 1943–1945, 160–61; Ryder, 166 (“yellow London fog”).

  Men stumped about in flame-stabbed confusion: The Tiger Triumphs, 73; Pal, 161–62; Field Marshal Lord Carver, The Imperial War Museum Book of the War in Italy, 1943–1945, 184–85 (“Oh, God, don’t let me die”).

  Twelve of sixteen Gurkha boats: Pal, 162; Alexander, “The Allied Armies in Italy,” III-11; David Scott Daniell, History of the East Surrey Regiment, vol. 4, 207.

  By midday, no battalion: Gregory Blaxland, Alexander’s Generals, 89; Robin Neillands, Eighth Army, 291 (“an autocratic man”); Molony VI, 99 (“sough and whiffle”); Parker, 314 (“passed ever so slowly”).

  Yet the enemy had missed: Molony VI, 112; Kenneth Macksey, Kesselring: The Making of the Luftwaffe, 211; Blaxland, 95–96; CtoA, 55.

  Three bridges, dubbed Cardiff, Oxford, and Plymouth: “Engineers in the Italian Campaign,” ts, n.d., UK NA, CAB 106/575, 34–35; Pal, 165; The Tiger Triumphs, 74–75; newsletter, 8th Indian Division, March–Nov. 1944, Dudley Russell papers, LHC.

  Upstream between Sant’Angelo and Cassino town: Daniell, History of the East Surrey Regiment; Beckett, 157–58 (“Cries for help”); Frank Mills, “Well Dressed at Cassino,” n.d., author’s possession, 3–4 (glimpses of the abbey).

  Gurkhas twice surged into Sant’Angelo: Molony VI, 121; Pal, 165; The Tiger Triumphs, 75–76.

  Putrefying corpses were soaked in petrol: memoir, P. Royle, 1972, IWM, 99/72/1, 122–23 (“I had no regrets”); Connell, 191 (wounds dressed with paper); Blaxland, 99 (“This is real war”).

  They pushed on: C. N. Barclay, History of the 16th/5th The Queen’s Royal Lancers, 125, 126n.

  “He was thrashing and fighting”: John Ellis, On the Front Lines, 331.

  Two secure bridgeheads merged: Battle, 232–33; Molony VI, 80, 123; Trevelyan, 297 (“Flames of Jerry guns”).

  In four days Eighth Army would advance: Trevelyan, 272; Molony VI, 128.

  “Mark Clark has laid 4–1”: Ryder, 170.

  Clark had troubles enough: James C. Fry, Combat Soldier, 17, 33, 43; John J. Roche, “First Squad, First Platoon,” 1983, 351st Inf, 88th ID, MHI, ASEQ, 6–7; Wyndham H. Bammer, “Operations of Company K, 339th Infantry, in the Attack on Hills 66 and 69,” 1948, IS; Douglas Allanbrook, See Naples, 179 (“who gets Rome?”).

  Sheaves of fire from the entrenched 94th Division: G. K. Tanham, “Battlefield Intelligence in World War II: A Case Study of the Fifth Army Front in Italy,” Sept. 1956, Project RAND, RM-1792, CMH, 42; John J. Roche, “First Squad, First Platoon,” 1983, 351st Inf, 88th ID, MHI, ASEQ, 6 (“noise was all of a piece”); John Sloan Brown, Draftee Division, 107 (Red tracer vectors); Eric Sevareid, Not So Wild a Dream, 390.

  “a serpentine column of steam”: Roche, “First Squad, First Platoon,” 13; Sevareid, 388.

  Yet neither division moved far: CtoA, 52, 54; Chester G. Starr, ed., From Salerno to the Alps, 201–2; http://www.wisc.edu/wisconsinpress/books/2387.htm; Sidney T. Matthews, “Writing Small Unit Actions with the Fifth Army in Italy,” SM, MHI, box 2, 2 (Frederick Schiller Faust); Sevareid, 388 (“stupefyingly dead”); John E. Wallace, The Blue Devil “Battle Mountain” Regiment in Italy, 13–18; Alexander, “The Allied Armies in Italy,” III-11.

  That left Juin’s FEC: Anthony Clayton, Three Marshals of France, 83–85; “Draft Report on FEC,” SM, CMH, box 1; Starr, ed., 186–88.

  Plunging fire greeted them: Diana F. Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps in the Battle for Rome,” Cabinet historical section, UK NA, CAB 101/226, 13; Claude R. Hinson, “755th Tank Battalion Supporting the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division of the French Expeditionary Corps During the Advance on Rome,” 1948, IS (singed hair and burning flesh); George Bouille and Pierre Le Goyet, Le Corps Expeditionnaire Française en Italie, 1943–1944, n.d., MHI, trans. Antonio Ali Winston for author, 56–63 (Counterattacking grenadiers).

  By midmorning on Friday, May 12: Douglas Porch, The Path to Victory, 556; Fred Majdalany, Cassino, 243; Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps,” 13; Starr, ed., 267n (casualties approached sixteen hundred); “Draft Report on FEC” (“considerable alarm”); Parker, 320 (“dead take on a waxy look”).

  Juin went forward shortly before noon: Michael Carver, ed., The War Lords, 607; Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps,” 13 (three wounded battalion commanders); Sidney T. Matthews, “The French Drive on Rome,” Revue historique de l’armée, special issue, 1957, 128 (“the wrong foot”).

  Through much of the afternoon he scrambled: Clayton, 83–85; John Buchan, “Report on a Visit to the French Expeditionary Corps,” n.d., CMH, appendix A, 1 (“It’s gone wrong”); “Draft Report on FEC” CtoA, 61; Porch, 556 (only reserve division); Carver, ed., 607 (“it will go”).

  It went, spectacularly: Butler, “The French Expeditionary,” 15; Porch, 556; Clayton, 83–85; Bouille and Le Goyet, 74–78 (reported Monte Majo captured); Heinrich von Vietinghoff, “71st Infantry Division in Italy,” Sept. 1948, FMS, #C-025, MHI, 7–9, 22; Hans von Greiffenberg, “Field Fortifications in Central Italy,” 1950, FMS, #C-071, MHI, 3–5, 16; CtoA, 61 (“Accelerate the general withdrawal”).

  By Sunday the French had advanced: Starr, ed., 188–89; Matthews, “The French Drive on Rome,” 128–29; Molony VI, 139, 145 (“En avant!”), 140 (“Most unpleasant”); Bouille and Le Goyet, 78 (worse than in Russia); Parker, 341; CtoA, 62; Buchan, “Report on a Visit,” appendix A, 1 (“warfare to which we are accustomed”).

  The unpleasantries had only begun: “Draft Report on FEC” Starr, ed., 189–92.

  “Dark men, dark night”: Trevelyan, 271; Robert Capa, Slightly Out of Focus, photo, 113; Fry, 43 (“troops of the last century”); O’Connor, “Mektoub,” 119 (“dozens of wristwatches”); Hinson, “755th Tank Battalion,” 10 (One unit kept a tiger); Joe Chmiel, “Invasion of Normandy,” ts, n.d., in Matt Urban file, 60th Inf Regt, 9th ID, SOOHP, MHI (“Smokie, smokie”).

  It was said that in Sicily: Peter Schrijvers, The Crash of Ruin, 47; OH, Robert J. Wood, 1973, William E. Narus, SOOHP, MHI, 3–42; John Steinbeck, Once There Was a War, 168; Roberta Love Tayloe, Combat Nurse, 77, 79, 83 (doctors assigned numbers); Huebner, 81 (“sing, chatter, and howl”); Alan Williamson, “Adviser to Fre
nch Colonial Troops,” ts, n.d., Texas MFM, 4 (“women, horses, and guns”).

  Up and up they climbed: Starr, ed., 192–93; Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps,” 19 (“sky was a changeless blue”).

  By four P.M. on May 15: Starr, ed., 192–93; Molony VI, 149 (“falling boulders”); Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps,” 21; Buchan, “Report on a Visit,” appendix F (“grinning savages”).

  Men and beasts had exhausted themselves: “Draft Report on FEC.”

  On the French left: Brown, 117, 120; CtoA, 65–68, 77; Starr, ed., 207 (dust-churning flotilla).

  “rushed off his feet”: Buchan, “Report on a Visit,” 1; Matthews, “The French Drive on Rome,” 128–29 (nearly extinct 71st Division); CtoA, 86 (no more than one hundred riflemen); Starr, ed., 210 (terrorizing horses); Macksey, 212 (“One could cry”).

  All this buoyed the Allied high command: diary, MWC, May 14, 1944, Citadel, box 65 (“very pleased”); Carver, ed., 607 (“We’ve got them”).

  Only Clark remained somber: diary, MWC, May 14, 1944, Citadel, box 65; CtoA, 77; Tanham, “Battlefield Intelligence in World War II,” 53 (compared with two miles); CtoA, 71–73 (“disciplinary action”); Brown, 127 (traffic snarls).

  “I am disappointed”: diary, MWC, May 14, 1944, Citadel, box 65; GK, May 14, 1944 (“Called me about 6 times”).

  Even as he lashed: Starr, ed., 226; diary, MWC, May 15, 1944, Citadel, box 65 (“effort of the Eighth Army”).

  That same Eighth Army: Anders, 178; Terlecki, 83; Kurzman, 237; Ken Ford, Cassino 1944, 78–79; Molony VI, 130n (“oddments”); Rudolf Böhmler, Monte Cassino, 266 (“Impossible to get wounded”).

  In danger of encirclement: Albrecht Kesselring, The Memoirs of Field-Marshal Kesselring, 200–205; Jean-Yves Nasse, Green Devils, 113; Nigel Nicolson, The Grenadier Guards in the War of 1939–1945, vol. 2, 427; Butler, ed., “Human Interest,” 4; war diary, 1st Guards Bde, May 18, 1944, UK NA, WO 170/514 (“Cassino is lost”).

  The struggle for the high ground: “Operations by 2nd Polish Corps,” 40; Anders, 179 (six-man patrol); John H. Green, “The Battles for Cassino,” AB, no. 13, 1976, 1+ (cracked church bell); Piekalkiewicz, 181 (Benedict’s candlelit crypt).

  Just before ten A.M. the lancers’: Anders, 178; Parker, 352-53; http://www.krakowinfo.com/signal2.way; Trevelyan, 274.

  At 11:30 A.M. British signalers: Butler, ed., “Human Interest,” 4; Nicolson, 427–28; Ryder, 169; “Operations by 2nd Polish Corps,” 41; Molony VI, 134; Smith, 172 (“means a great deal”).

  For the first time in five months: war diary, 1st Guards Bde, May 18, 1944; Betsy Wade, ed., Forward Positions: The War Correspondence of Homer Bigart, 44–45; General Sir Sidney Chevalier Kirkman, “3rd and 4th Cassino,” Royal Artillery Historical Society, Proceedings, vol. 11, no. 3, Jan. 1969, 94+.

  In the abbey itself, further investigation: Trevelyan, 274; Tommaso Leccisotti, Monte Cassino, 132–33; E. T. DeWald, “Inspection Trip to Abbey of Monte Cassino, May 27, 1944,” Henry C. Newton papers, MHI (“a Mesopotamian tell”).

  A solitary American fighter pilot: Parker, 357; Walter Robson, Letters from a Soldier, 96–97.

  General von Senger, freshly bemedaled: Frido von Senger und Etterlin, “War Diary of the Italian Campaign,” 1953, FMS, #C-095b, MHI, 124; Vietinghoff, “71st Infantry Division in Italy,” 31 (found the Gustav Line ruptured); Molony VI, 114, 143 (“frightful”); Frido von Senger und Etterlin, “The Drive on Rome,” Sept. 1951, FMS, #C-097b, MHI, 11 (“the corps had been breached”); Neil Short, German Defences in Italy in World War II, 9n.

  “It was left to me”: Frido von Senger und Etterlin, Neither Fear nor Hope, 248.

  The task was formidable: Albert Kesselring et al., “German Version of the History of the Italian Campaign,” n.d., CARL, N-16671.1-3, 216; Walter Warlimont, “OKW Activities—The Italian Theater, 1 Apr.–31 Dec. 1944,” n.d., FMS, #C-099b, MHI, 23 (spotter planes); F. M. Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE: A Case Study of Tactical Air Interdiction,” Feb. 1972, RAND, R-851, 68 (“unremitting Allied fighter-bomber”); II Corps G-2, May 19, 1944, NARA RG 319, OCMH, CA, box 6 (horses had been killed); memo, Joseph L. Langevin, VI Corps G-2, to LKT Jr., May 18, 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 13, folder 4 (59 German battalions); John Ellis, Brute Force, 324 (only 405 men fit to fight).

  Italian supply-truck drivers: journal, Fourteenth Army, May 19–22, 1944, “The German Operation at Anzio,” Apr. 1946, WD, John Lucas papers, MHI, box 9, 104; Kesselring et al, “German Version,” 127 (barrages severed phone lines); A. G. Steiger, “The Italian Campaign,” July 1948, historical section, Canadian Army HQ, report no. 20, MHI, 59 (“I demand a clear picture”); F. W. Winterbotham, The Ultra Secret, 116.

  In truth, Kesselring had been outgeneraled: W.G.F. Jackson, Alexander of Tunis as Military Commander, 285; Matthews, “The French Drive on Rome,” 128–29; Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 70–71 (not until May 19); Kesselring, Memoirs, 201–5; Senger, “The Drive on Rome,” 11; Robin Kay, Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War, vol. 2, From Cassino to Trieste, 29; Walter Warlimont, Inside Hitler’s Headquarters, 1939–1945, 416; Molony VI, 164.

  “offensive against the cultural center of Europe”: weekly air intelligence summary, #78, May 15, 1944, Fifth Army, G-3 journal, NARA RG 319, OCMH, CA, box 6; corr, May 18, 1944, in G-2 report, II Corps, June 3, 1944, Robert H. Adleman papers, HIA, box 13 (“You have no idea”).

  “like spontaneous fires exploding”: Fred Cederberg, The Long Road Home, 121; Blaxland, 107 (crammed along a six-mile front); C. F. Comfort, Artist at War, 153 (“a vaporous fantasy”); Trevelyan, 297 (“clear their own minefields”).

  “the Shermans pitching like destroyers”: Kay, 46; Robin Neillands, Eighth Army, 293; Carver, 317; Butler, ed., “Human Interest,” 4–5 (eighteen hours to travel thirteen miles); Mark Zuehlke, The Liri Valley, 232 (“nose to arse”).

  If the Hitler Line lacked natural impediments: Erich Rothe, “Tactical Mission, Trace and Organization of the ‘Senger-Riegel,’” May 1947, FMS, #D-170, MHI, 3–6; Molony VI, 183; Mayo, 215; Short, 10, 18, 30–31, 50; John E. Krebs, To Rome and Beyond, 66 (“only trace of the crew”).

  “Head wounds are many”: Huebner, 77.

  Sergeants doled out rum rations: Cederberg, 121; Carver, 194 (“I couldn’t run a race”); Butler, ed., “Human Interest,” 3–5 (“melancholy sight”); Krebs, 77 (shot through the heart).

  On average a thousand German prisoners: memo, “Advances Made by Fifth Army Corps [sic],” n.d., MWC papers, Citadel, box 3; “Interrogation Reports,” May 1944, Combined Services Detailed Interrogation Center, NARA RG 407, E 47, AFHQ, 95-AL1-2.13, box 164 (“weird and wonderful collection”); Huebner, 76.

  As the second week of the Allied offensive: CtoA, 94–97; author visits, May 6, 2004, Nov. 29, 2006; Blaxland, 119 (eight hundred artillery shells); Calculated, 323 (bulldozers were needed); Matthews, “The French Drive on Rome,” 135 (“bleeding to death”); “Draft Report on FEC” Butler, “The French Expeditionary Corps,” 25–26.

  From west to east the Hitler Line: CtoA, 156; weekly intel summary, “No. 91, week ending 22 May 1944,” AFHQ G-2, NARA RG 407, E 427, 95-AL1-2.6 (“The enemy has denuded”).

  A Fifth Army Show

  Mark Clark shifted his command post: Calculated, 357; diary, MWC, May 22, 1944, Citadel, box 65; Sevareid, 393 (“Sit down, gentlemen”).

  For half an hour, unhurried and precise: Robert H. Adleman and George Walton, Rome Fell Today, 188; Alexander, “The Allied Armies in Italy,” III-16; Winston S. Churchill, Closing the Ring, 603; CM, 372.

  Under Operation BUFFALO: diary, MWC, May 22, 1944, Citadel, box 65; Sevareid, 394; Adleman and Walton, 188.

  As the correspondents shuffled: Sevareid, 394 (“in personal command”); msg, MWC to A. Gruenther, May 23, 1944, MWC papers, Citadel, box 63 (“no restriction”).

  If Clark had disclosed much: Calculated, 350–51.

  A face-to-face meeting at Caserta: msg, J. Harding to MWC, May 19, 1944, MWC papers, Cita
del, box 63; Calculated, 351–53; diary, MWC, May 20, 1944, Citadel, box 65.

  Clark suspected double-dealing: Texas, 370; diary, MWC, May 20 and 22, 1944, Citadel, box 65.

  “Hell, we shouldn’t even be thinking”: Adleman and Walton, 206–7; Calculated, 252–53 (“more than deserved”); msg, MWC to LKT Jr., May 21, 1944, 1705 hrs, LKT Jr. papers, GCM Lib, box 12, folder 11.

  “Regrouping would take place”: diary, MWC, May 18, 1944, Citadel, box 65; Adleman and Walton, 206–7 (“the great prize”).

  “I’m just a dog-face soldier”: Donald G. Taggart, ed., History of the Third Infantry Division in World War II, 149.

  Light rain had fallen: CM, 371; Joseph A. Springer, Black Devil Brigade, 211 (parachute cord); John Shirley, I Remember: Stories of a Combat Infantryman in World War II, 4 (after receiving no mail from home); Sevareid, 395–96 (“nothing ever new”).

  Clark had snatched a few hours’ rest: MWC to Renie, May 26, 1944, MWC pers corr, Citadel; msg, MWC to A. Gruenther, May 23, 1944, MWC papers, Citadel, box 63; aide’s diaries, May 23, 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 18, folder 3; OH, Robert T. Frederick, Jan. 7, 1949, SM, MHI; CM, 371; Calculated, 357; Adleman and Walton, 188 (Neither man said much).

  “They can hear this in Rome”: Sevareid, 395; diary, Robert M. Marsh, May 23, 1944, 81st Armored Reconnaissance Bn, 1st AD, MHI, ASEQ (like heat from a blacktop road); CtoA, 120.

  Then, at 6:30, the riflemen spilled: Frank M. Izenhour, “Breakout Anzio Beachhead,” ts, 1946, CARL, N-2253.10; George F. Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 318; CtoA, 128; Shirley, 9 (“I rolled him over”).

  Farther east, Company K: G-3 journal, 3rd ID, May 23, 1944, 0800 hrs, 1935 hrs, NARA RG 319, OCMH, CA, box 6 (“It is going too slow”); CtoA, 130, 133 (“We have no such words”).

  Just past noon, five more Sherman tanks: msg, MWC to GCM, May 17, 1944, NARA RG 165, OPD, WD, top secret general corr, 312.4-319.1, box 16; Mayo, 210; OH, John A. Heintges, 1974, Jack A. Pellicci, SOOHP, MHI, 241; Shirley, 2–7.