The Gothic Line

by Mark Zuehlke

  Among the RCR, it was felt that an opportunity to achieve a decisive tactical gain was thrown away. The Greeks were neither in a position to quickly take over the RCR’s line of advance nor inclined to vigorously engage the Germans. In the two weeks since coming into I Canadian Corps’s front lines, the brigade had taken 314 casualties.24 Like II Polish Corps, this brigade had no readily available source of reinforcements and such losses consequently reduced its combat effectiveness.

  As Gregg’s company tromped towards the northwest corner of Rimini airfield in order to swing left onto a road that would carry them to San Martino, it encountered a company of Greek soldiers huddled in the roadside ditch. Apparently startled by the appearance of about fifty men marching up the road straight at them from what was still reportedly German-controlled ground, the Greeks had taken cover. Gregg was unimpressed by the cautious pace of their advance.25

  Had the RCR been allowed to mount an all-out attack on Rimini with support by the 48th Highlanders of Canada, the ancient Roman

  * The decision that Rimini was to be “liberated” by the Greek brigade was made by Eighth Army and was intended to give this pro–Greek Monarchist unit a morale boost and also to generate support in Greece for the return of the monarchy after that nation’s liberation from German occupation. Already, Greece was a focal point for conflict between a Soviet-backed Communist movement and the American-British backed monarchists. The RCR thus fell afoul of political manoeuvring. In fact, the length to which the military went to maintain the illusion that Canadian troops were never inside Rimini was extensive. All records were purged from official histories, except for the RCR’s War Diary, which uses the codename ‘Fulmar’ for Rimini in its discussion of the orders given to Gregg’s company and to ‘D’ Company prior to the order for those units to withdraw. Ponte di Tiberio bridge spanning the Marecchia River could have been in 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade’s hands by nightfall. Instead, the RCR marched eastward to occupy San Martino, while the Highlanders moved into the bridgehead over the Ausa that had been won on September 18 by the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. Both were defensive moves intended to stabilize a front that was supposed to be ripped asunder that very night when 2 CIB and 3 CIB were to take San Fortunato Ridge.

  AFTER IT MARCHED out of San Martino on the morning of September 18, Lieutenant Colonel Jean Allard had expected the Royal 22e Regiment to receive at least five days rest. The Van Doos were in rough shape, physically exhausted and badly depleted by casualties. What was needed was some time for officers and men to rest, eat decent meals, and clean themselves up. Instead, at 0530 hours on September 19, Allard received orders from 3 CIB headquarers to move up behind the attacking West Novas. Although asleep when this order arrived, Allard was still fully dressed. When his batman woke him and put the order in his hand, Allard immediately jumped into his jeep and drove back to brigade for an extensive briefing.

  Lieutenant Colonel Pat Bogert, who had obviously delayed issuing Vokes’s orders of almost twelve hours earlier in order to give the men a scant rest, was far from encouraging. The West Nova attack had faltered and the Hasty P’s were in trouble. Then word came that the Van Doos were to carry out an assault. “That decision made me wonder,” Allard later wrote. “We of the R22ER all believed that we had earned a good rest. We were now required to return to the front within six hours, in a sector where two battalions had just been broken. Disobeying orders was out of the question, but I quickly decided that, for my men, the time of the attack would be delayed as much as possible.”26

  Allard proceeded to the start line, where he found the situation of the brigade’s other two regiments extremely confused. The West Novas seemed “in total disarray as a result of the complete failure of the attack it had attempted at dawn.” The approaches across the valley that the Van Doos were to cross “were completely bare, more like a pool table than tactical terrain.”27 Allard asked for a delay, but Vokes approved only a short one that would still necessitate a daylight advance. Allard pretended to accept this, but set about planning an attack at dusk.

  ‘A’ Squadron, 145th Royal Armoured Corps was assigned to support the Van Doos. Because he wanted a silent attack, Allard had no initial need for tanks. To ensure that a delay was necessary, Allard gave the 21st British Tank Brigade a false rendezvous point. At 1500 hours, he gathered his company officers together in a ditch one hundred yards behind the start line and briefed each man individually. ‘A’ and ‘C’ companies, under Major Henri Tellier and Major Fernand Trudeau respectively, would lead. Their target was a sumptuous estate on the western flank of San Fortunato Ridge, Villa Belvedere. Tellier’s job was to secure a firm base on the road running in front of the villa, after which Trudeau would hook right around ‘A’ Company’s position to seize the villa. ‘B’ Company would back ‘A’ Company up and Major Tony Poulin’s ‘D’ Company provided the reserve.28

  From the ditch, the company commanders enjoyed a good view of the ground to be crossed. The big villa was clearly visible on the skyline. “Do you see that house?” Tellier demanded of his platoon commanders. “That is our objective and this is the way we will go.” He then traced out the route on the map while at the same time indicating physical points of reference on the ground itself.29

  The planned artillery barrage started at 1550 hours, but Allard ordered no advance. Tellier and Trudeau had been told not to cross the start line until 1840 hours and just believed the artillery was softening the Germans up. Allard now reported to brigade that the tanks were late. When ‘A’ Squadron finally materialized at 1700 hours, Allard ordered the increasingly baffled tankers to conceal their Shermans and Churchills with camouflage nets in positions behind the cover of some buildings and await orders.30

  Tellier thought the tanks could prove useful in the role of direct artillery, so he went over and asked the squadron commander to fire on the objective from the moment his company crossed the start line until he fired a Very light. At that time, the tankers should shift their fire well over the crest. To his men, Tellier said, concentrate on “speed, speed. Get through his [defensive fire]. Get close to him. Run until you are exhausted.” Later he wrote: “The distance to be covered looked long and fearful.” Villa Belvedere was just under a mile away, over half of this ground being up the ridge’s steep slope.31

  Just before 1830 hours, Allard reported that his attack had been unexpectedly delayed by the tardy arrival of the tanks and he would require the artillery concentrations repeated so that the attack could begin at 1840. As the shells resumed falling, the light of day was fast fading.32

  Tellier’s men sprinted across the start line. “Probably we did stop every three or four hundred yards to draw breath and cast an eye over our troops,” he wrote, “but I remember only the running. The Germans spotted us as we started, but they could not be certain of our intentions, and we did make use of the dead ground, of which there was a fair amount beyond the flats as we began to climb. Whenever we passed a house, a couple of men were detached to chuck grenades into the window then to dash in one door, sweep the place with a Tommy gun if necessary and dash out another. . . . We went so fast that we kept ahead of the enemy [defensive fire], which chased us all the way up, but was always behind us. Only two men were wounded, and these were left behind, to be attended to later. I made no attempt at ‘fire and movement’ as such. Our fire was supplied by the tanks. All three platoons did the moving.”33

  As Tellier closed on the road, he could only see about twenty-five to thirty yards ahead. The men completed the last two-hundred-yard stretch “firing on the run and yelling like mad. It sounded as if a division were coming in.”34 Surprise was complete. Sentries had no time to sound the alarm before the Van Doos were in the defensive trenches rooting out dozing Germans or interrupting their meal. Eight men were captured in a trench, another sixteen in a small house. They were now past their original objective and closing on Villa Belvedere.

  The right-hand platoon rushed the mansion and killed seven
Germans manning a trench in front of it. “Then they put a bouquet of grenades into the house, at the same time yelling in Italian to anybody inside to come out and surrender. Apparently the inhabitants either understood Italian or the grenades, for out marched no fewer than forty-one armed enemy, including a captain.”35 Tellier set his tactical headquarters up in the villa and locked the Germans in the cellar.

  Not all the Germans were so easily killed or captured. One of Tellier’s privates, bayonet fixed on his rifle, rounded a tree and ran head on into a soldier coming out of a trench. Losing his rifle in the collision, the private kicked the German in the stomach. Unable to bring his Schmeisser to bear on the Van Doo, the German instead clubbed him on the head with the gun’s butt. The force of the blow knocked the weapon from the German’s hands, leaving both men with only their fists to fight with. As the two grappled, the private’s section commander closed up with his Thompson machine gun, pressed the barrel against the side of the German’s head, and blew it apart with a short burst.36

  On Tellier’s right, Trudeau’s company had advanced by bounds from one preset objective to another. Each of these was a road junction, easily located in the gathering gloom. After passing the last preliminary objective, the right forward platoon went for a group of houses to the right of the already secured villa, while the left platoon filtered into some trees two hundred yards to the left of the mansion and mopped this area up.

  Again the Germans had been surprised and the fighting was all at close quarters. More prisoners were taken at very little cost to the company.37 By 2010 hours, Villa Belvedere was secure and ‘B’ Company was arriving on the objective. ‘D’ Company set out from the start line at 2340 hours with the regiment’s antitank and medium-machine gun platoons in tow. This force arrived at 0210 hours on September 20.

  For the past couple of hours, the two lead companies had been mopping up groups of Germans milling around in the woods, orchards, and vineyards. Because of the extent of the surprise achieved, the Germans had been unable to pull their support weapons out. They destroyed a Mark V Panther and an 88-millimetre gun in place.38

  The Van Doos had achieved a stunning victory at very little cost. They also were the first Canadians to be firmly ensconced on San Fortunato Ridge. Most of the prisoners were identified as panzer grenadiers, with a few paratroopers mixed in. Allard warned the forward companies to expect a counterattack just before dawn or shortly thereafter.39

  NOT ONLY THE Van Doos enjoyed success during the night of September 19–20. The Loyal Edmonton Regiment moved off from the edge of the Ausa River at 2100 hours, with the scout platoon leading ‘D’ Company onto the ridge. The company was to follow a path through the saddle that bisected the eastern and western high points of San Fortunato Ridge. The ridge itself contained about two thousand acres of vineyards, fields, and orchards crisscrossed by roads, many of them sunken. While the southern and western slopes to the summit were steep, to the north and east they fell away gently to the level plains beyond. Although only about 160 feet high, the last significant point of high ground on the north slope was topped by the hamlet of San Lorenzo in Monte l’Abate—the Edmontons’ final objective. From the base of the south slope of San Fortunato Ridge to San Lorenzo was about 2,500 yards. The village itself was inconsequential, just a few little houses. But there was a large stone high-steepled church that dominated the northern slope of the ridge, which would serve as a defensible bastion and observation point.

  ‘D’ Company was to cover most of the intervening distance before stopping at a road junction, codenamed Bovey, and forming a firm base through which ‘B’ Company would pass and continue on to seize the hamlet, codenamed Moire. ‘A’ and ‘C’ companies would then come up and dig in on either flank of ‘B’ Company.40

  Things started badly, as ‘D’ Company was shelled while forming up and had seven men wounded. Under command of Major F.H. McDougall, the company nonetheless got off on time. Travelling with it was a section of engineers whose services were soon required to clear strings of box mines that barred the company’s path. By 2220 hours, these obstacles had been cleared and the company was moving again. The Germans seemed unaware of their presence. When ‘D’ Company came up on the ridge, it passed the scout platoon. Because the rifle companies would be moving over the horizon, it was expected that radio contact between the regimental headquarters and the company would be lost. The scouts were carrying a No. 18 set and were to set up a relay station on the ridgeline to maintain communications.41

  Like many plans, this one failed immediately after ‘D’ Company passed the scouts and disappeared into the darkness. The scouts could raise neither the company nor headquarters on their radio. Lieutenant Colonel Budge Bell-Irving and his staff were left to fret and anxiously wait for any kind of news.

  Meanwhile, ‘D’ Company moved carefully through the confusing terrain, trying to stay on course by use of compasses. Shortly after the company crossed the road running between San Fortunato and Villa Belvedere, its platoons became separated. The radios all failed and runners sent by each platoon to find the others ended up wandering lost. After finally linking up with each other, two platoons strayed into a German position. A sharp firefight left Lieutenant H.F. “Fritz” Hanson dead and Lieutenant J.S. Wood wounded. After breaking contact with the enemy, Lieutenant L.E. Taplin managed to get his radio working and relayed the news of the fight to Bell-Irving. He also said that Major McDougall was believed with the third platoon and “lost to them.”42

  Taplin was instructed to assume command of the two platoons, reorganize, and clear San Fortunato village instead of pressing on to the objective—it being thought that the company was now too weak to succeed in its original task. ‘B’ Company, by this time, had also passed over the ridgeline and vanished from the radio net. Its location was unknown.43 At 0210 hours, however, radio contact was reestablished and ‘B’ Company reported reaching Bovey and finding McDougall there with fifteen men.44

  Heartened by this news, Bell-Irving reversed his earlier order to Taplin and urged him instead to press on to Bovey and reunite with ‘D’ Company. Captain John Dougan, whose ‘C’ Company had arrived on the ridgeline and engaged in a futile search for the scout platoon, was directed to jump through the two forward companies and secure San Lorenzo. ‘B’ Company and what was left of ‘D’ Company would dig in and establish a strongpoint on Bovey. ‘A’ Company, so badly beaten up during the previous failed San Martino operation that it fielded barely two platoons, remained at headquarters.45

  Like the R22ER’s Major Henri Tellier, Dougan believed speed would prove the key to success. This was no time for cautiously probing through the dark. If ‘C’ Company did that, the Germans would have time to throw an AD hoc defensive line between Bovey and San Lorenzo. With barely sixty men, Dougan knew he lacked the strength to fight through any determined defensive force.

  Once again the searchlights were blazing to the west, this time reflected back to earth by bouncing the beam off a covering of cloud that had crept in early that evening. The resulting soft glow improved visibility enough for the men to move more quickly than would normally be possible.

  No amount of artificial moonlight, however, could rationalize the reality of the ridge’s terrain with what his map depicted. Finally, Dougan halted his men next to a little farmhouse and stepped inside to consult the map with a carefully hooded flashlight. The map and terrain remained at odds. There was supposed to be a road running to Bovey and from there to San Lorenzo. It was probably out there somewhere, but not near Dougan’s position.

  Blundering around in the dark with sixty men was asking for trouble, so, leaving the company at the house, he and his batman set off to reconnoitre the area. They soon stumbled upon a sunken road that the compass showed ran north to south. The two men walked carefully up it, listening for sounds. All Dougan heard was the soft muttering of voices coming from caves pocking the twenty-foot-high banks on either side of the track. Everyone in the caves seemed to be speaking I
talian. Dougan thought they were civilians hiding in the scant shelter of holes dug to escape the heavy Allied bombardments. But he also knew that this kind of road was ideal for use by the Germans as a shelter or defensive position. The sound of gunfire up ahead told him that the other two companies were probably fighting to hold Bovey. He needed to get there quickly.

  Time and again, Dougan had noted that the Germans were such creatures of doctrine they seldom could respond to any action that was unexpected or appeared illogical in terms of tactics. At Ortona, Dougan had led the first Edmonton platoon into the town’s outskirts by charging up a ditch bordered on either side by open ground swept by machine guns. If the Germans had positioned a single machine gun at their end of the ditch, the platoon would have been slaughtered. But the paratroopers defending Ortona had never expected anyone to be crazy enough to use the ditch for an approach. Dougan had got into the town without losing a man and won the fight for control of the outskirts.

  “Do the unexpected,” he thought. “And do it quickly.” Rushing back to the farmhouse, the captain told his men: “We’re going to move very quietly. Don’t speak. Don’t shoot at anything and we may have a chance to get through. If we’re successful, we’ll all be heroes. If not, we’ll all be dead.”46

  The company moved quickly up the sunken road without encountering any Germans, just a few Italians who poked heads warily out of their caves and then ducked back inside at the sight of the passing Canadians. ‘C’ Company emerged from the sunken road at an intersection with a road that led down to Bovey. As the infantry came astride the intersection, a Tiger tank clanked down the opposite slope and headed towards Bovey. Dougan’s PIAT man tried to bring the weapon to bear, but the tank rolled out of range.