Ortona

by Mark Zuehlke

  While he was communicating his plight to ‘C’ Company, the Mark IV rumbled back behind the house, remaining oblivious to the presence of Richard’s three-man tank-killer team. The German infantry who had fired on No. 13 Platoon were more observant. Small-arms fire crackled around the three men. Snipers positioned in the upper storey of the house and across the highway added to the flurry of bullets. A slug caught Richard in the right collarbone. As his two comrades dragged him back to better cover, a soldier from No. 14 Platoon crawled into No. 13 Platoon’s position with a new PIAT gun.

  No. 13 Platoon Sergeant J.P. Rousseau grabbed the weapon and started following the same path Richard and the team had taken. The intense small-arms fire quickly drove him to ground. The tank rolled back and forth on the far side of the house, as if seeking the infantry’s target. Rousseau lay still for fifteen long, terrifying minutes, waiting for a lull. Realizing Rousseau’s plight, Triquet ordered No. 14 and No. 15 platoons to rush forward by sections. They set off in short, sharp bounds right into the teeth of the enemy fire. Triquet meant to create the illusion that the main force was intent on storming the house and tank in a frontal assault. Men from both platoons were killed and wounded in the deception, but it distracted attention from Rousseau. The sergeant jumped up and ran across open ground, the thirty-two-pound weapon cradled in his arms. When he was fifty yards away, the tankers suddenly saw him. They started turning the turret by its hand-driven cranking mechanism, trying to bring him under fire with the 75-millimetre main gun. Rousseau closed another fifteen yards on the tank, knelt on one knee to help steady the heavy PIAT, and fired a bomb. The bomb, read Rousseau’s later citation for the Military Medal, struck “squarely between turret and traverse casing and the blast must have penetrated to the 75-mm ammunition stocked within the turret, for the Mark IV literally blew apart.” The tank was torn into thirty pieces and the crew vaporized.7

  The time was 0750, and the battle was only forty minutes old. By now Smith’s tanks were approaching the lateral highway. One was knocked out by a Panzer Mark III, which the Ontario tankers destroyed in turn. Triquet’s platoons married up and the company pressed on toward the highway, fighting through a network of well-dug-in German positions. Around them a tank battle erupted. Smith’s squadron engaged several more Mark IVs and a 75-millimetre PAK antitank gun. Rousseau tried to help with his PIAT but the weapon jammed. This was an all-too-common occurrence, leading most infantrymen to hate the PIAT.8 Smith’s tanks, however, needed no help. They quickly knocked out two of the tanks and destroyed the antitank gun. The rest of the German armour retreated. Their own marksmanship had been deplorable. Had their fire been as accurate as that of Smith’s squadron, the Ontario tankers would have been stopped in their tracks because the Germans were firing from protected positions, while the Canadian tanks were out in the open.9

  The Germans, now identified by the Canadians as members of 1st Parachute Division, followed their tanks’ lead and withdrew to the road. It appeared they were setting up for a last stand there.

  While ‘C’ Company and Smith’s tanks pressed on, ‘D’ Company became lost in the confusing terrain. They wandered for a while, getting caught in small firefights, until finally the company blundered into the West Nova Scotia Regiment’s lines on the south side of The Gully looking across to Casa Berardi. By the time the company realized its position, Triquet’s company was far forward, engaged, as he later wrote, in “one long Calvary.” Every foot forward was won in blood.10

  As the Canadians closed on the road, a young woman gripping a small child in each hand popped out of the ground in the kill zone between them and the Germans. She ran toward the Canadian line, dragging the children with her. Every soldier suddenly held his fire until the trio passed through the Van Doos and scampered into cover behind their position. As if by pre-arranged signal, Germans and Canadians simultaneously went back to trying to kill each other.11

  Triquet’s men at last threw the Germans back and gained the Ortona-Orsogna lateral road. Fifteen men had fallen, including two platoon commanders. Lieutenant Marcel Richard, who had been shot in the collarbone, walked back to the Van Doos main lines on his own. He entered Allard’s command post. Richard was as white as a ghost, and blood dribbled through the dressing over the bullet wound. Drawing himself stiffly to attention, Richard saluted with his left hand. Because of the wound, he was unable to lift his right. The young man asked in a steady voice for permission to be evacuated. Allard hurried to get the officer’s dressing changed and had him taken to the aid post by jeep.

  Allard soon went forward to personally assess the battle. On the track running across The Gully, he saw a thin line of khaki-clothed bodies stretching to the Ortona-Orsogna lateral. Triquet’s dead served as route markers for tracking the line of attack.12

  At 0830, ‘C’ Company and Smith’s tanks began a long, bloody advance toward the tall manor house of Casa Berardi. It stood 2,000 yards away. The small force fought its way through country devastated by more than a week of air and artillery bombardment. It was “a wasteland of trees with split limbs, burnt out vehicles, dead animals, and cracked shells of houses. Every tree and house was defended by machine-guns and tanks with the support of self-propelled guns; the stronger positions were attacked by Shermans while the infantry cleaned out what remained; two more Mark IV Specials were knocked out.”13

  The dwindling French-Canadian force was protected on either flank by a wall of explosives and shrapnel called down by the FOO, Captain Bob Donald. Smith’s tanks were consequently freed to concentrate fire to the front. This was critical to breaking German resistance. Triquet’s casualties continued to mount. His last platoon commander was wounded. He had to evacuate him with one soldier, who was also escorting two German prisoners. Before noon, Triquet reorganized his remaining thirty men into two platoons led by sergeants. They were still well short of Casa Berardi and now surrounded on all sides by a determined enemy. “The safest place for us is the objective,” he told the men.14

  Buttoned up inside his tank, Smith could not always see critical targets through the viewing slit. To get his attention, Triquet would jump up on the Sherman and drop gravel through the open turret hatch onto Smith’s head. When the man poked his head out of the hatch, Triquet pointed out the target he wanted destroyed. Smith obliged with pleasure. When his men hesitated in the face of particularly stiff resistance, Triquet yelled, “They can’t shoot. Never mind them! Come on!”15 His men followed.

  Triquet’s headquarters group was cut to pieces. Only his orderly remained. The radio was smashed. He had to rely on Smith’s tank radio to pass reports back to the battalion. Meanwhile the FOO, Donald, and his signaller, who was bent double under the weight of the heavy #18 radio strapped to his back, scrambled through the sparse roadside vegetation. Moving constantly, Donald continued to keep the shrinking force ringed by artillery fire. The “artillery,” wrote Van Doos Lance Corporal E. Bluteau after the battle, “hammers without stop the German positions and I can say that the enemy doesn’t like it, and that, if we get out of this impasse, the artillery will have a large share of the credit.”16

  Two hundred yards short of Casa Berardi, ‘C’ Company “was caught in a severe barrage” of fire from around the manor house. Only twenty-one Van Doos and five tanks were left. Ammunition was short, with no possibility of resupply. The enemy were engaging with tanks, numerous machine guns, and snipers. A Mark IV charged down the road. Smith blinded it with a smoke shell, while another Sherman fired down the roadway, using the road verge as a guiding line for its fire toward the target. When the tank’s third shell struck the German tank, it burst into flames. At a range of 600 yards, a Mark IV Special was destroyed in an olive grove.17 On the Canadian side, Lieutenant S.C. Campbell was fatally wounded when a mortar shell struck his tank turret, Lieutenant D. MacGregor received a scalp wound from a sniper’s bullet that pierced his steel helmet. Another tank was immobilized when a track was shot out. The crew were out of ammunition and unable to escape. Th
ey would hide in the tank for the next three days because there were so many Germans around it was impossible to escape. Only two tank officers were still in action, Major Smith and Lieutenant Harrod. Four tanks remained.18

  At about 1430 hours, the Canadians captured the manor house. Then they pushed on through a small scattering of buildings nearby, trying to reach the final objective of Cider Crossroads little more than 1,000 yards farther on. Although they came close, Triquet realized he could never hold the exposed ground. He wisely retreated to the manor house. With the tall, shell- and bullet-pocked structure forming the centre, the men established a circular perimeter that had the infantry on the outside and one tank pointing each direction. There were only fourteen Van Doos. Between them they had five Bren guns, five Thompson submachine guns, and a rapidly dwindling supply of ammunition. They were desperately thirsty. There was no water. The manor house’s well was outside the perimeter and covered by snipers. Two men had died trying to refill their canteens there.19 Drawing on his knowledge of French generalship, Triquet told his men, “Ils ne passeront pas.” World War I General Henri Philippe Pétain had uttered this battle cry at Verdun, where the French army had made a determined, bloody stand credited with saving France from German conquest.

  At dusk, Triquet, Donald, and Smith gathered near Smith’s tank to discuss defensive plans. Triquet’s orderly had just walked up with a tin of food and urged his commander to please eat something, when a shell came apparently out of nowhere and exploded nearby. Donald was cut almost in two. He died instantly.20 The orderly, his stomach ripped open, also fell. He cried out, “I’m hit, Captain,” and died seconds later.21 Neither Smith nor Triquet was touched. The RCHA had just lost its fourth FOO in four days. Another FOO would be captured, killed, or wounded each day for three more days — the heaviest rate of FOO casualties the regiment suffered in the war.

  As midnight approached, Triquet heard noise coming from The Gully. He yelled the password and demanded that whoever was coming out of the depths halt and give the countersign. “Don’t worry, Paul,” a voice called out. Triquet recognized it as Captain Oliva Garceau’s. ‘D’ Company had managed to creep through the enemy lines from its position inside the West Nova Scotia Regiment’s perimeter to reinforce Triquet.22 Soon after, Captain Andre Arnoldi brought ‘B’ company along the highway by the same route Triquet and Smith had taken. Lieutenant Colonel Bernatchez moved up with the last company and his headquarters a short time later. The Van Doos dug in, creating a defensive island around Casa Berardi. The old building’s cellar and stables had ceilings supported by massive gothic-style gables. Its upper storeys were also stoutly constructed, so that it was relatively immune to the effects of artillery or other German fire. Bernatchez made the stables and cellars the battalion’s aid posts.

  Shortly before Triquet’s company was reinforced, a single Mark IV tank had roared out of the west, barrelled past the manor house before anybody could react, and disappeared into the gathering darkness heading hell-bent for leather toward Ortona. It was the last German vehicle to travel unmolested along the Ortona-Orsogna lateral road. After six days of fighting, The Gully was turned and the lateral highway closed.23

  The Germans recognized the import of failing to prevent Casa Berardi’s capture. Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring grumbled to Tenth Army commander General der Panzertruppen Joachim Lemelsen, “For two months now I have not been able to exercise proper command because everything evaporates between my fingers and runs down like water from the mountains.” Lemelsen responded, “This whole thing must be blamed on the complete failure of 90th Panzer Grenadier Division.” Kesselring agreed. “It is that outfit’s own fault,” he said. Drawing hope from the arrival of 1st Parachute Division’s General Richard Heidrich, Lemelsen said, “Wherever Heidrich is, everything goes all right. . . . The enemy advancing along the coast was flatly thrown back by Heidrich; others let themselves be simply overrun.”24

  The decision was made to relieve Generalleutnant Karl Hans Lungershausen as commander of the 90th Panzer Grenadiers, and replace him with the colourful cavalry officer Generalleutnant Ernst-Günther Baade. Independently wealthy, Baade was a brilliant if eccentric soldier. In the interwar years, he had been a renowned international horse rider. Rather than wear a proper military uniform, Baade preferred a Scottish khaki kilt, lacking a sporran, worn over his riding breeches. Suspended in a holster slung around his neck, he always carried a large pistol. Baade had overseen the masterful withdrawal of German troops from Sicily across the Strait of Messina. He was a commander who fought from a forward command post, where he would not be irritated by staff officers and clerks. Lemelsen’s slight hope was that together, Baade and Heidrich could rescue the desperate situation around Ortona.

  Tenth Army chief of staff Generalmajor Fritz Wentzell said in another phone conversation, “Intention of the Canadians will be to take Ortona. They could not get through on the coast and now they are trying further along the main road to Orsogna. When they have crossed it they will wheel around and press on towards Ortona. The Korps is trying to prevent this with the last available forces. New decisions cannot be made in this situation, one must try to throw in everything to prevent the Canadians from succeeding.”25

  In the 76th Panzer Korps’ war diary, the December 14 notation read gloomily: “Enemy will bring up further forces and tanks and, in the exploitation of today’s success, presumably will take Ortona.”26

  17

  A NEW PLAN IS NEEDED

  THE Royal 22e Regiment’s capture of Casa Berardi was the only noteworthy progress made by 1st Canadian Infantry Division on December 14. The Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment, which had put two companies across The Gully on December 13, was unable to retain its grip in the face of a determined counterattack by the 1st Parachute Division. In the evening, the Hasty P’s withdrew to the southern lip of The Gully and dug in.1

  The Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry sent one company to clear a house on the right flank being used by the Germans as an observation post. ‘A’ Company, commanded by Captain J.B. Hunt — an officer cross-posted from the Royal Canadian Regiment to the PPCLI when he returned to the division from a bout of jaundice and there was no spot in the RCR for him — was to receive covering fire from the mortar company. This fire, however, fell on the company instead of on the enemy. Despite heavy casualties, the attacking force pushed ahead until Hunt was killed when a bullet hit him between the eyes. Facing heavy fire from an estimated four machine guns positioned around the house, the surviving elements of the company withdrew.2

  The Carleton and York Regiment spent the day on the defensive, finally throwing back another of the 90th Panzer Grenadiers’ suicidal counterattacks in the late afternoon. As for the West Nova Scotia Regiment, it was too broken by casualties to do more than hold in place. The Gully remained a formidable barrier to any advance on Ortona. It was obvious that victory could be achieved only by capitalizing on the Van Doos’ success at Casa Berardi.

  Surprisingly, Major General Chris Vokes and his staff were less than jubilant over the Van Doos’ achievement. Although Vokes quickly cited Captain Paul Triquet for the first Victoria Cross awarded to a Canadian in Italy and Major Herschell Smith for a Military Cross, he was hard-pressed to follow up the attack’s success. Once again, Vokes had allowed himself to be caught with no available reinforcements to push through Casa Berardi in a race for Ortona. Only two of his nine regiments were unengaged. These were 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade’s 48th Highlanders of Canada and the Royal Canadian Regiment. The RCR was still licking the wounds that had left the regiment in tatters after the battle to breach the Moro River line. The 48th Highlanders were in good shape, but were blocking the track that passed through La Torre to San Leonardo, far out on the division’s left flank.

  Vokes stared at his situation map, seeking a solution that would break the enemy line at The Gully once and for all. His decision-making was probably little enhanced by the arrival at his headquarters of General
Montgomery and his entourage. Montgomery had come to receive a personal report from Vokes on the delay. When Montgomery left, Vokes decided he had to act. Trouble was that all he had immediately available was another squadron of Ontario Tanks. But maybe that would suffice. Vokes decided that a strong tank force inserted at Casa Berardi could dominate The Gully positions, enabling continued frontal attacks to shatter the German line at The Gully once and for all.3

  Instead of shifting any of the regiments already engaged against the front of The Gully, then, Vokes opted to continue with piecemeal frontal assaults. The only difference this time was that the Van Doos and the tanks could bring pressure against the German right flank and slowly push it in to Cider Crossroads and perhaps beyond. Even if the Van Doos proved unable to advance against the Germans, the tanks might be able to direct fire down much of the length of the enemy positions dug in to the reverse slope of The Gully. The safe haven the Germans had enjoyed would no longer be secure from the devastating effect of 75-millimetre gunfire.

  The task of carrying out the frontal assault was handed to the Carleton and York Regiment, which, of all the battalions facing The Gully, had so far suffered the lightest casualties. It was also one of the regiments closest to Casa Berardi. Vokes ordered the attack made at 0730 hours on December 15, following the usual pre-attack artillery barrage.4 Ever workmanlike in his approach, Vokes perhaps failed to appreciate that mounting attacks in precisely the same manner and at the same time for several days running stripped away any chance of catching the Germans by surprise. The artillery bombardment would tell the paratroopers and Panzer Grenadiers precisely where to look for the attackers. Vokes still seemed not to appreciate that the weight of the artillery was largely nullified by both the mud, which soaked up much of the explosive force of the shells, and the safe haven The Gully’s reverse slope provided. When the artillery lifted, the Germans would be there and waiting for the Carleton and York companies.