by Mark Zuehlke
Not all the soldiers were engaged in looting, of course. Many respected Italian property, taking only what was considered fair game for soldiers at war — food, liquor, and clothing. And meanwhile, the Edmonton pioneers set to work digging through the rubble of the building in which Lieutenant E.D. Allan’s platoon had been buried, hoping that some of the nineteen men lost might still be alive. On December 30, Corporal J.H. Johnman and Private R.J. Williams heard sounds coming from the rubble. A frantic recovery mission ensued, and in minutes Lance Corporal Roy Boyd of Wembley, Alberta, was rescued from the ruins. He was the only one of the nineteen men to be dug out alive.5
During the days following the fall of Ortona, Seaforth and Edmonton officers made a token effort to extend and consolidate the hold the two battalions had on the town. Patrols were sent out to investigate all areas that had formerly been in German hands. In the rail tunnels, a patrol found a nicely decorated Christmas tree bearing a handwritten sign that read: “Sorry we can’t stay to put mistletoe on, but we’ll make it hot for you in the hills.”6
It was still fairly hot in Ortona. Since December 28, the Germans had hammered the town repeatedly with artillery and mortars.7
Throughout the last days of 1943, about three daily bombardments were usually directed against Ortona. The concentrations of artillery caused little damage to the already mangled town. The enemy shells also did nothing to deter the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry from moving through Ortona and advancing up the Coast Highway toward the Riccio River and Torre Mucchia, an ancient, tall tower standing atop a seaside promontory. On December 28, the battalion passed through Ortona and reached its objective about halfway between the town and Torre Mucchia without firing a shot.
Although the battle for Ortona was over, some Canadians were still fighting. Major General Chris Vokes, commander of 1st Canadian Infantry Division, was not in a position to halt all offensive action now that Ortona had fallen. The country to the immediate south of the Riccio River was still contested. If the Germans were to be forced north of the Arielli River, the paratroopers must first be pushed back over the Riccio. To the west, the hamlets of San Tomasso and San Nicola remained important objectives, as did the crossroads to the north of these hamlets that joined the road from the coast to Tollo. On the coast, Torre Mucchia was essential to Canadian control of the countryside south of the Arielli River. The tower was not the necessary objective, although its commanding heights might serve well as a forward observation post. What mattered more was the actual headland upon which the tower stood. A triangular promontory protected on two sides by steep seaward cliffs, the relatively flat, bare summit provided a position that controlled the Coast Highway. Once the Canadians were in possession of the summit, they would be able to bring effective artillery fire against any targets using the highway south of the Arielli. On both German and Canadian military maps, the promontory was designated Point 59. Its capture became the final primary objective of 1st Canadian Infantry Division for December.
Frustrating Vokes’s ability to fulfill this task was the same problem that had plagued him for most of the December fighting. He had too few strong battalions to easily achieve the mission. There was no question of any battalion from 2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade participating, other than the already engaged PPCLI. The Seaforths and Edmontons were no longer effective. On the western flank, 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade was nearly worn out. He believed the 48th Highlanders of Canada had it in them still to capture San Tomasso and San Nicola, but the other two battalions were only capable of supporting this effort. That left 3rd Canadian Infantry Brigade. The West Nova Scotia Regiment was still too weakened to be of immediate use. At best, Vokes thought the West Novas would be able to advance from Point 59 across the Riccio and reach the Arielli River. The Royal 22e Regiment was also very weak, but Vokes thought it strong enough to advance along the right flank of the Highlanders to seize the crossroads of the Tollo road. The Carleton and York Regiment was his last resource. So, once again, he was forced to ask one battalion to do the work with virtually no support from any other infantry unit. The PPCLI could take off some of the pressure by driving up the coast highway, but it was unlikely to get all the way to Torre Mucchia in time to significantly reinforce the Carleton and York companies.
Vokes faced another problem. The attacks had to happen immediately. Although the weather had improved for a few days, that trend was now reversing itself. Long-range forecasts predicted that by early January repeated storms bringing heavy rain and even snow would force movement on the Adriatic coast to grind to a halt. If Point 59 were not taken in the next few days, the chances of tanks supporting any infantry attack would be remote. The result could be that the 1st Canadian Infantry Division might spend the rest of the winter locked into a salient jutting into the German line. Such a position would be costly to defend. What was needed was a solid line dug in behind a river. The Canadians needed to own all the ground south of the Riccio, in the same way that the Germans were known to be planning to dig in north of the Arielli. Such positions provided a secure bastion behind which a division could rest, rebuild, and prepare for renewed fighting in the spring.
There was no way Vokes could afford to have 1st Canadian Infantry Division engaged in continued, long-term combat in more than the most limited manner. The division’s fighting edge was gone. Its casualties had been so high that none of the battalions were truly combat effective. “Without a pause for reorganization,” Vokes wrote, “. . . the offensive power of an infantry division is bound to become spent, not for lack of offensive spirit, but simply because the quality of the offensive team play within the rifle companies had deteriorated.”8
This need for reorganization was not just limited to the infantry. Tankers, artillery gunners, medical personnel, and supply service units had all been badly cut up in the month-long battle. The many separate cogs that kept the division functioning were worn down and depleted, including the equipment. Most of the gun barrels on the twenty-five pounders of the Canadian artillery required immediate replacement. The gunners were themselves ragged with exhaustion.9
First Canadian Armoured Brigade was greatly reduced in effectiveness. While actual numbers of tanks destroyed and crew casualties were far less than those suffered by the infantry, the brigade’s three regiments had taken their heaviest combined losses to date in the Mediterranean theatre. More significantly, the battle weariness that affected the infantry also rested heavily upon the tankers.
On the evening of December 28, Joe Turnbull prowled the Ortona battlefield in search of his brother Gord. He had been told by other Three Rivers tankers that Gord had come through the battle unscathed. But Joe knew, too, that his brother might still be unaware that he had survived the destruction of Amazing and his subsequent escape into the German-held buildings of the Piazza Plebiscita.
He found Gord sitting in a shell hole, staring off into space, softly singing “Happy Birthday” to himself. Joe went down into the crater and joined him. Gord stopped singing. The two brothers sat together in silent companionship.
On the morning of December 29, the 48th Highlanders of Canada swept across the Riccio River and took San Nicola without meeting significant resistance. The battalion’s lead companies then wheeled to the right and advanced up the road toward San Tomasso. Resistance was expected to be heavier at this hamlet, so an artillery barrage was scheduled to precede the Canadian advance. ‘A’ Company moved off astride the road with ‘C’ Company guarding the left flank. The right flank was protected by a ravine. ‘A’ Company’s No. 9 Platoon, which was in the lead, had been reinforced earlier to a strength of thirty-three. Its commander was Lieutenant Jack Pickering.
The artillery fire plan called for a barrage by two British field regiments against an area suspected of holding the main concentrations of German resistance. The blanket barrage screamed down as the Highlanders moved up the road toward the hamlet. Forty-eight guns fired short. The number of rounds that crashed down over the next few min
utes were in the hundreds.
Pickering’s platoon was caught squarely inside the maelstrom. Men were thrown every which way, like rag dolls. Some, bleeding from shrapnel wounds and dazed by concussion, staggered to their feet only to be ripped repeatedly by the shrapnel of more exploding shells.
In the midst of the carnage, Pickering screamed, “To the road! To the road!” The road was bordered by a small ditch. If the men could reach it, they would have some scant protection from the incoming shells. Two platoon section leaders, Corporal George Tomasik and Corporal Carl Harley, were killed trying to get the men headed toward the ditch. Pickering stood in the open, directing the remnants of his platoon to safety, while another corporal desperately dragged at his arm in an attempt to force the officer to take cover. Finally Pickering relented and the two men ran to the ditch. Pickering made it safely, but the corporal was severely wounded.
The moment the shells started to fall, ‘A’ Company commander Captain Hamish Macintosh realized the artillery was coming from friendly fire. The forward observation officer for the British guns was up front with Pickering’s platoon. Macintosh waded into the middle of the strike zone. He screamed at the FOO to call off the guns. The man yelled back, “German shells! German shells!” Macintosh brushed the shocked officer aside, grabbed the radio handset, and ordered the fire plan stopped immediately.
As the smoke hung heavy over the road, No. 9 Platoon’s nine unscathed survivors slowly rose from the ditch. Twenty-four men lay on the ground, but amazingly only three were dead. The cries and moans of the wounded were pitiful to hear. All the uninjured survivors in the platoon were seasoned veterans. Every reinforcement was a casualty. Caught in an unexpected circumstance, their battle-field inexperience had taken its tragic toll.10
Despite its casualties, ‘A’ Company quickly renewed the attack on San Tomasso. Lieutenant Pickering and his eight men joined the assault. Captain Macintosh, sickened by the tragedy that had struck the platoon, issued curt instructions to the officers before they set off. “Shoot anything you see,” he said. The Highlanders went into the hamlet and did precisely that, sweeping the Germans out in fierce house-to-house fighting. Three more of the survivors of No. 9 Platoon died, including the sergeant, Bill Taylor. By nightfall, the Highlanders held both hamlets but were subjected to German artillery, mortar, and long-range machine-gun fire.11
On the Highlanders’ right flank, the Royal 22e Regiment attack on December 29 soon stalled in the face of heavy machine-gunning by Germans dug in on the opposite bank of the Riccio River. Two assaults were put in and both were repulsed. Faced by such heavy resistance, the attack stalled. Lieutenant Colonel Jean Allard, now commanding the Van Doos, ordered a halt until he could lay on an artillery fire plan for the morning.12
To the right of the Van Doos, the Carleton and York Regiment had begun a drive toward Point 59. Companies ‘A’ and ‘D’ led. The two companies were within 600 yards of the promontory when they were struck by withering artillery and mortar fire. The men pressed on through the shrapnel flaying the air, but soon came under intense small-arms and heavy-machine-gun fire. Major Winston Johnson was killed and Major Glen Foster and seven infantrymen wounded.13 At
the morning 3 CIB Orders Group, Carleton and York commander Lieutenant Colonel John Pangman had been told that intelligence staff expected the German defence of Point 59 to be relatively halfhearted. The paratroopers were believed to have insufficient strength in the battalions based on the Adriatic coast to mount serious resistance. This intelligence was wrong.14 The paratroopers the battalion faced were members of the fresh 1st Battalion of the 1st Regiment, which had been shifted the previous night from a quiet point in the line near Orsogna. They were heavily entrenched and obviously determined to prevent the fall of Point 59 for as long as possible. The attack ground to a halt. Resistance was so intense that 3 CIB commander Brigadier Graeme Gibson ordered the Carleton and York Regiment to close into a defensive position and await the morning.
During the night, the paratroopers blew up the coastal highway bridge crossing the mouth of the Riccio just west of Torre Mucchia.15 Although the paratroopers seemed determined to defend the headland, it was apparent that they also recognized the inevitable outcome of the battle. They would delay, but Torre Mucchia would eventually fall to the Allies. The only question was how many soldiers on both sides must die in the transaction.
About two miles southwest of the crossroads leading to Tollo from the coast, Americo Casanova and some of the men who had been hiding in the cave behind the stone house had decided the fighting around the area was light enough for them to risk an outside fire. They had a little mutton and were roasting it over the small flame. A pot leaning against the fire contained a thin, watery soup. Americo was almost drooling with anticipation, his eternally empty stomach growling up a storm.
Everyone was so focused on the fire and the food that they only realized they were not alone when one of the men looked up and saw what they thought were British soldiers surrounding them, rifles aimed their way. Then one of the Tommies spoke, and to the surprise of the Italians told them in rough French to get back in the cave. The men and Americo quickly gathered up the scraps of half-cooked mutton and the pot of simmering broth, kicked mud over the fire, and fled into the dark shelter of the cave.
The French-speaking British soldiers moved off. Americo could hear them continuing to talk French back and forth as they departed. He looked at his uncle, who shrugged, as if to say “Who can make sense of this war?”
Several days later, Americo and the other civilians would leave the cave for good and return to Ortona. He would find his family’s apartment building destroyed, his mother and siblings gone. Caught as they were on opposite sides of the front, the fate of his family remained a mystery. Not until June 4, 1944, would he be reunited with them.16
Antonio D’Intino’s family owned one of the poor houses in the fishermen’s quarters on the northeastern flank of Ortona, as well as the farm across the ravine west of the town. On December 29, D’Intino left his ailing father and ventured into the town to check on the property. He made his way down Corso Vittorio Emanuele and Corso Matteotti, climbing over the massive rubble piles and passing the shattered Cattedrale San Tomasso. Ortona seemed like an alien landscape to him. It took him several minutes to realize that the family’s house had been shelled and was nothing more than a ruin. He picked through the wreckage, but could find nothing of value.
As D’Intino searched the ruins, a young Canadian approached. He asked in perfect Italian if D’Intino might know a family that had lived in Ortona. D’Intino recognized the name. They were neighbours who lived just down the street. D’Intino said, “I’ll show you.” He led the soldier down the street to a badly battered structure and banged on the door. After a few minutes, the door opened a crack and an elderly man looked out warily. “Grandpapa,” the young man said and embraced his grandfather, whom he had never met. As the two men were joined by the old man’s frail wife, D’Intino walked quietly away, leaving the family to its reunion.17
Antonio Di Cesare’s family also returned to Ortona a few days after the fighting ceased. His parents had taken precautions against looting by stashing all the family valuables in the ceiling of the house. They had not counted on the house itself being reduced to a burned-out shell. Nothing of value remained. Like many other civilians, they found a place in one of the battered buildings that was semi-habitable and unclaimed by its previous owners. Antonio helped the Canadian tankers clean the cakes of mud off the tracks each day in exchange for food. In this manner, he was able to help his family survive the long winter.18
On the morning of December 30, the Tollo Road crossroads fell to the Royal 22e Regiment. As the paratroopers yielded the ground without offering any real fight, the Van Doos took the position without losing a single man. It was a mixed blessing, however, as the moment the Canadians occupied the new position they were hammered by intensely accurate artillery. An officer and sixteen infantrymen were
wounded.19
Meanwhile, the Carleton and York Regiment continued toward Point 59 with ‘A’ and ‘C’ companies. Again, the paratroopers were waiting with machine guns and mortars. The attack crumbled 200 yards from the tower. Lieutenant D.A.S. Black and four other men were killed. Captain D.H. Andrew and lieutenants W.N. Laughlin and H.G. “Cubby” Morgan were wounded, along with twenty-one other men. Most of the casualties were from ‘A’ Company, which had also lost men the previous day.
Lieutenant Colonel John Pangman was deeply shaken by these losses. It seemed as if the New Brunswick regiment was being left out on its own with insufficient resources and support. Brigadier Graeme Gibson appeared uninterested in leaving 3 CIB headquarters to visit the battlefield to gain a first-hand appreciation of the difficulties the battalion faced. Pangman expressed his disgruntlement. Gibson’s response was to order Carleton and York second-in-command Major Dick Danby to take over. Pangman was bundled away for a rest. He would never return to the regiment.20
Increasing frustration was the order of the day for the Carleton and York Regiment. The fight for Point 59 seemed hopelessly bogged down in the mud, with an absence of determined backing from supporting arms, either artillery or tanks. The tanks, of course, faced the same problems that had plagued them throughout the past month — mud and mines. On December 31, tanks from the Ontario Tanks tried to push up the promontory in support of ‘A’ and ‘C’ companies.21
The tanks became mired in the deep mud of a minefield. Two tanks lost tracks to mines. A third bellied out on a Teller antitank mine and had its bottom escape hatch blown in. The tank’s co-driver died instantly. A fourth tank got out ahead of the infantry, tripped a mine and, when the infantry attack again failed, had to be abandoned.22 The infantry went into the minefield and formed a defensive ring around the other three tanks, ensuring the paratroopers were unable to move up and destroy the machines during the night.