by Mark Zuehlke
But that base, Jefferson knew, could not be held indefinitely without help. As the night progressed, the Edmontons were being systematically pushed out of one house after another. It was clear that the Panzer Grenadiers were intent on tightening the ring until they had nowhere left to run. In a command post set up in a wine cellar under one building, Jefferson was trying to come up with a way to notify the brigade of his situation when ten-year-old Sicilian Antonio Giuseppi walked in. Realizing the boy would know his way around the town and surrounding countryside, Jefferson “gave young Tony whatever I had in my pockets at the time. It must have been an adequate amount of money as [his] eyes bulged at the sight of it.”4 Using an apple barrel for a table, Jefferson scribbled a note on a scrap of paper and addressed it to “any British or Canadian officer.”5 Jefferson wrote that he was “prepared to hang on, and urged that tanks be sent up.”6 The boy dashed into the bullet-torn darkness, and the Edmontons returned to the fight with the faint hope that he might actually get through.
Young Antonio found his way directly to 2 CIB headquarters and personally delivered the note to Vokes. Reading it, Vokes felt a “great ray of hope.”7 He knew then he had a chance of rescuing Jefferson and his men “if they could hold out until morning. At the time I bet that he would hold out. Jefferson was a very determined man who never flapped when the going got rough.” (Thirty years later, Vokes would attempt to personally thank Antonio during a visit to Leonforte, but he discovered that the Canadians had only learned his given names. These were so common as to be of no use. He regretted not being able to have “spoken to him about his heroism as a lad.”)
Vokes decided to assemble “a flying column,” consisting of one Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry company, four Three Rivers Regiment tanks, and some 90th Anti-Tank Battery guns. “The infantry would ride on the tanks and the anti-tank gun tractors. The column would roar down our side of the ravine, cross the bridge and charge up the road to the other side and into the town.”8
When Vokes set out his plan to Lieutenant Colonel Bob Lindsay, the PPCLI commander worried that the column “seemed rather small.” But he thought that mounting the entire company on the tanks and anti-tank guns might enable it to break through before the Germans could react. Success would depend on speed.9 Fortunately, Lindsay had already moved ‘C’ Company to a position overlooking the bridge, so he had a ready number of men for the column. In fact, when the four tanks arrived along with four 6-pounder guns and their tractors, the company commander, Captain R.C. “Rowan” Coleman, realized there was no way he could get a hundred men aboard the vehicles. Instead, No. 15 Platoon and his company headquarters would provide the motorized infantry element. The rest of the company would run behind, under the command of Lieutenant Colin McDougall.
At 0645 hours, the column was forming up when it came under such heavy mortar and machine-gun fire that the “attack was postponed indefinitely.”10 Vokes, increasingly anxious about the fate of Jefferson’s men in Leonforte, ordered another attempt at 0900. This time there was no hesitation. “The Shermans, followed by the anti-tank troop, thundered down the road, the infantry-men riding on the tanks and in the tractors and clinging to the guns, some even astride the barrels themselves. At breakneck speed the column swept across the bridge and raced up the long hill into Leonforte. Such was the speed of the assault that it sustained only one casualty as it passed through the enemy fire. It fell like a whirlwind upon the German posts at the entrance to the town and won their immediate surrender,” the army’s official historian wrote of the charge.11
Coleman and the troops aboard the vehicles never bothered to take the surrender of the Panzer Grenadiers at the town’s entrance. They just kept going into its heart and left it to McDougall’s men to mop up behind them. A short way into the town, the enemy fire grew too heated and Coleman ordered the infantry to dismount. They “immediately engaged in house to house fighting, working their way right into the centre of the town.”12
McDougall’s group soon caught up to the mobile column and after an hour of intense fighting, the combined force reached Jefferson’s headquarters in the nick of time. With tanks closing on the building, Jefferson and about thirty men inside it “had been lying low for fear of attracting” their attention. It was a relieved battalion commander who stepped out of the wine cellar to welcome the Sherman leading the way up the street. Coleman was right behind to offer Jefferson a salute and a handshake.13
The troop of Shermans from ‘A’ Squadron, commanded by Lieutenant Lou Maraskas, continued up the main street. Taking a wrong turn, Maraskas manoeuvred along a perilously narrow lane, with the sides of the Sherman almost brushing the buildings on either side, and emerged back on the main thoroughfare about fifty yards from where a Mark III Panzer was poking its main gun barrel tentatively out from a corner. Catching the German by surprise, Maraskas ordered his gunner to fire, and the first shot set the enemy tank alight.14
As the Mark III’s ammunition began cooking off, flames engulfed the tank, creating a fiery hulk that completely blocked the street to Coleman’s supporting tanks and anti-tank guns. With no alternative, he and the rest of ‘C’ Company edged warily past the sizzling wreck and started alone towards the northern end of Leonforte.15 Things went well for a few minutes as they moved up the mile-long main streets, then ‘C’ Company came under fire from three machine-gun posts hidden in houses overlooking the northern outskirts. Unable to continue in the face of this fire, Coleman ordered Lieutenant McDougall to veer to the right with No. 14 Platoon towards a railway station. Although the Panzer Grenadiers tried to stop the platoon, it pushed through to the station, even though several men were wounded or killed. Once the station was lost, the Germans slunk back about three hundred yards along the railway tracks into previously prepared dugouts. By this time, ‘C’ Company had shot its bolt and needed reinforcement.16
Lindsay was on top of that situation. “Not liking [only] one company for such a task” as clearing Leonforte, he had received permission from Vokes to bring two more companies into the town to carry on the fight.17 ‘A’ Company arrived first aboard the rest of ‘A’ Squadron’s Shermans and paused at the southern end of the town while its commander, Major J.R.G. Sutherland, ran up to Coleman’s position to find out where he could best situate his men. While the two officers were conferring, Captain Donald Brain’s ‘B’ Company passed by, only to be brought up short by a machine gun firing from “a large house dominating the main street.” The anti-tank gunners quickly came to the aid of the infantrymen. Dragging a gun up a side lane to get around the burning German tank, a crew was able to silence the German position with a single shot.
To pass through the town, the highway cut across the summit’s westerly flank. Looking up to the houses above it, Brain saw a cluster of Panzer Grenadiers and yelled for his No. 11 Platoon to go for the summit. No sooner did the men set out than they came under heavy mortar fire, and Brain realized it would take the entire company to win the feature. No. 12 Platoon, under Lieutenant W.L . Smith, “worked to the forward edge of the hill. Here they were fired on from a tank and dual purpose gun [88-millimetre] directly in front of them and from the high grounds on their left, which overlooked the main street and . . . suffered 17 casualties including Lieutenant Smith,” Coleman reported.
The PPCLI were hamstrung by the lack of wireless communication, and the fight for Leonforte hung in the balance. Coleman, Brain, and Sutherland, communicating by runners, realized they urgently needed to put together a coherent plan or face the same fragmentation that had befallen the Edmontons. Lindsay was somewhere farther back, out of touch with the three officers, who decided ‘C’ Company would “hold the ground it had gained, B [Company] should continue to attack the high ground at right, and ‘A’ [Company], with whatever support it could muster, would attack the high ground to the left.” They were going for total control of Leonforte.18
Nothing the PPCLI had experienced before matched the nature and intensity of the fighting in Leo
nforte, which foreshadowed the street battles their brother battalions of 2 CIB would face in less than six months in Ortona. “It was the first time we really bumped into what was a very strong defence of a town by the Germans,” Corporal Felix Carriere said. Before Leonforte, contact with the Germans had always been of short duration and had involved only a portion of the battalion. “All of a sudden, zap, this wasn’t the case anymore. Everyone was involved. You’re in the centre of a street and there’s nothing but fire flies running by and these are tracer bullets flying by.” Carriere discovered that “it doesn’t take long to know whether you can handle this or not. Some people, sadly, can’t handle it. Their makeup is such that their mind will not function, accept this and try to do the best they [can] with it . . . these are exceptions . . . The soldier finds a way to accept this and finds a way to be careful and in no time at all he is considered a battle veteran. All you have to do is go through one good strong battle...All the kid stuff is gone. This is serious business and you die unless you follow a set pattern of precautions while still doing your job.”19
The PPCLI learned the job on July 22. So, too, did the Three Rivers Regiment tankers (who would also be embroiled in the thick of Ortona come December). By 1330 hours, the wrecked Mark III had been shoved aside by Shermans, and the leading tank came under fire from the 88-millimetre gun that had been firing on Brain’s ‘B’ Company. It suffered two direct hits and began to burn. In the tank behind, Lieutenant Maraskas “jumped out ... and went to drag the driver out, who was wounded. He stood on the front of the tank in view of the enemy and successfully got the driver out. The enemy must have been poor shots because they hit the tank with machine gun fire but they did not hit the little Greek,” his friend Lieutenant Jack Wallace recorded.20
‘A’ Company’s Major Sutherland had the battalion’s 3-inch mortars with him and directed their fire onto the 88-millimetre gun. With the mortar crews pumping out round after round, ‘A’ Company put in an attack on the summit at 1520 hours.21 In the midst of the rush, Sutherland fell wounded. Commanding No. 7 Platoon, Lieutenant Rex Carey led his men across some ground that the German machine guns covering the artillery piece were unable to bear on. With grenades and bayonets, Carey’s men silenced one after another of the three machine-gun positions. Seeing another position in the ruins of a house, Private W. Reilly rushed it and killed the crew single-handedly. Carey was awarded a Military Cross and Reilly, the Military Medal.22
At the same time, No. 8 Platoon had been on the move. A sergeant accompanied by two men, including twenty-three-year-old Private Sidney John Cousins of Bagot, Manitoba, moved under covering fire of a Bren gunner to take out an enemy machine-gun position. The three men closed within twenty-five feet of the gun, but found they had no angle of fire on the Germans manning it, which was not the case for the enemy. A burst of fire wounded the sergeant and killed the man crouched beside Cousins. Snatching up the fallen soldier’s Bren gun, Cousins “rushed this post, firing from the hip. He knocked it out and killed 5 of the enemy therein. He then went to ground, changed magazines, and repeated his performance on another post, again knocking out 5 of its occupants. As a result of his gallant action, the whole of the enemy line collapsed, and the [company] successfully gained and held the ridge.”23 Later that evening, Cousins was killed. Lindsay put him in for a Victoria Cross, but the recommendation was denied. Because neither the Military Medal nor the Distinguished Conduct Medal (the other commendations designated for other ranks) could be awarded posthumously, he ended only Mentioned in Despatches.24
With the summit of Leonforte lost, the Germans withdrew rapidly from the town. The PPCLI’s ‘D’ Company helped them on their way by clearing the snipers who tried to stay behind. With a population of about twenty thousand, Leonforte was blessed with a small hospital. The PPCLI took over some of this sanitary space for its Regimental Aid Post. There was plenty of work for the medical personnel, as casualties from all of 2 CIB “poured in” throughout the night.25 Stretcher-bearer Jock Mackie would never forget this day in Leonforte. His first casualty was a man who had both legs torn off. “There’s nothing but a mess. You can’t tourniquet or anything like that. You can bleed to death in a minute with both the main arteries gone. And it’s just as well because what man wants to live with no legs?”26
The PPCLI had suffered twenty-one killed and forty wounded. Despite the desperateness of their situation during the night of July 21-22, the Edmontons emerged with only seven dead, seventeen wounded, and one lost as a prisoner. The Seaforths, meanwhile, had come off worst of all with twenty-eight dead and forty-eight wounded. Total 2 CIB casualties came to 275.27 Not counted in this tally were casualties suffered by the Three Rivers Tank Regiment, which had one officer fatally wounded and several other ranks injured. Lieutenant Douglas Neil McIntyre was mortally wounded by shrapnel while standing on the southern ridgeline behind his Sherman searching for targets to be fired on by his tank troop. Although his troop corporal carried him immediately to the Seaforths’ Regimental Aid Post, McIntyre died soon after.28
A significant number of decorations for bravery were awarded for actions carried out during the Leonforte battle. In all, twenty-one medals were presented. These included DSOs for Chris Vokes and Jim Jefferson, the latter’s commending his “aggressive leadership in this action.” Coleman received a Military Cross for his demonstration of “leadership and skill.” He was also shortly promoted to major.29
THE DISPROPORTIONATE RATIO of medals handed out to 2 CIB versus the 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade would remain a bone of contention for the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment because of their decisive seizure of the summit of Assoro and its subsequent defence. Not a single member of the Hasty Ps was awarded a decoration, although its acting commander, Major John Tweedsmuir, put in ten men for citations. There was no explaining the oversight; it was just the inefficient nature of the army beast, which declared that the recommendations had been received after a self-imposed deadline had passed. Only one officer from 1 CIB, Captain Dick Dillon of the Royal Canadian Regiment, received a decoration. Dillon garnered a Military Cross while leading his Bren carrier platoon up to the vicinity of Assoro.30
While the Loyal Edmonton Regiment had been carrying out its assault on Leonforte, the Hasty Ps had continued grimly defending their position atop Monte Assoro. Although resupplied by the RCR, they had received no indication that an attempt was under way to break through by following the main road. ‘B’ and ‘D’ companies of the 48th Highlanders of Canada led this effort. Their objective was a T-shaped junction where the road executed a hard left to become the main street leading into the town, while a secondary track wound off to the east along the southern flank of the mountain for a short distance before coming to a dead end. Brigadier Howard Graham’s hope was that, in seizing the junction, the Highlanders would cut the only road that provided a line of retreat for the Panzer Grenadiers. While the infantry could get away by scrambling cross-country, they would be forced to abandon any tanks, guns, and vehicles.
Given the way the road switchbacked up the mountain and was probably covered by German machine-gun and mortar positions, the Highlanders had rejected following it directly.31 Close to the base of the mountain, the road was badly cratered and also blocked farther along by the still-smouldering wreckages of the Hasty Ps’ motorized column that had been ambushed on July 21. These obstacles made it impossible for the infantry attack to be accompanied by tanks, although a troop of tanks from the Three Rivers Regiment’s ‘C’ Squadron was going to attempt to gain a ridge next to the destroyed vehicles in order to provide covering fire.32
The Highlanders hoped to carry off the same kind of stealthy climb the Hasty Ps had executed the previous night, despite the fact the Germans would likely be watching for such an attempt. Because of the way the road zigzagged up the mountain’s face, both companies would be forced to cut across each leg of its twisting ascent. Captain Bob Lyon’s ‘B’ Company would go up about a half-mile west of Assoro, while Major D.
W. Banton’s ‘D’ Company would be farther to the right and aimed directly at the junction. As the two companies started climbing a little after midnight, the moon had set and they were left with only starlight for illumination. The road followed no natural course. It had been carved out of the face of the mountain with its outside edge braced by stone walls that were virtual cliff faces about thirty to forty feet high. Climbing these, soundlessly and in darkness, was no mean feat. Yet that was what the Highlanders did. Like the Hasty Ps, they had stripped down to essential gear—guns, ammunition, grenades, and a precious water bottle. Both companies had a No. 18 wireless set, but these proved nothing more than a worthless burden to the signallers carrying them. When the two companies reached their assigned forming-up positions on a comparatively level shelf a little short of the junction, they waited for the dawn and a pre-arranged artillery bombardment of the town.33
While the Highlanders had been scaling the mountain, No. 1 Troop from ‘C’ Squadron—aided by engineers—had managed to navigate over and around the craters and vehicle obstacles to gain a low rise next to where the road started its winding ascent up the mountain. Lieutenant Slim Waldron led his tanks off the road and up a “boulder-strewn cutting” to a position that, when the day dawned, should provide a good line of fire on the junction. Waldron knew it was a hellish position, for they would be exposed to the Germans above who must have heard their engines and tracks grinding away during the climb. They were also right “amid a ghastly mess of burned and shot up vehicles, with burned bodies strewn about them and breathing the unforgettable stench of burned human flesh.”34
As dawn broke, a series of multicoloured flares shot into the sky from a position in the valley bottom, where Lieutenant Colonel Ian Johnston had set up his advance battalion headquarters. All but the red one were decoys intended to confuse the Germans as to their purpose. The red flare told the two companies to start moving. Seconds later, the artillery began pounding the town and road junction. Lyon and Banton’s men advanced, catching the few Germans in the area by surprise and quickly overrunning their positions.35 No. 1 Troop also swung into action and “with steady blasts of 75-[millimetre high-explosive], succeeded in clearing the enemy from their positions in the many coves in the mountainside.”36 By 1100 hours, the Highlanders were inside the town and engaging Panzer Grenadiers, who were clearly offering only a fighting withdrawal. The junction’s capture denied the Germans their only viable route to receive supplies and evacuate casualties. Having realized their grip on Assoro was loosening, the Panzer Grenadiers had slipped most of their mechanized weapons and vehicles out during the night before the Highlanders had concluded their climb. At 1400 hours, the last German infantry ran down the northern slope to gain the road that led up to a junction with Highway 121, northeast of Leonforte. They left behind four trucks, a single 88-millimetre gun, a large number of mortars and machine guns, and two crates of excellent marmalade, which was a welcome addition to the Highlanders’ rations.37 The Highlanders had lost only one man killed and seven wounded.38