The Last Great Cavalryman

by Richard Mead

  At the tactical level Dick was far from happy with what he read. X Corps was to come ashore at the northern end of the Bay of Salerno, with two divisions to the south of the eponymous town and a force of British Commandos and US Rangers to the north and further along the Amalfi coast. All the beachheads would be overlooked by mountains, whose passes the corps would have to force to get into the Plain of Naples. On Dick’s right would be VI US Corps, landing near the Roman ruins at Paestum. For the task in hand, his resources looked very thin, but the major constraint, as always in amphibious operations, was the availability of landing craft. Dick knew that 1 Airborne Division was in the theatre and decided to ask for a parachute brigade to fly in simultaneously. With this in mind he went on the next morning to Mostaganem, west of Algiers, for his first meeting with Lieutenant General Mark W. Clark of Fifth Army, under whose command he would be operating. He was met by a large US Military Police guard of honour and by Clark’s chief of staff, Al Gruenther, to whom he warmed immediately. He was not so sure about Clark himself, especially when the army commander rejected the proposal for the parachute brigade.

  SALERNO AND NAPLES

  Clark was to play a major role in Dick’s career, both during and after the war, and their relationship was not always easy. He was a relatively young man himself, less than two years older than Dick. He had seen action in an infantry battalion in the Vosges during the Great War and, like Dick, had been wounded, in his case by shell splinters. He had done well between the wars, attending both the Command and General Staff School and the Army War College and becoming an instructor at the latter in 1940. By the time the United States entered the war Clark had reached the rank of brigadier general and was serving as assistant chief of staff at the Pentagon. There he came under the watchful eye of Marshall, who was every bit as influential as his British counterpart, Brooke, in the selection of officers for high command. This was not Clark’s first experience of Marshall; he had impressed his superior some four years earlier with the clarity of his planning for manoeuvres. He was also a close friend of Eisenhower’s and accompanied him on his first visit to London in early 1942, during which he made a strong impression on Churchill, who nicknamed him ‘the American Eagle’. When Eisenhower assumed the role of Commanding General, European Theatre of Operations, US Army, Clark joined him, initially to lead II US Corps.

  Subsequently Clark became the first US general officer to set foot in French North Africa, as the leader of a clandestine mission landed from a British submarine on an Algerian beach to meet French officers sympathetic to the Allied cause. Immediately after Operation Torch he was instrumental in persuading Admiral Darlan, the French Commander-in-Chief, to reject the Vichy Government and declare for the Allies and thus, by the end of 1942, his stock was riding high. When Fifth Army was formed in early 1943, he was an almost automatic choice to be its commanding general.

  In spite of their close friendship, Clark was in many ways the antithesis of Eisenhower. Whereas the supreme commander subordinated national interest to Allied harmony and was invariably the most diplomatic of men, Clark was blunter with his allied counterparts and subordinates, put the United States first and had an innate distrust of the British, although this did not extend to the virulent Anglophobia displayed by a few of his countrymen. He had disapproved of placing US troops under British control during the Tunisian campaign, though he had no such thoughts when X Corps was later brought into Fifth Army. Whilst Eisenhower was personally modest, Clark went to the same lengths as Montgomery to promote himself to his troops and, through the press, to the American public. Another trait which he shared with Montgomery was to insist on his own orders being followed to the letter, but to be selective on occasion in his interpretation of orders given to him.

  To Dick, who never sought the limelight, Clark’s showmanship was anathema and he was dubious from the start about his military ability. Their approaches to battle were quite different, Dick relying to a great extent on intelligence and reconnaissance before selecting a weak point in the enemy’s defences and applying the maximum pressure there, Clark preferring to probe extensively on a wide front, thereby in Dick’s opinion incurring many unnecessary casualties. Even at this stage of the war the British were conscious of their limitations in manpower, whilst the Americans had no such concerns. The latter, usually preferring to attack an objective frontally, could not understand why the former tended to adopt an indirect approach, which might take longer but which cost fewer lives.

  The meeting with Clark at an end, Dick set off to visit the formations under his command. He went first to Bizerta, where he saw Horrocks in hospital before going to inspect 46 Division. This Territorial formation had arrived in North Africa in January 1943 and was actively engaged in the Tunisian campaign from then until the end. The GOC, who had arrived to take command on the very day of Dick’s visit, was an old friend from Staff College, John ‘Ginger’ Hawkesworth, who had previously commanded 4 Division, which had also played a major role in the battle for Tunis. Dick knew his record, which included leading an infantry brigade with distinction during the retreat to Dunkirk in 1940, and had every faith in his ability. He also liked the look of his brigadiers.

  Most of the rest of the corps, together with its HQ, was situated 400 miles away around Tripoli, but Dick now had the exclusive use of a two-engined plane, piloted by a charming Frenchman. His other infantry division was less well known to him, although it had joined Eighth Army just before the end of the Tunisian campaign and fought briefly and unsuccessfully near Enfidaville. 56 Division had begun life as 1 (London) Division, a first-line Territorial formation which had originally recruited exclusively from in and around the capital. One of its three brigades had been lent to another division for the Sicily campaign and was now refitting, replaced on a temporary basis by Julian Gascoigne’s 201 Guards Brigade. As 56 Division would be fighting in relatively open country south of Salerno, it had also been given its own armour in the shape of the Shermans of the Royal Sots Greys. Dick knew the GOC, Douglas Graham, only slightly as a brigade commander in the Highland Division from El Alamein to Enfidaville. He was some five years Dick’s senior in age, but had a sound reputation.

  These two divisions would make up the main landing force as the early stages of the battle were likely to be predominantly an infantry affair. As soon as circumstances permitted, Dick proposed to bring ashore his old friends of 23 Armoured Brigade, now commanded by Harry Arkwright and formed of the same three battalions of the RTR that had served under Dick in 8 Armoured Division in 1941.

  For the break-out Dick had 7 Armoured Division, under the command of Bobby Erskine since John Harding had been seriously wounded shortly before the capture of Tripoli. Whereas Hawkesworth had been in the division above Dick at Staff College, Erskine had been in the one below. He had also been BGS at XIII Corps through much of 1942, so Dick knew him well and liked him. The main infantry component was 131 Brigade which, like 168 Brigade in 56 Division, consisted entirely of three battalions of the Queen’s Regiment. Somewhat confusingly, both were popularly known as ‘The Queen’s Brigade’.

  To carry out landings on his left flank, there were two further formations. One was the Commando Brigade of 2 and 41 (Royal Marine) Commandos under Brigadier Bob Laycock, which would land at the small town of Vietri sul Mare, just to the west of Salerno. On the commandos’ left would be a force of three battalions of the US Rangers under Colonel William Darby, which would land at the town of Maiore, along the road to Amalfi. The Rangers and the Commandos were both in Sicily, so Dick had no time to visit them, although he saw the two commanders at the final briefing conference at Clark’s command post at Mostaganem on 31 August.

  Dick described this conference, which ran for five and a half hours, as ‘endless speaking’, but conceded that it was very well run. Charles Richardson, who had been transferred from Eighth Army to act as Clark’s Deputy Chief of Staff (British), recalled the contrast with Montgomery’s conferences, at which the Eighth Army com
mander would give a prominent lead, indeed do most of the talking himself. Clark, by contrast, sat in the background and the scene was set by his Head of G.3 (Operations), Donald Brann. He was followed by Lieutenant General Ernest J. Dawley, Commanding General of VI US Corps, whom Richardson recalled as a ‘ventriloquist’s dummy’ completely dominated by his staff.1 Dawley was followed by Dick. ‘I thought his performance was excellent,’ wrote Richardson later. ‘We all felt that he had worked out very firmly in his own mind how his corps battle should develop after the assault landing, and clearly he was not in the hands of his staff. This impression remained with me as the battles continued.’2

  The conference over, Dick returned to Tripoli to continue to put the final touches to his plan and to see the amphibious training being carried out there and at Bizerta. He may not have been dominated by his staff, but he got on with them very well and they were unquestionably important to him, two of them in particular. His BGS was R. B. B. B. ‘Cookie’ Cooke, late of the 17th Lancers, in which regiment he had been an exact contemporary of Dick’s brother Bob. Dick had known Cooke from the inter-war years and had come across him more recently as the Brigadier RAC of First Army. He was to remain with Dick for most of his tenure with X Corps and be a tower of strength. Even closer to him on a daily basis was his ADC, Captain (later Major) Hugh Vivian Smith, whom he knew personally and had interviewed in London prior to his departure.3 Smith was to serve with him for an even longer period but, unlike Cooke, Dick found him exasperating at times, yet he tried so hard and was so likeable that he kept him on.

  The other key person in Dick’s life for the next few weeks was Commodore Geoffrey Oliver, who commanded the Northern Attack Force of warships and transports and was thus responsible not only for getting the troops ashore, but also for supporting them with naval gunfire once they were there. Dick immediately struck up an excellent relationship with Oliver and his senior officers. He spent time looking over the various types of landing craft and was entertained in the wardroom of the command ship, HMS Hilary, which not only flew Oliver’s broad pennant but would also serve as Dick’s Main HQ until it was safe for it to be relocated ashore.4

  After a final visit to see Hawkesworth in Bizerta, Dick and his senior staff embarked on the Hilary on the evening of 5 September and set sail at 1230 hrs the following day. The vessel made slow progress initially due to having been bunkered with sub-standard Indian coal, but an infusion of Welsh coal held in reserve allowed her to increase her speed and make her rendezvous with the rest of the enormous convoy on time. They were spotted by enemy reconnaissance planes on 8 September, but that evening there was apparently excellent news on the BBC that the Italians had agreed to an armistice. Orders went out immediately that any Italian troops were to be treated as friendly unless they acted in a hostile manner and the news swept round the attackers, with many immediately assuming that opposition to the landings would be slight.

  On the following morning such assumptions proved hopelessly optimistic. In the early hours of 9 September the ships reached their allotted positions for disembarkation and the troops transferred to the assault craft. The initial naval bombardment was due to start at 0315 hrs, but an hour earlier the accompanying destroyers reported that they were being engaged by coastal batteries and were given permission to respond. It was already clear that the Germans were prepared for the landings, indeed they had come to the same conclusion as the Allies that this was the furthest point north at which air cover could be delivered from Sicily. The timing of the Italian surrender had come as a surprise, but plans had already been formulated for such an eventuality and the Germans reacted to the news with speed and ruthlessness, disarming their former allies and, where any resistance was met, dealing with it summarily. The only major German formation on this stretch of coast, 16 Panzer Division, had been on the alert since the previous afternoon and was able to respond immediately, whilst reinforcements were called up. From the bridge of the Hilary Dick could see demolitions taking place at the oil storage depot at Salerno and realized that surprise had not been achieved.

  AVALANCHE

  Hawkesworth had decided to land on a one-brigade front, with his 128 Brigade chosen as the initial assault force on the beach opposite the town of Magazzeno, followed as soon as it had secured a lodgement by 138 Brigade, whilst 139 Brigade remained in reserve. The main objective for 46 Division was the town of Salerno itself, through which Hawkesworth expected to pass to join up with the commandos on the other side. He also planned to take the town of Pontecagnano on the road from Salerno to Battipaglia. At 56 Division Graham opted to land two brigades simultaneously on beaches either side of the mouth of the River Tusciano, with 169 Brigade on the left tasked with capturing the key Montecorvino airfield, whilst 167 Brigade on the right, accompanied by the Royal Scots Greys, would take Battipaglia and the road from there to Pontecagnano. 201 Guards Brigade was to follow later.

  Both divisions started to come ashore within 10 minutes of the planned H-Hour of 0330, meeting with immediate resistance both from machine guns and mortars sited close to the beaches and from artillery further away. On 46 Division’s beaches there was initially serious congestion on the narrow front. On 128 Brigade’s left the leading battalion managed to push inland to Pontecagnano, but resistance was much stronger on its right, where little headway could be made and a spirited German counter-attack with tanks sent a battalion back in confusion with serious losses. Nevertheless, 138 Brigade managed to come in to the beaches as planned and was ordered to move into Salerno. At first progress was good and contact was made with the commandos from Vietri, 46 Reconnaissance Regiment even penetrating as far as Cava, well up the defile towards Naples. Heavy artillery and mortar fire compelled its withdrawal and Hawkesworth decided to consolidate his position. In the afternoon 139 Brigade was landed and, in spite of numerous casualties, by the evening substantially the whole of 46 Division was ashore.

  One battalion from 46 Division had gone astray in the early morning and landed on a 56 Division beach, causing great confusion as 169 Brigade came ashore, while a battalion from 167 Brigade also landed in the wrong place and became mixed up with the second wave. The large LSTs of the Greys were targeted specifically by the Germans and several were hit, only two-thirds of the leading squadron managing to land. Progress was made, however, and by 0825 hrs a carrier patrol had entered Battipaglia, reporting that it was clear of the enemy. Moreover, Brigadier ‘Lou’ Lyne of 169 Brigade considered that he was strongly enough established to attack Montecorvino airfield, where his troops found a great number of aircraft on the ground and destroyed them most satisfactorily. However, they could not secure the whole airfield and dug in facing the Germans across the runway. In the afternoon 201 Guards Brigade began to come ashore.

  On the left both the Commandos and the Rangers had landed without difficulty. Laycock established his HQ at Dragonea, a small village on the flank of the Molina Pass, leading via Cava to Nocera and Naples, which he intended to dominate from the high ground. Darby had done even better. Regarding speed as the essence, he had gone hell for leather up the road towards the Chiunzi Pass, which led down very steeply to Pagani, at the far end of the Nocera defile. His advanced patrols reported that they could see as far as Castellammare on the Bay of Naples. There he dug in and, having also cut the coast road to Amalfi, effectively denied the Germans the ability to outflank the Allies on their left. The Rangers and Commandos also joined hands on the road from Maiore to Vietri.

  Dick had received a bewildering array of signals throughout the day, some very hopeful, others indicating that the resistance was going to be tougher than many (although not Dick himself) had anticipated. At 1800 hrs he went ashore for the first time, meeting both Hawkesworth and Graham and returning to the Hilary at 2300 hrs. There he issued orders for the following day: 46 Division was to capture Salerno completely, hold the defile north of Salerno to enable the port to be opened and complete the occupation of its planned beachhead, whilst 56 Division was to capture
Battipaglia, take the whole of Montecorvino airfield, and, like its sister formation, secure its beachhead. Dick was worried, however, about his right flank and when he saw Clark on the following day he asked for the corps boundary to be altered in his favour, to which the army Commander acceded. Dick did not know it, but this exacerbated a problem which was not then apparent but would emerge within the next 48 hours – the extent of the gap between the two corps, bisected by the River Sele.

  VI US Corps, which had only landed 36 US Division on the first day, had established itself successfully, but not without being badly knocked about. Plans were now made to move into the gap and at the same time to land Dawley’s reserve, 45 US Division. A force was despatched to cross the Sele, but it failed to reach the town of Eboli or the nearby Ponte Sele, the latter a significant crossing point. In the meantime, enemy reinforcements were arriving to bolster 16 Panzer Division, both from Calabria, where Montgomery was moving very slowly up the toe of Italy, and from the north. The noose was tightening about Fifth Army.

  Dick was only too aware of the increasing strength of the Germans. 201 Guards Brigade took Battipaglia in the early hours of D+1, but the battalion which then occupied the town was thrown out again on the following morning. The Guards found themselves battling for control of a tobacco factory, a natural bastion which lay on the road to Salerno, whilst the Germans were also attacking strongly around Santa Lucia on Dick’s vulnerable right flank, their advance only broken up by accurate fire from the divisional artillery and the Royal Navy. The airfield at Montecorvino was finally cleared after three days of hard fighting, but was initially impossible to use as it was overlooked by German guns. In the Commandos’ sector the battle swayed backwards and forwards, with control of the hill above Vietri, nicknamed Commando Hill, being lost and then regained, whilst the enemy was infiltrating 46 Division’s front north and east of Salerno. The Rangers, on the other hand, beat off an attack on their position with relative ease. The beachhead, moreover, was now secure and, despite the continuing uncertainties, Dick decided to bring his Main HQ ashore on the morning of 12 September. A skeleton staff had set up the site two days earlier in an orange grove near Pontecagnano, but Dick had preferred to use the facilities of the Hilary until he was absolutely sure that the corps was there to stay. By 14 September he was sufficiently confident to bring ashore 23 Armoured Brigade, which he now used as the core of a force to secure his right flank around Santa Lucia against an attack by the Germans from the gap between the two corps.