An Army at Dawn

by Rick Atkinson

  At four A.M. on November 19: Hill, “Operation TORCH,” 177; AAR, “Operations of 1st Bn., Parachute Regiment,” Jan. 18, 1943, Allfrey Collection, LHC, 3/4.

  Barré passed word: AAR, 1st Derbyshire Yeomanry, n.d., PRO, WO 175/293; AAR, First Army, PRO, WO 175/50.

  An apricot dawn: Knoche, 28; Edward A. Raymond, “Some Battle Lessons,” Field Artillery Journal, Feb. 1944, 104 (“The war”).

  West of town: Hill, “Operation Torch,” 177 (“guns of all calibers” and “gun teams had worked”).

  The balance of the day: Howard A. Smith, Jr., “Among Those Baptized,” Field Artillery Journal, Apr. 1944, 214 (“Poor buggers”); James Lucas, Panzer Army Africa, 143.

  By late afternoon: NWAf, 287; DDE, “Commander-in-Chief’s Dispatch, North African Campaign, 1942–1943,” 19; Raymond, 104; Knoche, 29, 31; Kühn, German Paratroops in World War II, 168; Lucas, 143.

  This disagreeable news: Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 52 (Anderson had resisted); NWAf, 291.

  Neither side: Liebling, 3; Lowell Bennett, 130 (“a funny sort of front”).

  But Axis forces: Kriegstagebuch, 90th Panzer Armee Korps, Nov. 22, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225 (“There is no time”); Hinsley, British Intelligence in the Second World War, abridged ed., 270; AAR, 17th/21st Lancers, PRO, WO 175/292 (“Alice”); Anderson to DDE, Nov. 16, 1942, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-5-C;W. S. Chalmers, Full Cycle: The Biography of Admiral Sir Bertram Home Ramsay, 151 (“Huns are beating”).

  Never hesitant to play: John Kennedy, The Business of War, 274 (“like a peacock”); Jenkins, Churchill: A Biography, 681 (“not as good fighters”); Danchev and Todman, eds., 243 (“totally unfit”).

  Eisenhower maintained: DDE to H. H. Arnold, Nov. 21, 1942, Chandler, 751; memo, DDE, Nov. 22, 1942, Chandler, 761 (“It would be wrong”); Hinsley, British Intelligence in the Second World War, abridged ed., 263, 270 (25,000); DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 18, 1942, Chandler, 734 (“If we don’t”).

  Most disheartening: Anthony Farrar-Hockley, “The Follow-up to TORCH,” Basil Liddell Hart, ed., History of the Second World War, vol. 3, 1228.

  Allied fighters, by contrast: NWAf, 293; Richard G. Davis, Carl A. Spaatz and the Air War in Europe, 139; AAFinWWII, 121 (“rather appalling”), 127; DDE to GCM, Nov. 22, 1942, Chandler, 759; asst. G-3 inspection report to AFHQ, Dec. 1942, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-5C.

  Troops learned to their sorrow: Warren, 14; Charles Messenger, The Tunisian Campaign, 13 (crew chiefs sat); John S. D. Eisenhower, 204; Tibbits, 119 (crews wielded); L. F. Ellis, Welsh Guards at War, 27 (“a loving type of mud”).

  On November 24: W. J. Jervois, The History of the Northamptonshire Regiment: 1934–1948, 119; NWAf, 302.

  The other prong: ibid.; Ray, 12–13; Farrar-Hockley, 1228; Lucas, 144; Macksey, Crucible of Power, 94; Ford, 17.

  Fat Geese on a Pond

  With both brigades: Rolf, 36 (“Armor for Tunis!”); AAR, “Operations of 1st Bn., Parachute Regiment,” Jan. 18, 1943, Allfrey Collection, LHC, 3/4; Saunders, 88 (“great ebony warriors”); Waters, SOOHP, 1980, MHI (“tank-infested”); Blaxland, 104, 108.

  son of a Baltimore banker: Waters, SOOHP, 54, 66.

  Waters’s fifty-four light tanks: Arthur Robert Moore, ASEQ, ts, 1993, 1st AD; Forty, United States Tanks of World War II in Action, 42–51; Daubin, 6 (“squirrel rifle” and “hat box”).

  The battalion rolled: Waters, SOOHP, 611 (“I’m scared to death”); Daubin, 16 (“three-day growth”); Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 66.

  Farther north: ffrench Blake, 93 (“sent up a stream”).

  But it was on: Waters, SOOHP, 611 (“Right in front of me”); Robinett, Armor Command, 65, Daubin, 6–19.

  Seventeen Stuarts: Daubin, 19 (“fat geese”); Waters, SOOHP, 611; Rudolph Barlow, OH, n.d., SM, MHI; Lowell Bennett, 197 (“bounced off like peas”); Hans Jürgen von Arnim, “Recollections of Tunisia,” 1951, trans. Janet E. Dewey, FMS, #C-098, CMH, 20; Rame, 156 (shot down or crushed); Forty, United States Tanks of World War II in Action, 47, 49; Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 67; Boog et al., 805.

  Panicky, exaggerated reports: Nehring, “The First Phase of the Battle in Tunisia,” FMS, #D-147, MHI (“tear open one tactical hole”); Kriegstagebuch, 90th Panzer Armee Korps, Nov. 25, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225; Ulrich Bürker, “Einsatz Der 10. Panzer Division in Tunisien, II. Teil,” Dec. 1947, FMS, #D-310, 10; Lucas, 136 (preparing to burn).

  Kesselring voiced sympathy: Kesselring, “The War in the Mediterranean, Part II, The Fighting in Tunisia and Tripolitania,” FMS, #T-3, P1, MHI, 13 (“made a beautiful mess”); Kesselring, Memoirs, 143.

  Smiling Albert’s assurances: Chandler, 778n (DIZZY and INCUR); Nicholson and Forbes, 265; Kennett, 122 (“never had any bringing up”).

  The key to the door: Charles Hendricks, “A Time of Testing: U.S. Army Engineers in the Tunisia Campaign of World War II,” paper, Oct. 1999, Colloquium on Military Fortifications and Infrastructure in Tunisia; DDE to GSP, Nov. 26, 1942, Chandler, 774 (“At this moment”); DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 27, 1942, Chandler, 777 (“I believe”).

  CHAPTER 5: PRIMUS IN CARTHAGO

  “Go for the Swine with a Blithe Heart”

  From the tall windows: Raymond H. Croll, ts, n.d., MHI, 116; CBH, Feb. 1942, MHI; minutes, commander-in-chief staff conference, Oct. 26, 1942, NARA RG 331, AFHQ micro, R-79-D (had intended to move).

  “How weary I am”: DDE to MWC, Nov. 20, 1942, and Nov. 21, 1942, Chandler, 745, 750.

  He was hardly: Croll, 99, 116.

  Eisenhower’s own office: Three Years, 199.

  A few days before leaving: DDE to MWC, Nov. 20, 1942, Chandler, 744; Robert Murphy, Col U OHRO, David C. Berliner, OH-224, Oct. 12, 1972, 6–7; “History of AFHQ, Part One, Aug.–Dec. 1942,” n.d., NARA RG 331, box 63 (400 offices); Butcher diary, DDE Lib, A-43 (as much meat); “Tactical Communication in World War II,” part 1, “Signal Communication in the North African Campaigns,” 1945, Historical Section, Office of the Chief Signal Officer, MHI, 54 (“reasonable estimate”); Hansen, 3/40 (“huge, chairborne force”); Dickson, “G-2 Journal: Algiers to the Elbe,” n.d., MHI, 30 (“never were so few”); Jordan, 180 (“it’s worth fifty divisions”).

  Algiers already showed: Croll, 116 (electric razors); Moorehead, 65; MacVane, Journey into War, 85 (“I am married”); Rame, 206; both in NARA RG 338, Fifth Army awards and decorations, A 47-A-3948, box 56 (“Valor, Patience”).

  Oranges: Carter, “Carter’s War,” ts, 1983, CEOH, III-2, III-14; Lowell Bennett, 295; Jensen, 50.

  Indiscipline overwhelmed: AAR, Dec. 28, 1942, Center Task Force, Staff JAG, NARA RG 407, E 427, AG, WWII Ops Reports, box 244; AAR, II Corps JAG, Dec. 22, 1942, and AAR, HQ II Corps, JAG, Sept. 9, 1943, both in NARA RG 338, II Corps JAG, box 157.

  There was folderol: DDE, Crusade in Europe, 128 (Eisenhower was a Jew); Milton S. Eisenhower, The President Is Calling, 145 (“Ike”); Butcher diary, Nov. 25, 1942, DDE Lib (Clark gave); DDE to GCM, Nov. 21, 1942, and DDE to MWC, Nov. 21, 1942, Chandler, 748; John D’Arcy-Dawson, Tunisian Battle, 66 (correspondents advised).

  “After leaving where we were”: Dale Allen Hawley, New York Herald Tribune, July 3, 1943, MCC, YU.

  In a message on November 22: Chandler, 767n; Butcher diary, DDE Lib, A-50 (“Go for the swine”); DDE to MWC, Nov. 19, 1942, Chandler, 740; DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 18, 1942, Chandler, 736.

  In truth, he spent: DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 18, 1942, Chandler, 732.

  No distraction tormented: DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 9, 1942, Chandler, 677 (“these Frogs”); DDE, “Commander-in-Chief’s Dispatch, North African Campaign,” 17 (“morbid sense of honor”); DDE to GCM, Feb. 4, 1943, Chandler, 937 (“volatile”); Kennedy, 282 (“a dog about religion”).

  But the commander-in-chief lacked: CCS, “Minutes of Meeting,” Jan. 15, 1943, 1430, NARA RG 218, “Records of U.S. JCS,” box 195 (132 desertions); Wallace, “Africa, We Took It and Liked It,” 20; “The Reminiscences of Rear Adm. George
W. Bauernschmidt,” 1991, USNI OHD, appendix B, 9 (French supply requests).

  More distracting: Crawford, Report on North Africa, 83 (“like a Tammany scan- dal”); Milton Eisenhower, 137 (“fighting Nazis”); Three Years, 192 (“stinking skunk”); Chandler, 739n (“We are fighting”); Langer, 368.

  Darlan’s repressive actions: MacVane, On the Air in World War II, 121; Macmillan, The Blast of War, 184; Middleton, 242; Tompkins, 132, 136, 139 (hoarded coffee).

  Eisenhower averted: DDE to GSP, Nov. 26, 1942, Chandler, 775; DDE to GCM, Nov. 17, 1942, Chandler, 729; DDE to CCS, Nov. 14, 1942, Chandler, 708; DDE to W. B. Smith, Nov. 14, 1942, Chandler, 712.

  Roosevelt had authorized: Three Years, 206 (“I am but a lemon”).

  All this was folderol: Ramsey, 111 (“For Christ’s sake”); Omar N. Bradley and Clay Blair, A General’s Life, 133; Hanson Baldwin, New York Times, March 29, 1969, 1 (“best damn lieutenant colonel”); Piers Brendon, Ike: His Life and Times, 96 (“fatchist”); Macmillan, The Blast of War, 174 (“I’m no reactionary!”).

  At the end: Hatch, General Ike, 130; McKeough and Lockridge, 51, 61; Merle Miller, Ike the Soldier, 435; Three Years, 199, 206.

  Even an officer as strong: DDE to GCM, Nov. 17, 1942, Chandler, 731; Kay Summersby Morgan, Past Forgetting, 110 (“lonely man”); DDE to H. H. Arnold, Nov. 21, 1942, Chandler, 751.

  He regretted, too: DDE to GCM, Nov. 30, 1942, Chandler, 781; Ismay, Memoirs, 289; Bryant, 527, 528, 534 (“far too busy”); Three Years, 201 (“The whole thing”).

  The low moan: Ramsey, 236; Paul Semmens, “The Hammer of Hell,” ts, n.d., CMH, 94; Three Years, 306, 200.

  To his son: DDE to John S. D. Eisenhower, Nov. 20, 1942, Chandler, 747 (“I hope”); Morgan, 101; Davis, Dwight D. Eisenhower: Soldier of Democracy, 399.

  “The Dead Salute the Gods”

  no roasted peacock: Daubin, “The Battle of Happy Valley” AAR, T. A. Seely, includes OH w/ J. K. Waters, Dec. 29, 1942, NARA RG 337, Observer Reports, #46, box 52; Rame, 120 (“swallows diving”); Fergusson, 96 (“Like all things German”); Charles W. Eineichner, ASEQ, Rangers, MHI (“any weapon we had”); “Lessons of the Tunisian Campaign, 1942–3, British Forces,” n.d., NARA RG 492, MTOUSA, box 56.

  On the rare occasions: Tank Destroyer Forces World War II, 22; Howe, Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 69; Rame, 138; Robert S. Cameron, “Americanizing the Tank,” diss, Temple Univ., 1994, 772 (any airborne object); Robert A. Brand, ASEQ, 16th Inf, MHI; Relman Morin, Dwight D. Eisenhower: A Gauge of Greatness, 81 (“WEFT”).

  Despite such demoralizing episodes: H. B. Latham to G. F. Howe, June 13, 1950, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 228; AAR, T. A. Seely, NARA RG 337, Observer Reports, #46, box 52.

  Before dawn on November 26: NWAf, 300–301; author visit, Apr. 2000; Howe, Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 68; Daubin, 1–29; Waters, SOOHP, 611 (“a beautiful column”).

  The approaching Mk IV: ffrench Blake, A History of the 17th/21st Lancers, 1922–1959, 97; Belton Y. Cooper, Death Traps, 25.

  From the ridge: Daubin, 1–29 (“long searing tongues”); minutes, “Meeting of the Subcommittee on Armored Vehicles of the National Research Council,” June 1943, 9; John Ellis, On the Front Lines, 153 (“like a finger”).

  Wreathed in gray smoke: Messenger, 21 (“snapped like a cap pistol” and “power-driven grindstone”); Daubin, 1–29.

  “Our losses,”: Kriegstagebuch, Nov. 26, 1942, Div. Lederer, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225.

  “The Americans had done well”: ffrench Blake, 97.

  Ten miles south: Parris and Russell, 223–24 (eggs and a beefsteak); Middleton, 209 (“dusty and empty”).

  Tucked into an oxbow: author visit, Apr. 2000; Blaxland, 111; Robinett, Armor Command, 75 (“haunting memory”).

  The Surreys were spread: Jordan, 237 (twelve hours); Daniell, History of the East Surrey Regiment, vol. IV, 153–57; Lowell Bennett, 212–15; Ford, 27–28 (“My good man”); Middleton, 215 (“We’ll be in Tunis”); war diary, XC Panzer Corps, Nov. 27, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225.

  There was not a moment: Gardiner, ts, 1970, USMA Arch, 84–86; Gerald Linderman, The World Within War, 58; Destruction, 177.

  For two miles: Gordon A. Baker, Iron Knights: The United States 66th Armored Regiment, 136 (“looked like a damned cathedral”); Gardiner, “We Fought at Kasserine,” Armored Cavalry Journal, March/Apr. 1948, 8.

  Perfectly camouflaged: Gardiner, ts, USMA Arch, 84–86 (“horribly wounded”); Jervois, 119–22; Howe, Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 72–73 (“fought in each other’s presence”); Robinett, Armor Command, 75–76; AAR, n.d., PMD, LOC, box 6; Linderman, 25 (“burns like twenty haystacks”); Lowell Bennett, 298 (“As soon as I get well”).

  British soldiers, stone deaf: Middleton, 209–10 (“When they reached” and “sixpence for a Spitfire”); ffrench Blake, 98; Jordan, 65 (“a pack of lies”); Rame, 141 (“The dead salute”).

  Toward midnight: Jervois, 121 (recognized as witless); Destruction, 177.

  Regrettably, this decision: AAR, 5th FA Bn, Nov. 13, 1942–Jan. 18, 1943, and 5th FA Bn journal and operations report, Nov. 20, 1942–March 1, 1943, and letter, R. N. Tyson to Clift Andrus, Dec. 3, 1942, all in NARA RG 407, E 427, box 5879; Robinett, Armor Command, 71 (“looked like street lights”); Frelinghuysen, 27–38 (“Frederic Remington painting”); 10th Panzer Div., intel report, Dec. 17, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 227.

  Dawn on November 29: Jervois, 122; Middleton, 211 (“Drag ass”); Frelinghuysen, 41–45 (“People who fight a war”).

  The southern prong: Malcolm, 89–91 (“no more menacing”); author visit, Apr. 2000; Ray, 14–15; Austin, 19, 35.

  Both presumptions: Carell, 313 (“a Tunisian Verdun”); Jean-Yves Nasse, Green Devils: German Paratroops, 1939–1945, 72–74; James E. Mrazek, The Fall of Eben Emael, 180–91.

  The Argylls stopped: Malcolm, 91–95 (“Look, George” and “If only I had”); Kriegstagebuch, Nov. 28, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225; Lucas, Panzer Army Africa, 147; NWAf, 308n; Ford, 22; Richard Doherty, Only the Enemy in Front, 7, 35; Blaxland, 117 (“gaunt and gangling figure”).

  The commandos departed: Jack A. Marshall, ASEQ, 34th Div, 168th Inf, “The Battle That Wasn’t,” ts, n.d., MHI; Jack A. Marshall, “Tales of a Timid Commando,” ts, n.d., author’s possession (“a tall, Dracula-like figure”); AAR, 1st Commando troops, n.d., C. W. Allfrey Collection, LHC, 3/5/3; Jordan, 88–93; “British Commandos,” Aug. 1942, Military Intelligence Service, WD, 7; Fussell, Wartime, 284 (“Never give the enemy”); H. Marshall, Over to Tunis, 82 (“ant in a hairbrush”); Lowell Bennett, 99; Kriegstagebuch, Div von Broich, Dec. 1, 1942, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225 (“decimated in a short fire fight”); Coon, A North Africa Story, 68 (“tall, Dracula-like figure”); Hougen, The Story of the Famous 34th Infantry Division.

  Five hundred and thirty: AAR, “Report by Lt. Col. J. D. Frost, MC,” 2nd Bn, the Parachute Regiment, n.d., PRO, WO 175/56; John Frost, Nearly There, 1; Frost, A Drop Too Many, 74 (“We were not”); Robert Peatling, Without Tradition: 2 Para, 1941–1945, 73–87 (“traveling circus” and “a medieval look”); Warren, 17; Saunders, 93–99; Tugwell, 144.

  At five P.M. the 180 men: Destruction, 177n; NWAf, 309; Rame, 179 (“Dr. Livingston”); AAFinWWII, 87.

  “Jerry Is Counterattacking!”

  In late November: chronology, Chandler, vol. v, 99; Three Years, 204–208 (“Boy Scout trip”).

  the shocking news: Auphan and Moral, 255–66 (“Scuttle!”); Cunningham, 158, 255–65; Jean-Paul Pallud, “The French Navy at Toulon,” After the Battle, 1992, 1 (“The ship is sunk!”); De Gaulle, Memoirs, 359; Boatner, 301; Three Years, 203–204.

  Of greater concern: DDE to GCM, Nov. 30, 1942, Chandler, 700 (“apparently imbued”); Clark, Calculated Risk, 134 (“the Anderson setup”); Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 48 (“nothing is more difficult”).

  Some things about the war: Hinsley, British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. II, 487 (exceeded 850), 491; DDE to GCM, Nov. 30,
1942, Chandler, 779; Three Years, 208; Abbott, 64 (“There’ll be Stukas”).

  To Eisenhower’s surprise: Huston, 478 (U.S. Army doctrine and Regulations had prohibited); Chandler, 968n (until 1941); Dickson, “G-2 Journal: Algiers to the Elbe,” MHI, 44 (“only way to hurt a Kraut”); NWAf, 480 (“Purple Heart box”); Linderman, 25 (Ronsons); Cameron, “Americanizing the Tank,” 764; Jensen, 60 (“light every time”); Robinett, Armor Command, 157 (“rat racing”).

  “My immediate aim”: DDE to GCM, Nov. 30, 1942, Chandler, 779.

  Even as this pretty delusion: Ulrich Bürker, “Einsatz der 10. Panzer Division in Tunisien,” Dec. 1947, FMS, #D-310, MHI, 15; Boog et al., 805 (“definite change” and “play for time”); NWAf, 310; Lucas, 151; Ralph Bennett, 194; Heinz Pomtow, “The Campaign in Tunisia,” FMS, #3-A, NARA RG 319, OCMH, box 225; 10th Panzer Div, “Combat Report of the Tébourba Engagement, 1–4 December 1942,” n.d., PMR, LOC Ms Div box 4; Kühn, German Paratroops in World War II, 174 (only thirty German).

  From decrypted German messages: Hinsley, British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. II, 504 (“special priority signal”); Ford, 31 (“All around us”); Rame, 164–65 (“incandescent, enormous”). Rame was the nom de plume of A. D. Divine.

  Fischer’s tanks had closed: war diary, Blade Force, Dec. 1–2, 1942, PRO, WO 175/179; “At the Front in North Africa with the U.S. Army,” NARA RG 111, Office of the Chief Signal Officer, No. 1001, Dec. 1942; AAR, 78th Div, Dec. 2, 1942, PRO, WO 175/168.

  Two German infantry groups: 10th Panzer Div., “Combat Report of the Tébourba Engagement, 1–4 December 1942” (“Not the slightest interest”); NWAf, 315–16 (the Americans retreated); R. N. Tyson to Clift Andrus, Dec. 3, 1942, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 5879.

  They came running: Moorehead, 90 (“Keep clear”); Nicholson and Forbes, 263 (“Thank God”).

  The CCB commander: “Register of Graduates,” class of 1913, USMA, 1989 ed.; Robinett, Armor Command, 87; Rame, 153.