The Liri Valley

by Mark Zuehlke

  Disaster struck the infantry regiment when a direct mortar strike blew up the Bren carrier carrying its commanding officer and entire signals section. The Ontario Tankers could no longer communicate with the infantry companies by radio. With no idea what any infantry was doing, other than those each tanker could personally see, their gunnery posed as great a danger to the British troops as to the Germans.

  At 0930 hours, antitank guns knocked out two ‘B’ Squadron tanks and Captain J.I. Nichol was wounded.30 In ‘C’ Squadron, Lieutenant J. Symons’s tank caught fire and he was severely burned.31 When ‘C’ Squadron moved a tank troop under Lieutenant J.A. Cameron across the railway, two of its tanks, including the commander’s, were struck by antitank gun fire and burst into flames.32 As the tank carrying Corporal Pete Andrew brewed, he bailed out along with all but the co-driver. This man froze with fear and could not bring himself to move. Instead he remained in his seat, screaming. Andrew jumped back into the burning Sherman and dragged the terrified and helpless man to safety. Afterwards, he said, “I didn’t want to go back. But if I hadn’t, I’d have heard that boy squeal the rest of my life.”33 When Corporal Cecil Jones’s tank was knocked out, he almost led his crew into the German lines. Realizing his mistake, he got them turned around in time. To reach their own lines, however, they had to crawl through a series of mud-filled ditches.

  In ‘A’ Squadron, Sullivan was parked next to Major Millen’s tank. The entire battle had become a fiasco. There was virtually no forward movement any more. German shells were exploding all around and snipers were trying to shoot the tank commanders whenever they looked out of their turrets. A shell went off beside Millen’s tank and he was wounded in the head and paralyzed.34 Captain Bud Hawkins took over command of ‘A’ Squadron. After trying unsuccessfully to renew the advance, the Ontario Regiment received orders to hold its ground. This meant most of the tanks had to remain in very exposed positions. The supporting artillery dropped smoke shells, particularly on the northern flank, to provide concealment. When these started thinning out dangerously, Sergeant Ken Braithwaite and Trooper Kelly Turcott jumped into a Bren carrier and raced at breakneck speed around the fringe of the airport hurling out smoke canisters in their wake.35

  The 5th Buffs had by now withdrawn behind the airport. In an apparent attempt to maintain protection of the regiment’s right flank, ‘C’ Squadron’s tanks moved in single file across the airport to where Sullivan’s tanks were holding by the ruined barracks. Sullivan and his troop watched “wide-eyed as they drove past us, without stopping or communicating with us. They circled the hangars and retraced their path, still in single file, disappearing in the woods from which they had come.”36 What exactly the manoeuvre had been intended to achieve remained a puzzle to the tankers in the other squadrons.

  The terrific fight at Aquino generated a flood of infantry casualties, who all fell back to the eastern edge of the airport. Ontario Regiment Chaplain Waldo Smith and his driver, Trooper C. Westover, helped the wounded British soldiers. Smith sent Westover back to the Regimental Aid Post with a couple of wounded men, thinking he was getting the man away from the danger posed by the constantly exploding shells and mortar rounds. The driver set off with his pipe clenched in his mouth at a jaunty angle. Suddenly, a stonk of German Nebelwerfer fire threw up dust all around the Jeep, completely obscuring it from view. Smith was sure his driver was dead, but a little later Westover returned with an undamaged Jeep to report that the wounded had been safely delivered.37

  Westover continued to shuttle wounded to the rear throughout the day, making more trips than anyone could count and personally evacuating about 180 casualties. At one point, the quartermaster, Captain Harrold, found Westover weeping with exhaustion, hunger, and despair from all he had seen. He could offer the young soldier no comfort other than a few moments of gentle sympathy. For his part, Smith was determined to get as far forward as possible to help the wounded who could not walk back on their own. He had Westover drive toward where he believed the front lines were, but a British military policeman tried to turn him back, telling him that the area ahead was under constant German fire. Smith told Westover, “Drive on! I’m on the Lord’s side!” Westover obeyed, but a few minutes later said in a diffident voice, “It’s okay for you, Padre. You’re on the Lord’s side; but whose side am I on?” Smith agreed to return to the dubious safety of the shell-torn airport.38

  Smith was dismayed to see the tanks of 26th Armoured Brigade still milling about aimlessly, “raising dust and drawing fire. The shelling was incessant. It appeared to me that the enemy had us in the centre of a two-hundred-yard bracket both in traverse and range. I kept waiting for him to split that bracket and wipe us out. The odd mortar fell among us and caused some wounds but nobody was killed.”39

  The 26th’s attack had never materialized; it had crumbled in the first minutes of the morning. Consequently, from the outset, the Buffs and the Ontario tankers had been engaged in a futile battle. At dusk, they retreated south of the airport and harboured behind the protection of regiments of 36th British Infantry Brigade. The Ontario Regiment had lost thirteen tanks, twelve to antitank fire and one to a mine. That was almost one-third of their entire combat strength. Considering the number of tanks that had burned, human casualties were remarkably light. Only five men had been wounded and one was missing.40 Every tank in the fighting squadrons had been struck by at least one antitank round. Sullivan’s tank had been hit twice by armour-piercing shot, but each round had struck the angled glacis and veered off.41 The infantry and tanks had destroyed the German positions east of the Forme d’Aquino. In the melee, the two squadrons had knocked out a German tank, a self-propelled gun, and numerous antitank guns.42

  Smith collapsed into a slit trench and slept soundly through most of the night. At one point, he was shaken awake by a trooper wanting to borrow the Jeep to evacuate a wounded man. Smith agreed and fell back to sleep. In the morning, he woke to a feeling of deep shame, realizing he had not checked the wounded man’s condition. That was his job and he had failed. This realization left him shaken and more acutely aware that he should be relieved “before further lapses of that kind should make me indifferent.”43

  In the aftermath of battle, Sullivan found ‘C’ Squadron’s commander, the officer who had led the bizarre single-file column around the edge of the airport, “sitting on the edge of a ditch with his head in his hands. He had been replaced and it occurred to me that the Fear had claimed another victim.”44

  13

  WHERE ARE YOU GOING LIKE THAT, LITTLE POT?

  Although 1st Canadian Infantry Division’s May 19 reconnaissance in force against the Hitler Line was to be conducted on a two-brigade front, the availability of a single artillery regiment for the operation relegated one brigade to a diversionary role, while the other tried for a breakthrough. The Royal Canadian Horse Artillery guns were to fire a five-minute concentration in front of 3rd Canadian Infantry Brigade’s Royal 22e Regiment and Carleton and York Regiment immediately prior to their crossing the start line at 0630 hours.1 On 3 CIB’s left flank, 1 CIB’s 48th Highlanders and the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment were to occupy a low ridgeline about a thousand yards from the Hitler Line and, if possible, probe the German wire with patrols. South of the 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade regiments, the Princess Louise Dragoons Guards’ reconnaissance regiment would sweep through the pocket lying between the road approaching Pontecorvo from the east and the northern bank of the Liri River to mop up any remaining German elements there.2

  Despite relatively heavy mortar fire, the two 1 CIB regiments reached their assigned positions by early morning. The 48th Highlanders sent a patrol of four scouts to the edge of the wire. Arriving undetected, the small patrol measured the width of the barbed-wire barrier, examined the depth of an antitank ditch, counted the number of mines emplaced in the forward lines, and discovered several narrow gaps in the wire. Still unopposed, the intrepid team measured the dimensions of several concrete pillboxes and counted th
e number of machine-gun and antitank positions along a carefully delineated length of line. This accomplished, they slipped through a gap in the wire to check out how several houses were used as defensive points.3 By the time the scouts withdrew to safety, they had assembled a detailed picture of one section of the Hitler Line, a vital piece of intelligence for those developing the Canadian set-piece attack plan.

  The Princess Louise Dragoon Guards conducted their sweep with ‘B’ and ‘C’ squadrons leading and ‘A’ Squadron in reserve. The reconnaissance regiments were equipped with four-wheeled armoured cars, mostly Fox 1 and Otter Mark 1 models.

  Shortly after setting out, the PLDG squadrons engaged elements of the Hochlund Deutschmeister Division’s Replacement Battalion, supported by several tanks and antitank guns. One ‘B’ Squadron Otter was quickly knocked out. Throughout the day, the Guardsmen fought through terrain so close that they seldom detected German positions until being fired upon. By day’s end, the PLDG had lost two men killed and six wounded. They had, however, cleared their assigned area of operations to a point paralleling that of 1 CIB’s front line.4

  The two regiments from 3 CIB got off on schedule, right on the heels of the artillery concentration. Royal 22e Regiment had ‘A’ Company out on the right and ‘D’ Company to the left. A troop of British Churchill tanks supported each company.5 To the left of the Van Doos, the Carleton and York Regiment also advanced in a two-company-forward formation with ‘A’ and ‘C’ companies leading. As usual, thick morning fog obscured the ground. First objectives were quickly reached against resistance limited to desultory sniping, which evaporated when the Canadians closed on a sniper’s position, usually situated in the tops of the scrub oaks scattered in groves among the small grain fields.

  When the Carleton and York companies reached the first objective, however, concentrated German small-arms fire and mortar and artillery bombardments caught them in the open. Most of the day’s casualties of eight killed and twenty-one wounded happened within minutes of the regiment’s coming under this fire.6 Determined to keep the attack going, Lieutenant Colonel Dick Danby ordered ‘B’ and ‘D’ companies to leapfrog past ‘A’ and ‘C’ and carry on despite the heavy fire. ‘B’ Squadron of the 51st Royal Tank Regiment was in support.7 Once clear of the open ground of the first objective, infantry casualties became light, but sniper fire took a toll on the tank commanders, sitting head and shoulders out of the turret hatches to better spot enemy positions in the dense woods.8

  Reaching the east slope of a low ridge about 800 yards from the Hitler Line’s barbed wire, Danby ordered ‘B’ Company to halt just short of the summit while Major Rowland Horsey’s ‘D’ Company and the tanks crossed over and descended the gradual slope to probe the defences. Just as ‘D’ Company was heading for the summit, 3 CIB commander Brigadier Paul Bernatchez ordered the Carleton and York Regiment to halt and assume a holding position on the ridge’s east slope. The Van Doos, Bernatchez said, had met stiff opposition and, with only one regiment of artillery available, he was dedicating all guns to their support. Danby and his men were to sit tight until R22eR’s situation stabilized.9

  The Van Doos had run into heavy fire about 800 yards from the wire, just after Lieutenant Colonel Jean Allard had switched Captain Pierre Potvin’s ‘B’ Company and Major Charles Bellavance’s ‘C’ Company into the lead. Allard ordered this change so that ‘A’ and ‘D’ companies would be close behind the two leading companies, ready “to provide back-up support and even expand rapidly on the penetration which ‘B’ and ‘C’ companies were now preparing to effect.” He hoped to get inside the Hitler Line defences before the fog burned off.10 Potvin and Bellavance’s objective was a height of land to the immediate west of the Pontecorvo-Aquino road, itself about one-third of a mile west of the Hitler Line.

  As Potvin’s company moved through ‘D’ Company, he saw its commander, Major Ovila Garceau, leaning nonchalantly against the door of a house. “Where are you going like that, Little Pot?” Garceau asked in his customary slow drawl. Trying to mimic his good friend’s casual demeanour, Potvin replied, “We’re off to kill some Tedeschi.”11

  With the Carleton and York Regiment halted behind the Van Doos’ current position and no sign of anybody from the British 78th Division on the right, both regimental flanks were badly exposed. Suddenly, all the companies started taking small-arms fire from the surrounding woods. The men dropped down into the cover of the grain field in which they had been forming for the renewed advance. Potvin and the other company commanders realized that their men were now caught in a dangerous salient. If they were not to withdraw, they must attack. But Allard still did not give the order.12

  Some of Potvin’s men returned fire, despite the lack of obvious targets. Knowing they might need all their ammunition later, Potvin told his men to cease fire. He considered sending a fighting patrol into the woods to clear the Germans, but rejected the idea — he would probably end up with those men tangled in a firefight that would be hard to break off and that could throw the entire attack off balance. Finally, Potvin ran over to his assigned tank troop commander’s Churchill and asked him to machine-gun the Germans. Once the tank raked the tree line with its machine guns and then fired a high-explosive round into it, the German fire abruptly ceased.

  At 0935 hours — about thirty minutes after the men had first formed up in the grain field — the attack order came. Potvin’s company set off with his three tanks in support, but he soon realized that ‘C’ Company was not moving. “Bellavance’s radio must be out,” he thought. Seeing Lieutenant Claude Gagnon nearby, Potvin shouted that the attack was on and to tell his commander. When Gagnon was unable to raise Bellavance by radio, he waved his own platoon forward. As this platoon joined Potvin’s advance, the rest of ‘C’ Company rose up out of the grain and followed.

  Potvin led his men directly toward a small wood from which much of the harassing German small-arms fire had emanated. The troops ran forward eagerly, firing from the hip and yelling in French, “Let’s get those Germans!” As his men closed on the wood, the Germans scattered. A good number of German dead were left behind, testimony to the effectiveness of the earlier tank fire. As his men chased after the Germans, ‘B’ Company started to become disorganized. Potvin had to move quickly to regain control and get the men moving toward the objective, rather than engaging in a melee with the fleeing Germans.

  Breaking out of the thin patch of woods, ‘B’ Company entered another wheat field. This time the grain was shoulder high. Potvin could hardly see any of his men. Reaching a small rise, he looked about frantically, able only to see men’s helmets “floating on a sea of wheat.” The captain could find his way only by taking compass readings. He shouted course changes to his invisible men and they in turn passed the corrections along the line. Looking behind him, Potvin saw that the tanks were just coming around the edge of the woods and were at least 500 yards back. “Some close support,” he muttered. Still, the field was completely level, so they should soon catch up.

  Men hidden in the tall grain were calling for stretcher-bearers. The steady sniper and machine-gun fire was taking its toll. Increasingly heavy artillery, mortar, and Nebelwerfer concentrations were wounding others. With bayonets fixed, the sweat-lathered infantrymen pressed on stoically through the intensifying fire from unseen positions. Potvin realized his company was now “entering the main defences of the Hitler Line, which at this particular place looked like a giant horseshoe with its arms turned toward us, as though to invite us into its killing ground.” On the right, ‘C’ Company had disappeared in the grain. Potvin had no idea whether his company attacked alone or with Bellavance’s company still on line. The tanks had also disappeared. As the enemy fire escalated, the air filled with dust thrown up by exploding artillery and mortar rounds. Adding to the chaos was the acrid smell of gunpowder and the deafening racket of gunfire and explosions. The Van Doos pressed on, firing from the hip at Germans crouching in slit trenches. Other Germans ran away, zigzagging
wildly to avoid being hit. Most escaped; a few fell dead or wounded. ‘B’ Company started taking fire from behind, as snipers who had remained hidden in the scattered trees while the Van Doos passed now opened up.

  Leading his small headquarters section up a cart track that cut through the wheat field, Potvin realized he was ahead of the company’s two forward platoons when the section came up abruptly against barbed wire. From right behind the wire, a machine-gun position started firing, driving his section to ground. Hoping to find a route for attacking the gun, Potvin crawled up a small hillock. About thirty yards away from him was the concrete pillbox housing the gun position. Potvin heard both Lieutenant Audrin and Company Sergeant Major R. Drapeau shouting at him to take cover.

  Audrin spotted a German light machine–gunner slipping into a trench about ten yards to the right and pointed the man out to one of his Bren gunners. The gunner, just a few feet from Potvin, emptied a thirty-round magazine into the German. Potvin called to Audrin to move men past the dead German’s position and outflank the main machine-gun position. The Bren gunner said he would go with Audrin, but he needed fresh magazines. Potvin gestured to a man nearby to throw him a magazine, so he could in turn toss it to the gunner. As the soldier pitched the magazine over, a bullet struck Potvin’s shoulder and passed out the other side. Potvin felt as if he had “been hit by a giant fist.” Although he felt dizzy, there was no evident blood. “Must have just been the magazine hitting me,” he thought.