That calumny: “Notes on Converation Between Commander 13 Corps and Lieut. Col. Nangle, commanding 1/9 Ghurka Rifles,” ts, May 28, 1944, in diary, General Sir Sidney Chevalier Kirkman, Jan.–Sept. 1944, LHC; Trevelyan, 207 (paper bag holding a carrier pigeon); Smith, 138 (“spot of shooing”); Kirkman, article on 3rd and 4th Cassino, 94+.
At 8:15 P.M. on Friday, March 24: “Operations of N.Z. Corps,” 43–44; Molony V, 801n; Majdalany, Cassino, 204, 209 (keg of rum); Smith, 138 (“Never will I forget”).
By late Saturday, a swastika flag: Senger, “War Diary of the Italian Campaign,” 93; Trevelyan, 208 (“a heavy fall of snow”).
The New Zealand Corps disbanded at noon: Prasad, ed., 142; Phillips, 341; Molony V, 803. During the last three weeks of March, the 1st Parachute and 15th Panzer Grenadier Divisions reported 1,800 casualties, but during the eleven-day battle for Cassino in March the German losses are estimated at roughly 1,200.
“that valley of evil memory”: Parton, 360; GK, March 24, 1944.
“a persistent feeling that something, somewhere”: StoC, 447; Molony V, 806; Smith, 141 (“The strongest defences in Europe”); Phillips, 344 (“little of that tactical originality”).
Something had gone wrong: Brian Holden Reid, “The Italian Campaign, 1943–1945:A Reappraisal of Allied Generalship,” Journal of Strategic Studies, March 1990, 128+; OH, Andrew J. Goodpaster, Aug. 17, 2004, author (“unsynchronized schemes”); OH, Robert J. Wood, March 4 and 15, 1948, SM, MHI (probing for soft spots); “Report on Cassino Operations,” June 5, 1944, HQ, Fifth Army, Robert J. Wood papers, MHI, 21 (almost 600,000 artillery shells); Phillips, 338 (“a battle of the First World War”).
the strategy of “naked attrition”: Molony V, 806n, 835, 852 (“a crawling monster”); Chester G. Starr, ed., From Salerno to the Alps, 120 (six hundred tanks parked); Phillips, 339 (never could fling more than one-tenth); J.F.C. Fuller, The Second World War, 1939–1945, 272; Reid, “The Italian Campaign, 1943–1945,” 128+; Smith, 144 (“military sins no less”).
“Bombardment alone never had”: Calculated, 331; corr, E. N. Harmon to MWC, March 28, 1944, ENH, box 1.
“A little later when snow goes off”: Churchill, Closing the Ring, 509 (“war weighs very heavy”); Fuller, 274 (“presiding deity”).
It weighed heavy on the far side: Senger, Neither Fear nor Hope, 219.
Dragonflies in the Sun
“After you get whipped and humiliated”: Parker, 69; Howard H. Peckham and Shirley A. Snyder, eds., Letters from Fighting Hoosiers, vol. 2, 71 (“a callousness to death”); corr, 324th Service Group, n.d., censorship morale reports, NARA RG 492, MTO, AG, 311.7 (“We get quite a kick”).
“One goes on fighting, killing”: Trevelyan, 1; Sevareid, 417; John Muirhead, Those Who Fall, 4, 122.
“Watched an amputation last night”: diary, John G. Wright, American Field Service driver, May 29, 1944, author’s possession, 26; Schrijvers, 77 (“possessed by a fury”); e-mail, David Roberts to author, May 23, 2003 (flatulent noises); J. Glenn Gray, The Warriors, 139, 164 (“help me to keep my humanity”).
A survey of infantry divisions: Schrijvers, 77; John B. Romeiser, ed., Combat Reporter, 211 (“The more you hate”); Wagner, 64 (“He has no right to do this”); Collins, 97 (wounded German prisoners); Trevelyan, 149 (“sure hate their guts”).
“There’s no rules in this war”: Quentin Reynolds, The Curtain Rises, 212; “Comment Sheets,” censorship reports, NARA RG 492, MTO G-2, box 387 (“Take No Prisoners”).
“three R’s—ruthless, relentless, remorseless”: diary, Norman Lee Baldwin, Dec. 13, 1943, HIA, N. L. Baldwin papers.
“This is a war for keeps”: Annette Tapert, ed., Lines of Battle, 124.
Eager boys no longer scaled: John Patrick Carroll-Abbing, But for the Grace of God, 63; Daniel Lang, “Letter from Rome,” New Yorker, July 15, 1944 (Allied flags flapped); Jane Scrivener, Inside Rome with the Germans, 26 (Jumpy German sentries).
“dragonflies in the sun”: Scrivener, 60, 134–35 (those queued up for water); Robert Katz, The Battle for Rome, 205–19 (a B-17 day); Trevelyan, 229–30 (Graffiti on city walls); George F. Botjer, Sideshow War, 103 (“Allies, don’t worry”).
“Everything went”: Scrivener, 36; Walter von Unruh, “Inspection of Italian Theater of War,” 1947, FMS, #D-016, MHI, 17 (“Do you want work?”); Walter Warlimont, “OKW Activities—The Italian Theater, 1 Apr.–31 Dec. 1944,” n.d., FMS, #C-099b, MHI, 13 (Fifty thousand Italians).
The shadows soon deepened: Michael Burleigh, The Third Reich, 741–42; Richard Lamb, War in Italy, 1943–1945, 41–42 (arrest all Jews in the city), 55; Botjer, 100 (son of a Stuttgart chauffeur); Trevelyan, 62, 117 (“intolerant, cold, vengeful”); Alessandro Portelli, The Order Has Been Carried Out, 85–86; Martin Gilbert, The Second World War, 467; Katz, 71–75; Dan Kurzman, The Race for Rome, 61; U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Web site, articles on Italy and Rome, http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/.
Even for Romans not facing extermination: C.R.S. Harris, Allied Administration of Italy, 1943–1945, 170; Trevelyan, 229 (felling trees); Robert H. Adleman and George Walton, Rome Fell Today, 81–82 (neighborhoods went without power); “Contributions of Italy Toward the Allied War Effort,” Aug. 31, 1945, OSS, MHI Lib, 38n (infant mortality spiked); Kurt Mälzer, “The Problem of Rome During the Fighting Near Anzio-Nettuno,” Jan. 1948, FMS, #D-314, MHI, 8 (destruction of supply trucks).
Prices doubled: Botjer, 92; Katz, 283, 276 (shot them as they faced the Tiber); Trevelyan, 229 (ground chickpeas).
Blackshirts finding a film too tedious: Botjer, 95; Scrivener, 148 (five hundred eavesdroppers), 152 (priest condemned for subversion); Trevelyan, 287; Portelli, 125.
Soon half of Rome was said to be hiding: Lang, “Letter from Rome” Trevelyan, 97; Kurzman, 183 (had their shoes removed); Anthony Cave Brown, The Last Hero, 492 (“They pulled out the hairs”); Riccardo Luzzatto, Unknown War in Italy, 114 (“Long live Italy”).
Allied planes flying from Brindisi: “History of Special Operations (Air) in the Mediterranean Theater,” n.d., U.K., NARA RG 94, E 427, 95-USF-2-0.3.0, 270/50/29-30/G-1, 5; Eugene Warner, “Morale Operations, Report for 16–30 April 1944,” HQ 2677th HQ Co., OSS, MO branch, NARA RG 226, OSS history office, E 99, box 25, folder 1, 1–9 (Intended to inspirit Italian insurgents); OSS activities, March 1944, NATOUSA, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS history office, box 122; Anthony Cave Brown, ed., The Secret War Report of the OSS, 222 (Das Neue Deutschland).
In Rome, the OSS by March 1944: “Italian Operations Centering on Rome,” n.d., NARA RG 226, OSS history office, E, 99, box 41; Carl J. Friedrich, ed., American Experiences in Military Government in World War II, 133; Patrick K. O’Donnell, Operatives, Spies, and Saboteurs, 62 (German order of battle).
No OSS spy in Rome was more flamboyant: Katz, 49; http://muse.jhu.edu/cgi-bin/access.cgi?uri=/journals/annual_of_bernard_shaw_studies/v024/24.1carter.html (George Bernard Shaw); diary, Peter Tompkins, Jan. 1944, NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS history office, 190/6/10/7, box 47, 21, 42, 49 (a Roman prince); “Peter Tompkins, Author,” obituary, WP, Feb. 1, 2007, B-6.
Favoring a blue sharkskin suit: Katz, 144; Peter Tompkins, “The OSS and Italian Partisans in World War II,” Studies in Intelligence, spring 1998, http://www.cia.gov/csi/studies/spring98/OSS.html (daily radio bulletins); Brown, The Last Hero, 487–88, 495; “Italian Operations Centering on Rome.”
Still, it was part of the good fight: diary, Tompkins, Feb.–March 1944, 55–58, 77, 61, 67, 70–71, 130; Brown, ed., 202; Brown, The Last Hero, 494.
An estimated 25,000 Italian partisans: “Contributions of Italy Toward the Allied War Effort,” 26–27; “The Resistance Movement in German-Controlled Italy,” CCS Joint Intel Committee, March 8, 1944, weekly summary, #61, NARA RG 334, NWC Lib, box 326; Luzzatto, 80–82.
“Singing at the top of our lungs”: Katz, 204.
From the Piazza del Popolo: diary, Tompkins, 127–28; Portelli, 134.
He was in fact a medical student: Katz, 49–51, 57–62; Portelli,
161; author visits, May 10, 2004, Dec. 1, 2006.
As the singing troops approached: transcript, war crimes trial of Albert Kesselring, Feb.–Apr. 1947, Venice, NARA RG 492, MTO, AG HQ, 290/53/32/5-6, 000.5, boxes 816–18; Katz, 62, 72, 224.
“blown down by a great wind”: Trevelyan, 213; Portelli, 136–37, 139 (“pulp with a coat”); Katz, 68; diary, Tompkins, 127–28 (at least one head); Trevelyan, 213 (firing wildly).
Lieutenant Colonel Kappler was enjoying: Katz, 58–62; transcript, Kesselring trial (thirty-two men dead); Kurzman, 176 (“Revenge!”); Portelli, 142 (water and salt).
Late that afternoon the German high command: transcript, Kesselring trial.
“I am giving you now a Führer order”: ibid.; Kenneth Macksey, Kesselring: The Making of the Luftwaffe, 207; Lamb, 57.
Kappler spent all night: Katz, 101, 116–18; Lamb, 59 (Kappler added fifteen more); Trevelyan, 222; Portelli, 150, 175.
“I feel the flowers growing”: http://www.john-keats.com/biografie/chapter_viii.htm#last_days_and_death; Portelli, 7 (tuberoses perfumed the air); transcript, Kesseling trial (Five sharp cracks).
Five by five by five they staggered: Katz, 140–42; Portelli, 28.
Relatives of the dead from the Bozen Regiment: Botjer, 100.
A brief public statement: Katz, 273; Lamb, 61; “Under the German Yoke,” ts, n.d., CEOH, X-39, 12–13, 16 (“You will be avenged”).
“When Rome falls”: memo, Wallace Carroll to “Bannes,” Psychological Warfare Bureau, May 31, 1944, Wallace Carroll papers, LOC, box 1, folder 6.
Not for three months: diary, Tompkins, Jan. 19, 1944; statement, Brother Robert Pace, Oct. 1946, NARA RG 492, JAG war crimes branch, box 2046; Portelli, 191.
some Roman families received a curt note: Portelli, 188, and jacket art from archive of the Associazione Nazionale tra le Famiglie Italiane dei Martiri.
“I dream of the hills”: Trevelyan, 230.
CHAPTER 11: A KETTLE OF GRIEF
Dead Country
Fifth Army meteorologists for months: Charles C. Bates and John F. Fuller, America’s Weather Warriors, 257, 282n; William Murray, “Naples: Variations on a Neapolitan Air,” NYT, Nov. 19, 2000 (one eye open); Tom Gidwitz, “The Hero of Vesuvius,” 2005, http://www.vesuvius.tomgidwitz.com/html/the_hero_of_vesuvius.html, chapter 7; “Activity of Vesuvius Between 1631 and 1944,” http://vulcan.fis.uniroma3.it/vesuvio/1944eng_text.html; “Vesuvioinrete, il portale del vulcano Vesuvio,” http://www.vesuvioinrete.it/e_storia.htm; Moorehead, Eclipse, 69; memo on Vesuvius eruption, “Report of Mission,” May 5, 1944, Fifth Army, MWC corr, Citadel, box 3 (the smoke stopped); Spike Milligan, Where Have All the Bullets Gone?, 20–21 (more anxious).
The eruption began at 4:30 P.M.: Susan Sontag, The Volcano Lover, in Alice Leccese Powers, Italy in Mind, 288–89; Walter L. Medding, “The Road to Rome,” ts, n.d., CEOH, box X-38, 58; Alton D. Brashear, From Lee to Bari, 203–5; Eric Sevareid, Not So Wild a Dream, 367–69 (“The risk of life”); Norman Lewis, Naples ’44, 104–6; Texas, 342 (Peasants wept).
Just after nine P.M. on Tuesday: Milligan, 20–21; memo on Vesuvius eruption, “Report of Mission” (incandescent sheets); “Activity of Vesuvius Between 1631 and 1944,” http://vulcan.fis.uniroma3.it/vesuvio/1944eng_text.html; Kenn C. Rust, Twelfth Air Force Story, 32; “Pliny the Younger’s Observations,” http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/final/pliny.html; Michael Howard, Captain Professor, 86.
“Smoke of a thick oily character”: Harold Macmillan, War Diaries, 397; David Erskin, The Scots Guards, 1919–1955, 229; Brashear, 207 (snow showers); Wynford Vaughan-Thomas, Anzio, 212–13 (“this gesture of the gods”); Lavinia Orde, “Better Late Than Never,” ts, n.d., IWM, 96/34/1, 186; memoir, Aidan Mark Sprot, ts, 1947, LHC, 115.
Twenty-six deaths were reported: “Who’s Afraid of Vesuvius?” NYT, Aug. 26, 2003; Brashear, 203–5; H. H. Dunham, “U.S. Army Transportation and the Italian Campaign,” Sept. 1945, monograph #17, ASF, Chief of Transportation, NARA RG 336, 190/33/30/00, box 142, 199 (Rail lines remained blocked); Rust, 32; “History of the Aviation Engineers in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations,” June 1946, AAF Engineer Command, CEOH, X-39 (“enemy rocks”).
Ash mixed with rain: W. H. Connerat, Jr., “Ordnance in the North Africa and Med Theater,” ts, n.d., AFHQ, SM, MHI, box 2; corr, J.W. Crawford, Jr., Jan. 3, 2003, to author (“Sweepers, start your brooms”); Fred Howard, Whistle While You Wait, 165 (“Never trust a volcano”).
The world had not ended: Peter Verney, Anzio 1944, 156 (“Anzio Worse Than Salerno”); Anzio Beachhead, 105–6; Warren P. Munsell, Jr., The Story of a Regiment, 65.
Wide-eyed they lined the rails: Vaughan-Thomas, 191; memo, F. J. Lowry, “Guide to Merchant Vessels Unloading at Anzio,” March 7, 1944, SEM, NHC, box 47 (“The chances of being hit”); “History of Ordnance Service in the Mediterranean Theater,” ts, n.d., CMH, 8-4 JA, 85 (fifty vehicles from an LST deck); “Report on Port and Beach Operations at Anzio,” Apr. 29, 1944, 540th Engineer Combat Regt, NARA RG 334, NWC Lib, box 343 (three tons of cargo into a DUKW); “The United States Eighth Fleet,” ts, n.d., in “The Administrative History of the Eighth Fleet,” #139, NHC, folder 2, 3 (277 Luftwaffe raids); Charles Moran, “The Anzio-Nettuno Landings, January 1944,” ts, n.d., SEM, NHC, box 49, 56; memo, “Radio-Controlled Bombs Can Be Jammed,” March 10, 1945, SEM, NHC, box 47, 5–7 (Fritz-X bombs).
The toll could be seen in the hundred or so casualties: Beachhead casualties in early spring 1944 averaged 107 per day. Anzio Beachhead, 105–6; “Evacuation of Casualties by L.S.T.,” Apr. 1944, HQ, Combined Operations, GB COB X-22, NARA RG 334 NWC Lib, box 461.
wounded men on litters: Pyle, 196–97; Paul A. Cundiff, 45th Infantry CP, 159 (outscreamed the screaming shells); OH, Russell W. Cloer, 7th Inf, May 26, 2006, with author (“You came here to suffer”).
A British officer arriving in March: David Cole, Rough Road to Rome, 191–92; Lloyd Clark, Anzio, 226 (“a very moth eaten look”); memoir, Henry E. Gardiner, ts, n.d., USMA Arch, 238.
Most of the cargo hoisted: “History of Ordnance Service in the Mediterranean Theater,” 85, 88–91; “Engineer History, Fifth Army, Mediterranean Theater,” n.d., MHI, 101; Charles D’Orsa, “Trials and Tribulations of an Army G-4,” ts, n.d., Fifth Army, CARL, N-4906, 10. Further complicating Anzio logistics was the fact that most British and American weapons used incompatible ammunition. John A. Hixson, “Operation SHINGLE,” Military Review, March 1989, 64+.
That the cost was not greater: Chester G. Starr, ed., From Salerno to the Alps, 173; Paul W. Pritchard, “Smoke Generator Operations in the Mediterranean and European Theaters of Operation,” n.d., CMH, 4-7.1 FA 1; Walter A. Guild, “That Damned Smoke Again,” IJ, Oct. 1944, 25+; Brooks E. Kleber and Dale Birdsell, The Chemical Warfare Service: Chemicals in Combat, 336–39.
Six Allied divisions: Milton Bracker, “Anzio, 20 Years After Battle, Evokes Memories,” NYT, Jan. 22, 1964; Masayo Umezawa Duus, Unlikely Liberators, 131 (“Dracula days”); OH, Michael S. Davison, 1976, Douglas H. Farmer and Dale K. Brudvig, SOOHP, MHI, 43 (soldiers near the “dead country”); Audie Murphy, To Hell and Back, 117 (“We believe nothing”); George F. Howe, The Battle History of the 1st Armored Division, 305; Vaughan-Thomas, 193; Robert Capa, Slightly out of Focus, 124; Bill Mauldin, Up Front, 193.
The demand for sandbags: Leo J. Meyer, “Strategy and Logistical History: MTO,” ts, n.d., CMH, 2-3.7 CC5, XXII-26; Tom Roe, Anzio Beachhead, 82 (Mr. Lucky); Adrian Clements Gore, “This Was the Way It Was,” Enid A. Gore, ed., 1987, IWM, 90/29/1, 23 (“with one ear cocked”); Munsell, 60, 63 (“Men dreamed of steaks”); Lawrence D. Collins, The 56th Evac Hospital, 192 (“anziopectoris”); Vaughan-Thomas, 191 (“Anzonians”).
“The main thing you want”: Reporting World War II, vol. 2, 56; Lee G. Miller, The Story of Ernie Pyle, 314; Don Whitehead, “Beachhead Don,” 106 (“palsied old gentleman”); James Tobin, Ernie Pyle’s War, 152 (“Instead of growing stronger”).
Those perturbations only intensified: David Nichols, ed
., Ernie’s War, 238–42 (“pressing your luck”); Lee G. Miller, An Ernie Pyle Album, 96–97 (“cut on my right cheek”). Pyle returned to London, where he learned he had won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting in 1943.
Lucian Truscott had also pressed his luck: OH, James M. Wilson, Jr., former LKT Jr. aide, Apr. 23, 2004, author, Washington, D.C.
“I have almost become oblivious”: corr, LKT Jr. to Sarah, March 8, 13, 26 and Apr. 18, 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 1, folder 6.
His throat still nagged him: aide’s diary, Apr. 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 18, folder; diary, March 1, 2, 9, 12, 18, 19, 22, 30, 1944, VI Corps, Don E. Carleton papers, HIA, box 1; corr, LKT Jr. to Sarah, Apr. 16, 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 1, folder 6 (“lack of voice”); diary fragment, Fred Walker, n.d., NARA RG 319, OCMH, CA, box 006; OH, Harry Lemley, 1974, Gerald F. Feeney, SOOHP, MHI, 2/44-51 (remained energetic, buoyant).
“I can close my eyes and imagine”: corr, LKT Jr. to Sarah, Apr. 19, 1944, LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 1, folder 6; diary, Apr. 7, 9 (slept eight hours straight), 17, 1944, VI Corps, Don E. Carleton papers, HIA, box 1; Hugh A. Scott, The Blue and White Devils, 113 (bathrobe and slippers).
But heartbreak was never further away: Emajean Jordan Buechner, Sparks, 97–98.
Truscott had ordered the beachhead evacuated: C.R.S. Harris, Allied Administration of Italy, 1943–1945, 160; StoC, 451; Daniel J. Petruzzi, My War Against the Land of My Ancestors, 250; Francesco Rossi and Silvano Casaldi, Those Days at Nettuno, 201; corr, Ivar H. Aas to parents, March 24, 1944, provided author by Andrew Carroll; diary, Robert M. Marsh, March 9, 1944, 81st Armored Reconnaissance Bn, 1st AD, ASEQ, MHI (cesarean delivery with an ax).
“This beachhead is the craziest place”: corr, William J. Segan to Herman H. Segan, May 6, 1944, author’s possession; Robert D. Burhans, The First Special Service Force, 194; Robert H. Adleman and George Walton, The Devil’s Brigade, 177, 190; Carlo D’Este, Fatal Decision, 322 (“I can’t do a thing”); Harold B. Simpson, Audie Murphy, American Soldier, 92; Dan Kurzman, The Race for Rome, 259–59; Duus, 130 (watercress garnishes).