The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 (The Liberation Trilogy) by Rick Atkinson


  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).

  Troops played baseball: Edmund F. Ball, Staff Officer with the Fifth Army, 327; Flint Whitlock, The Rock of Anzio, 260; William L. Allen, Anzio: Edge of Disaster, 130 (water-skiers); Ralph G. Martin, The G.I. War, 1941–1945, 141; Fred Sheehan, Anzio: Epic of Bravery, 174; Bill Harr, Combat Boots, 82–93.

  More than thirty Anzonian newspapers: Edgar Clark, “Anzio Papers Headline Men Who Make the News,” May 1, 1944, Stars and Stripes, draft, SM, MHI, box 2; John Lardner, “Anzio, February 10th,” in The New Yorker Book of War Pieces, 263 (“following rats”); Verney, 227 (beetle racing); George Aris, The Fifth British Division, 1939 to 1945, 220, 225 (Thousand of dollars were wagered).

  Alcohol provided some consolation: Charles F. Marshall, A Ramble Through My War, 73 (“catacomb courage”); Allen, 130; F. Eugene Liggett, “No, Not Yet: Military Memoirs,” ts, n.d., 158th FA, ASEQ, MHI, 6 (“Plastered in Paris”); diary, Marsh, May 10, 1944 (“The still blew up”); Stars and Stripes, Apr. 25, 28, 1944, Italy edition, 1 (first authorized beer).

  Toffey’s change-of-command party: JJT, XII-27; Nathan William White, From Fedala to Berchtesgaden, 98.

  “There are days and other days”: JJT, XII-23, XIII-3, XIII-17 (“Efficiency in general”) XII-12 (“seen about enough of Italy”); White, 98 (he had come full circle).

  Only a few miles from the beetle races: Vaughan-Thomas, 199, 202; Hans Paul Joachim Liebschner, “Iron Cross Roads,” ts, 1999, IWM, 99/82/1, 82–83; corr, Albert Lewis Pyle to Carl Swickerath, Feb. 23, 1973, ALM, box 1 (“Roosevelt is a Jew”); Trevelyan, 208 (trapped rats in empty sandbags); R. W. Komer, “Report on Historical Observation from the Field,” Feb. 24, 1944, Chester G. Starr papers, HIA, box 1.

  No field glasses could reveal: “The German Operation at Anzio,” Apr. 1946, Military Intelligence Division, WD, JPL papers, MHI, box 9, 75, 86–87, 99 (“German divisions are battle weary”); Walter Kühn, “The Artillery at Anzio-Nettuno,” March 1947, FMS, D-158, CARL, N-17500.838.2, 11–13 (“blast and gouge effect”); Arthur Robert Moore, “Memoirs—World War II,” ts, 1993, 1st AR, 1st AD, ASEQ, MHI, 5–6; Robley D. Evans et al., “American Armor at Anzio,” ts, May 1949, CARL, N-490214, 80; Verney, 211 (“Call the roll, Kesselring”).

  A pair of seventy-foot barrels, named Robert and Leopold: R. J. O’Rourke, Anzio Annie, 23, 43, 91–94, 141, 164; Francesco Rossi and Silvano Casaldi, Those Days at Nettuno, 177; Lida Mayo, The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront, 200; Marshall, 45.

  Yet it was the close fight: White, 98; Donald E. MacDonald, “My Buttons Are in the Way,” s.p., 1952, HIA, 77n (“saving it to use on Hitler”); “Training Notes from the Sicilian Campaign,” Oct. 25, 1943, AFHQ, G-3, CMH, Geog Sicily 353, 28 (“pickers-off”); OH, William P. Yarborough, 1975, J. R. Meese and H. P. Houser, SOOHP, MHI, 63 (shield their eyes).

  “The march up is something”: MacDonald, “My Buttons Are in the Way,” 26; Whitlock, 255 (“skeletons in clothes”); Joseph A. Springer, Black Devil Brigade, 145 (Scouts sniffed the air); David McClure, “How Audie Murphy Won His Medals,” ts, Oct. 1969, and David McClure, “Audie Murphy,” ts, Jan. 1958, both in ALM, box 1.

  More than four billion Allied leaflets: “Psychological Warfare in the Mediterranean Theater,” Aug. 1945, MTO; Margaret Bourke-White, Purple Heart Valley, 167 (“Where is the hot water?”); Burhans, 193 (“Abe Levy” series), 199; Roe, 85 (“What goes on at home”); William Woodruff, Vessel of Sadness, 139 (“very cheeky”).

  Enemies who could not be talked from their works: Starr, ed., 171; Robert J. Williams, observer report, n.d., #93, NARA RG 337, E 15A, box 53; Springer, 165 (das dicke Ende kommt); AAR, 3rd ID, Apr. 14, 1944, DRL, Ft. B; William P. Yarborough, “House Party in Jerryland,” IJ, July 1944, 8+ (“House 5 and 6”).


  In this “kettle of grief”: O’Rourke, 150; memoir, Gardiner, 243–44; “Engineer History, Fifth Army, Mediterranean Theater,” n.d., CMH, 9-2.5 AB, 90 (bomb on a combat engineer bivouac); memoir, James R. Pritchard, ts, n.d., 68th Armored FA Bn, 1st AD, ASEQ, MHI, 35 (pierced their Piper Grasshopper); T. Moffatt Burriss, Strike and Hold, 78 (“holding his face together”); Adleman and Walton, 190 (“got an extra foot”).

  “Yesterday made 60 days”: censorship morale reports, Nov. 1943–June 1944, NARA RG 492, MTO AG, 311.7, box 931 (“All the boys who never prayed”); “Lessons from the Italian Campaign,” March 15, 1945, HQ, MTO, CMH, Ital. 353, 72 (“foxhole-itis”); Collins, 190 (S.I.W.); OH, John A. Heintges, 1974, Jack A. Pellicci, SOOHP, MHI, 231 (bottle of tranquilizers); Albert E. Cowdrey, Fighting for Life, 150 (Anzio Beachhead Psychiatric Society); MacDonald, 43 (“stumbling figure”).

  “This war has become a very personal affair”: censorship morale reports, Nov. 1943–June 1944; Michael Gonzalez, curator, 45th ID Mus, to author, March 25, 2005 (German scalps); letter, “Bob” to family in New Haven, Conn., Apr. 20, 1944, MCC, YU (“Henry would shoot him again”); Woodruff, 144 (“struggle so hard”); Liebschner, “Iron Cross Roads,” 82 (“simply refused to die”); Martin, 127 (“What’s your name now”).

  The days warmed, the seasons advanced: memoir, Gardiner, 231; memoir, Pritchard, 35 (camouflaging craters); “Fifth Army Medical History,” ts, n.d., NARA RG 112, MTO surgeon general, 390/17/8/2-3, box 6, 91–98; Meyer, “Stratgy and Logistical History: MTO,” XXII-30.

  “We seem to be having phenomenal success”: Collins, 167–69, 179; Edward D. Churchil, Surgeon to Soldiers, 279.

  The new season stirred the dull roots: “Report of William Russell Criss,” ts, n.d., 45th ID Mus, 317 (“getting us fat”); Marshall, 30 (Axis Sally).

  “Next to missing you all terribly”: JJT, XIII-13; D’Este, 418 (“where many of us ceased to be young”).

  “Put the Fear of God into Them”

  High above the mud and the misery: “Air Power in the Mediterranean,” Feb. 1945, MAAF, historical section, MHI, 7, 10, 33 (“non-operational”); F. M. Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE: A Case Study of Tactical Air Interdiction,” Feb. 1972, RAND, R-851, 11 (Barely five hundred German planes); Edward B. Westermann, Flak, 234 (4,300 German flak batteries).

  a crewman flying from Italy listed in his diary: Mina Curtiss, ed., Letters Home, 318; Albert F. Simpson, “Air Phase of the Italian Campaign to 1 January 1944,” June 1946, AAFRH-115, CMH, 239, 255, 265, 365n; AAFinWWII, vol. 3, 55, 66 (growing pains); Kenn C. Rust, Fifteenth Air Force Story, 19 (“disorganized mob”).

  Losses in the fall of 1943: Tami Davis Biddle, Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare, 224; Geoffrey Perret, Winged Victory, 265–69; “Target Priorities of the Eighth Air Force,” May 15, 1945, HQ, Eighth AF, director of intel, Office of AF History, Bolling AFB, Md., 520.317A, 13; corr, Arthur T. Harris to Ira C. Eaker, Nov. 4, 1943, Eaker papers, Eighth AF corr, LOC, box 19 (“small coal and steel towns”); memo, H.H. Arnold, “Progress Made by the RAF and U.S. Eighth Air Force in the Combined Bomber Offensive,” Nov. 7, 1943, NARA RG 243, section 3, envelope 194 (bomb damage at Coventry); Martin Gilbert, Winston Churchill’s War Leadership, 44, 89 (“ever learned to fly”).

  As the war’s fifth winter ended: Westermann, 1 (over a million civilians); Biddle, 174, 205–7 (long-range fighters); AAFinWWII, vol. 3, 49; Richard G. Davis, Carl A. Spaatz and the Air War in Europe, 66; Leroy W. Newby, Target Ploesti, 38 (“barroom brawlers”); “Eighth Air Force Tactical Development,” July 1945, Eighth AF, MHI (“fear of God”).

  offensive code-named ARGUMENT: Glenn Infield, Big Week, 4, 44; AAFinWWII, vol. 3, 43 (Allied losses were bitter); James H. Doolittle, I Could Never Be So Lucky Again, 396 (more Luftwaffe planes); Davis, 322–26; John Ellis, Brute Force, 195, 204; Bernard C. Nalty et al., With Courage, 225, 228 (less than a month); e-mail, Conred C. Crane to author, March 2, 2007.

  “un-gear the German war economy”: “The Effect of Allied Strategic Bombing on the Present Status of the War,” Feb. 2, 1945, in “Air Power in the Mediterranean,” 7, 10, 33; H. H. Arnold, Global Mission, 328; “An Analysis of the Weather Factor in This War,” Apr. 1944, NARA RG 334, NWC Lib, AAF WIB A 4-44, box 27 (average two tons of high explosives); “Target Priorities of the Eighth Air Force,” 21–23 (German synthetic oil facilities).

  Even so, the hard winter for airmen: Davis, 358, 379; Charles R. Shrader, “Amicicide: The Problem of Friendly Fire in Modern War,” Dec. 1982, CSI, 36 (bombing Switzerland).

  Losses remained dreadful: Davis, 288; Ellis, Brute Force 220–21; Biddle, 204; Marvin A. Kreidberg and Merton G. Henry, History of Military Mobilization in the United States Army, 1775–1945, 647; Harry H. Crosby, A Wing and a Prayer, 95 (“When a plane blew up”).

  “When I fly a mission”: John Muirhead, Those Who Fall, 98; Stephen E. Ambrose, The Wild Blue, 169 (“You must remember this”); Nalty, 184 (13,000 U.S. airmen); Michael Burleigh, The Third Reich, 746 (140,000 Allied crewmen); censorship morale reports, Nov. 1943–June 1944, NARA RG 492, MTO AG, 311.7, box 931 (“On my last four raids”); Newby, 46 (aluminum patches); Howard, 51, 85 (“the enlarged pupil”).

  Propeller turbulence: James S. Nanney, “Army Air Forces Medical Service in World War II,” 1998, 9, 20–23; memo, “German Fighter Tactics Against Flying Fortresses,” Dec. 8, 1943, HQ, Eighth AF, CARL, N-13354 (“Sisters’ Act”); “Combat Informational Intelligence Series: Interview with Brig. Gen. H. S. Hansell,” Aug. 9, 1943, RG 334, NWC Lib, box 14; Conrad C. Crane, Bombs, Cities, and Civilians, 54 (“I didn’t pray for myself”).

  “variable one subject to local conditions”: “Air Power in the Mediterranean,” 62. Air Force statistics indicated that casualty rates among airmen in the Mediterranean remained proportionally higher than those of the ground forces through the end of 1944. Simpson, “Air Phase of the Italian Campaign to 1 January 1944,” 369. Many flying casualties in the Italy-based Twelfth Air Force were classified as “nervous disorders.” James S. Nanney, “Army Air Forces Medical Service in World War II,” 1998, 17.

  “Fly ’til I die”: Howard, 165.

  Among those affected by the ever spiraling quotas: Michael C. Scoggins, “Joseph Heller’s Combat Experiences in Catch-22,” War, Literature & the Arts, vol. 15, nos. 1 & 2 (2003), 213+; Joseph Heller, Now and Then, 181.

  Command of the Italian skies: Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 19 (“German withdrawal”).

  Extravagant claims for airpower’s efficacy: OH, Ira C. Eaker, Feb. 1975, Hugh N. Ahmann, AFHRA, K239.0512-829, 375–76; Battle, 14.

  Much of the thinking about how best: Mark M. Boatner III, The Biographical Dictionary of World War II, 641; Vincent Orange, Tedder, 223; Solly Zuckerman, From Apes to Warlords, 185–95, 203, 209–10; Eduard Mark, Aerial Interdiction in Three Wars, 94; Molony VI, 35.

  “without critically weakening the enemy”: Andrew Brookes, Air War over Italy, 1943–1945, 80; AAFinWWII, vol. 3, 372–73 (hard to cut); Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 26, 29; “Isolation of the Battlefield as Effected in the Italian Campaign,” July 1944, HQ, AAF, CARL, N-9818, 7, 10–11; “Report on Operation STRANGLE, 19 March–11 May 1944,” July 24, 1944, HQ, MATAF, AFHRA, 626.430, 3 (“could have afforded to discard”).

  Eaker and his apostles: OH, Lauris Norstad, 1979, Hugh N. Ahmann, AFHRA, K239.0512-1116, 532; James Parton, “Air Force Spoken Here,” 381; H. M. Wilson, “Report by the Supreme Allied Commander,” 1948, part II, 7.

  STRANGLE began badly: Anthony Cave Brown, The Last Hero, 475–77; Patrick K. O’Donnell, Operatives, Spies and Saboteurs, 59–60; index, OSS operations, Italy, 1944, “Ginny,” NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS history office, 190/6/7/6, box 40, 33; report, OSS activities, March 1944, NATOUSA, NARA RG 226, OSS history office, box 122 (“Mission assumed lost”).

  An Italian fisherman who spotted a dinghy: Max Corvo, The O.S.S. in Italy, 155–62; affidavit, Capt. Clifford M. Bassett, M.D., and Capt. Robert J. Willoughby, M.D., May 24, 1945, forensic examin
ation of “15 men dressed in American military uniforms on Punto Bianca,” author’s possession (hands lashed with wire); http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/WCC/dostler.htm; Brown, 480–81. General Dostler was tried at Caserta after the war and executed by firing squad.

  The bombing campaign proved more potent: AAFinWWWII, vol. 3, 378–79 (twenty-seven bridges); 384; Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 41n; memo, “How STRANGLE Worked on Four Targets,” ts, n.d., Lauris Norstad papers, DDE Lib, box 18 (hit at twenty-two points).

  Stations, bridges, engine repair shops: Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 34, 38 (tripled to seventy-five), 46; “Analysis of Tactical Attacks on Bridges and Viaducts,” n.d., HQ MAAF, CMH, Geog Italy, 370.2, 2; Klaus Stange, “Railroad Situation from January 1944,” Apr. 1947, FMS, D-049, 8 (shot up rail electrical conduits); “Interdiction of Italian Railways,” Apr. 15, 1944, HQ, MAAF, NARA RG 319, OCMH, CA, box 8 (trains often halted in Florence); Ernst Eggert, “Supply During Allied Offensive, May 1944,” 1947, FMS, #D-128, MHI, 3–4 (drums ran short).

  Kesselring in early April: Mark, 168; Albert Kesselring et al., “German Version of the History of the Italian Campaign,” CARL, N-16671.1-3, 110 (took nearly a week); AAFinWWII, vol. 3, 383; Walter von Unruh, “Inspection of Italian Theater of War,” 1947, FMS, D-016, 18; Eggert, “Supply During Allied Offensive, May 1944,” 8; Stange, “Railroad Situation from January 1944,” 8–9 (“difficulties seemed to pile up”).

  With that maddening blend of dexterity: Walter Warlimont, “OKW Activities—The Italian Theater, 1 Apr.–31 Dec. 1944,” n.d., FMS, C-099b, 17–18; “Report on Operation STRANGLE, 19 March–11 May 1944,” 3 (For every boxcar destroyed); Karl Theodor Koerner, “Rail Transportation Problems in Italy,” Apr. 1947, FMS, D-010, MHI, 11 (bridge spans across the Po); Sallagar, “Operation STRANGLE,” 54; Britt Bailey, “The German Situation in Italy,” July 1951, NARA RG 319, E 145, OCMH, R-series mss, #R-50, 34; Mark, 178.

  “achieved nothing more than nuisance value”: StoC, 451; Kesselring et al., “German Version,” 107–15; Molony VI, 42 (grew sclerotic); Parton, 384 (“virtually without air support”); “Air Power in the Mediterranean,” 50 (“not forced to withdraw”).

 
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