UNKNOWN SOLDIERS: Reliving WWII in Europe

Two weeks of deadlock while his enemies strengthened their Beachhead by the day, and Adolf stamped his foot. This cancer on the shin of his Fortress Europa must be removed:

. . . the landing at Anzio marks the beginning of the invasion of Europe planned for 1944. Strong German forces are to be tied down in areas as far as possible from the bases in Britain where the majority of the invasion troops are still stationed. The object of the Allies is to gain experience for future operations.

Every soldier must, therefore, be aware of the importance of the battle which the Fourteenth Army has to fight.

It must be fought with bitter hatred against an enemy who wages a ruthless war of annihilation against the German people and who, without any higher ethical aims, strives for the destruction of Germany and European culture.¹⁸

For the first week of February following our commitment to the line on the left we were lucky. The weather wasn’t bad, and the thrust of German intentions was clearly coalescing down the Anzio highway against the British on our right. Then on February 7 it rained all day, and that night enemy infantry again infiltrated around the British flanks and after a heavy barrage attacked from the rear, and head-on with tanks. The rain stopped, and the moon came out. The Second North Staffordshires were driven back from the key high ground of Buon Riposo Ridge west of Carroceto. On the British left the Germans smashed over our Third Battalion. Major John Boyd, its commanding officer, was killed, and his men spent a three-day supply of machine-gun ammunition and over 5,600 rounds of mortar shells with the support of an intense concentration of artillery. General Penney of the British First pleaded for relief, but Lucas insisted he had virtually none available.

In two more days, on February 9, the Germans attacked again and drove the exhausted and depleted Brits from the Factory. The pressure was intensifying. This was the date of my last journal entry and letter home for three weeks, with a P.S.: “I hear that by Act of Congress we’re all Pfc’s.” A singular, and my single, promotion of the war—by legislative fiat to all privates first class in combat.

Next day the British were pushed out of Carroceto. General Penney’s men were taking the whole brunt of the building German offensive, and once again he pleaded for help. Lucas at last agreed to commit the 45th’s 179th and a few tanks from the First Armored Division; their counterattack on the Factory was repulsed. The Engineers moved back up on the left, relieving our Second and Third Battalions, leaving only the First in the line.

[This portion of the page contains copyrighted material and is available in the print edition, but is not available online.]¹⁹

Not until February 29 (this was a leap year), more than two weeks after the fact, was I able to record my next near-demise when it was all too clear that both armies were bracing for what was to come. The upper windows of isolated stone houses as close to the front as we could get provided almost our only chance to spy on the enemy. Of course if we could see them, as we’d learned in the mountains, they could see us back. We were in the left coastal sector at the time. From my journal: