An Army at Dawn

by Rick Atkinson

  It was over: “Darlan funeral,” Signal Corps, 35mm, B&W, NARA, ADC 1002; “Funeral for Admiral Darlan—Record of Events,” Dec. 26, 1942, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-204-F (“the following errors”).

  The procession wound: Gosset, 130; De Gaulle, Memoirs, 381 (“the long disease”); Macmillan, The Blast of War, 167 (“Once bought”); Hunt, 153 (“fell like a stone”).

  Finger-pointing: Fergusson, 148 (“a cup of tea”); Three Years, 239 (“Is there anyone here”); Jordan, 139 (“Arab”); D’Este, Bitter Victory, 55 (“You will find the Americans”).

  Yet a harsher: Larrabee, 436 (“our Italians”); Alexander G. Clifford, The Conquest of North Africa, 1940–1943, 405 (“gifted amateurs”); W.R.C. Penney, ts, n.d., LHC (“crashing bores”); Fergusson, 148 (“The British cope”).

  “The plain facts”: AAR, 1st Guards Bde, Jan. 9, 1943, PRO, WO 175/86.

  To Major General Terry Allen: Dixon, “Terry Allen,” 57 (“Please always remember”); GCM to TdA, July 30, 1942, GCM Lib, Pentagon correspondence, box 56, folder 17; Baumer, 68, 117 (“all that stuff”); Pyle, Here Is Your War, 187 (“like vermin”).

  Yet as the weeks: Dixon, “Terry Allen,” 57; Steven Clay, Blood and Sacrifice: The History of the 16th Infantry Regiment, 27 (read in mss); Curtis, 42; Liebling, “Find ’Em, Fix ’Em, and Fight ’Em,” 221 (“like whiskey”); Pyle, Here Is Your War, 188 (“Is this a private war”); Robert W. Porter, SOOHP, John N. Sloan, 1981, MHI, 260; S.L.A. Marshall, Men Against Fire, 161 (“A man fights”).

  The last straw: Porter, SOOHP, 259–60 (“I can’t understand”); “Terry Allen and the First Division,” MHI; D’Este, Bitter Victory, 274.

  good men dared: Sherwood, xvii.

  The bottom of the year: DDE to CCS, Dec. 26, 1942, Chandler, 868 (“severest disappointment”); “directive for commander-in-chief, Allied Expeditionary Force,” Aug. 13, 1942, NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 325.

  An enormous siege: Bennett, Ultra and Mediterranean Strategy, 196; Ellis, On the Front Lines, 36; “Commander-in-Chief’s Dispatch, North African Campaign, 1942–1943,” 51. (Eisenhower came to believe that quick victory in Tunisia would have put Allied troops in the Po River Valley in northern Italy by winter 1943.)

  For now, there were deficiencies: Allerton Cushman, AGF Observer Report, March 29, 1943, NARA RG 165, E 418, Director of Plans and Ops, box 1228 (“The German army”); Stanley J. Grogan, “Memorandum for Mr. McCloy,” n.d., NARA RG 165, E 418, box 1228 (“More than discipline”); John P. Lucas, Observer Report, Apr. 28, 1943, NARA RG 165, E 13, OCS classified general correspondence, box 106 (“not leading their men well”).

  They had seen things: Marshall, “The Battle That Wasn’t,” ASEQ, 34th Inf Div, MHI (“cracked porcelain surface”); Michael D. Doubler, Closing with the Enemy, 253, 293; Linderman, 212 (“questers”); John C. McManus, The Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II, 282 (“Twins, we feel”).

  “Things have not gone well”: Anderson to Brooke, Dec. 25, 1942, PRO, WO 175/56.

  CHAPTER 7: CASABLANCA

  The Ice-Cream Front

  At 10:30 P.M.: “President’s Trip to Casablanca,” Guy H. Spaman to Frank J. Wilson, June 26, 1945, FDR Lib, Secret Service records, box 4; George E. Durno, “Flight to Africa: A Chronicle of the Casablanca Conference Between President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill,” n.d., FDR Lib, 200-2-U; Hassett, 127, 142, 146; Leahy, 143; Raymond W. Copson, “Summit at Casablanca,” American History, Apr. 2002, 60.

  With a steamy sigh: Seale, vol. II; Michael F. Reilly, Reilly of the White House, 136–47; Goodwin, 366; Sherwood, 665.

  A kind of Roman camp: AAR, 1st Armored Signal Batt, Sept 18, 1943, NARA RG 165, director for plans and ops, corr, box 1230; Wordell and Seiler, 281.

  Fragrant with begonias: Reilly, 150; Austin, 71; Durno, 63, 66, 68; msg to DDE, Jan. 10, 1943, NARA, AFHQ micro, “Casablanca Conference,” R-49-M; Donald E. Houston, Hell on Wheels: The 2nd Armored Division, 143 (“Hail to the Chief”); Macmillan, The Blast of War, 194; memo, Arthur R. Wilson, Dec. 10, 1942, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 246 (George Washington).

  Overseeing this feverish activity: Austin, 71 (“Every other four-wheeler”); Semmes, Portrait of Patton, 132; Patton, War As I Knew It, 35; Codman, 76 (“absolutely steady”); Crawford, Report on North Africa, 26 (“the Ice-Cream Front”).

  Patton was miserable: Farago, 222 (huge Packard); A. G. Shepard, “Report on Operation TORCH,” Commander in Chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, serial 0014, NARA RG 38, OCNO, box 3; Robinett, Armor Command, 110 (“Where are the Germans”); Blumenson, Patton, 174–75 (“Top Dog”); John Field, “Patton of the Armored Force,” Life, Nov. 30, 1942, 113; Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 163 (“kill someone”).

  Patton discharged: Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 175, 123, 150.

  Arriving from London: Pendar, Adventure in Diplomacy, 140 (“working up mud”); Thomas B. Buell, Master of Sea Power: A Biography of Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King, 253; Pogue, George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory, 1943–1945, 18 (dire warnings).

  Churchill and his entourage: Lord Moran, Churchill: Taken from the Diaries of Lord Moran, 85 (silk vest and nothing else); Ismay, Memoirs, 284–85 (“we were clever enough”); Bryant, 434, 485; Kennedy, 280; W. Averell Harriman and Elie Abel, Special Envoy to Churchill and Stalin, 1941–1946, 180 (“Any fool can see”); Goodwin, 301 (“big English bulldog”).

  “at the conference”: Matloff and Snell, 379 (“the British will have a plan”); Roger Parkinson, A Day’s March Nearer Home, 14; “The Reminiscences of Walter C. W. Ansel,” 1972, USNI OHD, 3–124; Ian Jacob diary, quoted in Bryant, 540 (“dark hole”); Moran, 78 (“the control of the Mediterranean”); D’Este, Bitter Victory: The Battle for Sicily, 38 (“dripping of water”); Lord Tedder, With Prejudice, 390; Macmillan, War Diaries: The Mediterranean, 1943–1945, 8.

  Speedy Valley

  Operation SATIN envisioned: The AAF in Northwest Africa, 29; “Memorandum of Conference at Advanced Allied Force Headquarters,” Jan. 21, 1943, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-187-D; Three Years, 236.

  SATIN was bold: NWAf, 350; Roskill, 433 (437,000 soldiers); CCS msg, Jan. 1943, NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 325 (“The Allied forces”); “Diary Covering the Activities of General Fredendall and Supporting Players,” Jan. 3, 1943, James R. Webb Collection, DDE Lib (“II Corps is to be bait”).

  Eisenhower and his staff: memo, AFHQ G-4, Jan. 15, 1943, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-188-D (“logistically out of hand”); “Record of Conference Held by C-in-C Allied Force,” Jan. 10, 1943, NARA, AFHQ micro, R-188-D (“fatal to do nothing”).

  Eisenhower made several moves: “History of Allied Force Headquarters,” 1945, MTOUSA Historical Section, NARA RG 407, E 427, 95ALI-0.1, boxes 142–43; Theodore J. Conway, SOOHP, Sept. 1977, Robert F. Ensslin, MHI; Ambrose, Eisenhower: Soldier, General of the Army, President-Elect, 1890–1952, 226; Akers, OH, July 27, 1949, SM, MHI; D. Clayton James, with Anne Sharp Wells, A Time for Giants, 153 (“begged and pleaded”); Butcher diary, DDE Lib, A-8 (“Clark admitted”), A-127 (“Ike doesn’t think Clark”), A-157, A-194 (“manure pile” and lectured him); Danchev and Todman, eds., 356 (“very ambitious and unscrupulous”).

  “I bless the day”: DDE to GCM, Nov. 11, 1942, Chandler, 690.

  At fifty-nine: “Outline History of II Corps,” n.d., NARA RG 407, E 427, box 3112; Robert H. Berlin, U.S. Army World War II Corps Commanders, 5; These Are the Generals, 227 (“very soldierly little fellow”); Benjamin S. Persons, Relieved of Command, 27; “World War II Generals,” 1945, WD, USMA Lib.

  Thirty-five years later: letter, James Webb to family, Apr. 20, 1943, OW, MHI (a conviction that neither); Leland L. Rounds, OH, Oct. 21, 1948, SM, MHI; “Leland L. Rounds: His Tale, July 13, 1944,” OSS files, NARA RG 226, E 99, box 39 (“Lay off”).

  Orders issued from: Curtis, “The Song of the Fighting First,” ts, 1988, MRC FDM, 56; Carter, “Carter’s War,” ts, n.d., CEOH, III-13.

  Truscott found him: Kirkpatrick, “Orthodox Soldiers: Army Formal
Schools Between the Two World Wars,” 10; Truscott, Command Missions, 144 (“outspoken in his opinions”); Fredendall to LKT Jr., Jan. 22, 1943, 1050 hrs. and 1345 hrs., LKT Jr., GCM Lib, box 9, folder 5.

  Fredendall also harbored: “Diary Covering the Activities of General Fredendall,” Oct. 7, 1942, “Log of Our Transatlantic Flight,” James R. Webb Collection, DDE Lib; James, A Time for Giants, 95 (“Ike is the best”); Dickson, “G-2 Journal,” MHI, 35.

  Lloyd Fredendall’s chosen avenue: Rame, 214 (Solomon the Eunuch); Baedeker, 315; Miller, Ike the Soldier, 472; G-1 report, HQ II Corps, Feb. 14, 1943, NARA RG 492, MTOUSA, box 263; Carter, “Carter’s War,” III-13 (“Fredendall’s kindergarten”); Dickson, “G-2 Journal,” 37 (“surrounded by children”); “Diary Covering the Activities of General Fredendall,” Jan. 25, 1943, James R. Webb Collection, DDE Lib (“woods are stiff”).

  Tébessa’s high plateau: “Diary Covering the Activities of General Fredendall,” Jan. 8 (“cold as a snake”), Jan. 9 (bulletproof Cadillac), and Jan. 11 (“Everyone is freezing”), 1943, James R. Webb Collection, DDE Lib; Austin, 77 (“lumber camp”); Pyle, Here Is Your War, 301 (in his canvas chair).

  Day and night: blueprint, 19th Engineer Regt, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 19248; “Historical Record of the 19th Engineer Regiment,” Oct. 1942–Oct. 1943, NARA RG 407, box 19248; “II Corps Engineer Section Journal,” Jan. 21–March 1943, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 3234; “Diary Covering the Activities of General Fredendall,” Jan. 25, 1943, James R. Webb Collection, DDE Lib.

  Some officers believed: Truscott, Command Missions, 146; MacVane, Journey into War, 195 (“Some of ours”); Waters, SOOHP, MHI, 175–76, 202 (some questioned); Carter, “Carter’s War,” CEOH, IV-15 (“We had no proper”).

  Suspected Tunisian collaborators: “History of the 26th Infantry in the Present Struggle,” MRC FDM, 5/19, 6/13; Raff, 194–95 (“Of the thirty-nine”).

  Ted Roosevelt, who had been peeled: TR to Eleanor, Jan. 16 and Feb. 2, 1943, TR, LOC, box 9; Cameron, “Americanizing the Tank,” 761; “Journal for the 3rd Battalion,” 26th Infantry, Feb. 1943, MRC FDM (“everything but the Rising Sun”).

  Among the most active: AAR, “Account of Carleton S. Coon,” NARA RG 226, E 99, OSS, box 39, folders 8, 34, 39, 75, 85 (“mule turds”); Coon, A North African Story, 68 (“rogues and cutthroats”), 76 (“one Arab and one cow”), 79; George C. Chalou, ed., The Secrets War: The Office of Strategic Services in World War II, 20 (“Bad-Eyes Brigade”); The Overseas Targets: War Report of the OSS, vol. 2, 19–20 (“This use of hostages”); Brown, The Last Hero: Wild Bill Donovan, 266, 269 (“Captain Retinitis”).

  “It is still”: TR to Eleanor, Feb. 6, 1943, TR, LOC, box 9.

  So were the tens: Pyle, “Our Soldiers in Tunisia Learn the Agony of War,” ts, n.d., AAR, 26th Inf, NARA RG 407, E 427, box 5942; Mayo, 135; article, Gault MacGowan, New York Sun, Dec. 8, 1942 (Army grub); letter, Raymond Dreyer to family, March 10, 1943, MCC, YU (Life Savers); letter, Joseph T. Dawson to family, Apr. 26, 1943, Dawson Collection, MRC FDM (“We often wonder”); Abbott, 64 (“Tunisian deer”); Lawrence J. Starr, ASEQ, 135th Inf, 34th ID, MHI; Houston, 139; History 67th Armored Regiment, 71.

  Dysentery, parasites: Wilson, “The Operations of the 509th Parachute Battalion in North Africa,” 1948; Hamilton H. Howze, “The Battle of Sidi bou Zid,” lecture, n.d., Cavalry School, MHI (“Stuka time”); D’Arcy-Dawson, 95 (“Messerstorks”); Ray, 34 (250 Allied casualties); Ford, 44 (Evelegh ordered); Austin, 77.

  “Never out of artillery range”: Lawrence J. Starr, ASEQ, 135th Inf, 34th ID, MHI (“An old man at twenty”); Tank Destroyer Forces World War II, 24; Liebling, 66 (“old man with chilblains”); Robinett, Armor Command, 139 (“Lay it on them!”); Abbott, 83 (“Mother, please”).

  “I should have”: diary, Nov. 10, 1942, OW, MHI; Robinett, Armor Command, 28 (“I would either go”).

  Known as Dan: author interviews, Edith Ward Spalding, Oct. 2000, Robin Ward Yates, Sept. 2000, and John Ward Yates, August 2001; obituary, Assembly, March 1973; Gugeler, ts, n.d. (unpublished Ward biography), OW, MHI, I-11, III-1, V-4, VII-13, IX-4, IX-22; David A. Shugart, “On the Way: The U.S. Field Artillery in the Inter-War Period,” paper, Apr. 2000, Society for Military History, 5; W. B. Smith to OW, July 1943, OW, MHI; OW to 8th AD cadre, March 3, 1942, OW, MHI.

  Ward had two peculiarities: Gugeler, IX-16; diary, Nov. 8, 1942, Jan. 15, 20, 27, 1943, OW, MHI.

  “The Touch of the World”

  The Emperor of the West: logs, FRUS; Reilly, 152; Elliott Roosevelt, As He Saw It, 71 (“Winnie is”).

  Preserving the status quo: Austin, 73 (“Business: Chiefs of Staff”); Sherwood, 676 (“Ike seems jittery”); Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 133, 135; Frederick E. Morgan, OH, n.d., FCP, MHI (how such a man).

  He spoke without notes: Chandler, 906n; FRUS, Jan. 15, 1943, 569 (“might be a good division”), 567 (“At first operations”).

  Watching this performance: Bryant, 17, 552 (“shooting his tongue”); Boatner, 63; Danchev and Todman, eds., xv (“I flatly disagree”); David Fraser, Alanbrooke, 92–93, 297; Kennedy, 291.

  did not distract: Danchev and Todman, eds., 352 (“ridiculous plan”), 351 (“Eisenhower as a general”).

  Now Brooke pounced: msg no. COS (W) 430, British chiefs of staff, Jan. 5, 1943, Watson Notes, GCM Lib; FRUS, 567, 574, 577; Bryant, 548; NWAf, 353; Hinsley, British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. II, 579 (Ultra decrypt today).

  Eisenhower tried to regroup: FRUS, 567–69 (“any necessary adjustments”); Three Years, 236 (“Fredendall’s plan”); “Minutes of Meeting,” CCS, Jan. 15, 1943, NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 195.

  British and American chiefs: Kent Roberts Greenfield, American Strategy in World War II: A Reconsideration, 31; Howard, Grand Strategy, vol. IV, 245; Morison, The Two-Ocean War, 241; Behrens, 328; Francis Tuker, Approach to Battle, 319 (It is axiomatic).

  No sooner had Eisenhower: FRUS, 539 (“final victory”); memo, British chiefs of staff, Jan. 2, 1943, NARA RG 165, E 422, box 54; “Minutes of Meeting,” JCS, Jan. 16, 1943, 1700 hrs., NARA RG 218, box 169; Matloff, 24 (Eisenhower’s own planners).

  All of which argued: FRUS, 539, 570, 572, 573; Clark, Calculated Risk, 50 (“Why stick your head”); Leighton and Coakley, 673.

  As Brooke had listened: Bryant, 545; Pogue, George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory, 1943–1945, 7; Ernest J. King and Walter Muir Whitehill, Fleet Admiral King, 413 (“old crustacean”); Buell, xi, 11, 75 (foghorn voice), 78–79 (bibulous and lecherous); GCM, OH, Oct. 5, 1956, Forrest Pogue, GCM Lib (“Albion perfidious”); C. E. Lambe, OH, Feb. 26, 1947, FCP, MHI (“his eye on the Pacific”).

  King threw a rock: “Minutes of Meeting,” JCS, Jan. 16, 1943, 1700 hrs., NARA RG 218, box 169 (“do not seem”); FRUS, 547, 549; Mary H. Williams, ed., Chronology, 1941–1945, USAWWII, 81–97; Leighton and Coakley, 662, 663n (only 15 percent); Mansoor, The GI Offensive in Europe, 47–48 (virtually all U.S. Marines); Matloff and Snell, 157 (at least three times), 357–60.

  No matter: FRUS, 553, 555; Albert C. Wedemeyer, Wedemeyer Reports!, 165 (secretly tape-recorded), 158; “Minutes of Meeting,” JCS, Jan. 16, 1943, 0930 hrs., NARA RG 218, box 169 (“If we subscribed”).

  Brooke recorded his assessment: Danchev and Todman, eds., 360.

  Casablanca lay: Gugeler, ts, MHI, X-53 (“too terrible”); Three Years, 243 (“neck is in a noose”); Butcher diary, DDE Lib, A-176; Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 136–37; Danchev and Todman, eds., 363 (“deficient of experience”); Sherwood, 689 (“The President told General Marshall”); D’Este, Eisenhower: A Soldier’s Life, 623 (read in mss) (“what I’m going to do with Tunisia”); Roosevelt, As He Saw It, 79 (“What’s your guess?”); Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 154 (“He thinks his thread”).

  Brooke’s deputy: Kennedy, 273 (“He is difficult enough”); Codman, 76; Durno, 73 (“You Are My Sunshine”); Reilly, 155; Harmon, Combat Commander, 109 (“Corporal of the guard!”).

  Mornings, he lounged: Sherwood, 688; Roosevelt
, As He Saw It, 102; Macmillan, The Blast of War, 194; Kersaudy, 240 (“Come and see”); Ismay, OH, Dec. 17 and Dec. 20, 1946, FCP, MHI (“Very well”); Frederick E. Morgan, OH, n.d., FCP, MHI (“to view with contempt”); Charles F. A. Portal, OH, Feb. 7, 1947, FCP, MHI (“We don’t get paid”).

  Roosevelt also found: Roosevelt, As He Saw It, 94; Codman, 76; Powell, In Barbary.

  A state dinner: FRUS, 832 (effects of teetotalism), 608 (“there just aren’t going”).

  Around and around: “Minutes of Meeting,” CCS, Jan. 16, 1943, 1030 hrs., NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 195 (“how Germany is to be defeated”).

  There it was: “Minutes of a meeting at the White House on Thursday, Jan. 7, 1943, at 1500,” NARA RG 165, E 422, box 54; FRUS, 594–96, 597 (“not interested in occupying Italy”); Trumbull Higgins, Soft Underbelly, 47; “Minutes of Meeting,” CCS, Jan. 18, 1943, 1030 hrs., NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 195.

  After two stormy hours: Danchev and Todman, eds., 362 (“It is no use”).

  “We lost our shirts”: Wedemeyer, 191–92.

  Besides, the president: Signal Corps film, ADC-979 and ADC-465, NARA; Walter Logan, United Press account, Jan. 21, 1943; Durno, 74 (“Roadsides were a panorama”); Reilly, 160 (To distract curious), 155 (“The Heinies know”); Harmon, 109; Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 157 (“bunch of cheap detectives”); Clark, Calculated Risk, 149 (“Negro troops who”); Whitehead, 35–37; “President’s Trip to Casablanca,” Guy H. Spaman to Frank J. Wilson, June 26, 1945, FDR Lib, Secret Service records, box 4 (no bullets); Harriman and Abel, 181 (trained on the docile troops).

  Rumors that FDR: Houston, 144 (“Anything is possible”); Durno, 75–79; Logan, UP account, Jan. 21, 1943; Blumenson, The Patton Papers, 1940–1945, 158 (“says India is lost”); Three Years, 283 (“hoped to die”).

  The distant roar: “Minutes of Meeting,” CCS, Jan. 19, 1943, 1600 hrs., NARA RG 218, JCS records, box 195; Austin, 71–72 (“We’ll need”); John S. D. Eisenhower, Allies, 238 (“petit De Gaulle”), 244; Tompkins, 230 (“a self-seeker”); Codman, 72, 80 (“Uncle Sam”); Murphy, 170, 174–76; Roosevelt, As He Saw It, 74, 91 (“a dud”); De Gaulle, 387, 392; Anthony Eden, The Memoirs of Anthony Eden, Earl of Avon, 421; Leahy, 144; Pendar, 151 (Jeanne d’Arc); Moran, 88; FRUS, 694; Harmon, 109; Signal Corps film, ADC-979 and ADC-465, NARA; Churchill, The Hinge of Fate, 682; Sherwood, 685 (entire Secret Service detail); Reilly, 158.