The Liri Valley

by Mark Zuehlke

  Zigzagging across the wire band was an antitank ditch created by setting off explosive charges at nineteen-foot intervals across the width of the entire valley. Because of the precise spacing of the charges, the ditch was really a series of overlapping craters that varied in depth from eight feet to fifteen feet and in width from fifteen to thirty feet, depending on their proximity to the centre of the explosion. Aerial observation revealed that the tendency of Italian soil to crumble into any adjoining depression and for those to become waterlogged had seriously plagued attempts to make the ditch an effective tank obstacle.15 It was believed the tanks could wallow through, although when they reared to go up the side facing the Germans, their undercarriages would be momentarily exposed to antitank fire.16

  From aerial reconnaissance and examination of the fortifications used at the Gustav Line, intelligence staff knew that many camouflaged concrete and steel pillboxes existed, housing antitank guns and machine guns. Most were impossible to locate, because the structures were so deeply buried that the embrasures housing the gun ports rose no more than three or four feet above ground level. Intelligence officers were baffled by one camouflaged structure that appeared on photos as a forty-nine-foot-by-forty-nine-foot square of concrete. On May 12, Eighth Army staff designated it a prototype defensive structure. Four similar structures were also noted. The staff could only surmise that “they are possibly large dugouts.”17

  The large concrete structures were actually Panzerturms and they were masterfully camouflaged. Each Panzerturm was a fabricated steel-and-concrete shelter dug into the ground and mounted with the turret from a disabled Panther Mark V tank. Most were constructed on the site of a destroyed building. The building’s rubble provided additional protective cover and camouflage. The turret was painted to match its immediate surrounding and camouflage nets made of wire interwoven with bamboo grass were arrayed over the position’s entry points. Depressing the long distinctive barrel of the .75-millimetre gun between two rows of sandbags rendered it invisible from the air. Aerial photos revealed only regular-shaped, light-toned squares that lacked any visible detail. When detected at all, intelligence staff could do no better than label them “concrete structure.” The form of defensive weapon housed was unknown.18

  Camouflage was given priority in the German engineering work, even at the cost of completing fewer positions. But there was no shortage of fortified works. Tenth Army planners knew that any Allied attempt to breach the line must involve a combined infantry and tank force. If the tanks were destroyed, infantry penetrations could be contained and even repelled by counterattacks. Therefore the Germans focused on developing an impenetrable antitank screen. The Panzerturms were the centrepiece of this screen, with nine in the Canadian sector. Each turret could rotate through a 360-degree field of fire and had a maximum range of about 1,200 yards. Sited 150 to 200 yards behind or to the flank of each Panther gun were two to three towed .75- or .50-millimetre antitank guns that could support and protect the main gun from flanking fire. Dug in around this array of antitank weapons were heavy and light machine-gun pill-boxes and open infantry trenches. Other antitank guns were scattered along the length of the line and self-propelled guns were so positioned that they could quickly move wherever an attack materialized. These latter included .88-millimetre guns mounted on Mark IV tank bodies, which the Allies called Hornets, 5-centimetre guns fitted onto the chassis of Mark IIIs, and .75-millimetre guns mounted on either the chassis of a Mark III or the back of an armoured half-track. In all, there were sixty-two mobile antitank guns, of which twenty-five were self-propelled guns.19

  To prevent Allied infantry from closing on the Panzerturms, the surrounding ground was overlapped by well-emplaced machine-gun positions. Most were housed in concrete or steel pillboxes, log-roofed gun pits, or inside pits dug under houses. Ten heavily armoured pill-boxes, each housing a two-man machine-gun team, were positioned between fifty and seventy-five yards behind the wire. One hundred yards back of the pillboxes stood a row of open-topped concrete gun emplacements for other machine-gun teams. The further the Allies came inside the Hitler Line defences, the more numerous the German positions became, forming a maze of weapon pits and pillboxes that could lay down a blanket of interlocking fire from all directions. The concrete emplacements were ringed by a metal track to which a machine gun was fitted, enabling the gunner to quickly swivel the weapon to face in any direction.

  Because the number of German troops available to defend the line was quite limited, emphasis was placed on arming most with machine guns — weapons the Panzer Grenadiers and paratroopers were well versed in using. There were relatively few men left to serve as riflemen and it was intended that most of these would act as snipers, hiding in the trees and engaging Allied infantry as they approached the wire and minefields. Narrow gaps, amply covered by machine-gun emplacements that could fire directly down the gap’s length, were left in the wire for back-and-forth infantry movement.20

  A manpower shortage was the biggest German handicap. The two most effective German divisional commanders in Italy — 1st Parachute Division’s General Richard Heidrich and 90th Panzer Grenadiers’ Generalleutnant Ernst-Günther Baade — shared responsibility for this area. Both generals, and their divisions, were well known to the Canadians, who had fought them in Sicily and during the bloody battle of Ortona in December 1943. Baade was a flamboyant and highly competent cavalryman, with a penchant for wearing Scottish kilts. Since the paratroopers were arrayed along the section of line guarding Aquino, the Panzer Grenadiers would bear the burden of meeting the Canadian offensive.

  The 90th Panzer Grenadiers were not the crack division they had once been. Although there were still many veterans who had spent almost five years of continual campaigning, the division had a large share of relatively new recruits. Morale was low, but the battalions were far from broken in spirit. The division was, however, seriously depleted. On May 20, the division had deployed from north to south: 200 men in the 361st Regiment’s 2nd Battalion and 200 in its 3rd Battalion, 150 men in the 576th Regiment’s 1st Battalion and 125 in its 2nd Battalion. Positioned immediately to the north of Pontecorvo were about 360 men in the 44th Field Replacement Battalion, which had a large contingent of foreign soldiers of very limited reliability. Inside Pontecorvo itself was a force of engineers drawn from the 334th Engineer Battalion and the 190th Engineer Battalion, numbering no more than 250. At best, Baade’s force had 1,285 infantry trying to hold a 5,500-yard-long front.21 Complicating matters even more for Baade, his small force was being relentlessly ground down by casualties resulting from the need to engage the daily Canadian probing attacks and reconnaissance patrols. As each day whittled his force away, Baade received virtually no reinforcements.

  What provided Baade with a significant advantage was the strength of his supporting arms and the defensive works inside which his men were positioned. He expected to meet a full-scale infantry-cum-tank offensive that would fall somewhere in the centre of his line. Accordingly, that was where he positioned his strongest and most seasoned regiment, the 576th. It was to Baade’s advantage if the Canadians delayed their offensive in order to mount the set-piece operation of which Eighth Army was so fond. Time was his greatest ally. With time, he might receive more reinforcements, dig more infantry trenches, lay more mines, and clear better fields of fire through the grain fields. His men had started occupying the Hitler Line in strength on May 18 and needed about four more days to organize the best possible resistance.22

  While Baade was going to get the time he needed, he would not be reinforced. Although Commander-in-Chief Southwest Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring had ordered Fourteenth Army, containing the Anzio beachhead, to transfer the 26th Panzer Grenadier Division to Tenth Army command on May 20, he had done so in order to deploy it against the advancing French corps.23 Kesselring had little to offer Baade. The general would have to do his best with what men he had. Despite the weakness of his forces in Italy, Kesselring remained confident that his general
s could hold the Hitler Line. As Generalleutnant Fritz Wentzell, Tenth Army’s Chief of Staff, later wrote, Kesselring’s headquarters staff “persisted in their idea of defence of gradually wearing down the attackers as it had done in the previous battles of Cassino and the battle of the Sangro.”24

  Kesselring was not the only one harking back to the winter battles for inspiration. Vokes, too, kept thinking of opportunities won and lost during 1 CID’s advance from the Moro River to Ortona. In the end, it had been a flanking operation by 3rd Canadian Infantry Brigade that had carried his regiments past The Gully. The prospect of 1 CIB doing so at Pontecorvo, so that Operation Chesterfield need not be mounted, obsessed him.

  Another piece of intelligence encouraged him in this hope. A Pole, impressed into the 44th Field Replacement Battalion and taken prisoner by the Princess Louise Dragoon Guards, reported that the defences around Pontecorvo were incomplete. Although a deep canal crossed in front of the town, the Pole assured his interrogators that tanks could easily cross over. Once Pontecorvo was taken, nothing could stop a tank advance westward on the Pontecorvo–San Giovanni road.25

  This and other intelligence reaffirmed Vokes’s certainty that Pontecorvo was the weak link. From the maps, it appeared that if 1 CIB moved at least one regiment across the Liri River and advanced along the south bank that had been cleared by the French, he could mount an amphibious attack across the river into Pontecorvo itself. With other regiments, backed by tanks, assaulting across the canal at the same time, the Germans defending the town should be easily overwhelmed.

  Vokes ordered Brigadier Dan Spry to investigate the possibility of such an attack. Although dubious, Spry agreed. He selected Royal Canadian Regiment commander Lieutenant Colonel Bill Mathers and the RCR company commanders to go with him. If the plan proved feasible, it would fall to the RCR to carry out the river crossing.26 To give Spry more resources, Vokes placed the normally independent Princess Louise Dragoon Guards reconnaissance regiment under his command. By the time Vokes called it a night on May 20, he had reason to be pleased. His staff was working out the full details for Operation Chesterfield and he had an alternative flanking assault in the works that promised a quicker and less costly conclusion.27

  About the time Vokes finished issuing instructions to Spry on May 20, R22eR Captain Pierre Potvin was painfully crawling toward the woods from which the regiments had attacked. Weak from loss of blood, Potvin knew if he did not find help very soon he would die. The likelihood of his living through another night was slight.

  Since being wakened at dawn that morning by the hammering of a German machine gun, Potvin had narrowly escaped capture several times. He vaguely remembered seeing German troops moving through the house during the night, but not finding him hidden under the collapsed roof beams. Whether the memories were real or hallucinatory dreams, he knew not. In the morning, the house was wrapped in the inevitable fog. Digging in his pockets, Potvin had discovered his compass gone, leaving him with no idea which direction led toward the Canadian lines. He would have to wait until the fog lifted before moving.

  Searching the house, he found a room where a stack of Van Doos’ haversacks leaned against one wall. All were blood encrusted and many blood-soaked bandages were scattered across the floor. ‘C’ Company must have used the room as a first-aid post. Despite the bandages wrapping his broken right wrist and the pain shooting through his left arm from the wounds there, Potvin wrestled several packs open. In one, he discovered half a stale cheese sandwich and a dreg of red wine in a water bottle. He wolfed both down.

  Just as he drained the wine, several shots were fired close to the house. Potvin squeezed into the cover afforded by some large wine casks. German voices came from the room where he had spent the night. Then one infantryman entered the room where Potvin crouched. The man kicked a few of the haversacks, conducting a desultory search. Potvin thought that if the German paused, he must surely hear his breathing. After a few minutes, the German left, but the party stuck around the house for another hour before wandering off. From the haversacks, Potvin removed a gas cape and spread it out on the floor under the raised wine casks. Then he lay down to wait for the fog to lift. Swarms of flies descended on him, crawling over his bloody bandages. The feel, sight, and sound of the insects blanketing his wounds and his bloody and tattered uniform were almost unbearable. He gritted his teeth and endured.

  About noon, he left the house. The sun was shining. His only directional guide was a shaky memory of Major Ovila Garceau standing in the doorway of the house as Potvin passed. If his memory was correct, the door had opened toward his line of approach. Fearful of being spotted by the Germans, he crawled slowly in what he hoped was the right direction. To his left, the sound of tanks moving about could be heard, but whether they were Allied or German he could not tell. Potvin carried on, taking, as his strength failed, increasingly longer rests between ever shorter periods of slow crawling. Nearing the end of his reserves, he heard men coming through the brush under the scrub oaks. Peering into the dim light, he saw a flash of khaki and through parched lips croaked as loudly as he could: “Van Doo here. Twenty-second.” Staggering to his feet, he moved toward the figures and saw them cautiously approaching with rifles at the ready.

  A Carleton and York patrol gathered around him. They placed him on a stretcher and hurriedly carried him back to the lines. One man told him it was about 1900 hours. Potvin muttered that he had then been in no man’s land for almost thirty hours. Hearing this, men on every side pressed water bottles and bits of rations his way. Potvin felt like weeping with gratitude. An overwhelming sense of the comradeship that exists among fighting soldiers washed over him.

  Once inside Canadian lines, Potvin was transferred to the R22eR Regimental Aid Post. He learned there that the regiment had given him up for dead. Nobody had seen any sign of Private Réné Casavant, whom Potvin had briefly encountered during his trek across no man’s land. A patrol was immediately mounted, however, to look for him. At dawn, when the patrol discovered a blood-covered bandage, it pressed on and Casavant was recovered. The two men were loaded into an ambulance and taken to a field dressing station. As a nurse cut away his tunic, Potvin asked her to detach his shoulder badges and place them in the bag with his other personal effects. A Medical Officer quipped, “I think these Van Doos think of their regiment even when they are dead.” Potvin laughed, but thought it might be true. He also wondered how long it would be before he returned to ‘B’ Company. That he would return was, in his mind, not even a question.28

  15

  IT’S SHEER MURDER

  Like so many towns in the Liri Valley, Pontecorvo traced its lineage to the Roman Empire and a period two centuries before the birth of Christ. Set on a hill rising about 300 feet above the valley floor, it had been built with war in mind. Pontecorvo was bordered immediately to the south by the Liri River and to the east by the narrow San Martino River. In modern times, a canal had been created in the river in front of the town to prevent flooding. A bend in the Liri River provided some protection to the town’s western flank. The hill upon which Pontecorvo stood was steeply sloped on all but the northwestern edge, where a road climbed up to enter the town square. Terraces for gardens created a series of almost sheer steps connected by switchback paths. A path of this kind ran up every side of the hill.

  German engineers had positioned the Hitler Line’s main defensive works about 2,000 yards in front of the canal. These defences were roughly equivalent in strength and design to those found elsewhere along the line. The barbed-wire field was a bit narrower, about nine feet, but mines were densely laid in front of and behind the wire. There was no doubt that the ancient, pale-grey stone buildings and church bordering the slope on the eastern side had been fortified and housed machine-gun positions. Given the advantage of their height, these positions could bring murderous fire down on any attack against the forward line.

  Many buildings in Pontecorvo had been reduced to rubble. The rest had suffered bomb and shell dama
ge. In past weeks, Pontecorvo had been bombed forty-seven times. The number would have been higher, but 239 (Fighter-Bomber) Wing, Desert Air Force command refused requests by 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade for indiscriminate bombing of the town. The air wing commanders had learned from Cassino that bombing a town into ruin only made it more defensible. Instead, they told the army commanders that they would bomb targets in towns only if “they were described with a six-figure map reference.”1

  Such map references had been provided on May 20 by 1 CIB headquarters when it called for bomb runs against pinpointed targets on the southeastern side of Pontecorvo. From these positions, German machine guns and mortars were engaging a French force that was trying to pass the town on the southern side of the Liri River. At the same time, 1 CIB requested the bombing of buildings identified as German barracks northeast of the town and of the town’s clock tower, believed to house an observation post.2 At 1300 hours, twenty-two Kittyhawk bombers swooped down and unleashed their bomb loads with deadly accuracy. Simultaneously, Canadian artillery hit Pontecorvo with a five-hour-long bombardment. Opposition to the French advance ceased soon after the artillery-bomber operation began.3 The artillery was less precise than the bombers and much of the town was reduced to a smoldering ruin by dawn of May 21. The clock tower, having been knocked to pieces by a direct bomb hit, no longer dominated the skyline.

  Long before, most of Pontecorvo’s civilian population had fled. Nearby farms and country homes had also been abandoned. While some refugees had gone west toward Rome, the majority had taken to the northern mountains. Thousands of Liri Valley refugees crossed the Apennines into Abruzzo province on the Adriatic side. Few would ever return, for there was little to come back to in a land devastated by months of war. The Liri Valley, more than anywhere on the World War II western front, resembled the band of Belgium and northern France inside which Germans and Allies had fought the better part of the previous war. As eking a life out of no man’s land in Flanders had been impossible, so too was it nearly impossible to survive in the Liri Valley. For weeks, those residents who stayed remained hunkered in the shelter of basements and caves dug into hillsides or the banks of rivers. They were hungry, generally dirty, lice-infested, often sick. Explosions, shrapnel, or bullets injured many, particularly children. Of eighty-nine civilians treated by Canadian medical personnel during one short period, thirty-five were treated for wounds inflicted by military weapons.4