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Italian Campaign
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The Italian
Campaign was one of the major campaigns Canadians fought during
the Second World War. Canadian soldiers served in Italy from 10 Jul
1943 to the spring of 1945.
The Italian campaign
included Canadian participation in several major periods of action;
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Battle of Sicily
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Southern Italy
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The Sangro
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Battles of the FSSF
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Cassino
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Liri Valley
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Advance to Florence
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Gothic Line
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Winter Lines
The FSSF (First
Special Service Force) served as a joint Canadian-American unit as
part of the US Army and served in several battles. |
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Battle of Sicily - Southern Italy - The Sangro -
Battles of the FSSF - Cassino - Liri Valley - Advance to
Florence - Gothic Line - Winter Lines |
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Sicily
Sicily was the
first campaign to which Canadians would contribute a division
sized formation. The Allied operations on the island have been
subjected to much criticism; it took 38 days after the initial
landings on 10 Jul 1943 to seize the island, with the majority of
the German forces on the island crossing to the mainland in
safety. Nonetheless, the battle allowed for both men and
commanders of the Canadian Army to gain battle experience, and by
all accounts Canadian soldiers (of the 1st Canadian Infantry
Division and the 1st Canadian Army Tank Brigade) performed
exceedingly well in the tasks allotted them. Politically, the
battle brought an end to Italy's official alliance with Germany.
Italian leader Benito Mussolini was deposed in late Jul. In early
Sep, after the invasion of the Italian mainland, Italy quickly
surrendered, prompting a German invasion of the country to
continue the fight, with a fascist puppet state established in the
north.
The German way of
war was revealed in Sicily and would be their way throughout the
Italian Campaign. Delaying actions were to be fought along lines
of resistance rather than a solid line of defence. Each line of
resistance was spaced far enough apart to prevent Allied artillery
from engaging more than one at a time. Lines of resistance were
optimally located on forward ridges, from which the enemy could be
engaged, and then withdrawn from under cover when the Allies
concentrated overwhelming force against it.
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Battle of
Sicily |
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Landing in Sicily – Grammichele –
Piazza Armerina – Valguarnera – Assoro – Leonforte – Agira
– Adrano – Catenanuova – Regalbuto – Centuripe – Troina
Valley – Pursuit to Messina |
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Southern Italy
The invasion of
Italy proper commenced on 3 Sep 1943 with landings at Reggio di
Calabria against no opposition. Further landings by the British
and Americans farther north at Salerno occurred six days later.
The newly-renamed 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade supported the
advance of the British up the west coast to assist the Salerno
landings. The 8th Army formed on the right of the Allied line, and
began the march up the east coast of Italy with he US 5th Army on
the left, advancing up the west coast. The 1st Canadian Infantry
Division was employed here as well; the controversial decision to
commit Canadians indefinitely in the Mediterranean had run counter
to General McNaughton's wishes to return the Canadian units to the
United Kingdom after the Battle of Sicily had concluded.
McNaughton was no longer in command of the Canadians overseas, and
in early 1944, the 1st Division would be joined by other
formations.
By the end of Sep
1943, all three Canadian armoured regiments were being shuttled
back and forth between the two corps making up the 8th Army,
providing mobile fire support for the infantry. Canadian infantry
found themselves supported most often by British tanks, while the
Canadian armour operated in support of British formations. The
terrain was arduous, with narrow unpaved roads and steep elevation
changes which could easily be defended by small groups of the
enemy, or blocked by demolition of culverts and bridges. The
Germans began a "leisurely, calculated retreat to the Alpine
redoubt,"1 and events would show their ability to draw
this retreat out for over a year and a half. At the tactical
level, small scale skirmishes were the order of the day, delaying
for short periods and then withdrawing to the next geographical
obstacle, be it a mountain or a river, to inflict more punishment
on the advancing Allies.
The Germans settled
in for the winter on a line drawn across the narrowest, and
highest, part of the Italian peninsula. The Gustav Line and Monte
Cassino were turned into formidable defensive works, and the
Hitler Line was prepared to defend the Liri Valley - the road to
Rome. |
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Southern
Italy |
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Landing at Reggio – Potenza – Motta
Montecorvino – Termoli – Monte San Marco – Gambatesa –
Campobasso – Baranello – Colle d'Anchise – Torella
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The Sangro
The end of the Gustav Line settled in
the vicinity of the Sangro River, and Canadian and British attacks
in the area made slow progress for high cost. Across the Sangro
lay the Moro River, which took three days to cross, followed by
fighting at a feature called The Gully, which saw attack and
counter-attack over the period 10 to 19 Dec. The fighting shifted
towards the small port city of Ortona and heavy fighting outside
the town (marked by the award of the Victoria Cross to Major Paul
Triquet of the Royal 22e Regiment) and within took place. The
fight for the city became known as "Little Stalingrad" in the
press and took on significance well in excess of its strategic
importance. Shortly after Christmas, the city was abandoned by the
Germans, and the Canadians settled in to a three month period of
stalemate on the Arielli Front. During that time the headquarters
of I Canadian Corps became operational, as the 5th Canadian (Armoured)
Division arrived in theatre.
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The
Sangro |
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Castel di Sangro – The Moro – San Leonardo
– The Gully – Casa Berardi –
Ortona – San Nicola-San Tommaso – Point 59 – Torre
Mucchia |
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Battles of the FSSF
The First Special Service Force was a
unique and highly trained special operations unit made up of
Canadian and American soldiers. Service in the Aleutians Campaign
had been uneventful, and the mission for which the unit had been
created - commando raids on hydroelectric plants in Norway - was
called off. They arrived in the Mediterranean in late 1943 and
promptly put to work, clearing German defenders from a number of
high features in Nov and Dec, first at Monte Camino, then Monte la
Difensa-Monte la Remetanea, and finally Monte Majo. Redeployment
to Anzio followed in Jan 1944, where the Force spent four months
pinned down in the beachhead there, responsible for a stretch of
front line out of proportion to their numbers. The Advance to the
Tiber and Rome followed.
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Battles
of the FSSF |
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Monte Majo – Monte Camino – Monte la
Difensa-Monte la Remetanea – Anzio – Rome – Advance to the
Tiber |
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Cassino
As the Canadians
waited out the winter on the Arielli Front in a series of patrols
and small unit actions (including the first combat actions of the
5th Canadian (Armoured) Division), the fighting at Anzio had also
quickly reached a stalemate. Intended to put the Allies in Rome, a
timid expansion of the beachhead and a rapid German response
stalled the attack for four months. The Allied command looked to
Monte Cassino for a solution. Several armies had tried to take the
heights at Cassino, including the Americans, the Free French, and
the New Zealanders. The commander of the 15th Army Group, General
Harold Alexander, opted to assault along a broad front with as
many formations as possible. American, French, British and Polish
formations lined up on a 35-kilometre wide line, and once they
attacked, the Anzio force, too, would try once more to break out.
Canadian tanks assisted in the initial attacks at Cassino
beginning on 13-14 May 1944, while the Canadian Corps waited in
reserve to play its part in the breakout down the Liri Valley.
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Liri Valley
The British and
Indian XIII Corps failed to break the Hitler Line as planners of the
Cassino battle had hoped, and I Canadian Corps was moved up in the
middle of May to take on the task. The line was heavily wired and
mined and studded with concrete emplacements and armoured gun
turrets. Nonetheless, at the cost of 1,000 casualties, the Canadians
breached the line in a day, inflicting almost as many casualties.
Other offensive actions were equally successful; the Americans
crossed the Garigliano and advanced along the coast; the French
Expeditionary Corps also broke through German defences, and the
forces at Anzio managed to breakout as the Poles were finalizing
their capture of Monte Cassino. After the Hitler Line came the Melfa
Crossing, garnering a Victoria Cross for Major John K. Mahoney of
The Westminster Regiment (Motor). On 4 Jun 1944, Rome fell to the
Allies. The battle marked the first divisional level operations of
the war for the 5th Canadian (Armoured) Division. |
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Advance to Florence
I Canadian Corps was
taken out of the line to rest and reorganize, made changes in
command, and, absorbing lessons from the costly battles of the
spring, created a new infantry brigade in the 5th Armoured Division
to change the balance of tanks and infantry. This new organization
remained in effect until Canadian troops left the theatre in early
1945, and the brigade was disbanded before the 5th Division went
into action again in North-West Europe.
Meanwhile, the 1st
Canadian Armoured Brigade continued its service to British
formations during the Advance to Florence, seeing action at the
Trasimene Line, Sanfatucchio, Arezzo, and Cerrone. |
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Gothic Line
The Canadian Corps
returned to the line in Aug 1944 as the 8th Army was driving north
of Florence to a new series of positions called the Gothic Line.
(The First Special Service Force left the theatre to take part in
the invasion of Southern France.) General Alexander proposed a joint
attack by his two Armies on the Florence-Bologna axis, where the
mountains were less rugged. His army commanders, General Oliver
Leese of the 8th Army and General Mark Clark of the 5th Army, "want(ed)
as little as possible to do with each other and (Leese) being
particularly vehement in his opposition to a combined assault. As
usual, Alexander was unwilling to assert himself; and he agreed that
the Eighth Army's attack should be shifted to the Adriatic coast
while the Fifth would make the thrust towards Bologna unassisted,
starting a few days later."2
For the Canadians,
the main German defensive line was 7 to 8 miles from their Start
Line beyond a range of hills. The attack began on 25-26 Aug with a
largely ineffective barrage, and an opening attack by the 1st
Canadian Division so slow that the 5th (Armoured) Division, in
reserve, was brought up within 48 hours. Both divisions plunged into
the wire, minefields, concrete and steel fortifications. The Cape
Breton Highlanders attacked Montecchio three times before The Perth
Regiment captured the place with a flanking move. Point 204 fell on
31 Aug, a key position in the German line, once again the Perths
were responsible for its capture, supported by The British Columbia
Dragoons. The two divisions began to leapfrog past each other. On
the left, the British struggled to keep up, and left high ground in
enemy hands to their rear in their haste to do so.
On 5 Sep, resistance
from the town of Coriano stopped the Canadians. Five days of failed
assaults by the British, despite offers by the Canadian corps
commander (Lieutenant General E.L.M. Burns) to take the place from
the flank, followed. Finally the British and Canadians attacked
together on 12-13 Sep 1944 and inflicted 1,200 casualties. The
Canadians had lost 200 men killed and wounded. |
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Winter Lines
Action at the Rimini
Line followed, where the Germans had used the time Coriano had
gained them to strengthen defences on the San Fortunato Ridge. San
Fortunato was taken on 19 and 20 Sep by the 1st Division, and at
last the Canadians looked down upon the Lombard Plain.
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For the
Eighth Army commanders and staff, the Lombard Plain had long been
seen as 'the Land of the Lost Content' - a great broad plain
stretching to the horizon and beyond where armour could run riot,
as it had in the Western Desert of blessed memory, driving the
enemy before it like sheep to the slaughter. It was all a great
self-inflicted delusion. The army went down into the Romagna, the
southeast quadrant of the plain, and found it laced with rivers
and canals, many of them channelled between steep embankments
which inhibited tank movement as thoroughly as the southern hills
and ridges had done, and made life inconceivably difficult for the
decimated and embittered infantry.3
Here the Canadians
fought from one water obstacle to the next, from the Marecchia to
the Fiumicino to the Rubicon to the Pisciatello to the Savio
Bridgehead where Private E.A. "Smokey" Smith earned a Victoria Cross
for close action with German armour on 22 Oct 1944. The sequence of
river crossings carried on through to Dec, and after the Savio came
the Ronco, the Lamone and the Capture of Ravenna on 4 Dec. The Senio
followed, where the Canadians tried several times to effect a
crossing. Once again, winter stalemate set in. The Canadians wiped
out to German bridgeheads on the Senio in Jan, and settled in to
wait.
Throughout 1944, the
Allied forces in Italy managed to pin down 40 divisions there and in
the Balkans, about 20% of the total German military ground forces,
preventing their use in the Soviet Union, in Normandy, Southern
France, the Scheldt, and the Ardennes. |
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Return to First Canadian Army
The forces in Italy were relocated
to North-West Europe in early 1945 in an administrative move known
as Operation GOLDFLAKE.
- There was no more serious
fighting in Italy after I Canadian Corps sailed from Leghorn for
southern France, en route to the Netherlands...Of the 92,757
Canadian soldiers who served in Italy, more than a quarter
became casualties. Nearly 5,500 were killed and almost 20,000
wounded, with another 1,000 taken prisoner. During the whole
campaign, Allied casualties totalled about 190,000 in the
American Fifth Army and 123,000 in the Eighth Army (including
the Canadians). Approximately 435,000 German soldiers were lost,
including 214,000 officially recorded simply as "missing".4
Battle Honours
Regiments that served in the
Italian Campaign were awarded the Battle Honour "Italy".
Notes
- Marteinson, John. We Stand on Guard: An Illustrated History
of the Canadian Army (Ovale Publications, Montreal, PQ, 1992)
ISBN 2894290438 p.263
- Ibid, p.281
- Ibid, p.287
- Ibid, p.290
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