大象传媒

This story was written by my late father, George Edward Whiting, about his experiences in Italy 1944.

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In the morning, the 18th of January 1944 we left San Marcellina and went up nearer to the front. We crossed the river Volturno and the town, which was on both sides of the river, was absolutely flat with the continual bombardment and it was tragic to see the destruction. We made our camp alongside the main road between the Volturno River and the Garignalano River and I think we were about 15 miles behind the front. We heard that last night they had got three bridgeheads over the Garignalano and everything was going well so we thought it wouldn't be long before we made another move forward.

The weather was very cold here and the grass was always white with frost. I ought to know for I was changing my underclothes prior to washing them when Tom Cuthbert and Bill Remnant came up behind me and sat me down in the icy white frost. It's no joke when you have only a short shirt on.

The next day we moved forward again to a village called Casanova and we parked below a large hill beside it. In the evening we walked up to the top of it and got a marvellous view of Casanova and the country behind. I should imagine the hill had been used as an enemy OP for there were a number of bomb craters there where our planes had dive-bombed them. It was easier coming down than going up and we had a race down the hill to dinner.

We had an easy time here. We had nothing to do so we used to get up just in time for breakfast and then wash and shave after it was over. In the evenings we fixed up a light in TLB and we played cards. There was Tom, Bill, Benny, Bill Remnant and myself in the group and we used to ask what we should play and of course Bill Nyberg always used to plump for Slippery Ann which most of us had got fed up playing. If we played any other game he would play for a little while quite peacefully then all of a sudden he would throw his cards down and say, "This is no game at all." On nine o'clock we would switch on the wireless to hear the news. It was funny being so near to the front yet having to tune in to the 大象传媒 to hear what was happening just a few miles in front of us.

On Saturday Jan 22nd 1944 we heard there had been another big landing behind the Germans near Rome and it appeared everything was going all right. It didn't go all right for this Angio bridgehead was in a precarious position for some time afterwards.

Two or three days passed with the battle in front of us going in a ding dong fashion and each night we would gather in the truck still, for a game of cards or a discussion. We could still see Vesuvius from here and at nights it would send out its red glow every now and then.

Saturday Jan 28th 1944 came and Sgt Lang, our NCO IC signals, came to see us from the gun position. He said nothing much was doing up there, so you can guess how surprised I was when at eight o'clock at night we were playing cards, word came down that the Bren carrier and myself were to report to the gun position. We got away about ten o'clock and half way there we broke down by the roadside and Wilbraham, the driver, went back to get a fitter. By the time the repairs were done and we got to the gun position it was half past three in the morning and I had another shock for we were to move off at 5.30am to go to an OP. Sgt Laing, Wilbraham, Remnant and myself did a lot of work during the next two hours fixing in a wireless set and all the other things necessary and off we went with Capt Leaman at 5.30am.

We got to the Garignulano River and took our turn waiting to go over the pontoon. We didn't know until afterwards that the place where we were waiting was constantly being shelled, but nothing happened while we were there so it was all right. Jerry tried his best to hit that pontoon and once or twice he did for there was some damaged British trucks lying about. Our turn came to go over and we drove onto the pontoon, which was pulled across the swift flowing river by infantrymen. I felt sorry for those men who had to stay in that one place and take all that was thrown at them.

Over the river we had a plain to cross over, and Capt Leaman mentioned the enemy were in a town we could see in the hills beyond, so quite evidently we in turn could be seen by the enemy. All along the road were notices "You are under observation. Do not stop," or "Dust is Death. Do not raise any dust," and further along there was a notice, "Enemy shelling this place constantly. Do not stop." As if we would after reading those notices. The only feeling I had was we were going the wrong way, towards the enemy instead of beating it back the other way.

We arrived at the OP a little village called Tufo on a hill on the right of a larger town called Minturno on the east. The village was deserted except for the infantry and after Capt Leaman made his OP in an upstairs room overlooking enemy country. We made our living quarters in a downstairs room of another house not in view of the enemy. The room had no windows to blast in on us and it just held the six of us for there was a jeep driver called Preedy and Sgt Laing with us.

In the evening after a meal when Capt Leaman came down from the OP we sat and talked and Capt Leaman was quite amusing I found. He wanted to sing and he and Sgt Laing began to sing all the good old songs. Then Jerry started shelling the village. It was my first experience since North Africa and I didn't feel too happy. Captain Leaman didn't turn a hair and continued to sing his songs with Sgt Laing. Sgt Laing didn't appear to be nervous or Bill Remnant, but a long time afterwards the Sgt did tell me how scared he was and when he left us later on in Italy he had a severe nervous breakdown.

Later on we switched our wireless set over to the 大象传媒 to hear the news at nine o'clock and the football results, and shells were still falling so it appeared funny to hear Arsenal 4 Portsmouth 1 against the background of a crashing shell on a house. I did my turn on the telephone that night between midnight and half past one and our side was sending over a big barrage with one or two coming back making the door shake and a terrific din. I picked up one of Capt Leaman's books to read, to while away the time and it was called "How to destroy civilisation" by Dorothy Thompson. My God, I thought, they are doing their level best to do that here.

When it was time to call my relief I was pretty tired having no sleep the night before so although the din was still on I fell asleep. It's surprising how safe you feel putting your head underneath the blanket and falling asleep. I only hoped the house would stand up to it all.

Shells fell at intervals throughout the next day and the days following, sometimes dropping in front of our house or sometimes screaming over the top of the roof to fall behind us. Tiles and glass shattered afterwards and one shell fell quite near to us killing one infantryman and a big hot splinter came right through our doorway without hurting anyone. This happened at night when Bill Remnant was on duty watch and it unnerved him a bit. I felt sorry for him for he was only a young boy. He came from Chertsey and he had such a nice young lady for he had shown me her photograph.

We had to go out to get wood for our cooking and we discovered there were still dead people in some of the houses. Bill and I stumbled on one when we were rummaging in a house for wood.

After we had been there for five days having occasional shots at the enemy, the Italians began to arrive back in the village and I thought it was extremely tragic to see children wandering about so near the front line. I often wondered since why they came back for every time a shell fell they ran screaming down the street in an absolute panic, yet when it was quiet back they would come again. We moved into a better house which had a table, chairs and we had a nice fire going each night and after he came down from his observation post each night Capt Leaman would keep us in fits of laughter with his antics. His face would never change if shelling started and you would think he was unaffected by it all, but in a few months time he had gone absolutely grey. He was only 24, so we can tell what real affect it did have on him.

On Feb 6th 1944 we left Tufo to go back to the gun position where we learned we were destined for the Cassino front where the Germans had been holding us up for so long on the Monte Cassino monastery. So that night we had a move back to Capria and the Vollutno again and arrived at St Angelo in the Cassino sector. I was sorry to leave Tufo but it's always the same in the army. You hate going to a new place, get nicely settled in and then you hate having to move on to another place. The Americans were in this sector and when we arrived they had come back to St Angelo for a well earned rest for they had made repeated attacks attempting to take Monte Cassino and the Monastery and failing, had severe casualties so they were out of action recovering from their wounds.

On February 23rd 1944 I went forward to an OP with Captain Foxwell and two other "A" Troop chaps in an armoured car. We reached a great rocky mountain called Trochio, which when we climbed it would give us a good view of Monte Cassino, which was still the thorn in the flesh monastery occupied by the Germans, and which had caused so many casualties among the many different troops who had tried to take it.

We didn't attempt the ascent of Trochio that night, but spent the night at the base alongside the biggest American gun I have ever seen. It seemed to me to be a huge naval gun and we nicknamed it "Big Bertha" after its counterpart in the First World War. When it fired, it shook the earth and afterwards we learned the Germans had protested to the Red Cross about the use of such a weapon.

The next morning we climbed the mountain and it took a good half an hour to reach the top. It was raining and mud and slosh made the trip very slippery. After it was dark we began to build the OP from rocks and through the darkness we could see the outline of the monastery. After getting the wireless fixed up we made a rota for watching and my turn was from midnight until 2am. It poured with rain and although the three of us were huddled together in the hole with our ground sheets over us, the hole filled with water and we got soaked through.

The next morning was still raining and as the visibility was nil we set to try and build the OP a bit better and after this miserable day we came down from the top to spend the night. There was a thin piece of tape all along the route which we had to follow for the hill was heavily mined. One infantryman stepped on an anti-personnel mine and it took his mates over two hours to get him down.

It was still raining the next day, but we went up and manned the OP just in case. The monastery looked very damaged from where we were and we found another mine got up to resemble a small cigar box, which Jerry would hope, you would pick up. We ringed it round with tape and left it for the engineers.

Next day was still raining so we did not climb the mountain, but did a priceless exchange with the Americans. For a few bottles of beer they gave us one pound of butter, one real loaf, one tin pineapple and other goodies. Considering we were on Compo rations, hard biscuits and corn beef this was indeed a banquet.

The weather slightly improved the next day so we were in the OP all day and night taking on several targets and with better weather shells from our own guns winged over the crest. It was a complete din at times, but I did manage to write a couple of letters through it all. One or two shells fell quite near us but whether it was Jerry or bad marksmanship on the part of our gunners I didn't know or care.

After ten days of this hell we were relieved and went back to the gun position but not without an effort. We got bogged down several times in the mud. I was knee high in mud trying to dig out the armoured car but we finally made it and the command post had found us a dry room in a house where we spent the next week trying to dry and clean ourselves up.

We knew before long another attempt would be made for Monte Cassino and on March 15th the big attack was started with bombers going over continuously from 8am till 12. 3000lbs of bombs for each German were dropped.

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