The Gothic Line Read online

  He “was awfully tired, hungry, and very, very thirsty. I suppose I had been standing in the turret of the tank for some eight hours or so. I hadn’t eaten since supper the evening before, and it was very hot.” Ferley decided to call a rest where they were, while he tried to figure out what their next move should be. The nearest cover beyond the ditch was three hundred yards away. Meanwhile, the Germans were still firing at Ferley’s Sherman. They “sure wanted that tank badly. They hit it eight times in all. The turret blew off and it was exploding and burning wildly. They were so busy pounding our baby, they didn’t drop a shell or mortar bomb on us, nor did a single rifle or machine-gun bullet come our way.” Ferley couldn’t understand it. They must have seen the crew evacuate the tank and would know they had been unable to flee the area.

  The lieutenant could see no way to get across the open ground safely without the cover of darkness. Campbell had his Thompson and Ferley a pistol that he couldn’t hit “a barn door at thirty paces with,” so he figured they could at least offer a token resistance if it came to that. The men lay in the ditch for thirty minutes, sweating and listening to the ammunition cooking off in the tank. Then over that racket, Ferley heard the approach of a wheeled vehicle. It was coming down the hill from Point 204, following a narrow track. A few seconds later, a German ambulance appeared and stopped about eight feet away from Ferley and his men. The driver of the vehicle and Ferley stared at each other for a long time before the ambulance drove off to the north.

  As Ferley started drifting off to sleep, Campbell nudged him. “Here come some paratroopers,” the co-driver said. Ferley woke up smartly. Sure enough, marching along the same route followed by the ambulance were four paratroopers. In their wake was a Dragoon by the name of Garnett from Green’s No. 4 Troop. He had a Thompson casually pointed at the Germans’ backs.

  After carefully calling out in a way that identified himself in order to avoid panicking Garnett into shooting him, Ferley asked: “Where are you going with those prisoners?” The trooper said he was taking them back to the Foglia. Ferley observed that Garnett was heading towards enemy lines rather than the Canadian rear. Realizing the Germans were unlikely to fire on the party for fear of hitting the prisoners, Ferley had the paratroopers clasp their hands on their heads and the Canadians all marched off to safety. Once they were safely behind the crest of a hill, the lieutenant sent Garnett back to Green’s troop. Garnett was to tell Turnley that Ferley’s tank had been destroyed and he and his crew were escorting the prisoners to the rear.27

  WITH EACH PASSING HOUR, the situation for the twelve tanks on Point 204 worsened. Several had either run out of fuel or were so low that the engines were kept turned off unless a move to a new firing position was required. The interiors of the tanks were like dust-choked steam rooms. Sweat showered off the tankers. From Tomba di Pesaro, mortar and artillery fire constantly hammered Point 204, making it extremely hazardous to venture outside the Shermans.

  Eastman and Turnley had lost contact with Vokes, so they took turns imploring brigade “to get additional troops forward, telling them that there was nothing in front of them of any consequence and that any attack in strength would be successful.” They asked for help from Kinloch’s ‘B’ Squadron, but brigade headquarters replied that this squadron was “pinned by antitank gun fire some mile or two behind.”28

  Just before 1300 hours, Waldron heard growling engines and clanking tracks approaching from the south to the hill’s left flank. The sergeant recognized the four tanks running along a narrow track that cut across the base of Point 204’s left flank as those of the regiment’s headquarters section. It looked as if Lieutenant Colonel Fred Vokes’s tank was in the lead, followed by his adjutant’s Sherman. Neither of these had a functioning gun. The two tanks mounted with real 75-millimetres were in trail, so that the two Shermans lacking guns blocked their firing forward.

  Waldron reported Vokes’s coordinates to Green and warned that the regimental commander was headed directly towards where the Panther and self-propelled guns had last been seen. Green called Turnley. “Senior Sunray is passing us on our left,” he said. “Suggest you stop him if possible as the road is covered by a gun we cannot locate as yet.” Turnley acknowledged.

  But it was too late. Vokes led his section directly into an ambush, presumably mounted by the Panther and self-propelled guns. The first round set the third tank in line ablaze, effectively blocking the line of retreat for the two forward tanks. Unable to either return fire or withdraw, these two tanks were in turn knocked out. The last tank had become separated from the rest by a space of about fifty yards. It immediately reversed and fell back to Point 204.

  Green could see two of the headquarters tanks burning and frantically fired smoke rounds in front of them, hoping to cover an escape by the crews. He was unable to see any trace of survivors.29

  A few minutes later, Major Eastman saw Vokes running up alone towards his position. The lieutenant colonel had lost his helmet and pistol and been forced to leave all the maps behind. Vokes told Eastman and Turnley that everyone else was either dead or captured. Eastman, who had earlier taken a p38 Luger from a prisoner, gave the pistol to Vokes so he would have a weapon.30

  Vokes set up shop next to Captain Stubbs’s tank because it was the only one with a radio link to brigade. The tank was parked on the road where a steep cutbank rose up from the left-hand ditch. Vokes called brigade and asked for immediate reinforcement, but received the same response that Eastman and Turnley had been getting. Phantom German antitank guns were still pinning down ‘B’ Squadron, which in reality was at this point still awaiting the Perth Regiment. Eastman, Vokes, and Turnley huddled in the ditch at the base of the cut-bank and in the lee of the tank while they discussed what to do next. Stubbs was nearby with his earphones and microphone on a long lead from the tank. The tank itself was out of fuel because a gas line had been severed by German fire during the advance up to Point 204. Inside the tank, the fumes were so strong it was almost unbearable. Stubbs was happy to be outside, despite the sporadic shelling.31

  Suddenly a mortar round exploded directly behind where Vokes crouched. The three officers were knocked to the ground. Eastman saw that Vokes had been struck in the back by shrapnel. Lying next to the wounded officer was the p38 that Eastman had given him. The pistol grip had been ripped off the gun. At first, as Eastman looked Vokes over, he thought the man’s wound not too serious. Then the major saw blood flowing from Vokes’s abdomen and realized some shrapnel had gone clear through his body.32

  As Stubbs climbed up on the tank and retrieved a syringe of morphine, another mortar round exploded nearby. Shrapnel severed the cord of his headset and a small chunk of metal penetrated his hand.33 Turnley was making a frantic effort to arrange for the lieutenant colonel’s evacuation, but the ground between the regiment’s assembly area at the Foglia River and Point 204 was so hotly contested no ambulance could get through safely. At last, Trooper A. Bonnifant from Halifax drove off towards Point 204 in his reconnaissance unit Honey. Although the Honey was fired on several times by artillery and mortars during the one-hour journey, Bonnifant managed to get through.

  While they waited for the evacuation vehicle, Vokes told Eastman that he “had no chance of survival. He continued discussing the operation.”34 Vokes ordered Turnley “not to withdraw but to hold the position until it was consolidated with the Perth Regiment.” Turnley was amazed at the man’s calm and ability to concentrate “while he was in great pain.”35 Vokes’s entreaties for reinforcements at this time must have finally had the desired effect. At 1430 hours, 5th Canadian Armoured Division commander Major General Bert Hoffmeister ordered Brigadier Ian Cumberland to immediately relieve the embattled Dragoons with the Lord Strathcona’s Horse Regiment, then exploit to Point 253, and onward to Tomba di Pesaro with the Perths in support. Realizing that the Dragoons had kicked a hole almost two miles deep into the direct centre of the Gothic Line, Hoffmeister was anxious to exploit the opportunity to effect the breakthroug
h.36

  The shelling of Point 204 continued. Shrapnel from one exploding round knocked Stubbs flat. He got up, checked the numerous spots on his body embedded with shrapnel, decided he was okay, and then “carried on.” His gunner was less fortunate. Shrapnel tore one of his eyes out. When the Honey arrived, Turnley ordered Stubbs evacuated. The captain ignored the order, loaded his gunner aboard, and then helped strap the by now unconscious Vokes onto the Honey’s back deck.37

  Although still alive when he arrived at a casualty clearing station in Sant’ Angelo, Vokes died several hours later. The news of his wounding and subsequent death soon reached his older brother, Major General Chris Vokes. The 1st Canadian Infantry Division commander found no comfort in one of his own philosophies of war. “From the day a soldier is born,” he believed, “his fate is written, and likewise the manner of his going, and also there is nothing he can do about it, nothing.”38 Vokes managed to get to the casualty clearing station before his brother’s burial. “It was a very sad thing,” he wrote, “to see this only brother of mine, whom I loved very much, balled up in a blanket and put into a hole in the ground. In fact, I broke down. I cried.”39

  AS THE AFTERNOON dragged on, the Dragoons on Point 204 continued to wait in vain for the promised relief. By early evening, the sixty men manning twelve tanks were extremely anxious. They had no radio contact with brigade, so were uncertain any attempt was underway to relieve them. If nobody came before nightfall, they would be hard pressed to stave off any German counterattack. While the paratroopers had obviously been caught off guard by the Dragoons’ unsupported armoured attack, they were no doubt already recovering. During the day, the Germans had seemed mostly lacking in the deadly Panzerfausts that enabled infantry to wreak havoc among tanks unsupported by infantry. If they now got among the tanks under cover of darkness with such weapons, there would be little the tankers could do to defend themselves.

  Waldron had wondered from the beginning of this risky assault if Vokes had been acting without orders. Now he was certain of it. He noted “that there was never any timing to the advance. It just happened as people gave orders to push on. It was just a series of errors piled one on the other. They [the orders] were so stupid even the Germans were surprised and because of our penetration into the line we disorganized what should have been a complete kill. They just didn’t take advantage of our lack of organization.”40 That would surely change. Waldron feared they would be slaughtered on Point 204.

  Yet help was on the way. Lieutenant Colonel Bill Reid had told ‘B’ Squadron commander Major David Kinloch that his men were ready to move at 1500 hours. Kinloch’s squadron and the infantry had immediately set off, the tanks clawing their way once more out of the re-entrant and the soldiers scrambling up the steep slope under the weight of their weapons and gear. But just as the force topped the crest, squadrons of tanks from the Lord Strathcona’s Horse Regiment met them. Lieutenant Colonel Jim McAvity, the Strathconas’ commander, told Kinloch that his regiment was to relieve the Dragoons on Point 204. Kinloch handed off the Perths and led his squadron back into the re-entrant to await the return of the rest of the regiment. For the major, it had been a bitter day. He “had lost good men killed and wounded, not a shot was fired by my squadron, and we accomplished nothing.”41 He was also desperately worried about what was happening on Point 204, but also knew there was now nothing he could do to help his comrades there.42

  [ 16 ]

  Pure Bloody Murder

  LIEUTENANT COLONEL Jim McAvity, the Lord Strathcona’s Horse Regiment commander, had no intention of slowing his dash from the Foglia River to Point 204 to match the pace of the infantry. He told Lieutenant Colonel Bill Reid that his Perth Regiment should follow in the tracks of the Shermans at its best rate. At 1600 hours, with ‘C’ Squadron leading and ‘A’ and ‘B’ squadrons following, the tanks sallied out from the start line towards a small hill that McAvity had designated the regiment’s intermediate objective. Once ‘C’ Squadron reached the hilltop, it moved into hull-down positions from which the main guns could provide a base of supporting fire for the advance’s second phase. ‘B’ Squadron, guided by the reconnaissance troop’s Honeys, passed by on the right flank and drove towards Point 204. Within minutes of passing ‘C’ Squadron’s position, a Panther tank engaged ‘B’ Squadron. Massed fire from all the squadron’s Shermans ripped the Panther apart before the German tank could cause any damage with its heavier, more lethal gun. Then the squadron pressed on for Point 204. Major Bill Milroy and his tankers arrived there at 1900 hours.

  Observers from divisional headquarters, who were sitting on a ridge back by the Foglia River, later told McAvity that the advance “looked rather like a sand-table demonstration of fire and movement.”1 Despite his intention to execute the manoeuvre quickly, the regiment had ended up taking twice as long to cross the ground as had the British Columbia Dragoons. When the Strathconas arrived on Point 204, Major Gerald Eastman of the Dragoons’ ‘A’ Squadron thought they had taken far too long getting there and that brigade command had entirely fumbled the operation. “Had they proceeded at the speed which we were able to make, it would have taken them perhaps at most an hour, even under fire, to get to where we were and they would have had time to go much farther.” By 1900 hours night was falling, rendering a further advance infeasible. Eastman thought the opportunity to deal the Germans a stunning, decisive blow had been frittered away.2

  When the rest of the Strathconas arrived, McAvity deployed ‘C’ Squadron on a spur running southeast towards the village of Pozzo Alto to cover the right flank, ‘A’ Squadron on another spur running to the northwest, and ‘B’ Squadron tight on Point 204 itself.3 Not knowing if the Perths would soon arrive, Milroy deployed his troops so each tank could fire across the others’ bows. Machine guns were dismounted and set up to protect the tanks from infiltrating German infantry.4

  While the Strathconas prepared their defensive perimeter, the weary Dragoon survivors returned to the re-entrant near the Foglia River. At dawn, the regiment had fielded fifty-four Shermans. By day’s end, only eighteen remained operational.5 Fifty-one officers and men were either dead or wounded.6 But the B.C. Dragoons had done their duty. They had kicked a deep hole in the Gothic Line that could now be exploited by the rest of 5th Canadian Armoured Division. Despite the haphazard manner of the battle’s development, it proved to be the regiment’s finest day of battle. Eighth Army commander General Oliver Leese was quick to praise the Dragoons for “their dash and determination in the fighting [which] largely helped us gain decisive results during the day.”7

  The Dragoons received the welcome news that, upon hearing of Lieutenant Colonel Fred Vokes’s death, Lieutenant Colonel Harry Angle had immediately demanded command of the regiment and Brigadier Ian Cumberland had agreed. Whereas Vokes had refused to recommend any officers or men for decorations during his tenure, Angle, in the immediate wake of the fighting, submitted the names of two men for medals. Captain Richard Bartley Sellars received a Military Cross for his attack on the German bunker in the re-entrant assembly area and Sergeant Frank Alexander Glover received a Military Medal.

  Glover’s Sherman suffered a direct hit near Point 204 that blew the sergeant, his gunner, and his loader/radio-operator out of the turret. The explosion killed both the driver and co-driver. Because the gunner was badly injured, the surviving crewmen were unable to make a hasty escape. In fact, Glover could find no means by which to evacuate the wounded man from the immediate area of the tank and quickly appreciated that the Germans must soon overrun the position. Leaving the unwounded crewman to tend to the gunner’s wounds, Glover scrounged several abandoned German and Canadian rifles and light automatic weapons scattered about the surrounding battlefield. He then dug three well-spaced slit trenches in an arc uphill from the disabled tank and placed several weapons in each trench. When the German attack came, Glover dashed from trench to trench, firing off rounds from the guns stashed there to create the illusion that more than one man defended the
tank. The Germans gave up after Glover repelled three attacks.8

  During their withdrawal from Point 204, the Dragoons passed the Perth Regiment marching towards the hill. ‘D’ Company was on the right and ‘B’ Company on the left, with ‘C’ Company close behind. ‘A’ Company had remained on the north ridge of the Foglia Valley in reserve. Private Stan Scislowski of ‘D’ Company’s No. 18 Platoon welcomed the long late-afternoon shadows cast by the heights to the west, figuring they partially hid the Perths from the German gunners dug in on the various surrounding hilltops.9 The regiment made the crossing without incident and by 2030 hours was digging in around the Strathconas’ tanks.10

  The infantry were desperately thirsty; their canteens long since drained. At a well next to the road leading from Point 204 towards Pozzo Alto, Scislowski joined some men lined up with their canteens at the ready while one man lowered a bucket into the hole. Suddenly Sergeant K.M. “Blackie” Rowe waded into their midst, pushing and shoving them away from the well. “Get the hell back where you belong, you dumb bastards!” the sergeant bellowed. Griping and cussing, the men sullenly complied. Scislowski belatedly remembered that the Germans liked to zero wells in with mortars, wait for a cluster of thirsty men to gather around, and then flay the position with explosives. Rowe told the still angry men that later, when they had finished digging in and darkness had fallen, one man from each section would be allowed to fill all of its canteens.

  Even then, the Perths made the fatal error of bunching around the well before it was fully dark. When the smoke from the German mortar rounds cleared, six men lay dead, including Company Sergeant Major Bob Johnston from ‘D’ Company. Scislowski felt lady luck had been on his side, for he had volunteered to refill his section’s canteens. Because he wanted Scislowski and Bren gunner Private Jim Heaton to set up a forward position on the north-facing slope, Rowe had sent another man instead.11 So someone else had died at the well.