Download or read book Italy s Sorrow written by James Holland and published by HarperCollins UK. This book was released on 2008 with total page 133 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: James Holland's ground-breaking account expertly documents the German advance to the stalemate of the Gothic line and a segment of Italian history that has been largely neglected. The war in Italy was the most destructive campaign in the west as the Allies and Germans fought a long, bitter and highly attritional conflict up the mountainous leg of Italy during the last twelve months of the Second World War. While the Allies and Germans were slogging it out through the mountains, the Italians were fighting their own battles, one where Partisans and Fascists were pitted against each other in a bloody civil war. Around them, civilians tried to live through the carnage, terror and anarchy while, in the wake of the Allied advance, beleaguered and impoverished Italians were forced to pick their way through the ruins of their homes and country and often forced into making terrible and heart-rending decisions in order to survive.
Download or read book At War on the Gothic Line written by Christian Jennings and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-03-08 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christian Jennings's At War on the Gothic Line tells the little-known story of the Allied effort to break the German defenses in Northern Italy—told through the eyes of the multi-national force that fought it. In the autumn of 1944, as Patton’s army paraded through Paris, another Allied force was gathering in southern Italy. Spearheaded by over 100,000 American troops, this vast, international army was faced with a grim task—break The Gothic Line, a series of interconnected German fortifications that stretched across the mountains of northern Italy. Striving to reach Europe’s vulnerable underbelly before the Red Army, these Allied soldiers fought uphill against entrenched enemies in some of the final and most brutal battles of the Second World War. In At War on the Gothic Line, veteran war correspondent and historian Christian Jennings provides an unprecedented look inside this unsung but highly significant campaign. Through the eyes of thirteen men and women from seven different countries, Jennings brings history to life as he vividly recounts the courageous acts of valor performed by these soldiers facing overwhelming odds, even as many experienced discrimination at the hands of their allies and superiors. Witness the courage of a young Japanese-American officer willing to die for those under his command. Lie in wait with a troop of Canadian fur trappers turned snipers. Creep along mountain paths with Indian warriors as they assault fortified positions in the dead of night. Learn to fear a one-armed SS-Major guilty of some of the most atrocious war-crimes in the European theater. All these stories and more pack the pages of this faced-paced, action-heavy history, taking readers inside one of the most important, and least discussed, campaigns of World War Two.
Download or read book The War Against Germany and Italy written by Kenneth E. Hunter and published by . This book was released on 1951 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Day of Battle written by Rick Atkinson and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2008-09-16 with total page 852 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the second volume of his epic trilogy about the liberation of Europe in World War II, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Atkinson tells the harrowing story of the campaigns in Sicily and Italy.
Download or read book Italy s Sorrow written by James Holland and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2008-04-01 with total page 656 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the Second World War, the campaign in Italy was the most destructive fought in Europe - a long, bitter and highly attritional conflict that raged up the country's mountainous leg. For frontline troops, casualty rates at Cassino and along the notorious Gothic Line were as high as they had been on the Western Front in the First World War. There were further similarities too: blasted landscapes, rain and mud, and months on end with the front line barely moving. And while the Allies and Germans were fighting it out through the mountains, the Italians were engaging in bitter battles too. Partisans were carrying out a crippling resistance campaign against the German troops but also battling the Fascists forces as well in what soon became a bloody civil war. Around them, innocent civilians tried to live through the carnage, terror and anarchy, while in the wake of the Allied advance, horrific numbers of impoverished and starving people were left to pick their way through the ruins of their homes and country. In the German-occupied north, there were more than 700 civilian massacres by German and Fascist troops in retaliation for Partisan activities, while in the south, many found themselves forced into making terrible and heart-rending decisions in order to survive. Although known as a land of beauty and for the richness of its culture, Italy's suffering in 1944-1945 is now largely forgotten. Italy's Sorrow by James Holland is the first account of the conflict there to tell the story from all sides and to include the experiences of soldiers and civilians alike. Offering extensive original research, it weaves together the drama and tragedy of that terrible year, including new perspectives and material on some of the most debated episodes to have emerged from World War II.
Download or read book War in Val D Orcia written by Iris Origo and published by Allison & Busby. This book was released on 2011-09-01 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is quite impossible to attach importance to material possessions now. All that one still clings to is a few vital affections' Iris Origo, October 1943. Marchesa Iris Origo and her husband had been settled at their rural estate of La Foce since 1924. When the Second World War broke out Origo, an Englishwoman married to an Italian landowner, had divided loyalties. But as the war dragged on and the hostilities escalated, the small community of Val d'Orcia found themselves helping evacuees, orphans, refugees, prisoners of war and soldiers from both sides, concerned less with who was fighting whom than caring for those who needed their aid. Origo kept her diary throughout this time, when the risk of betrayal was a fact of life and the penalty for helping the enemy would result in death. Even with German troops occupying her manor house, she wrote at night about her valiant attempts to shelter refugees, burying her diary in the garden each morning. The result is a book which has become a classic, an affirmation in itself of courage and resistance, and an unsentimental, compelling story of the trials and tragedies of wartime.
Download or read book Italian Prisoners of War in Pennsylvania written by Flavio G. Conti and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2016-10-19 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During World War II 51,000 Italian prisoners of war were detained in the United States. When Italy signed an armistice with the Allies in September 1943, most of these soldiers agreed to swear allegiance to the United States and to collaborate in the fight against Germany. At the Letterkenny Army Depot, located near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, more than 1,200 Italian soldiers were detained as co-operators. They arrived in May 1944 to form the 321st Italian Quartermaster Battalion and remained until October 1945. As detainees, the soldiers helped to order, stock, repair, and ship military goods, munitions and equipment to the Pacific and European Theaters of war. Through such labor, they lent their collective energy to the massive home front endeavor to defeat the Axis Powers. The prisoners also helped to construct the depot itself, building roads, sidewalks, and fences, along with individual buildings such as an assembly hall, amphitheater, swimming pool, and a chapel and bell tower. The latter of these two constructions still exist, and together with the assembly hall, bear eloquent testimony to the Italian POW experience. For their work the Italian co-operators received a very modest, regular salary, and they experienced more freedom than regular POWs. In their spare time, they often had liberty to leave the post in groups that American soldiers chaperoned. Additionally, they frequently received or visited large entourages of Italian Americans from the Mid-Atlantic region who were eager to comfort their erstwhile countrymen. The story of these Italian soldiers detained at Letterkenny has never before been told. Now, however, oral histories from surviving POWs, memoirs generously donated by family members of ex-prisoners, and the rich information newly available from archival material in Italy, aided by material found in the U.S., have made it possible to reconstruct this experience in full. All of this historical documentation has also allowed the authors to tell fascinating individual stories from the moment when many POWs were captured to their return to Italy and beyond. More than seventy years since the end of World War II, family members of ex-POWs in both the United States and Italy still enjoy the positive legacy of this encounter.
Download or read book Italy In The Second World War Memories And Documents written by Marshal Pietro Badoglio and published by Pickle Partners Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-06 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Marshal Pietro Badolgio was involved in the highest levels of the Italian political hierarchy ever since his early successes in the First World War, for which he was promoted General. He was head of the Italian Armed Forces from 1925 to 1940, and did his best to raise the military to a level that might match the expansionist views of Mussolini. He presided over the brutal invasion of Ethiopia, but nationally he acted as a counter-balance to Mussolini’s pre-World War II schemes. Unable to stop the inevitable disaster following the Italian-German Pact of Steel and the onset of war, he resigned as Chief Of Staff after the humiliating reverses of the Italian invasion of Greece. He was brought back into the political spotlight in 1943, after the fall of Mussolini, and was named Prime Minister of Italy during the turbulent months of their volte face change of sides. His position was unenviable, caught between the Italian people who cried out for peace and the Allied powers who pursued German defeat in Italy by armed force. In this fascinating book he recounts his memories and recollections of Italy during the Second World War, particularly focussed on his attempts to hold the country together in 1943 and 1944.
Download or read book The Battle for Rome written by Robert Katz and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-05-11 with total page 742 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In September 1943, the German army marched into Rome, beginning an occupation that would last nine months until Allied forces liberated the ancient city. During those 270 days, clashing factions -- the occupying Germans, the Allies, the growing resistance movement, and the Pope -- contended for control over the destiny of the Eternal City. In The Battle for Rome, Robert Katz vividly recreates the drama of the occupation and offers new information from recently declassified documents to explain the intentions of the rival forces. One of the enduring myths of World War II is the legend that Rome was an "open city," free from military activity. In fact the German occupation was brutal, beginning almost immediately with the first roundup of Jews in Italy. Rome was a strategic prize that the Germans and the Allies fought bitterly to win. The Allied advance up the Italian peninsula from Salerno and Anzio in some of the bloodiest fighting of the war was designed to capture the Italian capital. Dominating the city in his own way was Pope Pius XII, who used his authority in a ceaseless effort to spare Rome, especially the Vatican and the papal properties, from destruction. But historical documents demonstrate that the Pope was as concerned about the Partisans as he was about the Nazis, regarding the Partisans as harbingers of Communism in the Eternal City. The Roman Resistance was a coalition of political parties that agreed on little beyond liberating Rome, but the Partisans, the organized military arm of the coalition, became increasingly active and effective as the occupation lengthened. Katz tells the story of two young Partisans, Elena and Paolo, who fought side by side, became lovers, and later played a central role in the most significant guerrilla action of the occupation. In retaliation for this action, the Germans committed the Ardeatine Caves Massacre, slaying hundreds of Roman men and boys. The Pope's decision not to intervene in that atrocity has been a source of controversy and debate among historians for decades, but drawing on Vatican documents, Katz authoritatively examines the matter. Katz takes readers into the occupied city to witness the desperate efforts of the key actors: OSS undercover agent Peter Tompkins, struggling to forge an effective spy network among the Partisans; German diplomats, working against their own government to save Rome even as they condoned the Nazi repression of its citizens; Pope Pius XII, anxiously trying to protect the Vatican at the risk of depending on the occupying Germans, who maintained order by increasingly draconian measures; and the U.S. and British commanders, who disagreed about the best way to engage the enemy, turning the final advance into a race to be first to take Rome. The Battle for Rome is a landmark work that draws on newly released documents and firsthand testimony gathered over decades to offer the finest account yet of one of the most dramatic episodes of World War II.
Download or read book Purple Heart Valley A Combat Chronicle Of The War In Italy written by Margaret Bourke-White and published by Pickle Partners Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-06 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An excellent, richly illustrated, account of the bloodiest phase of the Italian campaign. Here is a report—in pictures and in words—of exactly what happened to our men during the bitterest phases of the Italian campaign. This report is not based upon a hurried visit behind the lines; Margaret Bourke-White spent a full five months on the Italian front photographing, questioning, observing, and living in close association with our troops. She was not content to remain safely behind the combat area. She flew over the German lines and narrowly escaped being shot down. On the ground she came closer to the enemy lines than any woman has been before the most advanced American post around Cassino.
Download or read book World War II Partisan Warfare in Italy written by Pier Paolo Battistelli and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2015-08-20 with total page 65 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Italy surrendered in 1943, it sparked a resistance movement of anti-German, anti-fascist partisans. This book explores the tactics, organizational structure and equipment of the brave Italian resistance fighters. Beginning with low-level sabotage and assassinations, the groups continued to grow until spring 1944 when a remarkable, unified partisan command structure was created. Working in close co-ordination with the Allies, they received British SOE and American OSS liaison teams as well as supplies of weapons. The German response was ferocious, and in autumn 1944, as the Allied advance stalled, the SS and Italian RSI looked to eradicate the partisans once and for all. But when the Allies made their final breakthrough in the last weeks of the war the partisans rose again to exact their revenge on the retreating Wehrmacht. From an expert on Italian military history in World War II, this work provides a comprehensive guide to the men and women who fought a desperate struggle against occupation, as well as the German and Italian fascist security forces unleashed against them.
Download or read book Anzio The Friction of War written by Lloyd Clark and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2013-03-28 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the story of the Anglo-American amphibious assault and subsequent battle on the Italian west coast at Anzio which was launched in January 1944 in a bold attempt to outflank the formidable German defences known as the 'Gustav Line'. ANZIO - THE FRICTION OF WAR outlines the strategic background to the offensive before detailing the landing, the development of an Allied defensive position, the battles in and around the perimeter, the stalemate, the breakout and the capture of Rome on 4 June 1944. While assessing the events at Anzio with the eye of an experienced military historian, Lloyd Clark also examines in detail the human response to the battle from high command to foot soldier. He also emphasises the German story - the first time this has ever been done.
Download or read book Sicily and the Surrender of Italy written by Lieutenant Albert Garland and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2015-07-16 with total page 644 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: (Includes maps) This volume, the second to be published in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations subseries, takes up where George F. Howe's Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West left off. It integrates the Sicilian Campaign with the complicated negotiations involved in the surrender of Italy. The Sicilian Campaign was as complex as the negotiations, and is equally instructive. On the Allied side it included American, British, and Canadian soldiers as well as some Tabors of Goums; major segments of the U.S. Army Air Forces and of the Royal Air Force; and substantial contingents of the U.S. Navy and the Royal Navy. Opposing the Allies were ground troops and air forces of Italy and Germany, and the Italian Navy. The fighting included a wide variety of operations: the largest amphibious assault of World War II; parachute jumps and air landings; extended overland marches; tank battles; precise and remarkably successful naval gunfire support of troops on shore; agonizing struggles for ridge tops; and extensive and skillful artillery support. Sicily was a testing ground for the U.S. soldier, fighting beside the more experienced troops of the British Eighth Army, and there the American soldier showed what he could do. The negotiations involved in Italy's surrender were rivaled in complexity and delicacy only by those leading up to the Korean armistice. The relationship of tactical to diplomatic activity is one of the most instructive and interesting features of this volume. Military men were required to double as diplomats and to play both roles with skill.
Download or read book The War North Of Rome written by Thomas R. Brooks and published by Da Capo Press. This book was released on 2009-09-09 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The British had a song for it: "Oh, we are the D-Day Dodgers," based on a comment from a female member of Parliament that dismissed all those not on the beaches at Normandy as draft evaders. Indeed, after the invasion of France the Allied armies in Italy found themselves in a forgotten theater of war. Until now, their eleven-month saga of bitter combat and gallant sacrifice has been ignored.The problem for the Allies was that the fall of the Italian capital on June 4, 1944- although a spectacular public relations triumph- did not end the campaign. The Germans had simply conducted a short strategic withdrawal, conceding one objective while proceeding to fortify additional defense lines.From Salerno to Rome, and most famously at Cassino, the Germans took advantage of the mountains, ridges and rivers that crisscross Italy to exact every drop of blood from the Allied forces. Although the press was no longer paying attention, in the north of Rome the process of continued Allied offensives met by a German resistance that alternated between ferocity and flexibility.A notable feature of the combat in Italy was the large mixture of Allied nationalities involved. Although the American Fifth and the British Eighth Armies were the major forces, on different parts of the line fought South Africans, Canadians, Greeks, Nisei, Jews, Poles, French, Gurkhas, Indians and others. The first U.S. black division fought here, as well as the Brazilian contingent (a curiosity to the Germans, who constantly probed their front).The War North of Rome features a forward by Senator Bob Dole, who fought in this neglected theater of war. He was one of 364 wounded (98 killed) in his regiment's attack on a series of German-held hills. Though he barely survived the battle he states, "I always felt I was fortunate . . ."By the time Allied forces vanquished the enemy in Italy, Russian soldiers were already dancing on Hitler's grave. Nevertheless, our young men north of Rome fought as bravely, and suffered as much, as troops on any front in WWII. Their record of courage and sacrifice is described here in a long-overdue, comprehensive account.
Download or read book The Campaign in Poland 1939 written by United States Military Academy. Department of Military Art and Engineering and published by . This book was released on 1945 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Poland, with the fifth largest army in Europe, was the first nation to feel the attack of the rejuvenated Nazi war machine. Because of later German conquests, the world has largely forgotten this initial success. Yet in one respect the rapid annihilation of the Polish Army was Germany's most important conquest. This campaign demonstrated to Germany, if not to the rest of the world, the correctness of her military doctrine. It furnished the proving ground for her organization and weapons. The rapidity of Poland's complete destruction came as a shocking surprise to the world at large. Eight days after the beginning of the war, all Polish forces were in demoralized retreat; and a month later, the entire fighting force of a million men had been annihilated. Military history offers no prior example of a conquest so rapid and complete. In this victory the new German air and mechanized forces played an unprecedented part. Nevertheless, it would be wrong to say that German success was due to these two arms alone. Simply stated, Germany's stupendous conquest may be attributed to the superiority of the entire German Army over the outmoded Polish war machine. Germany's balanced, well-trained, and ably led forces found no match in those of her smaller rival. This account of the campaign in Poland has been written for use in the instruction of cadets at the United States Military Academy. It is based for the most part on material prepared by the Military Intelligence Service, War Department. -- Abstract.
Download or read book The Blue Devils in Italy written by T/Sgt. John P. Delaney and published by Pickle Partners Publishing. This book was released on 2017-06-28 with total page 1151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 88th Division played a major role in the battle of Italy, where it was rated by the Germans after the summer of 1944 as the best American division in Italy. Because of the outstanding job it did in Italy, the 88th contributed its share to the winning of the war. It was the first of the draft infantry divisions to enter combat on any front in World War II and it was among the top divisions in the American Army. It won its share of territory and honors during its 344 days of combat. It paid dearly for all that it won—it lost 15,173 officers and men killed, wounded and missing in action. Only thirteen other divisions in the U.S. Army suffered heavier losses. The 88th fought its battles on what was called “a forgotten front.” Some day history will appraise the true worth of the Italian campaign in the overall war picture. Military historians will analyze and sift and publish detailed volumes on the operational contribution of the 88th in the battle for Italy. This book is not a history, in the true sense of the word. It is not intended to be such. It is rather the story of a combat division from its beginning to its end. It is a story compiled both from official journals and from the personal experiences of the citizen-soldiers who made up its squads and platoons. It is a story which never can be told in every complete detail. For every one of the incidents related here, a reader can remember scores that are not found in these pages. There are not enough words, or paper, to list them all. The incidents related are considered to be representative of the experiences of the majority of 88th men.
Download or read book War in Val d Orcia written by Iris Origo and published by New York Review of Books. This book was released on 2018-08-07 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A bestseller upon its original publication in the 1980s, these diaries reveal life during WWII in Tuscany and include stunning rediscovered photographs In the Second World War, Italy was torn apart by German armies, civil war, and the Allied invasion. In a corner of Tuscany, one woman—born in England, married to an Italian—kept a record of daily life in a country at war. Iris Origo’s powerful diary, War in Val d’Orcia, is the spare and vivid account of what happened when a peaceful farming valley became a battleground. At great personal risk, the Origos gave food and shelter to partisans, deserters, and refugees. They took in evacuees, and as the front drew closer they faced the knowledge that the lives of thirty-two small children depended on them. Origo writes with sensitivity and generosity, and a story emerges of human acts of heroism and compassion, and the devastation that war can bring.
