DAY OF BATTLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 December 1943, Page 3

DAY OF BATTLE

ATTACK BY NEW ZEALANDERS IN ITALY FORMIDABLE DEFENCES IN HILL VILLAGE. MASTERED IN WELL-PLANNED ADVANCE. (N Z Official War Correspondent.) ITALY, December 2. In broad yesterday, a company of a New Zealand battalion moved forward to an objective. The men ■ were told that the show was “just a morning stroll,” but they knew that there was grim work ahead. Their course lay through fields under fire from the enemy and over high country commanded by fire from Gelman guns - . Nevertheless, the platoons moved forward onto the rising ground which led toward a hilltop village over which were the mos powerful defences yet met by British troops in Italy. One platoon climbed up a narrowguage railway toward a town in the bright morning sunshine and was under the village by 9 o’clock. Its objective was a group of buildings below. Boldly this platoon advanced across the railway and gained the key building in a group. It was a shop commanding the passage over a road between two important towns. How the men ever crossed the railway line is still a mystery.as at least three German machine-gun posts commanded the line and these posts were perfectly concealed from the attacking forces. However, four men got across and into the' building before being pinned to the ground by a hail of machine-gun fire. The enemy machineguns held them there all day. One man who tried to get out and find the other platoons was hit twice by bullets and lay all day in a haystack before rejoining his friends. GERMANS DEMORALISED. Meanwhile, another platoon swung in a minature left hook and took the enemy in the rear after crossing his wire unhindered. Sitting up in earthworks which were the fruit of weeks of digging and preparation, commanding perfect arcs of fire on any attack, the Germans were demoralised to find the New Zealanders behind them. Their demoralisation was completed by their own artillery which reacted to the panic and laid a perfect barrage on to the positions held by their own troops. Our men used the German barrage as a heaven-sent intervention and pressed home their attack. With German shells howling about their ears, the Germans could hardly be expected to be at their best. The flanking battalion was soon in the two-storied headquarters building, and the Germans in deep dug-outs round the area realised that the jig was up. Sniping through an ancient archway, one German caused trouble till a New Zealander drilled him through the head with a rifle. At last the Germans broke and ran from their intricate trench system to the rear. But here again they were astray in their reckoning, for they ran toward the other platoon, which had established a Bren gun post in the second-story window of a shop down on the road junction. The Bren gunner had the target of a lifetime and made full use of his opportunity. After that the town fell quickly. When I visited the scene I went first to the shop where the indomitable four had established the Bren gun post. The building was scarred by bullets and half demolished by shells. Only 350 yards from it and above were three cunningly hidden machine-gun posts. The ground between was littered with German dead and pitted with shell holes. At the top of the hill were camouflaged combat trenches and gunpits commanding the whole area.

Then we came to German barracks built in farmhouses whose walls bore marks of bullets and shrapnel. At the German headquarters, shell-holes had demolished much of the three-storied hotel occupied on the previous day by the German staff. Around were dug-outs of such depth as to be impervious to .shellfire. Some of these still belched smoke from where our infantrymen had tossed in grenades, and a few contained the remains of even more Germans caught before they could make a break for freedom. The entire system of earthworks might well have been impregnable had they been manned by men of resource and courage. As one of our infantrymen said: ‘They had everything but guts.” HAND TO HAND BATTLE. In the courtyard itself, all is as it was when the deadly hand-to-hand battle ended. The sniper lies near the archway with a hole, between his eyes and a look of mild surprise. The dead lie as they fell in flight or in combat. One room alone houses 17 German dead. Many of the men have their own stories of the tight. One tells of grenades which hept bursting among the troops, thrown from an .unknown hiding place. Dozens of such points were discovered later—trapdoors and deep dug-outs which led many feet underground. Once discovered, the occupants shared the benefits of accurately tossed grenades. Thus fell the greatest strongheld yet encountered in Italy to the audacity and perseverance of the infantry. On the right of the formation which overpowered the German headquarters on this sector of formidable defence lines more New Zealanders attacked heights overlooking the village. At mid-afternoon, when they set out, the steep hilside looked as peaceful as any scene in this beautiful Italy. Farmhouses dotted the green slopes and at the top was the usual collection of buildings and haystacks among plantations of trees. It was a scene which harboured some of the war’s deadliest weapons, skilfully concealed so that even now some hours afterward it is impossible to discern the enemy’s deserted positions from below, though knowing their location. ENEMY TAKEN IN REAR. The first troops to move drew fire which revealed the whereabouts of the enemy’s strongeholds which were calculated to stand for the winter. They stood only a few hours. Having drawn the fire, our troops first engaged were pinned down on the lower slopes of the hillside, while others of one company strength by means of a circuitous route down deep heavily mined gullies advanced on the enemy right flank. One platoon went forward in a frontal attack under heavy machine-gun and mortar fire, while two others came in from the rear. The enemy was routed from weapon

pits in close combat. Some surrendered, but those who sought escape in dugouts were disposed of with hand grenades. It was hard fighting all the way. but strongpoint after strongpoint fell till by daylight the ridge was cleared.

The infantrymen’s work had not finished. They had then to dig in to meet any eventualities. There were not many wounded among our men, but those there were had to be carrid back on stretchers down slopes and over hills to waiting ambulances. It was a three-hour arduous task .