Writing From The Mediterranean Theatre of War
Operation Baytown, Invasion of Italy at Reggio, September 3, 1943
Canadians in Combined Operations, specifically members of the 80th Flotilla of Canadian Landing Crafts, transported troops and war materials from Messina, Sicily to Reggio di Calabria (toe of Italy's boot). Some Canadians, including my father (Leading Seaman, RCNVR and Combined Ops) may appear in the above photo. On one occasion they also transported a reporter for The Montreal Star, according to WWII memoirs by a Canadian Navy officer.
The writer/reporter was not identified but I lean toward Sholto Watt, who with many other Canadian correspondents, travelled to The Med in lead up to the invasion of Sicily in early July, 1943. I have not found a book, diary or journal by Sholto Watt but I have found a few lengthy and descriptive news articles he sent back to Montreal for publication during the months of summer and fall in 1943.
Some informative passages are provided below with links to newspaper coverage related to his time in the Mediterranean region.
Sicily to the Eye
There is always one cloud in the blue skies over Sicily.
Sometimes it is a thin, wispy, pale thing; sometimes a thick, white,
billowy roll stretching out and out at 10,000 feet in the air.
It is the plume of smoke and vapor from the volcano of Etna.
And Etna, from many miles away, dominates the valleys and sharp
hill-ranges of Sicily: it is usually blue and insubstantial to the sight,
but with only a flicker of imagination
you are persuaded of a brooding and mysterious force within -
as if indeed Vulcan were there waiting his moment
to crash forth upon the world.
The hills of Sicily are steep,
they are very often terraced for the cultivation
of grape vines, of lemons and oranges, of tomatoes,
peaches and plums...
Green grass is such a rarity that I have heard English
soldiers cry out to one another when they have spotted it.
But the hill towns, crammed in upon themselves on the peaks,
induce in any mind that pictorial evaluation of a scene
which might be the delight of a painter's life;
they are not merely picturesque, they compel
the eye. The whole landscape is strange and
beautiful; it hints of cruel things and very old.
That is Sicily to the eye...
Canadian troops land west of Pachino, above; Canadian sailors manned
landing crafts at Avola and Noto, just north of Pachino.
Photo Credit - The Winnipeg Tribune
Army Handicaps
Campaigning here brings less pleasant data to other senses.
There is an implacable midday heat, and by our timing
midday by the sun comes at two in the afternoon,
so that when you are at your afternoon's work
you are enduring the worst of it.
Dust, next, permeates everything
and on the country roads it is almost insupportable:
driving along in a military convoy you must wear goggles
for the eyes and hold a moist handkerchief over your face
to keep this dry fog from your lungs.
The insects are myriad and peculiar
and their bites can have very unforeseen results.
Mosquitoes, unhappily, will almost certainly bite you
and give you malaria if you do not take precautions -
you must sleep under a mosquito net,
which you must watch like a hawk
for tiny tears and which you must search nightly
for the lurking mosquito before you tuck it
carefully under your bed.
* * * * *
After a time* we were sleeping in casas or houses
and I had a helper, a little Sicilian boy named Pietro.
He was cute, about 13 or 14 years of age,
but very small because of malnutrition.
Photo - The Winnipeg Tribune, August 13, 1943
His mother did my washing and mending for a can of peas
or whatever I could scrounge. I was all set up.
When Italy caved in there was a big celebration on the beach,
but I had changed my adobe and was sleeping with my hammock,
covered with mosquito netting, slung between two orange trees.
I didn’t join in the celebration because I’d had enough vino,
and you not only fought Germans and Italians under its influence,
you fought your best friend.
Doug Harrison, RCNVR, Combined Operations
"Dad, Well Done," Page 37
*September 3 - early October, 1943. Men who worked the Canadian landing crafts scrounged up lodgings and supplies for themselves while in Messina. By day they ferried supplies to Reggio, and by night they fended for themselves. They were eye-witnesses to the movement of troops and were on hand "when Italy caved" or surrendered to the Allies.
* * * * *
More details about conditions in Sicily are provided by Sholto Watt:
Water and Food: Shortages and Supplies
You cannot rely upon the water;
therefore you must carry your own drinking water,
or you must chlorinate it yourself with a little white pill
and dose it half an hour afterwards with a little blue pill
which allegedly takes away the chlorine taste.
The ice that is made in some of
the Sicilian towns you must not put into a drink,
so you cannot have ice water
though you come to crave it.
I never expected to become a connoisseur of cold water,
but that is literally what the Sicilian campaign has made me.
Even washing water may be dangerous,
and you must not expect it to be hot.
Army food is satisfying,
but it is not inspiring,
and the most ingenious cook cannot conceal
the taste of bully beef.
If one is settled for a while in one place,
eggs may sometimes be obtained
from the country people.
What they most appreciate is bully beef,
so that very satisfactory exchanges may be made -
though strictly against the rules.
Fruit is plentiful
and so are tomatoes and peppers and onions.
Once in a long while you may have an inferior -
but different - meal in a little restaurant.
It is, however, accompanied by pangs of conscience,
for the local people are short of food
and you are not.
* * * * *
War correspondents may have had some assistance from war planners to get reasonable accommodation and meals on a fairly regular basis. Canadians in Combined Ops received very little help in these areas. Once initial invasion landings were made in Sicily (Operation Husky, July 10, 1943) and the first troop and supply ships were emptied of men and materials of war and returned to a safe port, Navy boys who manned landing crafts were left to their own resources and ingenuity. Since ALCs and LCMs came with no kitchens, beds or toilets, Canadians and Combined Ops curled up on the beaches at night or found other (more comfortable?) places to stay.
My father writes the following in memoirs:
Safe Rooms at The Savoy in Sicily
After about a week of being continually harassed
by bombers, ack-ack fire and dog fights in the sky
(we Canadians shot down a wing tank and almost
single-handedly drove the Americans from the skies),
one of our fellows on a short reconnoitre ashore
found an abandoned limestone cave.
This cave, a huge hump in the beach landscape,
was to become our shelter at night for nearly three weeks.
About 60 of us slept there, including another Norwich boy,
the late Buryl McIntyre. The remaining Canadian boys slept
in holes dug along the beach, covered over
by whatever they could scrape up.
The cave itself had been used at some time
to house cattle to protect them from us.
It was large enough to sleep many more.
The roof was 70 or 80 feet thick and
supported by huge limestone pillars inside.
We soon obtained a barrage balloon (the same way I got the rum)*
which we anchored on top of the cave. Unless a bomb
dropped in front of the door, we were as safe as a church.
There wasn’t a bomb as yet that could pierce that roof.
The limestone underfoot was almost like wet cement,
but we happily trudged through this,
put our hammocks down doubled up,
laid our mattresses on them,
curled up in our blankets clothes and all,
and slept like logs.
We even recessed navy lamps into the walls.
The ceiling was about 20 feet high.
It was cool, damp and safe
and we shared our good fortune
with several little green lizards who had cool feet.
Early each morning we paraded out
and slung our sleeping gear over bushes
or on the lower limbs of olive trees
and they would be quite dry by night.
We decided to free one sailor from duty
and he was to take over as a cook,
something we just didn’t have.
The cook’s duties were to find food
and cook it in a huge metal cauldron,
which we had procured in the same way
as the rum and barrage balloon.
The cauldron was raised on stones and heated
by pouring gasoline on the limestone underneath.
This worked out quite well.
The cook scrounged tomatoes (pomadori)
which were plentiful and we managed some bully beef
(the same way as rum, barrage balloon and cauldron).
This was all stirred up together
and one night we had tomatoes and bully beef,
and the next night we had bully beef and tomatoes.
Once in a while we threw in a sea boot
to add a little flavour.
"Dad, Well Done," Pages 107 - 108
*While unloading an LCM during the first week of Operation Husky, my father borrowed a case of rum ("intended for the Officer's Mess," he says) to share with his mates. The sailors regularly borrowed supplies because very little was provided for them, including food, clothing or shelter.
* * * * *
Closing paragraphs from The Montreal Star's war correspondent remind us that war was hard in Sicily (July - August, 1943) and would soon move on to Italy (Sept. '43 and beyond):
From Hell-hole to Another Shore
The war correspondent's life is one of uncertainties
and surprises, exasperations and sudden thrills of excitement.
One week you are living in a hell-hole,
a dusty camp smothered with flies and mosquitoes,
sweltering in the heat;
the next you are in a palazzo surrounded with vineyards,
on the cool and beautiful eastern slopes of Etna,
with 36,000 litres of wine in the cellars of which
you are invited to make yourself free....
Up to the north of the island (I go)
for the last phase, and the start of the next.
The last time I have been along the road,
the sappers were clearing it of mines.
Two of them lay dead, their charred bodies
partly hidden beneath white cloths.
Now they rested from the war, and their
sad remains were taken to the bosom of Earth,
the forgiving mother of us all.
The armies were moving north and east,
to converge upon Messina... then, from a height
above (the city), I watched the turn of the campaign.
Our guns shifted from the port and installations of Messina
to the farther shore; the enemy's guns from the mainland
were directed now on the city they had so lately held...
In the straits our navies held command;
in the air our aircraft swept on, unchallenged,
in unbroken formation, to further targets.
As the days passed, more and more
of our little ships lodged themselves in the straits,
more and more the bombers and fighters echoed
in the skies; and on the roads the military traffic
moved incessantly towards the embarkation beaches.
On the mainland we could see the deserted city of Reggio.
The shore was silent and mysterious;
the Fascists had fled, but the Germans,
we believed, lurked somewhere in the high hills...
And the next morning
in the hours of darkness,
I stood above the Straits and heard
and saw the shattering bombardment
which breached the first wall of the dungeons
and came to the ears of jailers and victims
throughout the prison of Europe.
Please link to newspaper coverage from The Star in which Mr. Watt is featured.
Please link to Passages: 'HERE IS YOUR WAR' (3) by Ernie Pyle
Unattributed Photos GH
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