Canadians in Combined Operations Served in Sicily, 1943
Photos and Videos of Exact Locations Seem Few and Far Between
'Preparing to land at HOW Beach', D-Day, Sicily, 10 July 1943
Photo - Major W. H. J. Sale, MC. National Army Museum
(HOW Beach was 1 - 2 miles south of GEORGE Beach)
Introduction:The peaceful scene photographed above (if it was indeed taken on July 10, the first day of Allied landings along the eastern shores of Sicily) soon changed. Canadian sailors, members of RCNVR and Combined Operations who served at GEORGE and HOW Beaches aboard the 80th and 81st Canadian Flotillas of Landing Crafts (i.e., LCMs, Landing craft Mechanised) reported that the Luftwaffe (and quite possibly "Italian fighters") was soon on the scene. They returned every two hours to bomb and strafe Canadian crafts and all materials of war as it was being delivered ashore - for three straight days.
My father, a member of the 80th Flotilla, writes the following:
July 10, 1943. We arrived off Sicily in the middle of the night and stopped about four miles out. Other ships and new LCIs (landing craft infantry), fairly large barges, were landing troops. Soldiers went off each side of the foc’sle, down steps into the water and then ashore, during which time we saw much tracer fire. This was to be our worst invasion yet. Those left aboard (in charge of LCMs and delivering to Monty's troops all material of war, set to go into action after LCAs finished delivering troops and their 'boots on the ground': Editor) had to wait until daylight so we went fishing for an hour or more, but there were no fish.
A signal came through, i.e., “Do not fire on low flying aircraft, they are ours and towing gliders.” What, in the dark? Next morning, as we slowly moved in, we saw gliders everywhere. I saw them sticking out of the water, crashed on land and in the vineyards. In my twenty-seven days there I did not see a glider intact.
We started unloading supplies with our LCMs about a half mile off the beach and then the worst began - German bombers. We were bombed 36 times in the first 72 hours - at dusk, at night, at dawn and all day long, and they said we had complete command of the air. ("Ha! I say Ha!": Editor)We fired at everything. I saw P38s, German and Italian fighters and my first dogfights. Stukas blew up working parties on the beach once when I was only about one hundred feet out. Utter death and carnage. Our American gun crews had nothing but coffee for three or four days and stayed close to their guns all the time. I give them credit.Ephus P. Murphy’s pet monkey went mad and we put it in a bag of sand meant to douse incendiary bombs and threw him over the side. The Russian Stoker on our ship, named (William) Katanna, said Dieppe was never like this and hid under a winch. Shrapnel and bombs just rained down. (From "Dad, Well Done" page 31)
The videos assembled below - from the Imperial War Museum - do not depict the WWII bombing action but give us some idea what beachside areas were like in the 1940s. Today GEORGE Beach is a lovely town called Fontane Bianche and I would revisit the area again in a minute. In September, 2023 I visited the town and beach (with my younger son), found the cattle caves (grottazze) in which the Canadian sailors had found protection from the bombs, and then accommodation.
Photo of LIFE magazine as found in Museum of Allied Landings, in Catania
Editor added details in white lettering
Photo of GEORGE Sector or Beach, September 2023. GH
We walked north to Cape Ognina (red circle) but did not have time
to walk south to Cape Negra. Next time! Map - Catania Museum
Links to videos (located at the Imperial War Museum (IWM), UK) follow:
Film 1. Please click here:
INVASION OF SICILY (LANDING)Details available at IWM (AYY 502/1/3).
Object description - The 17th Infantry Brigade after landing on Sicily.
Content description - Troops unloading stores and vehicles onto George Beach. Landing craft and men are directed by a man with a loudspeaker. A beach signal office. Troops making a road for vehicles to move up the beach.
Screen shot by GH:
Members of the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve (RCNVR who were
also volunteers for Combined Operations) manned LCMs (Landing Craft
Mechanised) as part of the Canadian 80th Flotilla, at GEORGE Beach for
four weeks. Accommodation was found in cattle caves about 1 km to the
right of this location on the beach (at modern day Fontane Bianche). GH
Film 2. Please click here:
INVASION OF SICILYDetails available at IWM (AYY 500-4)
Object description: Troops landing south of Syracuse for the invasion of Sicily.
Content description - Troopships and motor transport ships at anchor with Assault Landing Craft passing, on "George" Beach. Men of the 2nd Battalion, Cameronians preparing to disembark from HMT Dunera. Men climbing down the ladder on the side of the ship into landing craft. Close up of men preparing to leave the deck and climb down the ladder. Men getting into a boat already half-filled with soldiers. The Assault Landing Craft moving off for the shore. View of the beach from an ALC. Men disembarking from ALCs and others already on the beach. View of the beach showing landing craft in the foreground and bigger transport in the background. Close up of men disembarking from ALCs panning to another beach scene. Italian prisoners removing their own barbed wire defences. Two Italian prisoners removing a stake, panning up to the crowd of shipping in the bay. A Priest gun and Bofor guns in the foreground and a large ship in the background at a Vehicle Assembly Park. Men of the 2nd Battalion Cameronians marching away from the beach. Men of the 13th Brigade, 2nd Inniskillings marching through the village of Cassibile. Close up of the men's faces as they pass through in single file. Sherman tanks passing men who are marching up to the front, raising up dust. A group of 125 Italian prisoners being led in by men of the Cameronians in the early hours of 11 July when taking the small town of Floridia.
Screen shots by GH:
Men climbing down the ladder on the side of the ship into landing craft.
View of the beach showing landing craft in the foreground
and bigger transport in the background.
Same as above, slightly wider view of GEORGE Beach
A Priest gun and Bofor guns in the foreground and a large ship
in the background at a Vehicle Assembly Park.
GEORGE Beach (from south toward the north), September, 2023 (GH)
Film 3. Please click here:
INVASION OF SICILY (LANDING)Details available at IWM (AYY 502/1/2)
Object description: Troops of the 17th Infantry Brigade landing on Sicily.
Content description - Troops leaving the parent ship. View of Sicily in the distance and the approaching shore. Various landing craft going ashore at George Beach. Troops disembarking from the landing craft.
Screen shots by GH:
"The parent ship." Boarded in or near Alexandria. Name unknown.
"Various landing craft going ashore at George Beach." These are Landing
Craft, Assault (LCAs) with troops aboard. Supplies come later on LCMs
"Various landing craft going ashore at George Beach." These are Landing
Craft (for) Infantry, Large (LCI(L)s). Olive groves in background*.
"Troops disembarking from the landing craft." [LCI(L)]
*Olive groves are mentioned in captions re still photographs revealing vehicles leaving GEORGE Beach after being unloaded from larger vessels (e.g. LCTs or LSTs). See below.
Film 4. Please click here:
INVASION OF SICILYDetails available at IWM (AYY 510/1)
Object description: The 24th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery in Syracuse, Sicily.
Content description - Troops embarking from HMS «Monarch of Bermuda» onto landing craft. Vessels arriving. Landing craft flying white ensign. Shot from interior of landing craft approaching and landing at George Beach. Troops disembarking from landing craft through the surf. Shots of the beach. Bulldozer at work rescuing vehicles.
Four screen shots of landing craft nearing George Beach, home to the 80th Flotilla of Canadian LCMs from July 10 - August 7, 1943:
Screen shot photos by GH
The first Italian prisoners taken by Commandos at Coastal Battery. Panning shot of civilian prisoners. Donkeys and horses in the street, including one with a plumed headdress. Priest and Sherman tanks being unloaded. Priest tanks landing from craft. Priest tanks firing.
Prisoners arriving in Syracuse, including officers and naval personnel. Officers standing in a doorway looking at the camera, one is smoking. Civilians looting houses and warehouses, and then being controlled by troops. The heavily bombed main street. Civilians drinking from a bomb crater in Syracuse.
Troops leaving landing craft and wading to shore. Italian prisoners being searched. Prisoners sitting on the grass. Women and children sitting under trees. Close up of children. A soldier walks past with a boy. Close up of a woman holding a toddler.
Troops running along by a wall. A soldier with a camouflaged helmet peers around the corner of the wall. A Sherman tank with an insignia and identification 'Clive'. Soldiers pass along the road followed by the tank. The tank crew wave at the camera. A Sicilian barber cuts a soldier's hair, watched by a crowd of other soldiers and civilians. Priest tanks firing in an orchard.
The infantry mopping up near Augusta. Soldiers looking out for snipers. Soldiers advancing from orchards. Troops discovering and testing water from wells in an orchard. Close up of water being stirred in a cup.
***
The last video shows a rather peaceful landing in the first 30 seconds or so. At some point on the first day of landing on George Beach
enemy aircraft arrived, made a stiff impression on several Canadian sailors aboard (initially) LCAs and (later ) LCMs for 72 hours. A pillbox or two had to be silenced during the first 3 days and gradually work became a routine, ship to shore was completed in relative safety, and accommodation was found in two cattle caves - with a thick limestone roof.
My father wrote the following in memoirs:
Our beach had machine gun nests carved out of the ever-present limestone, with slots cut in them to cover our beaches. A few hand grenades tossed in during the night silenced them forever. Slowly we took control and enemy raids were only sporadic, but usually at dawn or dusk when we couldn’t see them and they could see us. At such times we had to get out of our LCMs and lay smoke screens, and travelled the ocean side or beach side depending upon which way the wind was blowing. Even then they could see the masts sticking up. During one raid I was caught on the open deck of the Pio Pico, so I laid down - right on a boiling hot water pipe. I got up quickly. A stick of Axis bombs lands near LCTs and LCMs near Avola, Sicily.
Photo credit - St. Nazaire to Singapore, Volume 1
We were never hit but six ships were hit in a sneak attack out of the sun by German fighters carrying a bomb apiece. At night they would drop chandelier flares with their engine motors cut off. Everything would be dark and then suddenly it was like daylight. The flares were on parachutes and took forever to come down. After the flares lighted us up in came the bombers. Fortunately our gunners got so expert they could shoot out the flares. Our LCM was fortunate enough to pick up rum destined for the officers’ mess; but it never arrived there - we stowed it in the engine room. From then on we went six or seven miles up the beach at night, had a swim, slung our hammocks and drank ourselves to sleep, to awake in the morning covered with shrapnel, but never heard a sound.One morning as we returned to the beach after a heavy bombing we noticed an LST with its bows completely gone and smouldering a bit. We went aboard to examine it and found under the rear canopy a sailor sound asleep in his hammock. After we awakened him he said he hadn’t heard a thing. The rest of the crew was missing.Later we moved into a limestone cave, dank and wet, but safe from bombs. We hung a barrage balloon over it, about 1,000 feet up, and one sailor got drunk and shot it down but we had 50 - 60 feet of limestone over our heads. We used a pail of sand saturated with gasoline to heat our meals on if any food was available.I had 27 days at Sicily living on tomatoes and Bully Beef. I swore I would kick the first bull I saw in Canada - right in the posterior - if I got back. Everywhere I looked there were anti-personal hand-sized grenades that needed only to be touched to go off. They were built to maim and not kill because it takes men to look after the wounded, but if you’re dead, you’re dead. We threw tomatoes at a lot and exploded them in that manner.
"Dad, Well Done" pages 32-33George Beach circled in yellow. A road can be seen going NE from
the beach to Cassibile. Yellow arrow points to the ridge of land that
is home to 'Grottazze' (underlined in red) or "lizardly" cattle caves
More videos (with relevant excerpts from sailors' memoirs) to follow if found, e.g., related to Canadian sailors at other locations, e.g., Sicily or Italy, in the Mediterranean Sea in 1943.
Please link to more videos related to Sicily -
Videos: Operation HUSKY, Sicily, July 1943 (Part 3)
Unattributed Photos GH
My father saw many gliders during the landings of Allied troops on the 
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