'Monte Cassino - A German View'
An excerpt from the classic account by Rudolf Bohmler, who was a battalion commander in 3rd Fallschirmjager Regiment
First published in German in 1956 and in English in 1964 Rudolf Bohmler’s account of the Battle for Monte Cassino is one of the few volumes from the German perspective of any of the battles in Italy. It is much more than an account of the Cassino battle alone, dwelling at length on the context and strategic situation in Italy and quoting from the Allied perspectives that had been published at the time, including those by Winston Churchill and General Mark Clark. He also spent some time investigating the German use of the Monastery and the efforts to remove its artworks before he arrived on the battlefield with his unit in February 1944.
Monte Cassino - A German View is widely considered to be essential reading for those wanting a full understanding of the Monte Cassino battle, Bohmler was also writing to preserve the reputation of his fellow Fallschirmjagers, so many of whom died under Allied bombs and artillery and in subsequent assaults on their positions:
The successful defence of the town and hill of Cassino is one of the out standing feats of arms accomplished by German troops in the Second World War. This impressive victory won by the 1 Parachute Division and the army units placed under its command evoked the astonished admiration of the world, and it is all the more impressive in that it occurred in the fifth year of the war, at a time when the German armies were no longer striding victoriously forward and no longer enjoyed the advantage of superior armaments.
Cassino was fought against an enemy who had long since seized the initiative and who possessed an overwhelming superiority on land, at sea and in the air. The Germans, on the other hand, had been on the defensive and hard-pressed for a year and more, their divisions had been bled white and their resources in armaments weakened by aerial bombardment.
As their fathers had stood up to the fury of Verdun and the battles of the Somme a quarter of a century before, their sons now stood fast in the face of the terrifying material onslaught with which the enemy was destined to destroy them. The paratroops well knew what was at stake. The order that Cassino was to be held in all circumstances meant a struggle to the death; but they also knew that very pregnant reasons had been responsible for the order. Their task was not simply to hold up the enemy for a while, but to bar the way to Rome. For Rome in the hands of the enemy meant airfields not far from the German frontiers and more and more bombs on the already hard-pressed homeland.
Kesselring had good reasons, after the first battle of Cassino, for entrusting the defence of this vital key-point to the I Parachute Division. Heidrich’s Division personified the hard core of the German parachute arm. It was the successor to the 7 Flying Corps Division, the ‘womb’ of the parachute arm, which had been raised with such great difficulty by General Student.
With this division were connected those names which have gone down in the history of war as the first operations ever to be conducted by means of parachute landings—Stavanger and Dombas in Norway, Rotter dam, Dordrecht and Moerdijk in Holland, Eben Emael and the Albert Canal in Belgium, and last but by no means least, Crete.
Yet Crete all but became the graveyard of the German parachute arm. The severe casualties suffered persuaded Hitler that the days of the paratroops were over and that their initial successes had been due solely to the novelty of the arm and the surprise it achieved. Churchill, on the other hand, after the conquest of Crete, ordered the strength of the British paratroops to be raised from 500 to 5,000!
Crete was the first milestone on 7 Flying Corps’ unhappy road. From there its regiments and battalions were pitched into Russia, where they were for the most part split up into small units and placed under the command of army divisions. Some went to Leningrad, some to Stalino and Yuhkno, and by the time the exhausted remnants were crouching frozen in the hard winter of 1941/42, most of the veterans of Crete lay buried in the snowy deserts of Russia.
It was only the summer of 1942 that the last remnants—scattered elements of the 2 Parachute Regiment, the machine-gun battalion and the anti-tank sections—returned from Russia. Hitler had sacrificed one of the keenest weapons in his armoury to plug up a few holes on the Eastern Front, while the Allies were busily engaged in creating a mighty airborne army. Nor is that the end of the story. While the last of the paratroops were being decimated at Volkhov, Hitler sent the ‘Ramcke Brigade’ to Africa—without its aircraft, as infantry! And in Africa they remained, lost for ever to the parachute arm.
This senseless waste of an elite body of men is a tragic chapter in the history of Hitler, Master of the Art of War.
...
Now the Division was at Cassino. Behind it lay 220 days of continuous fighting. Only for a short while, after the evacuation of Sicily, had it enjoyed a brief rest in Calabria and Apulia; since Salerno it had been uninterruptedly in the front line, the fierce storm of battle had swept over it, and its ranks had been very greatly depleted. The men had fought till they could fight no more. They were worn out, and most of them were suffering from malaria. Many had had no leave since quitting Russia. Yet their fighting spirit remained unbroken. The superior enemy strength had taken heavy toll of them, but they had proved their ability to stand up to odds, and the success they had achieved bred in them a fine measure of self-confidence. Come what might at Cassino, they’d take good care that the enemy did not get a walk-over.
...
[Bohmler continues with a number of individual stories from the Cassino battle]
The first story concerns the fate of No. 7 Company, 3 Parachute Regiment. Only a handful survived the seven-hour preliminary bombardment; most of them had died and been buried beneath the ruins; and those who had survived were at the end of their tether when the barrage at last lifted to engage targets in the rear areas. But when they heard the clatter of on coming tanks, their fighting spirit burst once more into flame. A fresh hour of trial was at hand, and they were ready to meet it.
Through the slowly clearing smoke and dust Lieutenant Schuster’s men suddenly saw the first three Sherman tanks a bare fifty yards away. They were twisting and turning this way and that in an effort to find a way through the mass of craters and rubble. Behind them came infantry, with out a care in the world and confident that nothing could harm them in this desolation of ruins. Without bothering about cover, the men clambered over the piles of rubble, and no shot, no burst from the dreaded German machine-gun, Mk. 42, broke the peace. The tank commanders, too, felt quite secure. They lounged unconcernedly out of their turrets, joking with each other over the inter-com. There was not a ‘Jerry’ to be seen anywhere!
Suddenly the first shots rang out from among the ruins, and the tank commanders ducked hastily back into their tanks. The infantry dived into craters or sought cover behind the armoured vehicles. That was the first blow. The second, aimed at the leading Sherman, followed at once. Lance-Corporal Blum supplied it with a ‘Panzerfaust’ (the German anti-tank bazooka). The crew leapt out, but were plastered with rifle grenades as they dashed for cover behind the remnants of a wall. The two remaining monsters ground their way laboriously towards Schuster’s men. The infantry crept cautiously forward under cover of their armoured escort, throwing hand grenades haphazardly into the ruins around them. But the paratroops were on the alert, and prevented any further advance.
The tanks stuck fast in the rubble, until darkness enabled them to get back. The infantry, however, remained where they were. Despite his successful parry ing of the first thrust, Schuster’s position was highly dangerous. He knew that the enemy had broken into No. 10 Company’s position on his right. In the evening he heard that the only assault gun in the sector had been buried beneath the ruins. His means of communication had been destroyed, runners could not get through, and he had lost touch with battalion head quarters. The enemy, he thought, was probably sitting on top of the company, on Rocca Janula. Isolated and cut off, he and his men crouched in the ruins and waited.
The night passed quietly. The Company Commander distributed a little bread and sugar, the only food they had left. But the men were desperately thirsty. For twelve hours they had had nothing to drink, and clinging chalk dust and the heat of battle had parched their throats. In front of them they could hear the murmur of the Rapido, but between them and it were the New Zealanders.
© Maximilian Verlag Gmbh & Co 1956, ' Monte Cassino - A German View'. Reproduced courtesy of Pen & Swords Publishers Ltd.
For the Allied perspective of the attack made by a combined US Army, Indian and New Zealand Tank force (inexplicably, without infantry support) see Tank Attack at Monte Cassino: The Cavendish Road Operation 1944, a comprehensive reconstruction by Jeffrey Plowman.