Intelligence on the front line

27th February 1944: A US Intelligence officer despairs for the German 'children in uniforms' being sent to the front line

German troops surrender at Anzio.

POWS of the US Army at Anzio.

On the Anzio beachhead everyone was either on the frontline or just behind it, the depth of ground held by the Allies was only a few miles at its greatest extent, and everyone was under threat from shellfire. There were a number of caves and the basements of buildings which provided relatively good sleeping accommodation, secure against most shells except for a direct hit. But most had to chance it, including the wounded in tented hospitals waiting to be evacuated.

Wireless operator, Bombardier S. Williams operates his radio from a shallow dugout on Anzio.

Charles F. Marshall¹ ran the daily gauntlet to the Intelligence Corps field base, on one occasion seeing the truck in front of him blown up by a direct hit. He had arrived in early February and had been shocked by the bodies piled up near to the beach. As a fluent German speaker (his parents were German speaking Hungarians who emigrated to America) he was a natural for Intelligence duties.

He headed a section devoted to examining captured German documents:

The greater the butchery, the larger was the capture of documents. I was always a bit repulsed when handed a batch of bloody papers with a buck slip reading, “From good Germans — dead ones.” This was our Third Infantry Division's trademark. The study of documents was engrossing work, because one never knew what one would find. There was also a tantalizing element: In which batch would we hit the jackpot? Meticulous examination leavened by serendipity and voila! There it could be!