442nd Infantry Regiment (United States) - The Gothic Line

The Gothic Line

On March 23, 1945 the 100/442 shipped out from Marseille and traveled to Leghorn, Italy, attached to the 92nd Division. The Fifth Army had been stalemated at the Gothic Line for the prior five months. The 442nd faced extremely tough terrain, where the saw-toothed Apennines rose up from the Ligurian Sea. Starting from the northeast, the peaks hugged the east coast of Italy and stretched diagonally southward across the Italian boot. To the west, on the other side of the mountains, was the wide flat Po River Valley that led to the Austrian Alps—the last barrier to Germany. For nine months German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring directed the construction of the Gothic Line along the top of the Apennines. The Todt Organization (known for its fortifications at Monte Cassino) used 15,000 Italian slave laborers. They drilled into solid rock to make gun pits and trenches, which they reinforced with concrete. They built 2,376 machine gun nests with interlocking fire.

On the Italian front, the 442nd had contact with another segregated American unit, the 92nd Infantry Division, as well as troops of the British and French colonial empires (West and East Africans, Moroccans, Algerians, Indians, Gurkhas, Jews from the Palestine mandate) and the non-segregated Brazilian Expeditionary Force which had in its ranks ethnic Japanese.

General Mark W. Clark welcomed the 442 and presented his plan to break the Gothic Line. General Clark had a disagreement with Supreme Commander Eisenhower. Clark had to negotiate for the return of the 100th and 442nd because Eisenhower wanted them for the Battle of the Bulge and General Devers, commander of the Sixth Army Group, needed fresh troops. General Clark got his wish. The 442nd and 100th, minus the 522nd, along with the 92nd Division, mounted a surprise diversionary attack on the left flank. They intended to shift enemy attention to it from the interior, allowing the Eighth Army to cross the Senio River on the right flank and then the Fifth Army on the left.

In front of the 442nd lay mountains code-named Georgia, Florida, Ohio 1, Ohio 2, Ohio 3, Monte Cerrata, Monte Folgorita, Monte Belvedere, Moente Carchio, and Monte Altissimo. These objectives hinged on surprising the Germans. The 100th went after Georgia Hill and the 3rd Battalion attacked Mount Folgorita. On April 3 the 442nd moved into position under the cover of nightfall to hide from the Germans who had good sight lines from their location on the mountains. The next day the 442nd waited. At 0500 the following morning they were ready to strike. A little over 30 minutes later objectives Georgia and Mount Folgorita were taken, cracking the Gothic Line. They achieved surprise and forced the enemy to retreat. After counterattacking, the Germans were defeated. During this time, 2nd Battalion was moving into position at Mount Belvedere, which overlooked Massa and the Frigido River.

The 442nd made a continuous push against the German Army and objectives began to fall: Ohio 1, 2, and 3, Mount Belvedere on April 6 by 2nd Battalion, Montignoso April 8 by 3rd Battalion, Mount Brugiana on April 11 by 2nd Battalion, Carrara by 3rd Battalion on April 11, and Ortonovo by the 100th on April 15. The 442 turned a surprise diversionary attack into an all-out offensive. The advance came so quickly that supply units had a hard time keeping up.

The Nisei drove so hard that beginning on April 17 the Germans decided to destroy their fortifications and pull back to make a final stand at Aulla. The last German defense in Italy was Monte Nebbione, directly south of Aulla. San Terenzo lay East of Mount Nobbione and became the launching point for the Aulla assault. The final drive of the 442nd began on April 19 and lasted until April 23, when the 3rd Battalion finally took Mount Nebbione and Mount Carbolo. Following the fall of San Terenzo, 2nd Battalion hooked right around the mountains and Task Force Fukuda (consisting of Companies B and F from 2nd Battalion) flanked left from Mount Carbolo creating a pincer move onto Aulla. On April 25 Aulla fell and the German retreat was cut off. In the days that followed, Germans began to surrender in the hundreds and thousands to the Fifth and Eighth Armies. This was 442nd's final World War II action. On May 2 the war ended in Italy followed six days later by Victory in Europe.

The 442nd is commonly reported to have suffered a casualty rate of 314 percent, informally derived from 9,486 Purple Hearts divided by some 3,000 original in-theater personnel. The official casualty rate, combining KIA (killed) with MIA (missing) and WIA (wounded and removed from action) totals, as a fraction of all who served, is 93%, still uncommonly high. Many Purple Hearts were awarded during the Vosges Mountains campaign and some of the wounded were victims of trenchfoot. But many trenchfoot victims were forced—or willingly chose—to return to their unit even while classified as "wounded in action". Wounded soldiers often escaped from hospitals to return to the fight.