1 Apprenticeship

p. 23 For reasons behind the selection of Salerno, see Ian Gooderson, a hard way to make a war: the allied campaign in Italy in the second world war [sic] (London: Conway, 2008), pp. 188–191 and Martin Blumenson, The United States Army in World War II, The Mediterranean Theater of Operations: Salerno to Cassino (Washington: Office of the Chief of Military History United States Army, 1969), p. 25-26.

pp. 24-25 Descriptions of the terrain around Salerno and Naples are from 139 Bde intelligence reports, WO 169/8950 139 Bde WD, September 1943.

p. 26 Mark Clark, in his memoir Calculated Risk (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1950) p. 191 describes the British divisions as ‘veteran’, this is only true relative to the entirely untried Texan Division.

p. 26 German dispositions from Gooderson, hard way to make a war, p. 193 and pp. 198–199.

p. 26-27 Verity story from DDSF/3/5 Denys Crews manuscripts ‘First Meeting With “Tich” Verity’ and ‘The Landing at Salerno September 9th 1943’, also OAS, p. 92.

pp. 27-28 Description of the landings from WO 169/8767, 46th Division WD.

p. 30 The sanitary arrangements are described in from WO 169/8950 139 Brigade WD, August 1943, and Intelligence report #7, 21 September 1943.

p. 31 Brian Sullivan had originally joined the Sherwood Rangers pre-war but was commissioned in the 2/5th Foresters after Dunkirk and served with them in North Africa. He was hospitalised in Algiers, downgraded as unfit for service and sent back the UK where he served in a training unit. He re-joined the TA after the war. (Obituary, Firm and Forester, Vol. 11/3, Apr 1991, p. 271).

p. 32 Assessment of 15th PG Div from WO 169/8950 139 Brigade WD, Intelligence report #3, 12 September 1943.

p. 32-33 Crews and Warsop give slightly different accounts of Shelton’s death (OAS, p. 93 and p. 109), which I have attempted to reconcile here. The roll of honour in W.C. Berwick Sayers, Croydon and the Second World War (Croydon: Croydon Corporation, 1949) p. 510, says he was hit by a sniper. Shelton’s grave in Salerno Cemetery records his unit as The Border Regiment, though both Sayers and the Foresters’ War Diary for August 1943 give it as the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, his original unit, one example of the difficulties of working out precise unit casualties. His younger brother, Michael, died six months later in February 1944 flying a Typhoon fighter over Belgium, and his father had won the DSO with the Naval Division in France in 1917. Although the family lived in South London, his mother had been born in Nottinghamshire.

pp. 34-35 Stan Corby said that he saw tanks in On Active Service pp. 49–50. The DLI War Diary WO 169/10206 records both the enemy advancing upon their positions towards dusk and that one of their A/T guns fired twelve rounds of AP that evening, suggesting Corby’s report of tanks is accurate.

p. 36 WO 373/4/140, MM citation for MM for Cyril Adshead.

p. 36 Details of Palmer’s capture from WO 169/10296 5th SF WD, September 1943. As well as Palmer ten other ranks are recorded in WO 417 as being taken prisoner on 12 September, almost all of them probably from this patrol. Four men are recorded as having been killed on that day, but only one of these, Bernard Widdowson, whose body is not buried in Salerno War Cemetery, seems likely to have fallen victim to the ambush. Garrett, None but the Brave, p. 149; WO 169/10296 5th SF WD, September 1943; and WO 169/8950 139 Bde WD, September 1943; all refer to the use by the Germans of deception techniques, there are also references in the secondary literature, see Walter Pond, Salerno (London: Pan Books, 1964) p. 89 and p. 153.

p. 37 The sniper is described by Keith-Lucas, in OAS, p. 72.

p. 38 Stroud is buried in the War Graves section of Hastings Cemetery, his home town.

p. 38 The motor-cycle incident is related by both Corby and Boultby, OAS, p. 50; and p. 70.

pp. 38-39 Secondary accounts focus on the commandos in reporting these actions around Piegollele, e.g. Pond, Salerno, pp. 209–211 and pp. 217–220; Des Hickey and Gus Smith, Operation Avalanche: The Salerno Landings (London: William Heinemann, 1983), pp. 265–273. At least four infantry battalions (2/5th Leicesters and 1/4th, 2nd, and 5th Hampshires) were also engaged in the area at this time, WO 169/8767, 46th Division WD, September 1943.

p. 39 Clark’s explanation of the preparations is in Calculated Risk, pp. 198–99.

p. 39-40 Crews account is in OAS, p. 95 but he may be wrong that the FOO was in contact with HMS Warspite as his narrative would place the incident after she was damaged.

p. 40 Fred Sheldon’s account of the attack in OAS, p. 105. HMS Warspite survived, and after repair she would also provide gunfire support at Normandy in June 1944.

p. 40 Garrett, None but the Brave, p. 149 reports the rumour of bagpipes. In fact the 51st Highland Division had not landed with the Eighth Army in Italy.

p. 41 WO 373/8/188, MM citation for Jack Wilson, gazetted in London Gazette Supplement 36764, 24 October 1944, p. 4903, also WO 169/10296 5 SF WD. Since the MM could not be awarded posthumously the recommendation must have been initiated prior to his death.

p. 41 The date of Roger Newton’s wounding was not recorded when first reported. Stan Corby remembered Newton as being an early casualty in the RAP but seems mistaken as the date of his wounding was later stated as 16 September. Newton was evacuated from Salerno, but his wounds became infected, and he died of septicaemia in 104 General Hospital British North Africa Forces in Algeria, on 7 October 1943. He is buried in Dely Ibrahim War Cemetery, Algiers. My thanks to his son William Newton for confirming from personal letters the date of Newton’s injury and details regarding his death.

p. 41-42 Eric Morral describes the events here in OAS, p. 61; see also IWM Tape, #13231, John Henry Booth interview with Peter M Hart (1993), Reel 2. From the casualty lists the two men killed in the explosion appear to be Private Eric Pearce from Worcestershire, buried in Salerno War Cemetery, and Private Richard Sockett from Shropshire, commemorated on the Cassino Memorial. Sockett, who had fought and been wounded with the 2nd Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry in Tunisia before transferring to the Sherwood Foresters, is wrongly identified as being in the 2nd Foresters by the CWGC, the casualty lists clearly identify him as serving with the 5th Bn. Joseph Kilby, from Birmingham, died the same day, but probably from wounds received earlier the campaign.

p. 43 Logistics operations from WO 169/10296 5SF WD, Keith-Lucas, OAS p. 73; Markham, IWM Tape #13561, Reel 11.

p. 44-45 The operations around Il Telegrafo are described by Wright, in OAS p. 118, Corby, ibid, p. 51, and Crews, ibid, p. 95-96.

p. 44 2nd Lt Reg Oliver had originally joined up with the Royal Artillery pre-war but had transferred to the Worcestershire Regiment in June 1939 and then to the Foresters.

p. 45 Crews does not name the man shot by the sniper, and wondered whether he was in fact only wounded rather than killed, but if he is correct as to the date, the only casualty suffered by the battalion on 25 September and its last fatality at Salerno was 34 year old Private Barriston Mountford from Stoke-on-Trent, who is buried in Salerno War Cemetery. Two more privates in the battalion were wounded after this date, on 26 and 30 September, the last perhaps the victim of a mine or booby-trap.

p. 46 Author’s analysis of WO 417 for final statistics. As always, casualty figures are hard to calculate exactly and are open to interpretation and doubt. Both sets of figures include one officer attached from the DLI. Nine men originally reported as casualties or missing were later removed or reported not missing. Unlike at Sedjenane, none of those recorded as taken prisoner were also reported wounded, although Corporal Raymond Oakes was later reported to have died of wounds in German hands. His grave is in the Salerno War Cemetery.

The analysis indicates that the battalion suffered 229 casualties in total between 10–19 September. The War Diary shows a battalion strength of 28 Officers and 744 ORs on 21 September, against a War Establishment (excluding 1st Reinforcements) of 38 officers and 786 other ranks.

In September 1918, according to the CWGC database, the 1/5th Sherwood Foresters had suffered forty fatalities. In September 1943 the 5th Foresters suffered thirty-eight fatalities. Both figures exclude men attached to the battalions and recorded by the CWGC under other units, and those later dying of wounds, hence the apparent discrepancy with the fifty dead previously stated.

p. 46 Saul David, Mutiny at Salerno: an injustice exposed (London: Brassey’s, 1995), particularly pp. 54–75, is the most complete coverage of events; Peter Hart, The Heat of Battle (Barnsley: Pen and Sword, 1999) pp. 48–50 describes the dissent amongst men of the 9th DLI who were from 50th Division. WO 169/10296 5 SF WD for the two Scottish Officers. The 51st Division did eventually land in Normandy.

p. 47 The percentages are calculated by dividing the casualties identified in WO 417 by War Establishment. This is, of course, not quite the same as the casualties divided by the total number of men serving as officers or NCOs during the period, which is near impossible to give with accuracy.

p. 47 Captain Frank Stuart Smith, from Edgbaston in Birmingham, died on 22 September 1943 and is buried in Salerno War Cemetery. He is identified as being a DLI officer on his grave, but he is listed in the Foresters’ war diary as a casualty. The 16 DLI diary shows him as being transferred to the Foresters on 16 September.

p. 47-48 Mardell relates this incident in More Sherwood Foresters Memories, p 141. Reginald Oliver was ex-RA, but had been with the infantry since 1939, was highly regarded by all other accounts, and did not re-join the battalion until 30 October, so seems unlikely to be the officer. Lieutenant Edward Hinde was also ex-RA, although he had been with the battalion since July. Hinde was admitted to 184 Field Ambulance in October, but this would appear due to illness as he does not appear on any casualty list.

p. 48 The comparison with other unit casualties is based upon CWGC records from Salerno War Cemetery and the Cassino Memorial from 10–30 September 1943. There are thirty-eight Foresters recorded as killed in this period (thirteen of these are on the Cassino Memorial, indicating their bodies were not found). The 3rd Coldstream Guards lost sixty-one dead, the 6th Grenadier Guards fifty-seven, the 2nd Scots Guards fifty-five. The 6th Lincolns also lost thirty-eight dead, mostly in an attack on 23 September. If casualties on 9 September are included, then still only the three Hampshire battalions of 128 Bde, the 2/4th KOYLI (138 Bde) the 8th Royal Fusiliers (167 Bde), and the 2/5th Queen’s (169 Bde) are added to the list of battalions that had more deaths at Salerno than the 5th Foresters. The methodology is admittedly imprecise, for example not taking into account casualties evacuated from the beachhead and later buried in other cemeteries, such as Roger Newton, and officers killed when not fighting with their parent unit.

p. 49 Warsop, OAS, p. 110. Geoffrey Kendall Coombs, IWM Tape, #22080 Reel 4, attests to the treatment of self-inflicted wounds.

p. 49-50 On tea and other rituals, see Binch, OAS, p. 81; Boultby, ibid, p. 70; Ashley, ibid, p. 65; Corby, ibid, p. 51.