Anzio

by Wynford Vaughan-Thomas

Based on the real life of a war correspondent during WWII

Genres: History, World War II

253 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1962

About the author

Lewis John Wynford Vaughan-Thomas, né Thomas, CBE was a Welsh newspaper journalist and radio and television broadcaster. In later life he took the name Vaughan-Thomas after his father.

Reviews

[John Irby · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy reading WWII history books. Anzio beach on the west coast of Italy was one of the bloodiest stalemates of the war. The Brits, Yanks, and Germans slugged it out through the winter, spring, and early summer before enough power was gathered to push the Germans out of southern Italy. The story also highlights the difficulties in wartime when two allied forces fight side by side, in this case the British and the Americans. The personalities of the generals clashed and the men at the front suffered. If you enjoy war history, you'll find this one interesting and well written.

[Erik Empson · Rating 4 out of 5]

If there was ever a more apt WWII occasion for the phrase "lions led by donkeys" Anzio was it. There is lots to say about the battle but two statements are indisputable. The soldiers fought heroically, on both sides, and endured hardship beyond our imagination; secondly, they were let down terribly by poor decisions and terrible leadership by people who should have known better.
In this book, written by a war correspondent who was on the scene, General Lucas gets the brunt of the blame for the debacle, which saw two divisions of Allied troops landed on the beaches of Nettuno and Anzio, and then left there for the Germans to group and close in on their small beachhead. Lucas put his efforts into securing the beachhead rather than expanding it, thus turning what was essentially in principle a good strategy to alleviate the stalemate on the Gustav Line, become a liability of its own.
Lucas was terrified of failure and thus failed to commit. But the roots of this also lie in with Churchill himself - two divisions were simply not enough, but Churcill was adamant they proceed. Hence though Lucas was clearly inept, the argument that he didn't dash for the attractive objectives of Cisterna, Albano, and Velletri, let alone worry the German communications lines, is slightly hollow. Arguably if he had done so, it would have been another kind of tragedy: one where rather than densely packed, the Allied front was over-extended with perilous lines of supply. The result was a return to the bloody static trench warfare of WWI and dreadful losses. Tanks in the offensive proved pretty useless in the terrain, and time and time again, the Germans appeared to survive the most heavy of ariel and artillery bombardments, allowing them to pursue their deadly nightly infiltration tactics.
Oddly it was another leader who swung the balance in the Allies' favour - Hitler himself who forced Kesselring to make renewed offensives, ultimately breaking their army's own back. This wasn't of course the end of the matter. Clark, vaingloriously decided to go against General Alexander's masterplan after the breakthrough at Anzio and head west rather than to Valmontone, thus allowing the German's to retreat from the Gustav line with their forces in order. Alexander didn't, it appears, have the compunction to have his subordinate do otherwise.
This is a graphic story, well told. A couple of interesting things to explore further, mostly the activities of the Special Service Force who were positioned on the west bank of the Mussolini Canal, to the east of Anzio and on the edge of what was then the Pontine marshes. Will endeavour to find out more about their sorties in to areas I know well - Foce Verde and present day Latina.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

An early 1960s account of the Battle of Anzio, i.e., written and published before it became known that the Allies were reading German coded messages, but with advantage that the author was in the Anzio Beachhead as a British journalist. According to a short note in my paperback copy, he was approached after the war by a woman whose wartime job was as a censor in the Office of War Information. In that capacity, she was reading Vaughn-Thomas' reports which so impressed her that she kept copies (unclassified press reports, remember). When she contacted him after the war it was to urge him to write a book based on those reports (drawing on her complete collection of his reports). The journalist cum author was also smart enough to marry her. The book itself is impressive in its detail as well as analysis and restrained commentary (British reserve, you know). It includes a number of sketch maps reflecting different phases of the fighting in the Anzio beachhead. Recommended.