Remembering Monte Cassino

The skies over Omaka will soon be buzzing with vintage aircraft as the biennial Classic Fighters Airshow takes place. Among the highlights expected is a re-enactment of the Battle of Monte Cassino.

CHERIE HOWIE talks to four veterans of a battle remembered as one of the hardest fought in World War II

AT THE GERMAN'S MERCY

Lying alone and paralysed behind the wall of a monastery with four bullets embedded in his body, Blenheim man Ivan Gibbons could hardly have been in a more vulnerable position during the battle of Monte Cassino.

A 26th infantry battalion private, Mr Gibbons was wounded on the fourth day of the battle, with three bullets piercing his stomach and one his hip as he and other soldiers made their way through the streets of the town of Cassino.

"The Germans were above us, but we couldn't dig in because all the roads were sealed up."

His mates dragged him behind the wall of a monastery, where he lay, paralysed from the waist down, and mostly alone, until he could be rescued the next day.

He felt no pain, but his situation was dire.

"I was just numb ... all I was worrying about was the Germans coming down. I was helpless."

His war was over, but the battle to regain the use of his legs had just begun.

"I was told I would never walk again, but I was determined to. I took the attitude that I was going to walk again."

Taken to a military hospital, he particularly remembers visits from fellow Blenheim soldier Raymond Faulkner.

The now late Mr Faulkner sat with him, prayed with him and wrote to his family, so they knew what was going on, Mr Gibbons said.

"That meant so much to my family. He was wonderful, a tower of strength ... the service is a great place to have long-term friends, friends for life."

Four months after being wounded, Mr Gibbons began the long journey back to New Zealand on a hospital ship.

Once home he spent more time in both Wellington and Wairau hospitals before being discharged.

By February, just under a year after he was wounded, he was walking without assistance.

Mr Gibbons returned to Monte Cassino in 2004 and, amazingly, found the wall he had sheltered behind 60 years earlier.

Knocking on the door of the neighbouring monastery, he was met by an elderly nun.

Although she spoke no English, and he no Italian, they were able to communicate that they were both there during the battle she inside the monastery, he lying on the ground outside. The woman showed him to the wall.

The commemorations were also a time to remember friends lost, among them his best mate, Laxon Brown, who died the day after Mr Gibbons was wounded.

WAVE AFTER WAVE OF THESE BOMBS....ALL YOU COULD SEE WAS SMOKE

Endless bombing and shelling for three months is how 90-year-old Russell Kidd of Blenheim remembers the battle of Monte Cassino.

Mr Kidd was serving with the sixth field artillery divisional signal, running communication lines out to the guns.

He had already spent two years fighting in North Africa, including at the battle of El Alamein, where he lost a brother, when he was sent with other New Zealand troops to take part in the Italian campaign.

Monte Cassino was just one part of that effort, but he remembers it clearly. "There were wave after wave of these bombs. The whole town was bombed and the monastery. All you could see was smoke. Three months we were there and it was just shelling and bombing."

For those on the ground, the threat came not only from the enemy, but from their own side, he recalls. "Some of the US planes turned back too early and they bombed our own lines."

Shell holes also proved a hazard, with tanks unable to get through and the holes filling with water when it rained, he says.

His war did not end with the battle. "I went right through Italy and I was at Faenza when the war ended."

For Ray McLennan, Monte Cassino was also just one part of his war. A territorial soldier, he was conscripted in 1940, and after 13 months training in Waiouru, he was sent to North Africa and then later to Italy.

The former Seddon, Renwick and Marlborough Boys' College pupil missed the first battle, at Sangro River, after becoming sick and missing the ship from Egypt.

"I was put in hospital and then a convalescence home. It must've been meant to be." Returning later to his unit, he found himself at Monte Cassino, where his job was to take supplies to the tanks.

"We went up at night. The Germans used to keep a good eye on us."

While he escaped the battle unscathed, he was later wounded at the River Senio, when he was hit in the head with shrapnel. "I was offered a trip home, but I didn't take it. I went back into service."

Mr McLennan returned to Italy in 2004, including Monte Cassino for the 60th anniversary commemorations, but he found it hard to recognise.

Mr Kidd also returned for the commemorations and had a similar experience.

Both the town and the monastery have been rebuilt.

It was the second commemorative journey Mr Kidd had made, after a pilgrimage to El Alamein 12 years earlier. He plans to make another visit to the battlefield with family in 2012, "if I'm still here".

The site is important to him because it is where his brother, Hilton, who was killed in the battle at the age of 20, is buried.

"It's one of 1300 graves there, but we found it (in 1992) row B, No12."

British ex-patriate Fred Brown had a different perspective on Monte Cassino.

An aircraft technician in the Royal Navy's fleet air arm on HMS Formidable, he was involved in the battle off shore.

The Formidable was an aircraft carrier, catering for Barracuda torpedo biplanes which were providing support for the American bombers taking part in the battle.

Despite the scenes on shore those on the ship had little time to witness history.

"We were working all the time, day and night. We didn't have time to look at what was going on."

For Mr Brown, who moved with his wife and children to Blenheim more than 50 years ago, Monte Cassino was just one of many battles he was involved in, first on the HMS Formidable and later on the HMS Indefatigable.

On the latter ship, his crew was involved in attacks on the giant German warship Tirpitz, anchored in Norwegian fiords, and later in the Pacific war, attacking Japanese controlled islands, including Iwo Jima and Okinawa.

The ship also came under daily threat of kamikaze bombers. Mr Brown lost 14 of his crewmates when a kamikaze pilot smashed into the Indefatigable in April 1945.

SHOW BRINGS ALIVE BATTLE

Imagine Wither Hills standing between two armies, one desperate to break through and make their way to a major city beyond, and another equally desperate to push back the same onslaught.

In between both is the town of Blenheim, caught in the middle and vulnerable.

The defending forces use the hills to repel repeated attacks, taking advantage of the height to pick off those below.

The attacking forces eventually respond with an aerial bombardment that destroys not only the target, but also the town below.

If that sounds like a nightmare scenario, it is one those living in the Italian town of Cassino were faced with in early 1944. The town was almost completely destroyed in the four-month-long Battle of Monte Cassino, along with the 1400-year-old monastery on the mountain behind the town for which the battle is named.
The battle involved a series of four attacks by the Allies, who were intent on breaking the German defensive line, known as the Gustav Line, and seizing Rome.

The infamous destruction of the historic abbey of Monte Cassino, founded in AD524 by St Benedict, took place on February 15, because of fears that the abbey was being used as a lookout post for the German forces.
Two days after the bombing, German paratroopers entered the ruins to defend it, but their defensive line eventually broke in May. Allied forces entered Rome the next month.

Final casualties totalled more than 70,000, including 54,000 Allied and 20,000 German soldiers. Allied casualties included 1400 New Zealanders, 343 of whom died. An unknown number of civilians were killed.
Marlborough residents will get an inkling of the battle when it is re-enacted as part of the Classic Fighters Airshow at Omaka next month. Aviators from around New Zealand will recreate the battle twice during the three-day airshow, including the destruction of a replica monastery.

- The Marlborough Express