Chapter 3: Mediterranean Quartermasters Improvise During 1943
When the TORCH forces landed in French North Africa in November 1942, the Mediterranean area had already seen more than two years of war. Fighting had begun in June 1940, when Italy hastily declared war on a defeated France and an undaunted Britain. In the months that followed, Metropolitan France, with both American and Canadian missions accredited at Vichy, could be considered a neutral nation, but the French colonial empire was in fact, if not officially, at war with Britain. British attacks on Oran and Dakar in July 1940, and the occupation of Syria a year later, aroused deep French resentment, and made it urgently necessary that TORCH have the appearance of a predominantly American expedition. Hoping to nourish French resentment into a full alliance against the British, the Axis Powers were tactful in their official relations with the colonies. Apart from a small German-Italian observer organization, to enforce the armistice terms, the area was not under direct Axis control as the TORCH operation began.1
The British were constrained to action against their recent ally by the need to maintain their position in the Middle East. That Britain’s life line ran via Malta to Suez, and thence to India, was one of the truisms of recent history, but by mid-1942, as Japan extended its conquests, the Mediterranean became an American life line as well. The long alternative route around Africa slowed down convoys not only to British bases in Egypt, Iraq, and India, but to U.S. bases already established in Iran, Burma, and Australia. By mid-1942 the Middle East had become a center of American as well as British strategic interest, and succeeding months saw a slow build-up of U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF) units in the area, largely dependent upon the Royal Air Force (RAF) for logistical support. On 8 November 1942, the same day that far more dramatic events were occurring 2,000 miles to the west, Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews formally activated the U.S. Army Forces in the Middle East (USAFIME), a separate theater headquarters with roughly the same boundaries as its British counterpart.2 Thus many characteristics of warfare in the Mediterranean, and of American participation in operations there, had emerged before the
TORCH expedition. The first objective of Mediterranean combat was control of the sea lanes, a prize to be gained by land and air as well as naval operations. TORCH itself was decided upon primarily because German air power in Sicily and Crete had reduced the utility of Malta as a convoy station, and not solely because of the German Army’s threat to Egypt and the Suez Canal. Once maritime supremacy was restored, all further objectives would be more easily attained. The geography of the area assured that every major land campaign could be supported from its own major port, without excessively long lines of rail or highway communication. It was no accident that every major logistical headquarters was named a base section.3
The Middle East remained a predominantly British theater, and Americans there learned tactical and logistical concepts from veterans of the Eighth Army, and from the RAF’s Western Desert Air Force. The Desert Training Center in California had been selected because the arid climate and terrain resembled that of Libya, but conditions in both areas were widely different from the wet scrubby landscape actually encountered in parts of French Northwest Africa. As Lt. Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery’s forces converged with General Eisenhower’s, the faded khaki uniforms and pale yellow camouflaged vehicles from the desert country contrasted sharply with the wool olive drab uniforms and dark green vehicles of the units newly arrived from Britain and the United States.
The Anglo-American landings on 8 November 1942 were followed by three days of combat against French troops—a tragedy, but not a futile one. The fighting served to convince the French that TORCH was a major operation, not a series of pinprick raids, and that the outcome should be defined as a French revolt, rather than as an American victory. It can be argued that a more widely heralded operation, with less emphasis on surprise, would have saved American, French, and British lives; but that view underrates the alertness of German intelligence, and the strength and mobility of the opposing forces. The defection of Vichy French forces in Morocco and Algeria only strengthened Axis determination to win the race for securing Tunisia. On 9 November German planes were at Tunis. Two days later, using all-weather fields, hundreds of aircraft had arrived and five Axis cruisers were offshore. German tanks patrolled the streets of Tunis and Bizerte, and the outlying defenses at Mateur were bolstered. By the end of November 1942, the western Mediterranean was alive with the German effort to offset TORCH.4
Securing North African Beaches and Bases
In the predawn hours of 8 November 1942, TORCH convoys dropped anchor in Atlantic and Mediterranean waters, and began simultaneously discharging assault troops into landing craft that would carry them onto nine North African
beaches.5 Against Morocco the operation involved three landings along a 200-mile coastal strip. General Patton’s forces landed at Fedala and Safi, primarily to move overland and capture Casablanca without damaging that larger and more modern port. To the north of Casablanca, those striking at Port-Lyautey were to seize the only all-weather airfield in Morocco, secure the rail junctions on the main line from Casablanca to Algiers via Fes, and effect a junction with forces from Oran.
In the Oran area, two columns enveloped the city from the west, and a third column headed south from Arzew, a village some thirty miles northeast of the well-equipped berths at Oran itself. Inasmuch as these columns neglected the mole and piers in Oran’s harbor, two companies of the 6th Armored Infantry Regiment were floated in directly toward the docks of Oran at three hours past midnight. Far to the east of Oran, the same envelopment tactics were used against Algiers.
At all points opposition had been expected, and at Oran the French provided no disappointments. Even before the troops touched land, one phase of Quartermaster work began to unfold. From defenses in Oran’s harbor, French machine gunners, after a two-hour alert from the three enveloping columns, butchered the advancing infantrymen as they stood below deck in their two unarmored cutters. Those recovered were later buried by Quartermaster troops in Oran’s first military cemetery. Landings at other points proceeded without major incident.6
Only a few Quartermaster detachments were present during the period of 8–11 November, and the handling of QM classes of supply cannot be separated from the over-all support story. At all points, troops and unit trains went ashore with five days of supply, while another week’s supply was offshore as cargo. This meant that a total of twelve days’ supply for 107,000 men began moving over nine beaches. Dumps at each landing were the responsibility of each assault group. By merely observing the landings, task force G-4 sections missed an opportunity to carry out their mission of centralizing coordination.
The word “disorganization” summarizes the over-all picture of supply during the first three days. That the operation proved a success can be attributed less to the efficiency of the assault landing than to the essential accuracy of the estimate, largely ignored by tactical commanders, that the French would offer brief, if any, resistance. Much of the difficulty resulted from the inexperience of the participants, the speed with which they had been assembled, and their inability to rehearse the supply phase of the operation. On these points Western Task Force offers a valuable case study.7
In Morocco, thanks to what has been described as the calmest surf in sixty-eight years, small amounts of ammunition, rations, drinking water, and gasoline were
ashore by the afternoon of D-day. Because of an acute shortage of motor transportation, the forward movement of supplies from the beach groups to combat units, as well as the relocation of supplies misplaced by confused coxswains of landing craft, was virtually impossible. French resistance at Safi and Fedala terminated on D-day, and combat troops were free to move in the direction of Casablanca. On the first afternoon the surf rose so rapidly and ominously that operations over the beaches were threatened. High ground swells capsized some landing craft and dashed others against rocks with losses of troops, vehicles, and supplies. In the Port-Lyautey sector only tracked vehicles moved inland and shore parties had to scramble to move trucks and stores above the high-water mark.
Final computations on the destruction of landing craft varied, but most estimates agreed that losses for Western Task Force approximated 35 percent, a figure that was too high for efficiency. It was not even creditable by comparison with the higher losses at Algiers. Summarizing his command’s experience at Port-Lyautey, Maj. Gen. Lucian K. Truscott, Jr., reported to Patton that “the combination of inexperienced landing craft crews, poor navigation, and desperate hurry resulting from lateness of hour, finally turned the debarkation into a hit-or-miss affair that would have spelled disaster against a well-armed enemy intent upon resistance.”8
The loss of landing craft and their contents, as well as the lack of service troops on the beaches, quickly demonstrated the dependence of tactical maneuver upon logistical support. Because of insufficient supporting weapons, transportation, and communications equipment, the southward advance from Fedala by elements of the 3rd Division stalled as completely as if the French defenders of Casablanca had come out in force. In the hope of exploiting the advantage produced by a show of strength, the 3rd Division resumed its march by midnight of 9 November. Marching troops now endured the fatiguing test of hand-carrying supplies which should have been transported in organic vehicles.9
Transport quartermasters complained of their lack of authority to control unloading. Compounding the difficulty was the absence of other officers and noncommissioned officers capable of maintaining control on the beaches, piers, or quays. The beach supply-handling parties loafed at their jobs; some wandered away. Drivers of vehicles insisted that they were not obliged to assist with the unloading. Because beach parties consisted largely of combat engineers, there was a tendency to give them other duties. At Fedala, by the evening of D-day, more sailors than soldiers were handling cargo on shore. So haphazard was the unloading at dockside that the search for various items resembled a foraging operation. Even the arrival of thirty-three 2½-ton trucks belonging to the 3rd Division’s
Quartermaster company, could not bring quick order to the supply tangle at Fedala.
At Safi, speedy efforts were made to recruit local inhabitants, together with their trucks and wagons, to assist in the unloading and sorting of supplies. Quartermasters made payment in cigarettes, cloth, or canned rations but it shortly became apparent that workers were more interested in the golden opportunity to pilfer. Many native drivers, after being given a loaded truck and directions for delivery, disappeared. Two days after the landing, tons of ammunition and rations were discovered on native fishing boats.10
Slowly logistical order prevailed in Morocco. On 19 November 1942 the first administrative convoy docked at Casablanca, carrying thirty days’ supply of Quartermaster items and 32,000 service troops, including Headquarters, 6th Port, and its two organic port battalions. In addition, a Quartermaster truck regiment and a service battalion arrived, together with the advance echelon, Quartermaster Section, SOS, Western Task Force, consisting of Lt. Col. James E. Poore, Jr., and Col. Humphrey S. Evans, a supply officer. They made an immediate reconnaissance of Casablanca to determine available storage facilities, to survey the availability of local foodstuffs, coal, and liquid fuels, to determine local labor sources and wages, and to locate bakeries, shoe repair facilities, and other services.
Within the month Evans and Poore were working for Col. Ralph H. Tate, G-4, SOS, Western Task Force, and made the first survey of the Rabat-Meknes-Fes area along the rail line stretching toward Oujda, and thence to Oran. At mid-December, the Chief Quartermaster, SOS, Western Task Force, Colonel Middleswart, accompanied by his executive officer, Col. Neal H. McKay, arrived in Casablanca. With the activation of Fifth Army late in December 1942, Atlantic Base Section was organized and Middleswart became its chief quartermaster. By March 1943, Casablanca’s port capacity was not being fully used because, with the shift of operations toward Tunisia, Oran was receiving an increasing proportion of incoming tonnage.11
In the Arzew-Oran landings, Fredendall’s Center Task Force likewise experienced a shortage of service troops. Its G-4 staff failed to coordinate beach operations, and discipline at the beach dumps was lacking. Fredendall had one advantage over Patton. He had provided for the services of 350 men of the 1st Infantry Division’s quartermaster battalion as well as men of the 1st Engineer Special Brigade to support the 1st Infantry Division and Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division. Also, II Corps brought along its quartermaster to Arzew on D-day. With seven years of experience as an infantry officer, Colonel McNamara was able to observe the operation with a trained eye. He was on hand to make an early reconnaissance of sites. His presence would become even more important when II Corps assumed responsibility for supply functions for Mediterranean Base Section. By being in the area for D-day,
McNamara was able to make this supply transition smoothly.12
Resistance at Arzew, the primary D-day objective, was so brief that a detachment of it officers and 173 men of the 1st Division’s Quartermaster battalion was able to land at Grand Quay by 0930. Simultaneously, a smaller detachment came over Zebra Beach on the south side of the harbor. That afternoon two ships in the assault convoy berthed at Arzew’s two piers, and with the help of the Quartermaster detachment that had landed earlier, unloading of the assault cargo began. The detachment commandeered a locomotive and five cars, and, using a native crew, shuttled stores around the docks and from the beaches to the railway station which served as the divisional distribution point.
Inasmuch as three-fourths of the task force strength was being discharged at Arzew, three-fourths of its assault supply was also landing there. Along with the supplies of other services Quartermaster items moved from ship to shore under the supervision of 1st Engineer Special Brigade. For his Class I dump, McNamara selected a little park a few blocks away from the piers at Arzew, and his ration point was operated by 51 men of the 85th QM Depot Supply Company. Northwest of Arzew, 112 men from Company B, 205th QM Gasoline Supply Battalion, found the local gas and oil refinery in good condition and opened a Class III depot, exploiting both the pipeline and a narrow-gauge railroad to Arzew’s dock area.
Before landing, McNamara had been assured that trucks of the brigade would carry supplies, regardless of service, to the dumps for which they were intended. But there was a lack of G-4 supervision, and the engineers merely dumped cargo at spots convenient to them, always at the water line. Moreover, the engineers had no control over the landing area itself, and the Arzew docks and beaches were open to a host of visitors. Unit supply officers had a field day laying in reserves. Fortunately, the Class III dump slowly acquired stock because Company B, 205th QM Battalion, had a few trucks. The Class I officer, despite his resourcefulness in getting one truck to haul his own reserves, barely managed to maintain a balance of supply. Unquestionably, twelve days’ rations for 40,000 men should have been adequate until the D plus 4 convoy arrived. But they were exhausted in the course of four days, not as a result of bad planning, but by the overdrawing of rations inspired by the philosophy of getting while the getting was good.
On D plus 2, operations at Arzew harbor were left in the hands of the amphibian engineers, while the 1st Division’s Quartermaster battalion devoted itself to operating a divisional dump, distributing supplies, and providing trucks for the deployment of combat units. On 11 November the French commander at Oran surrendered, and McNamara immediately moved into the city. He had to make haste in selecting depot sites to house the shipments scheduled to arrive from the United Kingdom. Fourteen days of supply for a total of 80,000 men, according to the TORCH plan, would be on hand by D plus 30.
Surprised and chagrined to note the unfortunate contrast between representations on maps and photographs and
reality on the ground, McNamara was able, “after much jabbering in French and the use of my active hands,” to arrange for the occupancy of usable sites. His first call was on the manager of Oran’s large gasoline refinery. The tanks were in excellent condition and by 12 November had absorbed the contents of one tanker. Armed with premarked maps and aerial photos of Oran, McNamara sped to what appeared to be a promising Class I site, the city’s bull ring. But under the stadium seats where he had planned to store rations, McNamara found holiday litter which could not be tidied up in a matter of days. Nor was the ring desirable for open storage: it smelled of bulls. What he had thought were good avenues of access to the arena, well paved and broad, turned out to be nothing more than donkey paths. For a ration point he finally settled on a vacant lot at a good street intersection. His next stop was at the city hall where he was able to requisition a Class II and IV warehouse at 66 Rue du Tétre. Availability was the location’s only asset. On the southeast side of Oran, he opened a Class III distribution point.
After placing II Corps in the depot business, McNamara drove to Mers el Kébir and met the Quartermaster troops on the first follow-up convoy. The convoy brought the remainder of the 85th Quartermaster Depot Supply Company, the 93rd Quartermaster Railhead Company, and elements of the 28th Quartermaster Truck Regiment, a unit destined to operate directly under the II Corps G-4 Section.13
On 6 December the Mediterranean Base Section (MBS) was activated, and two days later it assumed supply responsibility for II Corps. Quartermaster installations in operation at that time included five Class I points, the Class II warehouse at 66 Rue du Tétre, eleven Class III points, a salvage dump, a sterilization and bath point, and a laundry service, attached to a medical depot. McNamara had been responsible for the interment of 256 dead in a cemetery at Sidi Chami outside Oran. Years later he wrote with a degree of humility: “Virtually no coordination or advanced thinking had preceded or accompanied the Oran operation. Our Quartermaster units had no concepts of their mission until we met them at the pier and told them where to go, what to do, and often, how to do it.”14
Eastern Task Force repeated the confusion of the other landings. The mishandling of landing craft at Algiers proved as characteristic of British as of American crews. Vessel losses on the first trip were estimated at an appalling 94 percent—by far the highest in the TORCH operation—with serious effects on landing schedules. Some boats became disabled while still in deep water, and the heavily equipped troops had no alternative but to abandon ship and swim ashore. In the Sidi Ferruch sector the Commanding Officer, 168th Regimental Combat Team, beached his vessels seven miles from their destination, and one of his companies landed fifteen miles away. At all beaches, Army shore parties dumped cargo helter-skelter. They called
for assistance from the naval crews. One lesson learned at Algiers influenced all subsequent Allied amphibious operations. For political reasons already described, the landings there were spearheaded by the U.S. 168th Regimental Combat Team, although the rest of the Eastern Task Force was British. As supplies for U.S. and British units came ashore, it proved impossible to keep them separated. There was a clearly indicated need for separate beachhead service areas manned by U.S. and British service troops, even when the Allied forces to be supported were small and landing sites were immediately adjacent.15
Among the most widely echoed criticisms of TORCH supply and one of immediate interest to the Quartermaster Corps was the charge that assault troops were overloaded with clothing and equipment. An overburdened soldier who became exhausted as he waded or swam through deep water in his effort to get ashore was in serious danger of drowning. Some did. As McNamara remarked:
The enlisted men were physically overburdened with food, ammunition, and accoutrements. The two C rations that he carried on his person as he went into Oran alone weighed 10 pounds. The bandoliers of ammunition, the clothing, gas masks, weapons, and other incidentals that the combat troops carried on their persons weighed an additional 122 pounds, making an aggregate of 132 pounds per man. This simply represented 110 pounds too many for a combat soldier to carry and enough to make anyone utterly useless. Moreover, each man had (either carried by him, or for him) two barracks bags each full of more equipment and clothing.16
TORCH landings also provided the opportunity to observe the adequacy of individual items of Quartermaster Corps equipment. The 1941 field jacket proved neither waterproof nor sufficiently warm, while in contrast the armored force jacket quickly won the popularity that it enjoyed throughout both the Mediterranean and European campaigns. Field shoes turned out to be too light, nondurable, and nonwaterproof, and the leather sole was declared unsatisfactory under field conditions. The field range, M1937, quickly demonstrated its tendency to clog when operated with leaded gasoline. Subsistence, ammunition, medical, and other supplies had been packed in commercial-type cardboard and corrugated paper cartons which were neither waterproof nor resistant to breakage when dropped. Markings in English meant nothing to native handlers. Since rough handling was an inevitable part of an amphibious operation, the remedial measures called for were improved metal strappings, the utilization of sturdier lumber, smaller and lighter packages, and universally recognized markings.17
Supply staffs being assembled in North Africa and Army Service Forces in Washington had little time to analyze and correct the deficiencies of the TORCH landings. Planning for further amphibious operations against islands of the western
Heavily burdened soldiers debarking at Phosphate Pier, Casablanca, 1943.
Mediterranean got under way almost immediately, and planners in London drew on their own TORCH support experience for lessons useful in planning the cross-Channel attack. Meanwhile the next phase of the Mediterranean war was marked by the first protracted engagement in World War II of a U.S. army corps over wide stretches of a continental land mass. It was the first campaign in which quartermasters would support an independent corps—a miniature army formation—of four divisions for any sustained period.
Supporting II Corps in Tunisia
Allied successes in Oran and Algiers gave rise to hopes for the early conquest of Tunisia. Recklessly outrunning their supply support, elements of Eastern Task Force crossed the Tunisian border on 17 November and drove deep into the province. But the enemy quickly braced himself to defend the vital ports of Tunis and Bizerte. On 1 December the Germans began their counterattack which led to an Allied withdrawal to eastern Algeria and the postponement of the Allied offensive until after the New Year. From General Eisenhower’s point of view, this delay would make possible the correction of an operational and logistical situation that markedly conflicted with the doctrines advocated in War College textbooks.18
Toward the end of 1942, Fredendall assembled his staff in Algiers and outlined their next mission. Constituted as a task force of some 40,000 men, II Corps was to advance through Sbeitla toward the port of Sfax. D-day was tentatively set for
22 January 1943. SATIN Task Force was built around the 1st Armored Division and the 10th Combat Engineer Regiment, plus tank destroyer, antiaircraft, and service troops. A small infantry and paratrooper force under Col. Edson D. Raff was already operating in the Gafsa area. Capture of Sfax would frustrate the enemy’s intention to keep open a coastal corridor for joining Rommel’s German Africa Corps (Deutsches Afrika Korps) with the Tunisian defenders. Fredendall selected the communication center of Tébessa, an old Roman walled city 125 miles east and south of Constantine, as his forward supply base. A highway and a single-track, narrow-gauge railroad parallel to it joined Tébessa and Constantine. To its north, eighty miles away, Tébessa was also linked by a road and meter-gauge rail line with Souk Ahras. At the time, British First Army had administrative control of the lines of communication in and around Tébessa.19
Early in January 1943, the II Corps staff moved to Constantine and put the last-minute touches on its supply plan. Planners estimated that a maximum of 250 long tons a day could be moved into Tébessa by rail. At the moment no trucks were available to increase the estimate. To stage supply forward from Oran or Algiers, both towns enjoying standard-gauge rail nets to the east, it would be necessary to transship supplies onto the narrow-gauge freight cars at Ouled Rahmoun, a rail hub a few miles southeast of Constantine. Ouled Rahmoun was also connected by a standard-gauge line with the minor Mediterranean port of Philippeville, via Constantine. As a communications center, Ouled Rahmoun was destined to become the site of a new base section, later called Eastern Base Section, in support of II corps. From the minor port of Bone, Eastern Base Section could use a second standard-gauge line to Souk Ahras, and thence into Tébessa a narrow-gauge line. (See Map 2.)
The II Corps accepted these communication restrictions because it initially anticipated a short campaign. Two command decisions based on that premise affected McNamara’s Quartermaster plans and operations. First, SATIN Task Force was to receive only Class I and III supplies, excluding Class II and IV items. Second, SATIN Force would move toward Tébessa after II Corps had finished its supply build-up. In other words the classic concept of supply would be reversed: troops would move toward a stocked base and not supplies toward them. McNamara’s first task was to organize a ten-day reserve of food and engine fuels in Tébessa before 17 January. To provide services he was allotted a company each of railhead, depot supply, gasoline supply, service, and salvage troops, and a platoon each of bakery, laundry, fumigation and bath, and graves registration troops, plus a truck battalion less two companies. At authorized strength these units comprised about 1,100 men to give support along a corps front of 110 miles.
Headquarters II Corps became operational on 8 January 1943 with a detachment under the assistant corps G-4, Lt. Col. Samuel L. Myers, consisting of one officer and two enlisted men each from the Quartermaster, Ordnance, Engineer, and Artillery Sections. Moving to
QM ration dump at Tébessa, February 1943.
Tébessa, Myers placed his command post in the grandstand office of the greyhound race track. Two companies of the 224th Quartermaster Service Battalion arrived on 9 January. Operated by the 85th Quartermaster Depot Supply Company, the ration dump at Tébessa, previously opened by the British, remained in a good-sized, empty, movie house. Seven miles to the east, in the only wooded ravine in the area, McNamara located his POL dump, operated by Company B, 205th Gasoline Supply Battalion. Arriving at the same time, Companies B and C, 28th Quartermaster Truck Regiment, organized a corps motor pool.
By simply reconsigning freight cars of cased rations and gasoline containers as they arrived in Tébessa, McNamara’s daily train moved to Sbeitla over the 100-mile rail line, traveling first northeast through Haidra, thence south to Kasserine, then northeast to Sbeitla. On 9 January a detachment opened a Class I and III railhead at Sbeitla in support of Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division, and other troops along the corps front. So far forward was the Sbeitla
railhead, in fact, that Capt. James H. Perry, commander of Company D, 244th Quartermaster Service Battalion, reported that daylight patrols “were the only thing between us and the Germans.”20
Although careful attention was given to the inventories on hand at the Tébessa depot—and McNamara or his assistant met nightly with representatives of the corps G-4 and other technical services to consolidate such information—the emphasis was on providing the fighting troops with their food, ammunition, and gasoline “when they wanted it and where they wanted it, with the least amount of paper work possible.” While the daily telegram was maintained, it was used primarily as a reflection of the previous day’s expenditures. If the troops asked for a certain number of rations, they were given the quantity without question, notwithstanding the prospect that they might subsequently abandon supplies in their bivouac areas and force quartermaster salvage service to expend extra effort in their recovery.21
Build-up of supplies continued. Reserves of POL increased daily while rations mounted in tonnage rather than in balanced items. Still, McNamara never doubted that somewhere between Oran and Sbeitla his ration shipments were “balanced according to a master menu.” Because he failed to receive menus or any other shipping documents, was unable to keep the ration cars of a train intact, and lacked troops to guard trains properly against pilferage, McNamara curtailed the issue of the B ration. Though clerks of the 85th Depot Supply Company attempted to balance issues, the troops closest to Tébessa were the only ones to enjoy the B ration with any regularity.22
With Rommel approaching rapidly from Tripoli and with Fredendall’s lines overstretched to prevent a junction of the two enemy forces, it became more and more apparent that the enemy was strong enough to make a dangerous thrust against II Corps. By the time that the French front was disrupted to the north of SATIN Force, the attack on Sfax had already been canceled. On 17 January II Corps headquarters moved from Constantine to an olive grove one mile away from McNamara’s gasoline dump near Tébessa. By now enemy pressure along the II Corps front had brought the 1st Infantry Division and the 168th Regiment of the 34th Infantry Division to Tébessa as reinforcements. Some 60,000 men of SATIN Force had to be supplied at the end of two single-track, narrow-gauge rail lines.
To support this augmented force, Eastern Base Section under command of Col. Arthur W. Pence was constituted on 13 February, and became operational at Constantine two weeks later. Col. Vere Painter was quartermaster of the new headquarters.
The command situation meanwhile deviated more and more from orthodox lines as II Corps, under British First Army’s operational control, was broken down into various task forces of
regimental and battalion size. To support these formations, McNamara stretched his Quartermaster units very thinly to operate railheads at Gafsa, Maktar, and at Tébessa itself. On 14 February Gafsa was evacuated at night, and Fériana became the railhead, forty-five miles below Tébessa. The next day, the 2nd Battalion, 168th Infantry, walked into an ambush near Gafsa, suffering heavily and losing most of its equipment. About 150 men managed to escape and McNamara received orders from the corps chief of staff to re-equip the battalion not later than the 16th.23 His reaction is of some interest:
This order in itself was a reflection on the staff work that had been done in the preparation for the operation. ... the entire campaign was based on the assumption that there would be no maintenance for loss replacements of any Class II and IV equipment ... it was impossible to meet this request, without spending at least three or four days. The request was met, but it took just about this long in which to gather the supplies by truck from the rear and deliver them to this battalion. With the slightest degree of advance planning this situation would not have prevailed. ... it would have been simple to re-equip one battalion.24
The Commanding General, British First Army, on 15 February directed forces holding the high ground west of Faid to withdraw and begin preparing a defense of Kasserine gap. Having issued their supplies, Quartermaster troops at Maktar and Sbeitla pulled back immediately into Tébessa. At Fériana the railhead detachment had no time to evacuate 50,000 gallons of gasoline, and the cache was ignited. Of all the times when McNamara did not want to be in a favorable supply position, the Kasserine pass crisis between 16 and 22 February 1943 headed his list. Tébessa then contained a million rations, a large number of unbalanced B ration components, and 500,000 gallons of gasoline. Ignoring rations and concentrating on the rail evacuation of packaged fuel, McNamara reduced his reserve at Tébessa to 100,000 gallons. Simultaneously, he pulled his support units back to Ain Beida, thirty miles west of Tébessa.25
By the end of February 1943, the enemy was slowly withdrawing to his original positions beyond Faid pass and at Gafsa, and the crisis had ended. Its aftermath marked the beginning of a new phase in Quartermaster operations. Throughout March, II Corps counterattacked over rough terrain toward the flank and rear of the Mareth Line. After 1 March 1943 II Corps, with General Patton commanding, operated directly under 18 Army Group. With three infantry divisions and an armored division present along the front, each with its organic Quartermaster staff and supply company, Quartermaster support at corps level functioned more and more in normal staff commands. Yet, in adjusting their activities to the new situation of this enlarged II Corps, staffs of corps and divisions alike encountered some trying problems of supply and salvage.
All four divisions attacked simultaneously along the front during the last week of March. The enemy had prepared his defensive positions well; some had been blasted out of solid rock. Terrain was a formidable obstacle. In climbing jagged
and barren volcanic rock, the troops literally tore service shoes and clothing to shreds. Patton noticed this. McNamara received an order to have 80 percent of the troops in new shoes within twenty-four hours. Thanks to Colonel Painter, 80,000 pairs of shoes came forward even though QM Class II and IV allocations for II Corps did not officially exist during the southern Tunisia Campaign.
For two days, 23-24 March, the Germans launched a heavy counterattack against 1st Division positions southeast of El Guettar and the corps after action report stated: “The performance of the 1st Division on this day [23rd] was in keeping with the finest traditions of the United States Army.” But supply shortages existed and Lt. Col. Clarence M. Eymer, 1st Division’s G-4, emerged from the battle with a file of unfilled requisitions. He invited the attention of Col. Robert W. Wilson, Corps G-4, to the Quartermaster portion of his list. Wilson confronted McNamara with Eymer’s requisitions, repeating that 1st Division now considered itself unable to return to combat unless the items were received. For his part McNamara believed that this division was “probably better equipped with Quartermaster items than any other unit within Corps command.” He further believed that Eymer’s listings on QMC Requisition Form 400 had been copied directly from War Department Tables of Equipment. As sent to him, the forms were unnumbered, undated, and marked “special.” Eymer refused to entertain McNamara’s suggested substitutions for many items, including one under the heading of “Trumpet, Slide, ‘F’ to `G,’ “ for a “Trumpet, ‘E’ to ‘F.’ “ Sensitive to implied criticism in McNamara’s proposals, Eymer accompanied Wilson into the chief of staff’s office where misunderstandings on the requisitions were ironed out.
The final battle around El Guettar involved large-scale artillery concentrations resulting in heavy ammunition expenditures. To meet resupply needs McNamara’s truck units, which he controlled but did not command, were expanded from the two companies he had in January 1943 to twenty-two companies near the end of March. Drivers of the units had been organized from the surplus boat regiment of the 1st Engineer Special Brigade. A study of the communication net from Tébessa to the railheads at Fériana, Sbeitla, Gafsa, and El Guettar showed that the highways and railroad forward were limited in capacity. Eight locomotives required repair, and only three were operable. In the evacuation of the Gafsa-Kasserine area, five railroad bridges had been destroyed, and the demolished high-arched bridge near Fériana—the construction of a bypass was out of the question—required months for restoration.26
Because the distances between II Corps and its divisions were as great as those between corps and Eastern Base Section, the one armored and three infantry divisions strained their own personnel and transportation resources to move considerable amounts of supplies. When the fighting began at El Guettar, the 1st Armored Division moved from Tébessa to Gafsa and Maknassy, but
corps was only able to locate forward dumps at Bou Chebka, 70 miles from the center of the division’s supply area. Because of poor roads, heavy rain, and congested traffic, the 140-mile round trip to the division supply point took twenty-four hours. Since corps could not provide closer support or attach additional transport, the quartermaster of the armored division formed two provisional truck companies from unit baggage trucks and assigned incoming replacements to the task of moving rations, gasoline, and ammunition closer to the combat units.
The 1st Infantry Division fared no better. Since the Class I supply point at Gafsa was initially stocked only with C rations, divisional trucks went as far back as Tébessa when B rations were available. Shortages of clothing and equipment continued to mount, for although requisitions were now authorized for Class II and IV supply, tonnage allocations from Eastern Base Section proved inadequate for the maintenance of the four divisions plus special troops. The absence of certain Quartermaster services was an additional handicap for the forward elements. A shoe repair section had not moved east of Algiers until the southern Tunisia Campaign was well under way. Located far from Tébessa, the 1st Infantry Division, shifting for itself, contracted for the services of a French cobbler in Le Kef. In late February the division obtained the services of a sterilization and bath unit, but laundry facilities were unavailable before March.27
Nevertheless, additional service units were joining II Corps at Tébessa. As early as 8 February, the 2nd Platoon, Company B, 95th Quartermaster Battalion (Bakery), had begun baking for II Corps, producing a daily average of 24,192 pounds of fresh bread during the remainder of the southern Tunisia Campaign. At the same time, 1st Platoon, Company A, 301st Quartermaster Battalion, opened a fumigation and bath point, using water from a stream in the vicinity of the POL dump. During March approximately 400 men per day enjoyed this service. Additional support was provided by the shoe repair section, 218th Quartermaster Company (Salvage Repair), which processed some 250 pairs of shoes daily, and by the 1st Platoon, Company C, 61st Quartermaster Battalion (Laundry), which handled some 8,000 pieces daily.
As the southern Tunisian fighting drew to a close, McNamara was in the midst of two activities that demanded more and more attention: salvage collection and graves registration. Early in March 1943 the 226th Salvage Collecting Company arrived at Tébessa. The unit policed the roads after the Kasserine crisis, retrieving discarded or abandoned matériel, both friendly and enemy. McNamara believed that his salvage operation had gone beyond his mission, and later commented:
The mere fact that a vehicle becomes worn out or a gas-mask gets a hole in it does not necessarily mean that it automatically becomes salvage. No item of supply becomes salvage until it has been declared useless for any purpose by the appropriate service in question [McNamara’s italics].
Then, when it is relegated to a junk-heap, it becomes salvage and becomes a Quartermaster responsibility. In any case, we did the scavenging for all the services, brought back all types of items of supply to our own salvage dump, and then they sent representatives there to go thru the items. ...28
Far from finished when II Corps came out of the line was the work of its burial parties, consisting of a single platoon of the 47th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company and a salvage collecting company. At Tébessa, a II Corps cemetery had been opened in early January. By the end of March the platoon had supervised the burial of 190 dead, which was about 80 percent of II Corps’ reported dead at that time, and in mid-April it was assigned to Eastern Base Section.
Pinched out of its own sector after the juncture of the British First and Eighth Armies, II Corps received a new mission from 18 Army Group on 10 April 1943. With Maj. Gen. Omar N. Bradley commanding, II Corps—100,000 men strong —was given the objective of Bizerte. The movement out of the Tébessa area to the new assembly point northeast of Bédja did not involve extraordinarily long distances, only about 140 miles. But it was, nonetheless, a challenge to II Corps’ ability to exploit the capabilities of twenty-two truck companies over an imperfect road net, amidst an atmosphere of secrecy. Necessarily, the move cut across British First Army’s supply lines. Of the two main routes selected, both originating at Tébessa, the most direct led just inside the Tunisian border through Le Kef, a main British transportation center, to Souk el Arba and Tabarka. The other highway ran inside Algeria through Souk Ahras, and eastward to Tabarka. To avoid congestion at Le Kef, most convoys followed the route through Algeria.
Coordination of the movement was worked out among officers of the British Movement Control Office, corps G-4, and McNamara’s assistant quartermaster, who was in charge of transportation. Because speed and surprise were essential, supply convoys were sandwiched between the convoys carrying troops in order that the infantrymen could go into action immediately upon their arrival without waiting for staged supply. With a minimum of paper work and a constant check on cross traffic, II Corps made the movement—one of the first large marches of the war—in four days. More than 12,000 vehicles and 94,000 troops had arrived in the northern sector of Tunisia by 23 April 1943.
Army Group meanwhile, selected Bedja on the sector line between II Corps and British First Army as Bradley’s supply center, with railheads at Sidi Mhimech, a few miles to the northeast, and at Djebel Abiod, thirty-five miles farther north. Behind II Corps, Eastern Base Section planned to establish a ration depot at Bone, a small port eighty miles west of Bédja, and forward Class III dumps at the minor ports of La Calle and Tabarka. Cass II and IV supplies would come from Algeria by rail. Having been denied the use of a southerly highway into Bedja from Bone because the British utilized it, the II Corps’ road net was restricted to a coastal route from Algiers, Philippeville, Bone, La Calle, and Tabarka, to Bédja, thence pointing northeast toward
Mateur. By rail, II Corps shared with the British the capacity of a line from Bone, via Souk Ahras, to Bédja.
On 15 April Eastern Base Section was notified that the initial Quartermaster requirements amounted to 948 long tons of Class II supplies and 1,256 long tons of Class III supplies. D-day had been set for 23 April and despite the limited capacity of the lines of communication Eastern Base Section exerted every possible effort to meet the requirements. Supplies were not only sent overland by truck from Bone, but they were also transferred onto landing craft which skirted the coast eastward as far as the beach at Tabarka. Here the truck companies backed their vehicles into the shallow water and supplies moved directly from boats to trucks.29
The first daily train from Eastern Base Section to Bédja carried 250 tons of supplies. Within this tonnage McNamara had ordered balanced B rations for 50,000 men. When the freight train arrived, it had sixteen carloads of peanut butter, a car full of crackers, a case of grapefruit, and a sack of flour. McNamara used the incident to impress on Eastern Base Section the necessity to balance rations. Because the next supply trains were almost a week late, the troops lacked balanced B rations, even in the comparatively quiet days before the offensive, and gasoline was received only in cumbersome 55-gallon drums. When Tabarka as well as La Calle began to receive supplies for the support of the new American sector, there was uncertainty as to which of the dumps could supply the units from one day to the next.30
By the evening of 22 April, II Corps’ supply targets had been met, except for rations and a few types of ammunition. To follow the advance, corps G-4 was soon trying to obtain one hundred additional 2½-ton trucks for each of the forward divisions. As corps was forced to establish new supply points directly behind the divisions, Eastern Base Section took over the Djebel Abiod dumps and pushed daily trains beyond Bédja so that gasoline and rations could be issued from forward railheads. When the Germans surrendered on 8 May, Painter had already taken over the operation of the ration dump and gasoline point at Michaud, a town five miles north of Mateur. He also had inherited the corps’ salvage operations, and continued the burying of 421 known dead in the II Corps cemetery at El Aouïna, near the major airfield between Tunis and Bizerte. Painter’s graves registration teams still had to locate and identify 877 missing troops. By 8 May McNamara retained control over the corps motor pool only.31
The surrender arrangements made new demands on Quartermaster truck companies. By 9 May, II Corps had acquired a total of 41,836 prisoners of war,
including 35,934 Germans, 5,861 Italians, and 41 men of other nationalities. Of these, corps hospitals registered 1,128 wounded. Prior to the surrender the evacuation of prisoners to Eastern Base Section’s compounds had proceeded in an orderly manner, imposing no undue strain on trucking facilities. But on 11 May 26,000 prisoners had to be moved to the barbed-wire enclosure at Michaud. Fortunately for this mass assembly the docile prisoners cooperated splendidly, moving toward Michaud on foot or riding in automobiles, or on bicycles or motorcycles, and asking only directions to the compounds.
For food, McNamara immediately began hauling captured stocks from the estimated 1,600 tons of subsistence taken at Ferryville. This was sufficient, he believed, to keep a million men fed for one day. Yet he knew the stocks were not balanced. Within their barbed-wire enclosures the prisoners organized their own camps and arranged among themselves for their own messing details. Quartermasters delivered German field kitchens to the compounds and, together with the food, turned them over to the camp commanders or to their designated agents. Water for 40,000 prisoners was a problem that soon overshadowed McNamara’s subsistence difficulties. He solved it by moving from Mateur to Michaud a number of wooden winery vats, twenty feet in diameter, which had been cut in the form of half-barrels, open at the center. Once the huge vessels were in place, engineers filled them with water from 750-gallon tank trucks and the prisoners had water for cooking and bathing.32
Having turned over support duties to Eastern Base Section, Headquarters, II Corps, during the next fortnight moved westward by truck to the attractive city of Relizane, located on a good highway about sixty miles southeast of Oran. On 20 May 1943 McNamara learned of his next Quartermaster mission—Sicily. For this operation II Corps for administrative and tactical control was placed under Seventh Army, with Patton commanding, and with headquarters at Mostaganem, about thirty miles from Relizane. Taking elements of his former I Armored Corps, Patton constituted a provisional corps under Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Keyes, which, together with Bradley’s II Corps, was to execute the American role in the HUSKY operation. Organizationally, this meant that a new tactical quartermaster and his staff, formerly attached to I Armored Corps, appeared in the field for the first time at army level. Since 12 February 1943 Col. Clyde Massey, the new Seventh Army quartermaster, had been coordinating plans with a new team of pipeline quartermasters in Oran.33
New Quartermaster Teams Organize in North Africa
Quartermaster service continued to be handled by the staffs and service troops of the three separate task forces for many weeks after the TORCH landings. But as operations shifted toward Tunisia, such a division of effort in a completely decentralized system demanded early revision. With a gravely
deficient support organization, II Corps had advanced into southern Tunisia in late January 1943. Adequate support for this advance demanded changes not only in the Allied command structure but also in the American SOS.
The advance echelon of AFHQ moved to Algiers on 25 November 1942, and as the headquarters grew its special staff sections gradually assumed control of operations in the Atlantic Base Section (Casablanca) and Mediterranean Base Section (Oran), the support echelons which had replaced the SOS of Western and Center Task Forces. During the next two months Colonel Ram-sey’s AFHQ Quartermaster Section, consisting of nineteen officers and enlisted men, American and British, was the only office with authority to coordinate Quartermaster operations in North Africa. Ramsey drew supplies from both U.S. and U.K. bases until early February 1943. During this period his enumerated functions ran the gamut of traditional Quartermaster activities, including responsibility for motor transport, construction supplies, and labor procurement. Yet this was intended to be only a short-lived arrangement, pending the organization of an American theater of operations and the inauguration of a separate supply channel.
Constitution of the North African Theater of Operations, United States Army (NATOUSA), was announced on 4 February 1943 and all U.S. resources within its boundaries passed from the control of the Commanding General, ETOUSA, on that date. Eight days later NATOUSA was further developed by the establishment of the Communications Zone, NATOUSA, a purely administrative command without support functions. For the time being, these organizations were really additional offices within AFHQ, set up to handle General Eisenhower’s purely American administrative responsibilities. Eisenhower himself was Commanding General, NATOUSA, and his deputy theater commander, Brig. Gen. Everett S. Hughes, also functioned as Commanding General, COMZ NATOUSA. Similarly, all other important American officers within the AFHQ structure were assigned dual functions with a minimum of extra personnel to assist them.
NATOUSA expanded its administrative structure on 15 February 1943, when Services of Supply (SOS NATOUSA) was constituted and placed under the command of Brig. Gen. Thomas B. Larkin, who immediately began assembling his staff at Oran. All supply activities and service personnel pertaining to, assigned or attached to Mediterranean Base Section, Atlantic Base Section, and Eastern Base Section passed under Lar-kin’s control insofar as their supply functions were concerned. In all other respects the base sections remained under the direct command of General Hughes. In the process of these rapid transitions, Middleswart left Casablanca on 23 February and became Larkin’s quartermaster at Oran as II Corps assumed the offensive in southern Tunisia.34
When NATOUSA was constituted, following the lead of G-4, AFHQ,
Ramsey divested himself of the responsibility for Quartermaster supply and maintenance operations for U.S. Army forces. Although the NATO USA activation order had named him Chief, Quartermaster Section, NATOUSA, a title he held throughout the remainder of 1943, he received no extra personnel and was given no major extra duties. His American staff worked within the framework of AFHQ and all organizational charts identified the section by the symbols “AFHQ/NATO USA (American).”
To interpret his mission and formulate policy, Ramsey found himself handling his staff duties at two separate levels. As Chief, Quartermaster Section, NATOUSA, he defined the Quartermaster mission for the American theater commander through the G-4, NATOUSA, and simultaneously at the AFHQ level he performed the same function for the Allied command through G-4, AFHQ. Specifically in his dual capacity Ramsey made recommendations on the levels of Class I, II, and IV supplies that should be reached in the theater. After the close of the southern. Tunisia Campaign, he exercised special staff supervision over the disposition of captured enemy matériel and battlefield clearance. For the U.S. forces in the theater, he recommended the approval of special issues of Quartermaster supplies from American resources to Allied forces. In doing so, he maintained close liaison with Middleswart in order to determine the stocks in American depots. After AFHQ created a Petroleum Section, Ramsey’s Class III responsibilities were confined to staff matters concerning coal and coal products. Eventually, problems involving captured matériel and battlefield clearance grew in size and scope and a special Captured Enemy Matériel Technical Committee, AFHQ, took over the function. Meantime, Ramsey himself attended meetings of sundry AFHQ boards and committees, including the Petroleum Section, AFHQ, the North African Economic Board, and the Joint Rearmament Committee, which formulated policy for rebuilding the French Army.35
Originally, neither Ramsey nor Middleswart had any direct responsibility for local procurement. Both the Western and Center Task Forces had come to North Africa with officers assigned to local procurement duties but it became quickly apparent that a centralized agency was needed if the Americans and British were to have equal access to available resources. On 30 January 1943, AFHQ set up a General Purchasing Board modeled after the organization established in London six months earlier. During 1943, the board was manned by both American and British officers and was responsible for procurement for both forces. Because certain North African manufactures were very scarce, a separate Local Products Allocation Committee was formed to apportion such items. Locally produced foodstuffs were soon placed on the list of controlled stocks, and both Ramsey and Middleswart became members of this committee.36
Initially, the headquarters designated SOS NATOUSA had supply functions only, without administrative authority, and thus differed markedly from the SOS headquarters recently established in the United Kingdom. It was decided that supply decisions for NATOUSA could be better made at the higher, Allied, level through the G-4 staffs. Thus there was no true communications zone and Eisenhower elected to use his NATOUSA deputy, General Hughes, to coordinate the logistical plans at the AFHQ and NATOUSA levels with the supply operations of SOS NATOUSA. This was considered necessary because an additional coordination with the British logistical effort was also carried on at the AFHQ level. Effective cooperation between Hughes and Maj. Gen. Humfrey M. Gale, the chief administrative officer (British) of AFHQ, demanded that Hughes be able to speak with the voice of authority regarding U.S. service troops and supplies.37
Thus General Larkin was made responsible for supply, but he was not given full authority of command over the base sections and service troops. For example, he was not authorized to transfer personnel between base sections without theater approval or to engage in signal communications, hospitalization, evacuation, and transportation. Similarly, this situation placed base section commanders in the difficult position of reporting to Larkin on matters of supply, distribution, construction, and maintenance, and to the deputy theater commander on all other matters. Nevertheless, SOS NATOUSA mounted the Sicilian and Italian invasions and established additional base sections in the western Mediterranean to support continuing operations and secondary activities on Corsica and Sardinia. As the various technical service staffs formed in Oran, they constituted an advisory or planning body directly under Larkin, without the benefit of an intermediate general staff and its traditional “G” officers. Larkin permitted his staff full use of his name in communications with AFHQ and NATOUSA and allowed them to deal informally with their opposite numbers at higher or lower headquarters.
When Middleswart’s Quartermaster responsibilities were subsequently enumerated within SOS NATOUSA, he had the following staff functions: first, the consolidation of base section stock reports and preparation of the theater-wide requisitions for submission to supporting agencies in the United States, and occasionally to the United Kingdom; second, the maintenance of control over stock levels for the theater and the proper distribution of Class I, II, and IV stocks among the base sections; third, the coordination of base section activities pertaining to sales stores, laundries, and other quartermaster services; fourth, the supervision and coordination of policies for graves registration, salvage and scrap, and personal effects and baggage throughout the theater; fifth, the maintenance of records of service units, including the status of their equipment, which were assigned or attached to base sections; and sixth, the supervision and coordination of subsistence procurement activities. As an SOS supervisory technical staff, the Quartermaster Section issued operating
procedures, technical manuals, ration menus, and special circulars as guides for quartermasters and QM units in base sections, and through frequent inspections checked on the execution of its technical instructions.38
On the eve of the HUSKY operation, the Quartermaster Section, SOS NATOUSA, working on its first support mission, consisted of an executive office and six divisions, concerned respectively with administration, planning, Class I, Class II and IV supply, salvage, and graves registration. Middleswart’s organization chart showed that his first and foremost mission was to supply clothing and equipment to the ground forces, and additionally to provide such items as rations, kitchen and mess equipment, barracks and office equipment, and stationery common to the ground and air forces. In terms of numbers the supply divisions absorbed most of his personnel. At this time NYPE sent convoys periodically to each of the three base sections, which in turn were in direct support of the combat troops.39 Because the base section depots were never far from the sea, Quartermaster distribution was no major problem as long as shipping was available. Yet one bad feature of this system hobbled Quartermaster supply. If convoys or individual ships containing ammunition as well as rations and clothing were diverted from their original port of call to another in an emergency, the Quartermaster Section had to locate coastal shipping in order to reroute Quartermaster supplies to their original destination. In a commodity-type organization, each supply division took care of requisitioning, storage, and distribution for its own categories of QMC supplies.
Middleswart’s biggest problem during the summer of /943 was that of personnel, both individuals and service units. He did not control the assignment of Quartermaster officers from base sections to his staff. At the end of the first month he had obtained only 8 officers and 18 enlisted men of an authorized strength of 13 officers and 24 enlisted men. Most quartermasters remained with their organizations when the entire group leapfrogged to another support area. In October 1943, by which time American forces were lodged on the Italian peninsula and his supply responsibilities had grown from 3 to 7 base sections and base commands, he still had only 6 officers more than when his section was created. He intimated to Larkin that only bureaucratic obstacles prevented the assignment of talented officers from the decreasing operations in Atlantic and Eastern Base Sections. Larkin pointed out that manning table increases were out of the question. Plans were afoot to move SOS headquarters to the Italian peninsula, and it was not feasible to enlarge the QM Section. Improvement was slow, and Middleswart complained repeatedly to Littlejohn of the predicament which forced him to adjust his operations to an expanding program with a “pitifully inadequate staff.” These difficulties take on added significance when they are related to the growth of tactical formations from two small task forces of 40,000 men each in November 1942 (TORCH), to an
independent corps of 100,000 men (Tunisia), to a miniature army of two corps (Sicily), to an army of three corps (Italy) and to an army group with two armies (southern France), in successive, rapid stages.40
Since a larger staff was impossible, a more efficient one was imperative. Unsuitable officers were transferred by various expedients, including reclassification. Energetic company-grade officers were put in charge of personnel, supply, salvage, and administration while Col. Mark V. Brunson, executive officer of the QM Section, gave a good deal of time to their training. Operational planning was a constant source of worry to Middleswart. Though detailed strategic decisions did not reach his level, he knew about the middle of May that the invasion of Sicily was not very far off. This was his second amphibious undertaking and he looked about for quartermasters of Western Task Force days. After repeated calls, Middleswart secured the services of Colonel Poore, who could be spared from his G-4 duty with Atlantic Base Section, to head a new Planning Division. Poore worked closely with officers of the task forces who were sent to Oran to work out the details of the HUSKY operation. Using maintenance allowances based on recent experiences, Middleswart and Poore prepared requisitions for 130,000 troops for the period D-day to D plus so, and submitted them as advance requisitions on the North African base sections.41
Once the plans were on paper, Middleswart placed members of his staff on temporary duty with the base sections. As liaison officers, Poore and his assistants moved around the ports and depots to check on Seventh Army’s requisitions. After the assault convoy had gone to sea, the liaison officers dropped their expediter roles and prepared to go to Sicily as observers. Once the HUSKY forces were securely lodged on the island, the Planning Division transferred support of the operation to the regular supply branches and shifted its attention to the next amphibious operation, Italy.42
As an alternative to HUSKY, the Planning Branch also computed requirements for an invasion of Sardinia (Operation BRIMSTONE), but this project was discarded in favor of an assault on the Italian mainland (Operation AVALANCHE) in the vicinity of Salerno. Again NATOUSA staffs worked with a Fifth Army panel, which temporarily moved to Algiers. Consisting of several Quartermaster officers and enlisted men, this group prepared requisitions for the first sixty days of supply in Italy, and prepared explicit instructions as to packaging and marking, ports of loading, dates, strength, and designations. If time permitted, requisitions were submitted to NYPE for direct shipment to Italy, thereby eliminating double handling and out-loading at North African ports. Poore’s
planning work involved something more than supply. His section drafted Quartermaster Tables of Organization and Equipment for Italian prisoner of war units. Hapless prisoners of the Tunisia Campaign were a definite liability in policed compounds, but an asset in Quartermaster support units under the supervision of U.S. cadres. Once approved by the War Department and constituted with Italian laborers, the tables provided manpower to fill gaps in the ranks of 3,800 Quartermaster troops that were earmarked for Naples.43
The widening scope of military activity was reflected in the second reorganization of Quartermaster Section, SOS NATOUSA, on 18 September 1943. Increased record keeping for support units necessitated the creation of a separate Personnel Branch. As a result of Tunisian evacuation and burial experience, graves registration policies and organization were reviewed and changes made. Col. Thomas R. Howard became chief of the Graves Registration Branch and also served as the theater graves registration officer.
With the introduction of special services in the theater, a separate supply branch was set up to meet the needs of the entertainment, recreation, and education programs. With more than 3,000 nurses present by this time, and with the first members of the Women’s Army Corps reaching North Africa in summer 1943, Middleswart designated a clothing supply subunit to handle their special needs. A new Baggage Group within the Salvage Branch supervised the disposition of effects, located owners, and stored property belonging to interned or captured personnel. Because the Quartermaster Section had experienced supply shortages and service inadequacies in the Sicilian campaign, Middleswart reorganized his General Supplies Group, subdividing it into four new units.
No matter how well his section was organized, Middleswart could always expect some higher or adjacent command to demand an explanation of why something did not proceed according to plan. Near the end of the Sicilian campaign, he anticipated a formal reprimand because of failure to coordinate. His planners had set up an air shipment consisting of 31,000 bottles of halezone tablets, a disinfectant for water. Colonel Poore estimated the shipment at three-quarters of a ton. The planners turned the shipping details over to supply quartermasters, who refigured weights and cubes as given in a new manual. In the process, someone selected a wrong set of figures, and the new estimate reached four tons. To lift 31,000 bottles, the air transport commander ordered out two cargo planes. When the Quartermaster depot truck arrived at planeside, the load weighed in at 1,600 pounds, and a single plane departed for Sicily. The incident was written up in detail in a circular letter, and it became a stern warning for all sections to perfect their staff coordination.44
After the invasion of Italy a third reorganization of Quartermaster Section, SOS NATOUSA, was announced on
12 November 1943. Middleswart abolished his Planning Branch, placing important aspects of this function with each of his supply branches in order to have no break in their planning and supervisory responsibilities. Other aspects of planning were centered in a Control Branch, headed by Maj. Ramon Wyer. This new branch exercised staff supervision over transportation, storage, and distribution, which had previously been controlled along commodity lines. The new Control Branch reflected Middleswart’s growing concern with statistical control over base section quartermaster supply. Outside his own office, Middleswart at the end of 1943 had to step in and set up a central depot in Oran where he could control theater-wide storage and distribution of critical maintenance and repair parts for quartermaster equipment.45
Poore, the former head of the Planning Branch, was meanwhile sent to the Peninsular Base Section at Naples, where pioneer planning activities in support of the Fifth Army were urgently needed. Colonel Brunson, although remaining the executive officer, became the new trouble shooter in Quartermaster liaison and observation work throughout the theater. Eventually, he became Deputy Quartermaster, SOS. It can be argued that the three reorganizations of 1943 exerted an unfavorable influence on Quartermaster support and that personnel were shifted around too often to become proficient in their duties. Middleswart, bearing in mind the intermittent type of warfare in the western Mediterranean, kept his staff small—thirty-four officers and eighty-one enlisted men —and by eliminating paper work was always ready to shuffle functions and officers from one branch to another as required.
As for intertheater liaison, the unofficial technical channel among Middleswart, Ramsey, Gregory, and Littlejohn throughout 1943 was largely a matter of exchanging personal letters. Few visits occurred. General Gregory toured Casablanca and Oran early in February 1943, but neither Ramsey nor Middleswart had the opportunity to return to Washington. Their knowledge of Quartermaster developments in the United States was sketchy. Not until after Anzio do official papers suggest that the situation had improved. Similarly, OQMG planners do not mention effective liaison with the Mediterranean quartermasters until the early spring of 1944. Formal Quartermaster reports from NATOUSA were not compiled until after the Tunisia Campaign. One of the first OQMC observers was 1st Lt. William F. Pounder, but the results of his tour did not reach the theater until the test of experimental clothing items at Anzio in March 1944. The first OQMG field team to be detailed to Middleswart’s section did not arrive in Oran until August 1943. The team’s survey of the depot system and replacement rates began to play a part in supply by May 1944. Support to the air forces was not officially reported on until November 1943. The first OQMG observers to join Fifth Army arrived in March 1944. On the other hand, liaison with Allied quartermasters was established early in 1943. At the operating level Middleswart established working relationships with Lt. Col. Paul C. R. St. Aubyn of the British Army, with Maj.
Roger Jung of the French Army, and later in 1944 with Col. Sebastiano A. de Carvalho of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force.46
Quartermaster Organization in the Base Sections
If Middleswart’s staff formed the brain of Quartermaster support at the SOS level, the Quartermaster staffs in the base sections and their depots were the bone and muscle of the supply system. Here were the troops, hired civilians, and later Italian cobelligerent service units which stacked and loaded bales and crates, inventoried and repaired thousands upon thousands of items of equipment, drove the supply trucks, and walked guard around acres and mountains of undramatic but invaluable materials of war. Rarely did they win heroes’ awards or the attention of the press, and often they suffered the wrath of the combat man when supplies were lost, stolen, or strayed. But for all of this, it takes little reflection to realize that in modern war everyone could not be on the firing line, that there could be no combat zone without a communications zone, and that—even by comparison with those of the Allies—the American rear areas were not lush vineyards.
Because it quickly became more extensive than the combat zone, the communications zone of a victorious theater was subdivided in the interests of administrative convenience. Base sections appeared along the coast of North Africa, in Sicily, Corsica, Italy, and southern France, their primary purpose being to accumulate supplies for the ground force elements to draw on and from which the Army Air Forces and Navy could secure items common to all forces. Unlike the fighting organizations, a base section was a comparatively static establishment, populated for the most part by administrative and service troops. Although Field Service regulations distinguished between the base sections and the mobile more temporary advance sections, there was no such explicit distinction in NATO USA until troops reached southern France in 1944. Base sections bore geographical rather than functional names—Atlantic Base (Morocco), Mediterranean Base (Algeria), Eastern Base (Tunisia), Island Base (Sicily), Peninsular Base (Italy), Northern Base (Corsica), and Continental Base (southern France). Mediterranean geography insured that each section would have direct access to water transportation, and thus to NYPE, and all of them, irrespective of their role in operations, were called base sections.
The base section quartermaster had something more than the job of transmitting or initiating Quartermaster policy or plans. He was also responsible for supervising the operations of the support units in his base section. At Casablanca, Oran, and Constantine, the base section quartermasters found their staffs involved more and more in operations. As early as March 1943, Colonel Evans, Quartermaster, Atlantic Base Section, and Colonel Sharp, Quartermaster, Mediterranean Base Section, almost
simultaneously hit upon the idea of creating a separate command organization to handle operational matters.47 Because he momentarily had a surplus of officers, Evans proposed that the organization be of the provisional type. Sharp’s plan called for a regularly constituted unit, one that would be commanded directly by the base section quartermaster. At the time neither concept was adopted, but these suggestions anticipated a TAO unit known later as the headquarters and headquarters company, quartermaster base depot. In the days ahead such a company would play a significant role in Quartermaster operations at the great base section in Naples.
Officers qualified to handle local purchases had accompanied the original TORCH task forces, and thus antedated the base sections. The daily progress of Quartermaster local procurement depended on the activities of Quartermaster purchasing and contracting officers and on the purchasing agent in each base section. The responsibilities of the purchasing agent within Mediterranean Base Section, for example, involved the standardization of prices for all commodities and services, the approval of all purchases and contracts involving more than $500.00, the allocation among the technical services of scarce supplies, the procurement of identical items needed by several of the services, and the negotiation of arrangements for raw materials that had to be imported from the United States for the manufacture of end items. The procurement officers for the various technical services were meanwhile expected to “make the maximum use of every available source or facility in this area.”48 To enable them to do this readily, they were permitted to sign contracts and make purchases involving amounts less than $500.00 without prior approval of the purchasing agent. In September 1943 the General Purchasing Board developed a reciprocal aid agreement with the French which had the effect of still further decentralizing local procurement activities. Under this system, direct payments of American funds to French businessmen or vendors were discontinued, and a franc account was credited to the U.S. Army through which French authorities settled the claims of French suppliers.49
The base section quartermaster had his share of personnel problems. Officers were transferred in and out of a section, moving either to a supply installation within the base section or to another base section. The rank of an officer did not affect his degree of mobility, and the brevity of his tenure in a given position was as much a reflection of greater need elsewhere as a commentary on his competence. In Atlantic Base Section’s formative period, January to March 1943, it was not unusual for an officer to hold as many as four successive positions or to remain on any single assignment for as little as one week. In February 1943, six key Quartermaster officers—including the quartermaster, his deputy, and the executive officer—were transferred to the newly formed Quartermaster Sections at SOS NATOUSA and Eastern Base. The following summer Atlantic Base Section suffered a similar
fate when about fifteen of its Quartermaster officers left Casablanca for a thirty-five-day Mediterranean cruise which ultimately brought them to Naples where they formed the nucleus of the Quartermaster Section, Peninsular Base Section.50 Meantime, none of the North African base sections provided quartermasters for Island Base Section (Sicily) until two weeks after the close of operations. Since 10 July 1943 all Sicily had been considered a combat zone and no communications zone headquarters was organized there until late August 1943. The area remained a quiet backwater, for subsequent operations were staged from the larger base sections in North Africa.
First Operations on Axis Territory
By 9 May 1943 German forces had been swept from Tunisia, and Allied strength was such that AFHQ was ready to conduct two major operations in quick succession on the enemy’s soil. For the tactical role Seventh and Fifth Armies had been constituted early in 1943. By spring the immediate objective of Seventh Army was Sicily, and landings in Italy by Fifth Army were in logical sequence to the occupation of that island.51
In working toward their final plans of action, Col. Clyde Massey, quartermaster of Seventh Army, and Col. Joseph P. Sullivan of Fifth Army had studied the shortcomings of TORCH and assembled reports of Tunisian experience. They gave careful attention to British First and Eighth Army reports. Each man listened to Quartermaster observers and inspectors who passed through Mostaganem, Algeria (Massey’s headquarters), and Oujda, Morocco (Sullivan’s headquarters), and spent much time in the field inspecting base sections or conferring with Ramsey and Middleswart on the status of Quartermaster supply.52 From these sources, each officer had been impressed with the necessity of perfecting the methods of moving supply over the assault beaches, of decreasing the soldier’s load, of weighing and balancing Quartermaster troop lists, and of using new Quartermaster packaging, crating, loading, and marking techniques. Yet at the time no American Quartermaster staff had operated in the field at Army level, so that the recently used Engineer support brigades were not fully understood.
In the thirteen months between July 1943 and August 1944, four landings on Mediterranean beaches—Sicily, Salerno, Anzio, and southern France—offered opportunities for improving Quartermaster supply procedures in amphibious operations. These operations were all beset with troublesome problems, but Sicily left behind the most instructive record. From a Quartermaster point of view, the most conspicuous deficiency in the TORCH landings had been the absence of an efficient beach organization. Center Task Force was unique in employing a specialized amphibian
Engineer brigade, and its techniques served as a model for ship-to-shore and shore-to-shore movements and for beachhead development. Because a beachhead operation at the outset labored under the handicap of shortage of transportation, problems of organization and scheduling required scrupulous attention. If, notwithstanding this handicap, the assault forces could not depend on a steady influx of supplies amidst the confusion of the landings, they were likely to be pushed into the sea and plans for the follow-up rendered worthless.
The details of the tactical plan necessarily determined the basic organization for beachhead supply. As the Sicilian and Salerno assaults were conceived in phases, Massey first, and Sullivan later, had to calculate the needs for each phase of his respective operations and the manner in which deliveries were to be made. For Quartermaster support these phases were separated into three chronological periods: assault, consolidation, and final. In the assault phase scales of equipment and supplies had to be reduced to the minimum necessary to sustain the early combat action. These were in turn divided into those carried by the individual soldier and organizational supply that would be immediately available from dumps along the beach. The consolidation phase witnessed the gradual build-up to whatever levels were considered practicable for the forwardmost army, corps, or division depots once space permitted their establishment. The supplies for the final phase of the amphibious operation were those that became part of the permanent inventory of the new communications zone. Normally, such supply went first into the army depots, but was later turned back
to the quartermaster of the base section that appeared with the opening of the new communications zone. So important was the proper calculation of requirements for each of these phases that Middleswart urged higher echelons to let experienced supply officers accompany all amphibious operations with the sole responsibility of noting what individual and organizational supplies were discarded without use or were issued for the assault phase but not used until later.53
The HUSKY plan called for the British Eighth Army to land near Syracuse while the U.S. Seventh Army, consisting of two corps broken down into four separate task forces, made simultaneous landings along a fifty-mile front on Sicily’s southern shore. SHARK Task Force (II Corps) consisted of three subtask forces: CENT (45th Infantry Division) for landings near Scoglitti; DIME (1st Infantry Division) to move ashore east of Gela; and Joss (3rd Infantry Division, reinforced by Combat Command A, 2nd Armored Division) to make landings in the vicinity of Licata and Agrigento. Using moonlight to their advantage, elements of the 82nd Airborne Division (Wolf Force) were to drop behind the invasion beach on Ponte Olivo airport, seven miles northeast of Gela. At sea in reserve was Task Force KOOL composed of the remainder of two divisions, the 2nd Armored and the 82nd Airborne.
Because beachheads were not expected to be consolidated quickly, planners agreed that each subtask force was to be self-sustaining for approximately thirty
days. This meant that CENT, DIME, and Joss each had to have a suitable quota of service troops, and that each craft carrying troops to their objective should also carry enough food, water, and gasoline to sustain its passengers during their first several days ashore. Each subtask force, supported by an Engineer shore regiment with attached Quartermaster supply troops, was thereby responsible for supplying its own ships and other landing craft as well as for the operation of all beachheads until that mission reverted back to the task force and the 1st Engineer Special Brigade. In this support concept quartermasters adopted one lesson of TORCH—graves registration platoons were attached to assault divisions. Laundry, bakery, and salvage personnel were not to enter the combat zone until army took over supply responsibilities. For the overland fighting in Tunisia, II Corps had had operational control of staging its own supply support; for the landings and advance inland in Sicily, the 1st Engineer Special Brigade, under Seventh Army, was to control resupply and Quartermaster services, thus eliminating both the army and corps quartermasters from any operational responsibilities. This was a new concept, of dubious validity in the eyes of many technical services officers.54
Regarding supply, Massey’s ration plan called for all units to land with 4 days’ rations, including a day’s individual ration of the C or K type and the remainder of a type drawn at the unit commander’s option. As cargo the assault convoy was to carry 7 days’ supply of cased rations. On D plus 4 another 7 days’ rations for all troops ashore were to move onto the beaches, and on D plus 8, a third follow-up convoy was to land another 7 days’ rations for all the troops ashore. As to engine fuels in 5-gallon cans, Massey’s plan contemplated landing a 7 days’ supply for all vehicles ashore on D-day, a second shipment containing a week’s supply for all troops ashore was to land on D plus 4, and a third convoy was to bring another 7 days’ supply for all vehicles ashore by D plus 8. Thereafter, Mediterranean Base Section released Class III supply as requested by Massey through Headquarters, Army Group. Class II and IV supply would arrive on the D plus 4 follow-up convoy in modified balanced loads for beachhead distribution.
Before the operation Colonel Massey explained to McNamara that in 8 days’ time II Corps would have received 21 days’ supply of Class I and III items into its Sicilian dumps. McNamara suggested that according to his arithmetic, 7 days’ supply for those troops ashore on D-day, plus another 7 days’ for those ashore on D plus 4, plus a third 7 days’ supply for those ashore on D plus 8 did not equal 21 days of supply at any time. He recalled his experience at Arzew where the assault units had exhausted 12 days’ supply of rations in 4 days. He recommended larger requisitions if shipping permitted. After the war, he wrote, “my comment, offered simply as a suggestion, was ignored. ... My own responsibility would be to disseminate the logistical data from a Quartermaster view point thru normal channels and to report on our situation thru Quartermaster channels to Seventh Army.”55
An illuminating insight into supply over a Sicilian beach can be derived from the experiences on to July 1943 of the 1st Infantry Division, part of whose Quartermaster troops landed near the fishing village of Gela four hours behind the initial assault waves, and the 3rd Infantry Division, which led the Joss Task Force in its attack on the beach of Licata.56
Because 1st Division was DIME’S key combat unit which also fielded two Ranger battalions and a battalion of combat engineers, the division quartermaster doubled as force quartermaster and divided his company into two staff organizations. One group handled divisional Quartermaster supply while the other concerned itself with supply for the whole task force. Because of limitations on seagoing transportation, certain DIME Quartermaster units and services were eliminated until after D plus 30, and some of the officers remained in North Africa to assure proper loading of organizational supplies and transportation aboard the D plus 4, D plus 8, and D plus 12 convoys.
Once on the beaches of Gela, the Engineer shore battalion handled the receipt of supplies at the water’s edge, while the 1st Division’s Quartermaster detachments established dumps a half mile inland. These units enjoyed good weather, no tides, and air and naval superiority. Supplies came ashore faster than the companies could handle them, and by H plus 7 adequate but badly mixed quantities of ammunition, gasoline, water, and rations were on the beach. A traffic jam occurred on the morning of D-day because of the speedy deposit of supplies at the water’s edge—including such superfluous items as barracks bags, athletic equipment, and administrative records. Scrambling of items made it impossible to keep satisfactory records of receipts. Somewhat reminiscent of TORCH was the misplacing of supplies by landing craft skippers who were diverted from their course when a landing site was in use or obstructed by another vessel.
The 1st Division met stubborn enemy resistance from the air as well as from tanks and artillery in the hills of Ponte Olivo. The first two days in the Gela sector were fairly hectic, and there were moments during D plus 1 when ration dumps were within point-blank range of German tanks. On 12 July, in the face of American aircraft, of naval gunnery, and of the timely arrival of heavier artillery, the enemy withdrew. Beach operations proceeded more normally, and the movement of stocks inland began.57
Joss Force (3rd Division) divided its service units among three separate formations, a Force Depot, a Near Shore Control Group, and a Beach Group.
While the Near Shore Control Group supervised the embarkation of all organizations and the loading of vessels carrying divisional supplies, the Force Depot, consisting of Quartermaster, Ordnance, Chemical, Medical, and Signal supply personnel remained in North Africa until the combat forces advanced beyond the limits of beach supply. With the establishment of the beachhead and the seizure of the port of Licata by D plus 3, the division quartermaster started moving supplies through the harbor.58
In addition to the improved organization on the beaches, the landings in Sicily were better than those in North Africa because of several new developments, the outstanding one being the debut of the DUKW, a 6-wheel, 2½-ton amphibian truck. Carried to the assault area aboard LST’s and capable of transporting supplies directly from a vessel offshore to an inland dump, this vehicle eliminated the double handling of supplies at the water’s edge. In the landings, DUKWs demonstrated that their uses could be many and varied. Besides hauling supplies, the amphibian trucks evacuated wounded soldiers to hospital ships, hauled beached landing craft out into deeper water, and rescued immobilized tracked and wheeled vehicles from sand dunes.
Unless the roads were good, it generally proved inefficient to dispatch a DUKW far inland, for this unduly lengthened its turnaround time, retarded its rate of discharge, increased wear and tear, added to the consumption of fuel, and increased the strain on drivers. Except for such evidence of improper use of the DUKW, or a comparatively rare report of overloading—somewhat overburdened with ten tons of artillery shells, one DUKW sank immediately upon leaving the ramp of a landing craft—this amphibian truck met most expectations.59
Closely related to the success of the DUKW was the experiment in palletized loading at ports. A palletized load—also known as a unit load—was a quantity of supplies fastened, usually by metal straps, to a single or double layered wooden platform, which could be readily lifted, moved, or stacked by a fork-lift truck and ship’s gear. The chief advantage lay in the speed and simplification of shipping, in the reduction in the number of handlers, and in lessened damage and pilferage. Widespread employment of palletized loads was discouraged, on the other hand, by the shortage of materials-handling equipment at ports, by the scarcity of personnel trained in dealing with such shipments, and by the fact that such units were wasteful of shipping space. Although numerous exploratory tests were conducted in the United States in late 1942 and early 1943, the desirability of palletized loads remained the subject of considerable debate throughout the war.60 Considering the distressing amount of breakage and pilferage in the North African landings, the opportunity to experiment with palletized loading at the next amphibious landing was understandably attractive.
At the Hampton Roads Port of Embarkation, where the 45th Infantry Division staged for the Sicilian invasion, more than 1,500 palletized units, varying in weight from two to three thousand pounds, had been packed and loaded. On D-day and D plus 1 these units were lowered into landing craft and delivered to the beach, where a bulldozer pulled them out of the landing craft and across the beach into the dump area. Water and gasoline were packaged in 5-gallon cans, with 56 cans on each pallet; oil, in boxes of 24 quart cans, 30 boxes per pallet; and 5-in-1 rations in boxes, 60 fiber boxes per pallet. Those pallets transported directly to the dump in DUKWs were lifted out of the vehicle and lowered to the ground by means of an A-frame attached to the rear of another DUKW improvised to serve as a mobile crane. The final phase in the life of the pallet consisted of its unloading, after which the platform was returned to the beach where it proved useful as a sled for the transport of nonpalletized supplies.
Landing on D-day with the 45th Division and remaining around Scoglitti for nine days solely to observe, Capt. Charles J. DaCosta of the OQMG agreed with others that “the palletization of water, oil, gasoline and 5-in-1 rations expedited the delivery to the dump area by 50 percent.”61 So impressed was he by the combined use of the palletized load and the DUKW that he did not echo the general warning against employing the amphibian trucks to transport supplies to inland dumps. He argued, rather, that the existence of a hard-surfaced road from Scoglitti to Vittoria permitted direct deliveries to a dump five miles inland without any significant loss of time.
Less publicized than the DUKW, but invoking less debate than the palletized load was the initial use of the assault pack. Whereas the palletized load was capable of handling all classes of supplies, and in substantial quantities, the assault pack was primarily designed for the delivery of clothing and equipment in small 50-pound loads. Clothing and equipment were manifestly less vital to the success of an amphibious operation than such rapidly consumed materials as food, gasoline, and ammunition, but inevitably a certain amount was lost or damaged in the confusion and fighting of the assault, and replacements had to be speedily provided. The assault pack worked out in detail by Middleswart’s staff and packed by Quartermaster depots was well suited to meet the minimum requirements, while eliminating the need to establish separate collections of individual items until the battle had moved inland.
The assault pack was simple: nothing more than a well-stocked barracks bag, containing the full complement of individual clothing and equipment for one man. A haversack at the bottom held a towel, salt and water-purification tablets, K rations, field jacket, raincoat, meat can, blanket, head net, and insect repellent. The pack also contained a web belt, canteen and cup, ammunition case, and steel helmet. For the Sicilian landing, in midsummer, when a fatigue suit was included in the pack, its pockets held a pair of wool socks, a box of matches, two packages of cigarettes, two
handkerchiefs, and a small roll of toilet paper.62
Made up in two sizes, medium and large, these packs were generally shipped on the basis of 5 for every hundred combat soldiers participating in the assault. This 5-per-hundred figure was sometimes considered high, and in his notes on the Sicilian campaign Middleswart considered 2.5 per hundred a better factor. The larger figure nevertheless prevailed on the grounds that it was not unduly excessive and that the contents of the unused packs were easily absorbed in the depot inventories, once larger installations began to appear. A less constant planning figure was that governing the proportion of medium-size to large-size packs, for experience transformed a fifty-fifty ratio into one calling for 80 percent medium-size packs. Shoes were packaged in separate waterproof containers, each holding 12 pairs of shoes on the basis of 1 pair per assault pack and pair for each 50 men landed in the force. Each shoe package contained 1 pair of B-width, 7 of D-width, and 4 pairs of EE-width shoes, while even sizes varied from size 5’s to 12’s, inclusive.63
Once beyond the beaches the amphibian engineers faced the problem of following a rapid advance. Six days after the landings about a quarter of Sicily was in Seventh Army’s hands. The Italian garrison was shattered and the Germans, although resisting strongly, were retreating toward Messina. On 22 July the port of Palermo fell and from the Quartermaster point of view this was welcome news in light of the difficulty which the 1st Engineer Brigade had had in moving supplies forward from the southern beaches.
All Sicily was a combat zone. This meant that army G-4 and the special staff for supply had simply delegated their operational responsibility to a very small brigade support staff. McNamara admitted that the amphibian brigade concept had worked well on the atolls of the Pacific, but pointed out that Sicily is an island of 30,000 square miles. An army of 150,000 troops moving quickly inland could not be supported by a brigade headquarters and attached service troops which had been drawn together specifically to handle a beachhead operation. Phased attachments of Quartermaster service troops to corps and divisions (except for a graves registration platoon) had not been arranged. McNamara explained his plight to Massey who attached two truck companies to II Corps to haul supplies from army dumps to army railheads. Similarly the Quartermaster company at the divisional level was severely handicapped in fulfilling its many missions and barely performed its role as a truck company.64
Throughout the campaign, Massey and McNamara were liaison officers with no control over their quartermaster situation. McNamara was skeptical of the extreme confidence that the army staff placed in the support brigade’s overworked small staff to keep track of the arrival, storage, and issue of Quartermaster supply. Within the first fortnight, two emergency requests reached Oran for additional rations, despite the fact that ample requisitions had been placed before the operation began. Several million rations were ashore, but not available in the forward areas. But for excellent Sicilian crops of tomatoes, grapes, and melons and for the nearness of African ports to those of Sicily, the ration shortage might have been far more serious. This situation was grave until Messina fell on 17 August and the campaign ended. On 12 September 1943, upon leaving for England where he was destined to become a quartermaster at army level, McNamara resolved that henceforth he was going to be something more than a liaison officer during a war of movement.65
Only when the progress of Allied arms in Sicily assured a rapid occupation of that island did the Allies seriously entertain an assault on Italy. At their level Quartermaster planners within SOS NATO USA failed to appreciate the last-minute arrangements that brought the U.S. Fifth Army from its training areas into the North African staging ports. In their view, these troop movements should have been completed immediately after the departure of Patton’s force for Sicily. On 27 July 194$ AFHQ issued Lt. Gen. Mark W. Clark a directive for Fifth Army instructing him to proceed with tactical planning for seizing Naples and its nearby airfields. Fifth Army was to consist of eight divisions under the command of British 10 Corps and U.S. VI Corps, only the latter being an American supply responsibility.
Fortunately, Colonel Sullivan during his stay in Morocco had developed supply plans for the projected invasion of Sardinia by 186,000 troops, accompanied by 34,400 vehicles. When, on 4 August, G-4, Fifth Army, called for Sullivan’s D-day plans for Operation AVALANCHE, it was a rather easy task to adapt the Sardinia requisitions of July 1943 to the scale of the new operation. On the other hand, as August advanced SOS NATOUSA had a difficult time in determining the location of the supplies in the base sections, what surpluses if any could be made available from Sicily, and what supplies had to be ordered from NYPE. At the end of August, Sullivan had completed his plans for the follow-up convoys through D plus 24, and Middleswart was hopeful that his pipeline system was ready to fulfill its mission.66
Item by item, Quartermaster supply plans for AVALANCHE did not differ materially from those laid down in HUSKY. Under rations the notable exception was the last-minute inclusion of a prisoner of war ration of the C type for 15,000 men for seven days. This feature, of course, had not anticipated the premature surrender of Italian troops, who subsequently had to arrange for their own subsistence. In addition to the assault pack and shoe package allowance already
described, Class II and IV plans called for a reserve for each 1,000 men consisting of o blankets, 2 shelter halves, 100 pounds of soap, and 10,000 sheets of toilet paper per day. As a beach reserve until replacement needs came on the D plus 12 convoy, organizational equipment included intrenching tools, electric lanterns and batteries, British-type emergency cookers, water bags, galvanized cans, field ranges, and wall tents. Class II and IV combat maintenance figures were based on OQMG tables of March 1943, which did not reflect experience in Tunisia or Sicily. One problem of the past was solved early. All medals and decorations were personally delivered to the Assistant Chief of Staff, G--1, Fifth Army, for distribution to units before embarkation. Class III planning factors were based on the 50-mile operational day with 6.25 gallons of gasoline as the normal requirement per vehicle per day.
At the last minute, Clark arranged for an emergency air transport service and Sullivan encountered a new situation in planning with Eastern Base Section quartermasters for stocking the supplies at a Tunisian air base. Sullivan had to arrange for special packaging of rations and POL for the maintenance of a regimental combat team or a tank battalion in action if air supply was needed. By the time of AVALANCHE Quartermaster supply planning for an amphibious operation was practically standardized procedure.67
Sullivan, who had the distinction of being in the war against Germany almost twice as long as any other army quartermaster, as early as January 1943 had begun to organize his office and to develop a balanced Quartermaster troop basis for an army. In this planning area there were no modern precedents to serve as a guide. Field Service regulations, field manuals, and War Department Tables of Organization and Equipment reflected ideals, offered only vague suggestions, or listed personnel for an army by rank and ratings. During his stay at Oujda, Sullivan had time to develop War Department tables of early 1942 and his own concepts into a well-planned Quartermaster organization. His earliest section constituted a planning staff of 12 officers, 1 warrant officer, and 15 enlisted men, a strength that was about half what the authorized table of 7 January 1942 allowed for the office of an army quartermaster.
The first structure of the office of Fifth Army quartermaster emerged out of an intense training program which Sullivan had instituted in Morocco. At “Sullivan’s College,” classes were held daily in all aspects of Quartermaster services of supply, with additional instruction in the evenings. Map exercises drawn from Tunisian battle situations served as a basis for the study of realistic supply problems, and participating enlisted men often presented solutions as if they were officers responsible for the accomplishment of a particular mission. In June 1943, Sullivan developed his office to the point where definite staff assignments were made among three functional divisions—Administrative, Operations and Training, and Supply—with each of these subdivided into operating sections. He contemplated having certain officers serve in command assignments over
nondivisional Quartermaster troops when his office became operational. For example, he planned for his Class I officer to serve as the battalion commander for all bakery companies. For Operation AVALANCHE, he divided his office into a forward echelon for the D-day landings and a rear element to land when Headquarters, Fifth Army, reached the area. Together with his operations officer and two noncommissioned officers, Sullivan himself planned to participate in the D-day assault.
The only significant change in the development of the office of the Fifth Army quartermaster during the ensuing campaign was the elevation of graves registration activities to the level of an independent division, an amendment to Sullivan’s original plans which was mute testimony to the high rate of casualties in Fifth Army. Upon being questioned in April 1944 by the builders of a new Seventh Army staff, Sullivan explained that a graves registration officer “is of the utmost importance to an Army Commander. More repercussions from a military, political, and moral point of view can be felt from poorly regulated graves registration activity than any other under the jurisdiction of the Army Quartermaster. It is a subject that requires the keeping of accurate records which must be referred to for years after the war is over.” When the army quartermaster became operational, the classic function of controlling nondivisional Quartermaster truck units was transferred to a separate transportation staff in Fifth Army.68
In planning AVALANCHE Sullivan, who was to command his service and supply units in battle, carefully phased the arrival of Quartermaster troops and timed the length of their projected attachment to divisions and corps. To assist the 36th Division’s Quartermaster company, Sullivan attached a gasoline supply company, a railhead company, and two sections of a graves registration company. On D plus 3, Sullivan planned for only a graves registration platoon to remain with each division. Between D plus 2 and D plus 11, attachments to corps consisted of a graves registration platoon, 6 service companies, 2 truck battalions (less 2 companies each), and a detachment of 75 men from a depot supply company. On D plus 12 when army assumed responsibility for supply, all attachments to corps were to cease except for the normal use of a truck company and a service company.69
The Sicilian campaign had shaken the Italians severely, and on 3 September a successful British landing on the mainland opposite Messina added to their discouragement. Meanwhile the Germans retreated swiftly from Calabria, began to evacuate Sardinia and Corsica, and prepared to defend Naples. On the evening of 8 September, as the Allied convoys approached Salerno, the troops aboard were heartened by Eisenhower’s broadcast announcing an Italian armistice.
To an invader from the sea the
proposed battleground of Salerno was a very unfavorable arena. The beach itself is flat. So is the country behind it for several miles. Sweeping inland from this oval seaside amphitheater the land rises rapidly. On 9 September 1943 the Germans in strength had reserved each rising tier of seats, and had paid particular attention to the placement of artillery in the arena’s gallery. As for the weather, landing conditions were admittedly good, but the clear day also afforded excellent visibility for enemy gunners and bombardiers. Supported by the 531st Engineer Shore Regiment, VI Corps on the right flank assaulted the beaches of Salerno Bay near the old Roman city of Paestum.70 Having arrived with the D-day convoy, Colonel Sullivan, his operations and training officer, and two noncommissioned officers from the Quartermaster Section, Fifth Army, circulated among the 36th Division’s beachhead dumps and the railheads to give advice and assistance. By 14 September the supply of assault packs and shoe packages had been exhausted and no replacements were due until D plus 12. Sullivan recommended that each man turn in his two extra pairs of shoes and four pairs of socks. The 36th Division quartermaster immediately set about redistributing this surplus and Sullivan accepted a requisition for replacement of the original issue of these items. On D plus 3, VI Corps took over the supply responsibility. As he reconnoitered Quartermaster dumps, cemeteries, and depots, Sullivan recorded in his diary that VI Corps Quartermaster personnel—two officers and two enlisted men—should concern themselves with their tactical mission, not any administrative assignment. On 21 September the remainder of the army Quartermaster Section arrived at Paestum and reported to Sullivan’s headquarters tent in an olive grove. That same day he assumed control of Quartermaster supply from VI Corps, and began looking toward the day when he would supply three corps of a field army.71
It was nearly a month before Fifth Army broke through the encircling hills, seized Naples, and drove the Germans beyond that great port. By 26 October the Quartermaster Section was settled in the royal palace at Caserta, and Sullivan found time to review the Salerno battle and to plan for the next. After operating under his preinvasion plan for a month, Sullivan recorded his disappointment over having combined a service company and a truck company as a substitute organization for a salvage collection company. He recommended to Clark that in future landings regular salvage collecting troops be provided as vital to Quartermaster operations. Acknowledging this recommendation, Clark was more than pleased with the performance of the 242nd Service Battalion, the 263rd Service Battalion, the 204th Gasoline
Supply Battalion, the Both Railhead Company, and the 47th Graves Registration Company at Salerno and Naples. “This is perhaps one of the first operations,” Clark wrote to General Gregory, “wherein service units were provided in sufficient number to perform adequately their mission.”72