Anzio. After the Salerno landings had been mounted in September 1943, the Allies planned a second landing on the west coast of Italy during the battle for the Mediterranean to try to break the deadlock in the Italian campaign, by breaching the Winter Line and hastening the capture of Rome. One plan was cancelled but the second (SHINGLE), decided upon at the Marrakesh conference with Churchill in the chair, was mounted on 22 January 1944 by Maj-General John Lucas's 6th US Corps of Mark Clark's Fifth US Army. Churchill later wrote he had hoped that the Allies were hurling a wild cat on to the shore but all they got was a stranded whale. The reality did, indeed, turn out to be very different from Churchill's hopes and it was the opinion of the US Navy's official historian that putting such a modest force ashore was akin to sending a boy on a man's errand.

Lucas's corps comprised the 1st British Infantry Division and a British Commando Brigade, which landed north of Anzio; and 3rd US Infantry Division, reinforced with tanks and Ranger battalions (see USA, 5(f)), which landed in or south of the port. In all, 378 ships took part and air support was drawn from Maj-General John Cannon's immensely strong Mediterranean Allied Tactical Air Force. By contrast, German naval and air forces were weak. Their explosive motor boats and human torpedoes did attack Allied shipping off the beachhead but they were largely ineffectual.

The landings, as indicated by ULTRA intelligence, achieved total tactical surprise and were virtually unopposed. However, the operation had been hastily mounted and Lucas's orders made its immediate objectives far from clear. Moreover, contrary to the expectations of the Marrakesh Conference, Lucas decided against exploiting the surprise he had achieved. Instead, he consolidated his position.

In the days that followed German bombers caused some damage to the naval forces and bad weather hindered the Allied build-up, and it was not until he knew reinforcements were arriving that Lucas agreed to advance. But by then it was too late, for the German commander in Italy, Field Marshal Kesselring, reacted with brilliant improvisation, and by 26 January he had the core of no less than six divisions of a hastily improvised Fourteenth Army, commanded by General Eberhard von Mackensen, surrounding the Allied perimeter. This cordon proved highly effective: when Lucas advanced, two battalions of Rangers near Cisterna were wiped out in an ambush; by 30 January the 3rd US Division had 3,000 casualties; the British who, with American armoured help, had created a salient towards Osteriaccia, had 2,100. These losses forced Lucas on to the defensive again.

However, during the last days of January ULTRA intelligence provided details of German plans and tank strengths—a senior intelligence officer on General Alexander's staff considered it ‘one of Ultra's most important triumphs’ (quoted in R. Bennett, Ultra and Mediterranean Strategy, London, 1989, p. 269)—and it enabled the Allied commanders to defend the perimeter with maximum effectiveness. The elimination of the Osteriaccia salient could not be prevented, but heavy losses were inflicted on the Germans; and when a few days later German forces began moving into the area around Aprilia it was known that it was a build-up to a counter-offensive. This was launched on 16 February but, aided by foreknowledge, powerful air support, heavy artillery concentrations, and sturdy defence, the Allies halted it after four days with little territorial loss and 5,389 German casualties. On 22 February Lucas was replaced by his deputy, Maj-General Truscott, who drove off a second German attack on 29 February. When the attack failed, Kesselring abandoned any hope of eliminating the landings, although he continued to attack the perimeter to keep the Allied landing beaches under fire. It was not until the spring that 6th Corps, now heavily reinforced, broke out and linked up with Fifth Army's 2nd Corps on 25 May and began the triumphant advance on Rome.

The cost of Anzio was heavy for the Allies: some 7,000 killed and 36,000 wounded or missing in action; 44,000 were disabled with injuries or sickness. German losses were estimated by Kesselring to have been 40,000 including 5,000 killed and 4,500 captured.

Bibliography

D'Este, C. , Fatal Decision (London, 1991).

ANZIO

ANZIO, a town on the west coast of Italy, thirty-three miles south of Rome, became a battleground in the spring of 1944 during the Italian campaign of World War II. The Germans under Field Marshal Albert Kesselring stubbornly defended southern Italy between Naples and Rome in the fall of 1943. General Mark Clark of the Fifth U.S. Army and General Sir Harold Alexander of the British army planned an Anglo-American amphibious invasion at Anzio to loosen the German grip on the mountainous terrain around Cassino, precipitate a battle for Rome, and compel the Germans to retreat to positions north of Rome.

The operation was risky because the Anzio forces would be isolated in German-held territory. Under pressure from Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who wished to capture Rome before the cross-Channel invasion into Normandy, the Sixth Corps under General John Lucas landed British and American troops at Anzio and neighboring Nettuno against virtually no opposition on 22 January 1944.

The Germans rallied quickly, penned the invaders into a small beachhead, and almost drove the Anglo-American force into the sea. The Allies held their precarious positions for four months, amassing forces for a spring offensive. On 11 May 1944 Alexander broke the Gustav Line, and Clark's units linked up with the beachead

fourteen days later. The Sixth Corps, now under General Lucian Truscott Jr., joined the main forces, and Allied troops entered Rome on 4 June, two days before the cross-Channel attack.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Blumenson, Martin. Anzio: The Gamble That Failed. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1963.

D'Este, Carlo. Fatal Decision: Anzio and the Battle for Rome. New York: Harper Collins, 1991.

Vaughan-Thomas, Wynford. Anzio. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1961.

MartinBlumenson/a. r.

See alsoGustav Line ; Monte Cassino .

Anzio , Lat. Antium, town (1991 pop. 33,497), in Latium, central Italy, on the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is a seaside resort with a fishing industry. A Volscian town, it was captured by Rome in 341 BC and became a favorite resort of the Romans. Nero and Caligula were born there; among the ruins of Nero's villa two famous statues, the Apollo Belvedere and the Girl of Anzio, were found. Anzio declined in the Middle Ages, but it revived c.1700 and became a residence of the popes. During World War II, Allied troops landed (Jan., 1944) at Anzio and nearby Nettuno to draw German forces from Cassino, thus effecting a breakthrough (May, 1944) to Rome.

Anzio, Lazio/Italy Antium The Roman name, from which the present name is derived, may have been taken from a Greek myth. According to this, the town was founded by Anteias, son of Odysseus, the hero of Homer's epic poem The Odyssey. The Romans captured the town in 338 bc.