We Knew it was Coming

Last summer an Associated Press dispatch pointed out that the successful naval operations around Sicily were carried out, for the most part, by men who were landlubbers. The correspondent chose as an example a ship which had been converted from a passenger liner into a transport, thirty-one of whose forty-seven officers had never been to sea before. Two of the officers mentioned in the dispatch were Princetonians, Lt. Carlisle Moore ’33 (Ph.D. ’40), senior watch officer and division officer, and Ens. Albert H. McIntyre ’42, plane identification officer and signal bridge officer.

Now the Weekly is privileged to print a graphic account of the invasion of Sicily, included by Lt. Moore (son of H. H. Moore ’00) in a letter to his wife. Lt. Moore, an instructor in English at Cornell, entered the Navy in 1942, via the USNR midshipmen’s school at Northwestern. He participated, also, in the Casablanca landings.

***

On the afternoon of July 9 we approached the southwest coast of Italy from due south, passing Malta and Gozo islands and heading for beaches near a small town called Scoglitti. Of the three large American forces attacking the island, we were the easternmost. To the west of us, one was at the same time steaming toward Licata and another toward Gela. In addition to these three, four other large forces were involved. East of us, a Canadian force was attacking the western side of the southeastern tip of the island, while three British forces were making for three sectors of the east coast, Portopalo, Marzamemi and Avola — all south of Syracuse. The seven forces were to strike together, on the minute, at 0235.

The plans were beautifully worked out to take care of any kind of enemy opposition, any eventuality, anything at all — except bad weather and bad weather we got. The beautiful blue Mediterranean whipped up a gale that evening that I have not seen equalled on the Atlantic. If it kept up it meant certain disaster. The ships could not unload the boats and the boats could not land on the beach. We could not turn around. It was too late for that. So on we went, pitching and tossing on a raging sea, hoping for a miracle.

No miracle appeared, but toward 2300 we began to get a lee from the island and, by the time we were to commence lowering the boats, conditions were not impossible, though still extremely difficult. In spite of the wind and the sea we managed to get the boats over, the troops into them and all the waves (a boat wave is a group of six to eight boats) off for the beach seven miles away before daylight.

Coming in, we had had one aerial attack. The enemy knew we were coming, of course. They had radar and observation planes to tell them of our approach and they did what they could to ward us off. But it was part of our plan to bomb all their airfields and keep their planes aground before and during the invasion and these measures must have succeeded very well, since we had only a little trouble during the first two days. Nevertheless, while we were coming in toward the coast, some high-level bombers almost did us some real damage. Dropping some flares, they lit up the whole convoy and then proceeded to take pot shots at us. We couldn’t see them at all.

The ships went to general quarters and I went back to my station on the fantail at the 3-inch guns, where I could see the whole show. The sky, the sea and all the ships were clearly, fearfully visible under the pink radiance of those flares. There were four of them hanging there in the sky, directly above us. They didn’t seem to be falling at all; they just stayed there, illuminating us clearly for the enemy bombers, burning with awesome beauty. I don’t know how the things work. They hang from parachutes, I know, but parachutes fall and these didn’t seem to. They stayed motionless for at least ten minutes, burning like meteors and slowly dropping globules of fire from themselves. Too bad it wasn’t the 4^th instead of the 9^th of July.

We were all pretty nervous. This looked liked our first real air raid. We didn’t know what to expect. At any moment out of that dark sky above the glare might come bombs to fall on us or planes to torpedo or strafe us. Suddenly, up ahead, we saw two large splashes very close to one of beautiful new cruisers, then another splash near another ship. We steamed along as before and nothing more happened. Our planes had chased them away.

We weren’t bothered during the actual landing, either, not until the third day. By that time, some of the enemy planes were starting to get through our cover and we knew we were in for some bad moments. There was the possibility of submarine attack, too, of course, and also of damage by floating mines. Now and then one of the ships would open up with her 20-mm. guns at a suspicious-looking object on the surface. We did on several occasions and sank them. When you fire at a floating mine, it does not explode; it just sinks, which is just as good. We had to keep a sharp lookout day and night for them.

The unloading was going slowly because we had so few boats left. The surf was still high and there were rocks along the beach, some beneath the surface where they couldn’t be seen, and many of our boats were lost beyond hope of repair. Just like Casablanca. The only difference was that we weren’t near any large port like Casablanca which we could go into after it had been captured and unload at docks. Fortunately, there were some large landing barges on the way toward us. These had landed their cargo, chiefly tanks and trucks, on the beaches and were now free to come alongside us and take our cargo in for us. But there weren’t many of them and we had to wait our turn. The ship was pretty far out from the beach.

On D+1 Day (the day after the day of the assault landing of the troops) we had weighed anchor and steamed blithely in to within about a mile of the beach, intending to anchor there so that the boats wouldn’t have to go so far on their trips between ship and shore. We hadn’t even found our berth before large shells from a shore battery began to fall uncomfortably close to us. The battery which was supposed to have been shelled and put out of commission by our destroyers along with all other near-by shore batteries must have been four or five miles away, but it had spotted us nicely. In a few more shots we would certainly have been hit. We turned around and got out of range as fast as our ship would go and stayed out until next day, when the battery was reported destroyed; but I won’t forget that last shot which whistled right over my head as I stood on the fantail. It couldn’t have missed us by more than twenty-five feet.

On the morning of D+2 day, before dawn, we were standing on deck supervising the unloading which still proceeded slowly because there were so few boats left, when the approach of enemy planes was announced over the loudspeaker system. We immediately went to the general quarters, as we had done many times in the past fifty hours. Hardly more than a minute passed before an Italian three-motored bomber loomed out of the morning dimness, heading directly for the bow of the ship at low altitude and high speed. Our guns opened fire on it instantly. It sheered off to starboard and, suddenly showing a trail of fire and smoke, crashed on the beach.

All that day, while we were unloading our cargo on LCT’s (landing craft for tanks) which had reached us at last, enemy planes managed to break through our air defense and take potshots at us in a hit-and-run fashion. The twenty or so ships which lay at anchor must have been a tempting target for them. But they were all driven off by our guns and by the guns of the many destroyers and cruisers which stayed with us all the time. So far, there was no report of enemy subs. No circling torpedoes had been dropped, either. All our troubles came from the air.

That day it was reported that one of the nearby airfields that we had captured two days before had just been recaptured by the Germans. This spelled trouble — real trouble — in the form of a heavy air-raid that night. We speeded up the unloading. The sailors bent to their work with more energy than before, forgetting their desire for sleep and muttering, “Let’s get the hell out of here.” By mid-afternoon both LCT’s were fully loaded and sent off to the beach. There were no more to be had and these would go to other ships for their next trip. We still had lots of Army rations to unload and only one of our boats left in use. We managed to borrow another from one of the other ships and we used those two for all they were worth.

Twilight approached and we still had a lot of rations in our hold. We knew it was coming and it did. About 2000, enemy planes were reported and we went to general quarters. Nothing happened immediately. We stood at our guns looking up at the sky and at the other ships. A few of our own planes were flying low along the horizon, trying to intercept the enemy before it reached us. We couldn’t count on them for further help than that, for when enemy planes are overhead, the ships send up such a heavy barrage of bullets that our own planes wouldn’t have a chance to dogfight.

For about an hour nothing happened. Then, a mile or so away on our port quarter, there arose a beautifully illuminated barrage of anti-aircraft fire, tracers making long streams of red fire in the darkness which arches high above the ships and, taken in the mass, looked like an upside-down waterfall of flame. We couldn’t see the planes, of course, but we knew they had come at last. All of a sudden there was a huge explosion and gigantic flames rose high from what seemed to be one of the ships. It looked like a perfect hit. It looked also as if we were in for it. In just a little while the planes would find us. We were now plainly visible under the light of flares which had been dropped over us a few minutes before. We could only look at that awful blaze and I had a hard time making my gun crews keep a lookout for planes approaching our own ship. In a little while news got about that the explosion was not one of our own ships, but one of the enemy bombers which, being hit by our fire, crashed into the sea and burst into flames. I didn’t know a plane could burn so furiously or so long. It’s the fuel and ammunition, of course.

But there were other planes around. We saw another barrage going up ahead of us. Then we saw a plane over us and we did some firing ourselves. It was out of range and soon out of sight and no bombs were dropped. After that several planes were sighted flying low over the water and headed toward other ships. Every ship was firing its guns and tracer bullets bespangled the sky. Our forces ashore had set up powerful batteries along the beach and these, too, sent up a continuous barrage which was impressive but dangerous to us, when their shells began to drop on our decks.

All this firing by the ships had its effect. Though you couldn’t see the planes you could follow their course by following the apex of the barrage and, following that line after the barrage had ceased, you were often able to see a streak of fire curving or circling downward and a moment later a blinding flash where the plane hit the earth or the sea and went up in flames.

Our moment came at last, about 2330, in the very height of the attack, when seven enemy planes had so far been brought down by American gunfire. The presence of another enemy plane was heralded, as usual, by a brilliant display of A-A fire from the ships. For a few seconds no plane could be seen or heard, but suddenly, astern of us, the dark shape of a twin-engined bomber (later identified as a Messerschmidt 110) could be made out against the bright background of tracers, sailing in toward us low over the water, its engines apparently cut to avoid detection, but coming in fast ahead of the barrage and heading directly for us on the fantail, until at a distance of about 400 yards it dropped a bomb into the water and swerved to the right, passing our starboard quarter at high speed where it dropped another bomb.

Its flight was too rapid and too low for my 3-inch guns but the 40-mm. right above us opened fire as soon as the target was sighted and its tracers could be seen cutting into its path with what looked like deadly accuracy. Nothing came of the bombs that had been dropped and, in a few seconds, the plane suddenly exploded in the air, burst into flames and hurtled to the beach where the impact sent a gigantic blaze high into the air. Another victory for our ship!

That wasn’t the end of it. Fifteen minutes later, without any warning at all, a bomber suddenly roared out of the darkness at us from the beach and dropped two torpedoes on our starboard beam, about 200 years away, raced over us and disappeared. We waited tensely for the torpedoes to strike. Nothing happened. Maybe they were duds.

After that it was quieter. The flares died out and we were left in peace. Though we couldn’t be sure, we thought we had seen eleven planes downed that night, two of them by us. 

This was originally published in the January 28, 1944 issue of PAW.