After months of maneuvers, an outbreak of measles and a change in orders, their squadron finally shipped out in a convoy from the port of New Orleans. They made the crossing towards North Africa at the end of April 1943. During the voyage, the troops slept in hammocks on the tank deck below, suspended from steel bars in tiers of three and when they weren’t cleaning equipment, they ate or killed time, playing hours of poker and gin rummy for big stakes and little. Nick wondered how many excuses the GIs could come up with to gamble the night away. Two weeks later, under a crescent moon, the American troopships approached the French Moroccan coast, while the Royal Naval frigates from Gibraltar scared off an attack by a wolf pack of U-boats. Nathan’s crew couldn’t sleep, so they went up on the main deck for some fresh air, as their LST, a Landing Ship, Tank, steamed closer to the port of Casablanca, liberated by British and American forces during Operation Torch.
“There’s no turning back now,” Nick said after a protracted silence, while the long stern wake marked their speed. “My father once said you can see the shoreline of Tunisia from Sicily. In the hills of the Baglio, north of Sciacca.
“È veru,” Paul confirmed.
“I wonder if my Venetian ancestors ever ran into yours on Sicily,” Nathan added. “Some of them were navigators, you know. Wouldn’t it be something if we could travel in a time machine and find out?”
“How about using it to find a peaceful island now?” Nick asked.
“Don’t we all wish,” Al said, shaking his head.
“I heard a lot of Brits got killed fighting the Desert Fox’s Panzers in Libya,” Paul said.
“Let’s not talk about it, cuginu.”
“Yeah, Paul. The worst thing is the fear of the unknown,” Nathan added. “Who knows what the battle front will be like by the time we get there?”
After several weeks of training exercises in Morocco with new, M10 Wolverine tank destroyers, their squadron moved east to Oudja, where they spent weeks in preparation for an amphibious assault on terrain that resembled the Sicilian coast. The port of Algiers was chosen as the point of embarkation for their convoy designated Dime Force, whose target was the Gela beach, one of four staging areas in southeastern Sicily. Their squadron would be part of General Paton’s Seventh Army Landing.
Though not time for mail call, a soldier came by and told Nick to go to the mail station since there was a stack of letters waiting for him. When he grabbed the bundle, he flipped through them and opened one of the envelopes from his father. He found a second one within that had a cancellation stamped October 15, 1942. He wondered why these letters were delayed for so many months. He examined the flap of that second envelope, which appeared jagged as if it had been tampered with. He shrugged and slid out a one paragraph note, which he read to himself and then aloud:
Caru Nicolo,
I can hardly believe that it is verità, figghiu miu. I am a free man, so lu capu says. I say to myself, Gaetano, nun è possibile. There must be some mistake. Ma no! È veru. Doppu Columbus Day, this year 1942, I will be paroled. No explanation. Chi sacciu? I must carry an enemy alien card wherever I go. They give me bus money and say go home. I am already in North Beach. Your mother make me a special dish, zuppa di pesci. I must find some work. I will ask around. No worry about your father no more. Allura, the only thing missing is you. As God is my judge, I will pray for you in my own house. Your mother will go to church for you.
Con affettu, Papà
Nick was so relieved that his father was a free man and back with his mother. There were plenty of other issues for Papà, his mental state and the loss of his fishing boat; even so Papà was home again. As his excitement abated he wondered why it had taken so long to get the news he had been hoping for and what was in the other letters. He hadn’t let on to his buddies his concern about not receiving letters from his family but in retrospect, he thought it was dumb of him not to express his feelings, instead making up phony stories about the competence of the army mail handlers. He had considered that something bad happened to Papà and that no one wanted to write anything to him, having to leave out the crucial part. Nick rubbed his chin. Then again, no news was supposed to mean good news, but he couldn’t deny to himself that the letters had been missing. And it couldn’t be the censors at Fort Missoula because his father had already been released, and then it hit him—that sonofabitch Sergeant Ackers.
After loading up their LST, the Dime Force convoy set out, first cruising by Bizerta, Tunisia and then sharply turning north, passing the small island of Gozo near Malta, before executing the attack, codenamed Operation Husky. There was still some time left, so Nathan, Paul and Al tried to get some sleep before the beach assault, but Nick was restless so he went topside. He wanted to see Sicily in a different light before the attack, so he squeezed himself between a loaded truck and the deck railing. As the LST got closer, the only night sounds were an incessant engine hum and the waves sluicing the hull. Nick swore he saw a ghostly outline of the cliffs of Sicily in the distance, but whether it was his imagination or not, the sensation was as magnetic and mysterious as all the stories he had heard from his parents and Ziu Francesco. He had had a premonition he would find his way back to his ancestral home, but never envisioned he might cross the island in a tank.
The first-quarter moon had set shortly after midnight, the time when paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne were dropped in the hills behind the Axis batteries. From the ship’s deck Nick could see flares set off before they hit the ground. He thought they had plenty of coglioni not just for jumping out of transport planes, vulnerable to enemy ack-ack, but attempting it in the nighttime.
During those dark early hours of July 10, 1943, Nick spied several submarines functioning as light lampposts marking their landing points. The first to hit the beach was a Ranger battalion, followed by the “Fighting First” of the Seventh Army. As they surged in their LCIs, officially called Landing Craft Infantry, the waves crashed over their heads, leaving them drenched and no doubt seasick from its churning ride. Nick saw them jumping out when the ramp lowered as they began to establish a beachhead at Gela without any naval or air support, and as far as Nick could make out, he guessed a tactical surprise. The troops met limited resistance from Sicilian reservists who manned the coastal batteries. Next to follow the infantry was a flotilla of LSTs, amphibious vessels loaded with Patton’s tanks, heavy vehicles and countless DUKWs, that everyone called ducks because they could float in water and wobble on land, a silly image that amused Nick for a brief moment, pacifying the tension that affected all his senses.
Nick squeezed his way back to his tank and lowered himself into the driver’s position while Nathan’s crew sat in the tank waiting for the steel trap door to open it jaws. He was scared of things that you couldn’t see, like running over invisible mines. As Nick looked at the faces of the crew team, he noticed their eyes were empty and bloodshot. No one said a word as the first vehicles, ducks and bulldozers were blown up by land mines.
It was already light out when Nathan’s crew disembarked. Nick heard the chaotic sounds of officers and sergeants screaming instructions, drivers shouting at other drivers, all trying to get the trucks and jeeps out of the way of the next unloading LSTs, their wheels spinning in the sand. During this FUBAR, army slang for ‘fucked up beyond all recognition,’ there were exploding rounds from batteries in the hills reaching them near the Gela pier, as well as shelling from Italian and German tanks camouflaged in the distance. Nathan’s crew was part of the first batch of tanks. By this point, the beach had been cleared of any remaining mines, but their tank destroyer still got stuck. Everyone except Nick jumped out of the tank, their boots sinking into the ground.
“Minchia, the tank is in some marshy crap!” Paul hollered over the din of noise and confusion that surrounded them, while Al paced around the perimeter of the tank. “Damn, rock that baby, Nick! You know, backwards, forwards!” He mimicked with his body.
“It don’t look like it’s goin’ to move, Paul,” Al added. “Looks like it’s cemented in.”
“Ah go on, Al. You don’t know what you’re yakkin’ about!”
Nathan barked: “Will you two stop it! Let’s see if we can get some help,”
“We’ll figure it out ourselves. We’re not stupid,” Paul shot back. “Nicolo!”
As they argued how to best move their beached tank, Nick remained in the driver’s position and looked beyond his tank team. His eyes locked onto an infantryman who had reddened bandages wrapped around what remained of his leg. They had been warned about land mines buried in the sand. The soldier stared out to sea, probably drugged up with morphine, waiting to be removed to a sick bay of a transport ship. Other casualties washed up onto the shore from LCIs that breached on false beaches and had come under enemy fire.
Tired of sparring with Paul, Nathan yelled up to Nick: “Try to use the momentum of the tank. Without burning the tranny!” Paul grimaced with arms akimbo. After many attempts, he called out: “Shut it down, Nick. Now!”
Some Seabees came by and rolled steel matting across the soft part of the beach, allowing their tank destroyer and a half dozen more to reach solid ground. Nathan heard over the radio that Italian light tanks, a Niscemi mobile group from the Livorno division, had just arrived. The message seeped in for Nick when those tanks took turns firing at them on the beach.
Nathan shouted down to the gun crew, “We got a bunch of Italian tanks up ahead. Fire when I give the order.” Paul and Al hopped to it.
Nathan returned hand signals to some of the other tank commanders, while he listened on his headphones, as Captain Monroe gave instructions over the radio. Nick eyed Nathan as his friend peered above the open turret, a horizontal rotating device that enabled them to shoot 360 degrees, which impressed Nick as a great improvement over the older tank destroyers they had trained with.
“Nick, move right, full speed. Don’t stop till I tell you.” As Nick sped diagonally across the battlefield, Nathan yelled: “Fire at will!” Paul kept changing the position of the gun as quickly as Nathan ordered. One of the Italian tanks wandered too close and Nathan’s crew scored their first knockout. At that moment naval gunfire opened up and the Italian tanks that weren’t destroyed reversed their engines all the way to the Gela plain. The ammunition ran out for the tank destroyers, so Nick shut the engine down, his thoughts racing as to what was going to happen next, his crewmates silent and mentally spent.
The smoke billowed across the entire sky with intermittent orange flashes. The accuracy of naval gunners so incredible, they had knocked out every artillery battery on high ground. The Sicilian reservists, overwhelmed by the bombardment and the onslaught of Allied soldiers, became the first to surrender, while all the Axis tanks retreated. Nick had read about ancient Sicily and understood once again that these island people were under siege by another overpowering armada. He puzzled over what he was doing here anyhow, a willing participant in yet another invasion of the land of his ancestors and wondered whether his tank hit any drafted Sicilian soldiers, maybe even civilians foolish enough to be in the area where they blew up their first kill. He recalled that Niscemi was the name of a Sicilian town. Gesù Cristo, he knew they were fighting the guys in black hats like in the movies—combatants who were real life fascists and Nazis out there who wanted to kill Nick and his friends. The stories had been leaking out as to what these bastards were capable of. But he couldn’t get it out of his head—did he kill any Sicilians? All the coastal forces surrendered after the first day of this assault. Later on in Rome, Nick would learn from an intelligence report that these Sicilian reservists were not political for the most part, the fascists and Germans never meaning much to them, or even Italians in general for that matter. He also uncovered something else he could never have imagined.
On the second day of the invasion the Hermann Goring Panzer Division counterattacked against the port of Gela from the northeast by way of the Biscari airfield. Their Tiger I tanks came in from the east and inflicted a lot of casualties, while the rest of the American Armored Division tanks waited to be dewaterproofed, the ammunition still scarce. When Nick first caught sight of the Tiger tanks, he realized that the Germans had upped the ante. They were trapped and were about to be buried, and no one would even know where his body was, six feet under the sand or beneath the sea. Like a miraculu, Nick crossed himself when he heard the Navy big guns obliterating the counterattack, starting with a barrage from the light cruiser, Savannah. The German tanks could not withstand the firepower from the destroyers and cruisers, so the enemy fled.
“Look at those Krauts scrammin’,” Paul gloated.
“Yeah, we sure gave them hell,” Al added.
“They’ll come a time when we’re out of range of big naval guns,” Nathan cautioned.
“Ah, don’t go on and spoil it Nathan,” Paul rejoined.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. You never listen to anybody,” Nick said.
“Just drive us around, Nick. We’ll do all the shootin’.”
“You don’t know buona fortuna when you see it, cuginu.” Paul snapped his hand dismissively at Nick, while Nathan’s eyes revealed he agreed with Nick. That same morning Nathan’s crew were part of a small detachment of Sherman tanks that headed north on the Niscemi road to assist groups of infantrymen, who had been cut off into many pockets and pin-downed, separated from their regiment.
“Nick, we need to get to the side flank of those Panthers.”
“Are you sure this is going to work, Nate?”
Nathan directed their M10, its light armor giving them a maneuverability edge, knocking out two enemy tanks in their first run. The M4 Sherman, the workhorse tank, with the help of anti-tank guns from the regiment, was able to destroy thirteen other German Mark III and Panther tanks, after a repeated exchange of hell fire. At the end of the tank battle, the 6-inch guns of the light cruiser, USS Boise, commenced firing, blowing up many of the remaining enemy tanks in retreat. Nick mused how long their luck would last through the nerve center of Sicily and on the spinal cord of Italy.
Throughout the invasion German bombers tried to destroy the armada and Nick checked his watch when a Ju–88 bomber off of Licata, mid-afternoon on July 11th, hit the American transport, the S.S. Robert Rowan. It was 1540. Nathan had Nick guide the tank onto the side of the road to adjust the rotation of the treads, just as that ship exploded into a blackish gray plume of smoke. The surrealistic image reminded Nick of the Greek mythology of Sicily he had studied, Mount Etna being the gateway to Hades, the smoking Rowan a harbinger of more tragedies to come.
That evening Axis planes attacked the naval ships offshore for an hour. After the enemy flew away, air transports appeared overhead, carrying paratroopers from Colonel Tucker’s 504th Combat Team, who had missed their Drop Zones. Nick cringed and cried out ‘Madonna, Madonna,’ while Nathan and Al gaped in horror, Paul crossing himself several times, as they witnessed the second wave being shot down under ‘friendly fire’ by AA guns from Allied ships and the beachhead. Nick thought how in hell could anyone come up with the term, ‘friendly fire,’ an oxymoron if ever there was one, a literary term he learned in his senior Honors class. On second thought, this was no time for him to intellectualize things—to call anything ‘friendly fire’ was simply moronic.
By the third day of Operation Husky, Captain Jones selected Nathan’s crew as the point tank to lead their squadron further inland. By this time the fighting had subsided, so the squadron encamped in a secluded location off the coastal road to Agrigento. After they set up a tent next to the tank, Nick cuffed his Zippo lighter, lit up and passed his cigarette around, so everyone could light up. They squatted in a circle and didn’t speak until half their cigarettes burnt.
“You know what was as scary as the beach landing?” Nick asked, as the crew fidgeted with their gear. “Sitting in that stinking LST tomb on the sea.”
“You’re right, cuginu.”
“Just like a duck in water under the bead of a hunter’s rifle,” Nick continued.
“I can picture a black duck from my home town,” Al put in.
“And then without …”
“Bang!” Paul interrupted Nick, as he mimicked shooting a rifle.
“Without any warning, the damn duck winds up dead, ass sticking out of the water.”
“Yeah, drowning to death like those bodies bobbing near the beachhead.” Paul took another drag.
“Face down in the black sea,” Al continued.
“Don’t dwell on this stuff. We all made it in one piece, didn’t we?” Nathan inhaled the smoke through his nose. “But I have to admit.” He took another drag. “It gives me the willies thinking about it.”
“I heard having Patton as commander is our best chance to get out alive,” Al said.
“Yeah, but didn’t he say in one of his pep talks, ‘We will get the name of killers and killers are immortal’?” Nathan asked. “It scares the shit out of me when our own officers start talking about warriors who won’t die in battle.”
“Yeah, like we’re the Persian Ten Thousand Immortals,” Nick concluded.
They buried the cigarette butts into the dirt, unrolled their sleeping bags and squirreled in. While his partners slept, Nick left the crew tent to gaze at the stars. He could see flashes on the northeast horizon, which marked the front lines where the British allies fought the German and Italian troops. He ruminated about the young GIs dead on the beach and wondered if many Italians or Sicilian paesani died. He thought about the flaming Italian tank they blew up, realizing he could have been in that tank had his family not emigrated to America. Perhaps they could be distant cousins. He would have to push these thoughts into the back of his mind. The pressure was already building inside and he prayed that he wouldn’t crack up. He closed his eyes and thought about his mother and father reunited, the money scarce. Soon after Nick’s musings detoured to Deborah and what she was doing now and if there was another guy. What he wouldn’t do to be with her one more time. He looked for a shooting star but the sky offered up the usual patterns. He gave up and scrunched into the tent.
The next day Colonel Jones briefed the captains of each tank company in his squadron, the news filtering down to the tank crews. The Allied Powers’ main objective was to take Messina, barely two miles from the Italian mainland. From Sicilian stories he heard in North Beach, Nick knew the island had some rugged terrain, which rose in the north with the Nebrodi mountain range, linking all the way eastward with the fiery volcano, Mt. Etna. He speculated which direction their squadron would go since their unit had been attached to Lieutenant General Patton’s Armored division. Would it be taking the most direct and dangerous route, heading northeast or storming Palermo first in the west and then heading east to Messina? While the brass argued battle tactics, the tanks sat idle.
After supper Nathan played poker with Al and Paul, while Nick sat under the tent opening and smoked a cigarette. He calculated that their camp was an hour and half drive by jeep to the paese natale of his father. He was very curious about his Nannu and the family hometown, having heard so many anecdotes from his Papà. The next morning he checked with Captain Monroe.
“I’ve never seen my grandfather. He lives in a fishing village not far from here. With your permission, Sir, may I visit him?”
“We have orders from General Patton, but I’m not at liberty to give details yet.” The captain rubbed his chin. “Stay right here while I pass this by the Colonel.” He returned within five minutes. “Private Spataro, the Colonel likes you boys so much, he going to let you use his own jeep. But I want you back by nineteen hundred, not a minute later. You can bring one of your buddies but the rest have to stay with the tank. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Sir! Thank you, Captain.”
“Before you go, there’s something that’s been troubling me.” The captain looked straight into Nick’s eyes. “I grew up in Virginia and never cottoned to folks like Ackers. The South deserves a better image.” The captain smiled. “Anyway, have a great time with your granddaddy, but watch out for yourself on the main road.” As Nick jogged away he added: “And make sure you don’t run into Sergeant Ackers.”