D-Day Dodgers : Reading Around

Having dwelled on the  Seven Years' War recently, and wanting a bit of change, I have been thinking a little about my tentative 'D-Day Dodgers'  WW2 in Italy project, if I might grace it with that title. As you may have already seen, I have a small force of vintage 20mm British and German WW2 figures, with more recently-acquired  equipment and AFVs, and I have a mind to use them to game the Italian theatre 1943-1945.  I have accumulated a few useful books which ought to give me a reasonable grounding in the subject, and am slowly working through them.  

The campaign started in  Sicily,  so it seems only natural that first up would be   James Holland's  recent 'Sicily 43' :   

 

An account of - you guessed it - the allied invasion of Sicily in 1943. So, when this book was published in the summer, it was a  'must-have'  (  and popular enough to be on special offer at supermarkets, so also a bargain ).

I like James Holland - I first read his account of the defence of Malta, which I've always been interested in, and was impressed. I've also enjoyed his WW2-based podcast 'We Have Ways of Making You Talk' with comedian Al Murray  ( who, it turns out, is no slouch on the subject ).  He is very much of the newer generation of popular military historians, including  Anthony Beevor and  perhaps originating with Lyn McDonald  ( who has, sadly, recently passed away, I gather ), who try to use as many eyewitness accounts from those on the ground  as possible, not just the 'top-down'  story of the senior commanders' thinking and the orders they issued.   Holland certainly finds a lot of witnesses, from all sides and all levels, and there are some brilliant stories: the Canadian 'Hasty Ps' attack on the hilltop town of Assoro, involving climbing a 1000-foot cliff  to reach the summit, is a particularly memorable one. Hmm..how to game that?   However,  I find that this very volume of testimony can make the book a bit of a slog at times, just like the actual campaign - especially during the description of the initial landings, the narrative would quite abruptly switch from one account to another, and there were so many of them that it was difficult to remember who was who, and where.  There are a commendable number of maps, which is great, but still it's hard to keep stopping and trying to work out where the action just moved to.  However, that is only a small criticism, it's a very good book on an overlooked subject.  

Previously I had read an older account of that campain,  'Sicily: whose victory?' by Martin Blumenson (1968, in the Purnell's History of the Second World War' series) - much more of a top-down look, and  with something of an agenda to paint the campaign as a missed opportunity, even a German 'victory' in that they managed to evacuate most of their troops and equipment safely onto the mainland.  I don't think I'd agree necessarily - as James Holland points out, this was the largest seaborne invasion ever mounted up to that time, and was planned by British and American staffs  new to working together, and intially a long way from the target. In truth, their main concern was simply that the landings  must not  fail, and this they achieved.

I have two accounts of the  Italian campaign as a whole : Richard Doherty's 'Eighth Army in Italy  (The Long Hard Slog )', from Pen and Sword books,  and  Eric Linklater's 'The Campaign in Italy' ,  the 'popular' version of the offical history , from HMSO and published 1951. 

Both are 'top down' accounts, describing the actions of Divisions, Brigades and sometimes Battalions, but not often any lower level and with only occasional eyewitness accounts. But they will tell the basic story, and I was particularly glad to find Eric Linklater's volume. He is an excellent and properly literary writer, having published many novels  ( I have mentioned  'Private Angelo' , set in this same time and place, in an earlier post )  and several non-fiction works, and his elegant prose is a pleasure to read :  the problem may be just finding the time.  Richard Doherty's book is more recent (2007) and a bit more brief, about half the length, so I suspect it will be read first!

Another useful find has been Anthony Tucker-Jones'  'Armoured Warfare in the Italian Campaign 1943-1945' in the 'Images of War' series from Pen and Sword. It gives a  very brief account of the campaigns, but concentrates on photographs of the combatants, especially their AFVs. Very useful, and it shows the rather polyglot nature of the forces, what with British, American, German and Italian types all involved, and the 'mid-war' nature of the equipment - so not all Tigers and Panthers, thankfully.  I certainly need more Bren carriers, and some Italian stuff is a must - I must look out for a Semovente, someone must do a model.  There's an inspiring picture at the front, of a unit of Churchill tanks on a typical Italian hillside near the river Marno - I can just see a gaming  table emulating that. 

Speaking of the terrain leads me to Pat Smith's  'Setting The Scene : volume 2 Creating a Wargames Layout for the Mediterranean' ,  published by the author and Steve Lampon, available from Steve's website  ( I was able to collect in person last summer from Steve's home, in Saffron Walden - I could see a wargames table set up through the window! ). 

 

 For what seems to be a self-published book this is pretty classy ( I think it helps that Steve runs a design consultancy ),  glossy A4 format, 150 or so pages and giving step-by-step illustrated guides to making terrain mats, mountain boards, buildings ( complete and  battle-damaged ), olive groves, vineyards, pillboxes and block houses and all manner of 'terrain clutter',  plus chapters on figure and vehicle painting.  The focus is on Napoleonic ( Peninsular War )  and WW2 ( Sicily and Italy), so I thought it would be interesting, as I think there needs to be a distinct 'look' to the games to give that Italian ambience.   There's also  guest spot from  Moiterei's Bunt Welt blog on the Italian WW2 army, which is interesting. It's all rather lovely,  I thoroughly recommend it to anyone who wants to really go for it with Mediterranean style terrain, and the authors have a couple of other books available  - one is on 'Winter Wargaming' -  so more power to them.   The only reservation I have is, I'm not sure I'm up to their standards!  There are some serious pieces of modelling in there, which are perhaps beyond my abilities and resources. But there are loads of ideas,  and some will rub off, I'm sure - for a start, Olive Groves and Vineyards are a must.. 

 And finally - a bit of a punt from a recent sale at the Naval and Military Press, I took a chance on 'The Tiger Triumphs - the story of three great divisions in Italy' .

This is an N&MP reprint of a volume from  the officially sponsored "Tiger Trilogy"  and tells the story of the 4th, 8th and 10th Indian Divisions in Italy 1943-1945.  It was originally published by HMSO in 1946, the two earlier volumes, covering  Eritrea, Syria, the Western Desert and Tunisia having been  published while the war was still going on. As I've said, I am interested in the multi-national nature of the forces involved  especially on the allied side, so I feel I can't just have generic 'British', and some Indian units seem a very good idea. The book reads well, and has descriptions of terrain and actions that may be quite inspiring for gaming the campaign. There are also orders of battle for the three divisions, which could be useful, I wonder if Colonel Badger's ( entirely fictional ) West Suffolks might have found themselves attached..?  Of course, doubtless  all the commanders, and the viewpoint of the authors. will prove to be very much 'white British',  but from reading the introduction and some early pages  the general tone is of pride and admiration for the Indian troops. I think it may  make a very interesting read. 

 Phew - so that's a lot of reading for me, and a lot of writing to describe it, I  hope it has been interesting!  I like the whole idea of  'something different' that  I hope an Italian setting will give my games, and with luck these volumes will provide plenty of inspiration.  Let's hope I can translate that to the table top!

Keep safe, and well, everyone.