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Marion, It's a long time since I had such a full morning. I am working through the above references and I will also check my library for any possible books. The majority of the information you list is new to me - thank you. You may wish to mention to Stanley that I visited the Gela landing site in 2004 and will be returning in 2006 as I am concentrating on the south coast of Sicily and the US 7th Army. I will discuss Trapani And Puma in a personal email to you at a later date. It is great to see Sicily back in the limelight again!

Colin.

Glad to be the one to make Sicily shine again. After all you know that's the country of my mom's family. So it has a special meaning to me in two different ways.

If I hear back from Stanley (hope he's okay), I will put the two of you in direct contact. I think he'd like that, and I know that would make your day.

Taken from Builders and Fighters - Engineers in Sicily - James W Dunn

(bold text is mine)

...General Truscott then decided to try the left flank where he planned an amphibious attack for 7 August. A German air attack destroyed one of the LST's, postponing the operation until 8 August. At 0315, a task force structured around Lieutenant Colonel Lyle A. Bernard's 2d Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment, landed in the vicinity of Sant' Agata about five miles behind the San Fratello Ridge. In addition to his own battalion, Bernard had two batteries of self-propelled 105-mm artillery, a platoon from the 10th Engineers, and another engineer platoon from the 2d Battalion, 540th Engineers.

While the 540th Engineers used D-7 bulldozers to clear away beach obstacles, the 10th Engineer Platoon went forward with the tanks and artillery as Bernard positioned his task force to cut Highway 113 and block the withdrawal route of the 29th Panzer Division. But the 29th had already withdrawn, and by the time Bernard's force made contact with the 7th Infantry, only Italian rear guard troops were captured...

Here's a tad more. I am trying to see what else I have for you at this moment in time. Thanks for your patience.

---------------

Sicilian Campaign

The organization landed on D-Day, July 10 for operation “Huskyâ€, on the hostile shores of Sicily. Regimental HQ, H&S Company, Medical Detachment and the 1st Battalion landed at Gela, Sicily as the part of Sub-Task Force, “Koolâ€. The 2nd Battalion landed a Licata, Sicily as part of Sub-Task Force, “Jossâ€.

On both beaches the regimental units acted as shore engineers for the divisions to which they were attached for the operation. They unloaded transports and Liberty Ships, operated DUKWS from ship to shore, established dumps and performed the multitude of tasks assigned to the engineers.

They supplied the 2nd Armored Division, 1st, 3rd and 45th Infantry Divisions and the 82nd Airborne Division. This included running truck convoys to the front lines in order to transport sorely needed food and ammunition to combat elements. In addition, an efficient motor pool was operated for the maintenance of unit and attached unit vehicles.

On July 25, the organization (less 2nd Battalion) moved to Palermo and prepared the port for operation, while the 2nd Battalion remained in Licata operating the port and beaches. 1st Armored Corps had been re-designated 7th Army under the command of Lt General George W Patton and the organization was attached to the 7th Army.

As soon as the harbor of Palermo was repaired, regularly assigned port battalions took over operations. On July 30, Company A moved to Termini Imerese. Upon being relieved of operations of the Port of Licata, the 2nd Battalion moved to Palermo on July 31. The 1st Battalion (less Company A) moved to Termini Imerese on August 1 to repair and operate the port. The rear echelon of four officers, one warrant officer and one hundred and thirty-four enlisted men arrived at Palermo on August 4. Companies D and E (Aug 2) and 2nd Battalion HQ and Company F (Aug 4), moved to San Stefano and then eastward along the northern shore of Sicily establishing unloading points for landing ship tanks, (LST’s) to supply tactical units.

At Brolo, the 2nd Battalion supported the infantry on two missions, which materially helped in the advance on Messina and the consequent clearing of the enemy from the entire island of Sicily. The first of those missions took place on August 8 when a battalion detachment of one officer and 48 enlisted men functioned as landing party and shore engineers for an assault landing behind the enemy lines in the vicinity of St Agata. The landing came as a complete surprise to the enemy and the detachment from the battalion suffered no casualties.

Three days later, the second amphibious landing took place. The battalion attachment of one officer and 48 enlisted men again functioned as the beach party and shore engineers for an assault landing behind the enemy lines vicinity of Brolo. This landing met stiff resistance, resulting in the loss of two engineers with three wounded. Shortly after both of these amphibious landings, enemy resistance collapsed, and Messina fell to the allies on the 17 of August 1943, ending the Sicilian campaign.

Colin do you have this book in your library? If not I highly recommend it. Chapters 6 and 7 pgs 115-152 are all dedicated to the Engineers during the Sicilian Campaign. Maps, text and photos are excellent. This is one book I rely on heavily for research!

The Corps of Engineers - The War Against Germany - Authors: Alfred M. Beck; Abe Bortz; Charles W. Lynch; Lidia Mayo; And Ralph F. Weld - Publisher: Department of the Army

If you do not have it, one good place to check it out is at Alibris. They are several other used book stores that may have it too and those are also listed there. You may already have your favorites too.

If you do choose to look at Alibris, I would appreciate it if you'd go through my Books Page and click on their ad. They are one of my affiliates and I get a "kick-back" from sales. Thanks!

Yes Marion, I have that book in fact you reccomended it to me some time ago and I obtained a copy from a s/h bookshop in the USA. I would not be without it and it is a great research source. Now that I'm concentrating on the US 7th Army 1943 it is even more important.

Colin.

Great. In my correspondence with everyone, I sometimes forget who I adviced on what! My friend Nancy just picked up this book too! I think I have sold more books for the Army Corps of Engineers than anyone else combined!

Well news on many fronts (so to speak) today. Colin I am just beginning to peruse approximately 1000 pages of documents that I received today from my private researcher, Carolyn Billups. The section I just got to is yup you guessed it, information on Sicily. These particular docs are day-to-day journals from the landing and onward. I'm only a few days into them currently, but already found some interesting paragraphs. The journal is set as follows. Here is an example from Thursday, 15 July, 1943.

Station: Port of Licata, Sicily

Events: Col Marvin, Capt. Fizdale visited 1300B to 1430B. Major General Ridgeway, 82nd Airborne Division visited dock 1730B.

Work Done: Co's D & E:

Unloaded Vehicles / Troops Loaded Casualties / Prisoners

1-LCT)

6-LST) 308 3479 103 264

10-LCI)

1-Navy

Ponton

Barge)

Co's F & E:

Interior guard, Port area, cleaning up and misc. usual details, rations, water, sign painting, general maintenance of Port area.

Enemy Action: None

Weather: Clear, Warm.

--------------

It's hard to make the numbers line up here, but the 4 numbers next to the LST's refer to the Unloaded Veh/Troops, then Loaded Cas/Prisoners

As you know I visit here every day Marion and with your last entry I am hoping you will later have some details of General Patton's 'reconnaissance in force' to Palermo.

Carlo D'Este mentions that Patton likened his objective to the making of 'rock soup'.

A tramp once went to a house and asked for some boiling water to make rock soup. The lady was interested and gave him the water, in which he placed two polished stones. He then asked if he might have some potatoes and carrots to put in the soup to flavour it a little, and finally ended up with some meat. In other words in order to attack we first had to pretend to reconnoitre, then reinforce the reconnaissance, and finally put on an attack... *

*Carlo D'Este "Bitter Victory" page 418.

Is this an American tale?

Colin.

An interesting tale! I was not familiar with the rock soup story. I do not know if it is American or not, but it sure sounds like it might be. Maybe someone else can shed some light on the history of the tale.

When doing my quick persusal through ALL the docs yesterday, I did see some refereneces to Gen Patton. One mentioned him visiting the 540th. As I said I read through all this very quickly yesterday when I was just trying to get a feel for what was there.

Right now it looks as though most of the journals are in regards to the 2nd Battalion, Co's D, E and F. 2nd Bn was the one who landed at Licata.