My tribute to Pope John Paul II
The II Polish Corps was raised from Prisoners of War held by the Russians. They were outfitted by the British and sent to the Middle East. They organized and trained near Baghdad with the British and entered combat in Italy by February 1944. At first the II Corps was small but as more men and specialized troops were added, it grew to 110,000 men.
The 10th Engineer Battalion was part of the corps headquarters support troops. It was a small unit for such a large organization and probably relied heavily on help from British and American engineers.
For a comparison, the following percentages represent the distribution of the troops within the corps:
Infantry - 30%
Armored - 23%
Engineers - 6%
Supply & transport - 10%
The II Polish Corps were immediately involved with the attacks on Monte Cassino. During the final assault their objective was to drive around the east side of the town of Cassino and capture the abbey ruins. They were credited with taking this peak.
After Monte Cassino, the II Polish Corps moved to the east coast of Italy with the British 8th Army. Whereas the barriers on the west was mountainous terrain, the natural barriers on the east coast were rivers that ran down to the coast. These rivers ran perpendicular to the British Army’s advance, with one river after another. I don’t have much about the work of the 10th Engineer Battalion, but they were probably busy assisting with river assaults.
Towards the end of the war, the II Polish Corps attacked on the east coast and faced more water obstacles, including numerous canals. This inspired the Poles to sing a song that went “Canal after canal, and after that canal yet another canalâ€. Here the 10th Engineers assisted in building bridges for the advancing tanks. The armored units were also equipped with Weasels, amphibious assault armor.
I would not have posted this except that the II Polish Corps fought next to the Americans corps for a long period of the campaign and probably shared similar experiences and maybe even struggled on the same projects together.
Reference: “Poles in the Italian Campaign, 1943-1945†by Olgierd Terlecki, printed in Warsaw in 1972
Steve