From Anzio to the Alps : an American soldier's story / Lloyd M. Wells.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Wells, Lloyd M. (Lloyd Manning), 1919-2000.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Wells, Lloyd M. (Lloyd Manning), 1919-2000.

Wells, Lloyd M.

United States. Army. Armored Infantry Regiment, 6th.

United States.

World War, 1939-1945--Regimental histories--United States.

World War, 1939-1945.

World War, 1939-1945--Campaigns--Italy.

World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American.

Soldiers--United States--Biography.

Soldiers.

Genre:

Personal narratives -- American.

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Personal narratives.

Physical Description:

xviii, 251 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Columbia : University of Missouri Press, [2004]

Summary:

This compelling work is Lloyd M. Wells's first-hand account of World War II based on a journal he kept during the war, letters he sent home, and personal records, as well as recollections of people and events. In June 1941, the twenty-one-year-old Wells was drafted into the army. He was commissioned second lieutenant after he attended OCS and was later promoted to first lieutenant with the First Armored Division. He saw action in North Africa, Italy, and Germany and was awarded the Combat Infantry Badge, the Purple Heart, and the Bronze Star. Wells offers the reader information that has never before been provided. He tells exactly what happened to 2/7 Queens on the night of February 21, 1944, when the troops came up to "the caves" at Anzio. He also depicts what happened during the last offensive in Italy and what armored infantry troops experienced on the perimeter of the attack. This book, however, is not just a story of battle actions. It is a personal story about the "old Army" and how young soldiers were transformed by it during one of the greatest upheavals in world history. Wells's goal in writing this book was to leave behind "an account of a simpler time and of the funny, sad, terrorizing, and tender moments of a war which, with the death of each man or woman who lived through it, recedes just a little bit further into the nation's past." He accomplished that and so much more.

Contents:

Chronology: The Italian Campaign: 1943-1945 xv

1. In the Beginning There Was Basic Training 1

2. Ninety-Day Wonder 12

3. Innocent Abroad 22

4. Mt. Porchia: The Legacy of a Battle 33

5. Cassino

January 1944 44

6. Anzio: The German Counterattack

February 1944 54

7. Anzio: Stalemate

March-April 1944 76

8. Anzio: Breakout and Holiday 92

9. Pontedera: Close Encounters of a Dangerous Kind 129

10. Bombiana and Porretta Terme 143

11. Winter 1945 163

12. Holding the High Ground 173

13. The Last Offensive: Eight Days in the Mountains 191

14. The Last Offensive: Twelve Days in the Valley 206

15. That Italian Spring

May-June 1945 225

16. The End of Everything 238.

ISBN:

0826215378

OCLC:

54500290