After a nearly unopposed beach invasion at Anzio and an impressive beachhead built up over a week, the Allied forces began their breakout from Anzio on 30 January 1944.

Background

The decision to heavily fortify the intial beachhead, rather than advance on the Alban Hills, was the source of great rancor between British and Americans. The British Chiefs of Staff who planned the attack and General Henry Wilson who gave the orders for Anzio thought they had made it clear that it was their intent to get to the Alban hills ASAP. The Alban Hills commanded the road to Rome and would be the meeting place with the rest of the main assault coming up from the Cassino area further south. General John Lucas (US VI Corps commander), who would command the Anzio campaign, and his commander General Mark Clark (US Fifth Army Commander), who would lead the US push from Cassino, thought the orders only meant a link up point and the timing would be determined later. Lucas and Clark also thought German counter-attacks would make getting to tha Alban Hills almost impossible immediately. Their idea was to fortify the beachhead to the point of impregnability, then move out. This is what they did. However, the Germans were not lax. They spent the week building up a force of 70,000 to oppose the breakout.

The Attempted Breakout 30 January 1944

In the early morning of 30 January 1944, the Rangers of Colonel William O. Darby, began the assault by getting within a kilometer of their objective of Cisterna. That would be as close as they got that day. they were found out and ambushed which drove them to ground. By mid morning, they were being attacked by tanks of the Herman Goring Division and tried a fighting retreat. By noon, only 6 out of 767 Rangers in the attack made it back to friendly lines. The US 3rd Division continued the attack, but still were a mile away from cisterna by end of the day 31 January.
The other prong of the breakout was to capture the town of Campleone near the Alban Hills. Here the British 1st Division and a regiment from the US 1st Armored Division pushed forward with great difficulty. They spent a lot of time just reaching the start line, because of mines and obstacles. Over two days, theygot tantalisingly close, but once again the Allied push was stopped short of the town objective.
The Allied high command was surprised by the lack of progress and this led them to think the German were preapring a major counter-attack soon. The Allies rushed to re-enforce the Anzio beachhead.
Whether clark and Lucas were correct about the intial speed of the push out of Anzio or not is immaterial, but the fact remains that the Germans did not counter-attack quickly or decisively and this made the decision to stay near the beachhead potentially catastrophic.

Motorcycle Ride Recommendation

Check out this ride from Nettuno to Cisterna to the Alban Hills and back down to Anzio going through Aprilia.

Book Recommendation: Anzio: The Friction of War from AbeBooks.com or Amazon.com

Map Recommendation: Michelin Italy Regional 563 from AbeBooks.com or Amazon.com

On 26 January 1945, Audie Murphy conducted the action near Holtzwihr, France that led to his receiving the Congressional Medal of Honor. The citation for the award tells it best;

"2d Lt. Murphy commanded Company B, which was attacked by 6 tanks and waves of infantry. 2d Lt. Murphy ordered his men to withdraw to prepared positions in a woods, while he remained forward at his command post and continued to give fire directions to the artillery by telephone. Behind him, to his right, 1 of our tank destroyers received a direct hit and began to burn. Its crew withdrew to the woods. 2d Lt. Murphy continued to direct artillery fire which killed large numbers of the advancing enemy infantry. With the enemy tanks abreast of his position, 2d Lt. Murphy climbed on the burning tank destroyer, which was in danger of blowing up at any moment, and employed its .50 caliber machine gun against the enemy. He was alone and exposed to German fire from 3 sides, but his deadly fire killed dozens of Germans and caused their infantry attack to waver. The enemy tanks, losing infantry support, began to fall back. For an hour the Germans tried every available weapon to eliminate 2d Lt. Murphy, but he continued to hold his position and wiped out a squad which was trying to creep up unnoticed on his right flank. Germans reached as close as 10 yards, only to be mowed down by his fire. He received a leg wound, but ignored it and continued the single-handed fight until his ammunition was exhausted. He then made his way to his company, refused medical attention, and organized the company in a counterattack which forced the Germans to withdraw. His directing of artillery fire wiped out many of the enemy; he killed or wounded about 50. 2d Lt. Murphy's indomitable courage and his refusal to give an inch of ground saved his company from possible encirclement and destruction, and enabled it to hold the woods which had been the enemy's objective."

From the Audie L. Murphy Memorial Web Site

Books

Motorcycle Ride

Start at the point where Murphy was wounded whilst operating the .50 cal. Then head over the Rhine to the Schwarzwald east of Freiburg for some beautiful woodlands and some great switchbacks. Finish in Freiburg. Its a great university town with lots of old world charm.

Maps

Although Warsaw born Soviet Marshal Konstanty Rokossovskiy stood on a hill overlooking Warsaw on 2 August 1944, he was not to complete the capture of it until 17 January 1945. The Russians had encouraged an uprising by citizens of Warsaw in preparation for the Soviet capture. However, German Marshal Walther Model, the "Fuhrer's Fireman," decided to counter-attack to the east of the city.*

The German counter-attack was viewed as a mere local setback to the Russians' continent wide front, but it was disastrous for Warsaw. The Warsaw Uprising went ahead from 1 August 1944 to 5 October 1944 with devastating results for the occupants of Warsaw.

Although the Soviet forces "liberated" what little was left of Warsaw on 17 January 1945, the Poles were actually just experiencing a change in ownership. Rokossovskiy was to later become the Soviet imposed Minister of Defense of Poland.** The Poles were not to have real liberation until 1989.

*Europe At War, No Simple Victory, Norman Davies, Macmillan, 2006, pages 115-116.
**Ibid, pages 242-243

Books by Amazon.com

Check out Norman Davies's new book, Europe At War, where he makes clear that eastern Europe was not "freed" by the Soviets. Indeed, the Soviets ran more people through concentration camps than the Germans. Rokossovskiy himself spent time in the GULag.

On 5 January 1940, The Finns began an offensive on the Raate Road, near Suomussalmi and ended up destroying or capturing the Russian 44th Division. The 44th had been halted at a roadblock southeast of Suomussalmi around the present day intersection of roads 912 and 843. The Russians hunkered down along the road between Suomussalmi and Raate in what the Finns called motti formations, a logging term doubling in meaning that the 44th's sub units could be broken into smaller chunks and cut up individually like so many logs. The Finns operated in small units all along the road and and spent days conducting close range grenade attacks and terrifying the Russian officers with highly selective sniper fire. The Russians were out of their mind with cold, hunger and fear. A single sniper round fired by a Finn marksman would unleash totally undisciplined "mad minutes" from the Russians, normally killing nothing, but trees. Soon, ammunition ran short and re-supply from the air turned the starving troops into in-fighting hords. After 2 days of this nightmare, the 44th dissolved in death, capture or flight. It was the high water mark for the Finns and showed the Russians that taking the grossly outnumbered, but skilled Finns would not be a cake walk. Check out the book recommendation below, Frozen Hell by William R. Trotter, which has an entire chapter dedicated to this battle.

Books from Amazon.co.uk

Motorcycle Ride

If you find yourself in Finland, try following the road from Kemi to Suomussalmi for a daylong ride. I rode the E75 from Kemi to Oulu and on to Helsinki last year and I can highly recommend the area. If finishing around Kemi look for campgrounds on the Gulf of Bothnia. Its a beautiful place to wake up (in the summer anyway).

Maps

On 22 December 1944, the German Army was near their zenith in the Battle of the Bulge and had surrounded the town of Bastogne, a key road hub of the area. The USA 101st Airborne had control of the town, but had no support. The German Army sent 2 officers and 2 NCOs to deliver the ulimatum to surrender, but were met with the reply of 101st acting commander General Anthony McAuliffe of "NUTS!" A source of great pride in the 101st forever more, McAuliffe's response has gone down in history as possibly the 2nd best defiance of a surrender request. Molon Labe being the undisputed best.

Books from Amazon.com

Motorcycle Ride

Try the N84 southeast out of Bastogne to the Luxembourg border where the road continues as the N15 to Ettelbrook.

Maps