by Duke Doering
February 27, 1944, this date in South Dakota National Guard history was part of a miserable month for Company B, 109th Engineers.
Earlier in the month of February 1944 members of Company B, 109th Engineer Battalion were assigned the mission of maintaining the mule trails between Cairo and Cassino, Italy. Most of the soldiers in Company B were from Hot Springs, SD.
The mule trails needed to be widened and cleared so weapons carriers could negotiate the trails in the mountainous area south and east of Cairo. Combat on the route to Cassino was very savage. Small groups of soldiers picked their way carefully across ridges, up slopes and through ravines, trying to avoid the continuous German artillery fire and snipers.
Monte Cassino was a rocky hill about 81 miles southeast of Rome, Italy, 1.2 miles to the west of the town of Cassino and at 1,706 feet altitude. It was best known for its historic abbey. St. Benedict of Nursia established his first monastery, the source of the Benedictine Order, here around 529.
The hilltop sanctuary was the site of the Battle of Monte Cassino in 1944, where the building was destroyed by Allied bombing and rebuilt after the war. The site has been visited many times by the Popes and other senior clergy, including Pope Benedict XVI in May 2009.
Early in the morning of February 6, 1944 a Company B truck was destroyed by artillery fire. That was after the day had already started badly with Sgt. Long’s detail of four soldiers being wounded when a gravel truck backed into a mine. The rocky ground made it impossible to dig foxholes, so the soldiers piled rocks around themselves for protection. The weather stayed cold and wet. Snow and ice made mountain trails treacherous. Trench foot and respiratory diseases were common hazards.
Then Staff Sgt. Donald G. Bledso and Privates Goeden and Wolf were killed by artillery fire. Robert Cox, from Lead, was wounded by the same shell. This direct loss by artillery caused the unit to withdraw from the bivouac to a point northwest of Cevero, where they could be out of German artillery range. During the withdrawal from the area, Lead soldiers Felix Cowan and Burton Kendall were injured. All in all February was a difficult month for the troops from the 109th Engineer Battalion.
Finally the Allies decided on an air attack at Monte Cassino. On February 15th American bombers dropped 1,400 tons of high explosives, creating widespread damage. The raid failed to achieve its objective, as German paratroopers occupied the rubble and established excellent defensive positions amid the ruins. All through the month of February and until May 18th, Monte Cassino and the Gustav defenses were assaulted four times by Allied troops, the last involving twenty divisions, attacking along a twenty-mile front.
The German defenders were finally driven from their positions, but at a high cost. The capture of Monte Cassino took some 55,000 Allied casualties, with German losses at around 20,000 killed and wounded.
