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9 Combat in Italy September 1944–January 1945 The war experiences of black and white soldiers took place in parallel universes. The 370th Combat Team left the United States on July 15, 1944, and arrived in Italy on August 1, 1944.The 371st arrived on october 18, 1944. As a member of the 370th CombatTeam, Spencer Moore arrived in Italy before Gene Johnston. After Spencer and Susie Moore, his young bride, spent time at Fort huachuca, Spencer went to newport news to board the Mariposa, a cruise ship, which had been converted to transport troops. nine to twelve soldiers occupied each of the staterooms . Some of the soldiers brushed their teeth in the French bidets in the rooms, not knowing their purpose. The others teased them about that for a long time.1 Moore went up to the bridge frequently and talked to the captain. one day, he asked Colonel Sherman, the commander, “Are we going to work or going to fight?” Moore knew that when the 9th and 10th cavalries had landed in north Africa , they were converted to quartermaster and engineer regiments. Sherman replied , “We’re going to fight.”2 Racial tensions persisted during the passage to Italy. When morale deteriorated on the ship, a white officer planned a party and tried to coerce the troops to attend. When they refused, tensions mounted. The officer felt threatened and talked a man into sleeping in his bunk.The man slept with his feet where his head usually was and was found shot in the foot the next morning. The colonel who had been the intended target died overseas.3 In a similar incident, a cruel captain forced the black soldiers to do extra duty and on hot days put them through calisthenics with rifles. later on when they were in Italy, someone shot and killed him in his tent and threw the rifle in on top of him.4 The 370th Combat Team Arrival The 370th Combat Team (CT) landed in oran, north Africa. When they arrived , the officers told the troops to stay away from the women onshore or they 66 / Chapter 9 would be found dead. From oran, they went by convoy to naples in July 1944; when they arrived, the harbor was full of sunken ships. A ramp had been built resting on the sunken ships, stretching all the way out to where the ship docked. When harold Montgomery walked ashore in naples, he and the other men heard a new sound “like the roar of a crowd in a ballpark. hundreds of black service troops—cooks, stewards, and laborers—had gathered to cheer the arrival of the first black combat soldiers in Italy.” That night, they stayed at the crater camp near Mount vesuvius, which had erupted on March 14, 1944. Would lava flow down on the Buffalo Soldiers as it had on Pompeii? During the night, the Germans bombed the harbor, but Spencer Moore was so tired he slept through it.5 The black press and politicians had pushed to get black troops into combat. When the 370th CT arrived in Italy, this goal was quickly achieved. They began to see action as soon as the last week in August. The 92nd Division was sent to Italy to put pressure on the Germans, so they had to keep troops there.The more troops the Germans had to commit, the fewer troops the Allies had to put in normandy. This Allied holding action involved thousands of black soldiers engaged in a three-pronged attack on the Germans: along the coast, they crossed the Cinquale Canal toward the town of Massa; to the east they assaulted the Strettoia hills; and further east, they went into the mountains and attempted to capture German defensive positions.The Gothic line extended from the coastal plain in the west to the Strettoia hills in the east and then on to the Apennine Mountains, also called the Apuan Alps.The barrier that confronted the 92nd Division and the entire 5th Army was virtually insurmountable that winter in 1945.6 numerous trenches with seemingly invisible gun emplacements and a labyrinth of escape tunnels gave the Germans extraordinary advantages. They also used camouflage expertly.Their steel and concrete fortifications were high in the mountains, such as at Castle Aghinolfi near Massa, which the Germans used to control the passes through the Apennine Mountains. Barbed wire, minefields, and trip wires abounded. From these posts, mortars and machine-gun fire relentlessly poured down on the...

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