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Instead of cutting off the Germans in the south, all that has been achieved is a second Tobruk —George H. Dormer, HMS Hornpipe crewman January 29, 1944, marked the end of the first week of Allied operations at Anzio-Nettuno. The Luftwaffe observed the occasion with several air attacks including a determined glide-bomb attack on the roadstead. “Nine German FW 190’s came down out of the sun early on the 29th,” Niblack crewman Joseph Donahue wrote in his diary. “Our five-inch guns broke up the formation with some very close shell bursts—they scattered in all directions as our Army P-40’s got after them.” Donahue thought the German air attacks off Anzio were more relentless than during the Salerno campaign. “German bombers came over again at noon time pouring down a heavy barrage of bombs that rocked the landing area. The Luftwaffe was going all out to destroy the ships off Anzio! They are not doing that well with their coordinated attacks because the Army is still pouring more troops and equipment ashore. Radio reports from the beach, however, say that the fighting is intense and the opposition very heavy.” Donahue explained: “The German planes coming into the area never caught us by surprise, thanks to the destroyer escort USS Davis with her new type radio monitor fresh from the States. The destroyer escorts Frederick C. Davis and Herbert C. Jones picked up approaching German aircraft every time and their jamming systems destroyed radio controlled robot bombs by screwing up their flight path.”1 Each of these two escorts, the Davis and the Jones, had three army radiomen on board whose mission was to monitor all Axis frequencies, determine the direction from which the bombers would come, and CHAPTER 14 THE ANZIO CAMPAIGN “A SECOND TOBRUK”? s-Tomblin 14.qx2 6/30/04 1:17 PM Page 339 operate a jamming set to jam the radio frequency being used to control the glide bombs. To operate effectively during air raids, however, Davis and Jones were stationed a mile off Anzio, making them obvious targets for the Luftwaffe. Davis, for example, was attacked ninety-eight times in her eighty-two-day stay off the beachhead. German planes harassed the destroyer escort by dropping flares, inspiring one of her officers to compose a ditty that went, “the flares at night burn long and bright, down on the bay of Anzio.” Naturally, both Davis and Jones were well known to the Germans and the ship’s radiomen once overheard Luftwaffe pilots saying, “Let’s concentrate on Frau Maier (Old Gossip).” They did, and Davis was bracketed by nineteen near misses.2 The technique of jamming German radio-controlled bombs was still in its infancy in January 1944 and that inexperience cost the British a cruiser. The air raid that began at 1740 on January 29 was detected early, as were all but one of the thirty German air attacks made against Allied shipping off Anzio in the first ten days of the operation. The fighter director ship Ulster Queen, on stand-by duty, reported that there were fifteen aircraft in the attack and that it “seemed better organized than usual.” Although the controlling frequencies of eighteen glide bombs were obtained by Ulster Queen, the destroyer escort assigned to the beachhead for jamming duty was unable to deflect one of them aimed at the British cruiser HMS Spartan. “On our port bow was anchored a beautiful sleek-looking black light cruiser or gun boat, British, and they were firing like hell at planes and glider bombs,” Ben Dauria of LST-326 recalled, “when all of a sudden, a glider bomb struck the Spartan’s forward magazine.” Lt. Cdr. Willard Granz, on board LCT-140, wrote in his diary. “A British cruiser, not more than 500 yards away, was hit by what we think was a radio controlled glider bomb. Several of the crew swear they saw it come in. Had wings on it and looked like a tiny airplane. We saw them several times before being dropped at night. They looked like planes afire, but when they hit the water there would be a tremendous explosion.”3 Spartan caught fire and listed to port. Moments later the rescue tug ATR-1 arrived with three two-and-a-half-inch hoses equipped with fog nozzles to put out the flames that roared skyward from the damaged cruiser. Also coming to Spartan’s rescue through the thick smoke was LCI(L...

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