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Italy's Sorrow: A Year of War, 1944-1945, by James Holland
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During the Second World War, the campaign in Italy was the most destructive fought in Europe – a long, bitter and highly attritional conflict that raged up the country’s mountainous leg. For frontline troops, casualty rates at Cassino and along the notorious Gothic Line were as high as they had been on the Western Front in the First World War. There were further similarities too: blasted landscapes, rain and mud, and months on end with the front line barely moving.
And while the Allies and Germans were fighting it out through the mountains, the Italians were engaging in bitter battles too. Partisans were carrying out a crippling resistance campaign against the German troops but also battling the Fascists forces as well in what soon became a bloody civil war. Around them, innocent civilians tried to live through the carnage, terror and anarchy, while in the wake of the Allied advance, horrific numbers of impoverished and starving people were left to pick their way through the ruins of their homes and country. In the German-occupied north, there were more than 700 civilian massacres by German and Fascist troops in retaliation for Partisan activities, while in the south, many found themselves forced into making terrible and heart-rending decisions in order to survive.
Although known as a land of beauty and for the richness of its culture, Italy’s suffering in 1944-1945 is now largely forgotten. This is the first account of the conflict there to tell the story from all sides and to include the experiences of soldiers and civilians alike. Offering extensive original research, it weaves together the drama and tragedy of that terrible year, including new perspectives and material on some of the most debated episodes to have emerged from the Second World War.
- Sales Rank: #138237 in Books
- Published on: 2008-04-01
- Released on: 2008-04-01
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.19" h x 2.01" w x 6.91" l, 2.20 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 656 pages
From Publishers Weekly
British historian and journalist Holland (Fortress Malta) vividly recalls the final year of World War II in Italy in this masterful narrative. The controversial decision to invade Sicily and Italy following the North African campaign was "purely opportunistic" and intended to draw German resources away from the main action in Normandy. As critics had feared, Italy, with its rugged mountains, was "a truly terrible place to fight," and the campaign became a bloody war of attrition. The final toll on combatants, civilians, and the Italian landscape was staggering; total casualties exceeded a million and entire cities were leveled. Cassino, the site of a decisive battle, was "utterly-100 per cent-destroyed" and Benevento resembled "a post-apocalyptic ruin." Holland's balanced account of the savage fighting and wholesale destruction draws on the eyewitness testimony of Allied and German combatants, Italian partisans and Fascist loyalists. He concludes-echoing historian Rick Atkinson's excellent recent account of the campaign, The Day of Battle-that despite its terrible cost, the fight in Italy played a decisive role in defeating Germany. A complementary volume to Atkinson's account focusing on the earlier stages of the campaign, this is popular history at its very best: exhaustively researched, compellingly written and authoritative.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
During the course of the past few years, historians and publishers have shown a renewed interest in World War II. The popularity of Ken Burns’ recent documentary The War is evidence that the general public is still fascinated by this iconic twentieth-century conflict. Though much has been written about the war in Europe, comprehensive treatments of the Italian campaign are far outnumbered by the vast array of books that document D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge, and the race across Western Europe to Berlin. Holland attempts to fill the void with this meticulously researched history of the final year of the war in Italy. Readers new to this subject may be surprised to learn of the tremendous havoc and destruction wreaked upon Italy during 1944 and 1945; those more familiar with martial history will welcome this inclusive chronicle of the Allied, German, and Partisan campaigns in both the south and the north of the Italian peninsula. --Margaret Flanagan
Review
Praise for Italy's Sorrow:
'James Holland has written his best book yet, a gripping, yet compassionate account of the terrible war in Italy, with a memorable depiction of civilian suffering.'-- Antony Beevor, award-winning author of The Fall of Berlin 1945 and Stalingrad
Praise for Together We Stand:
"Compelling and detailed...Entertaining though scholarly, this exhaustively researched narrative moves seamlessly from the exalted strategy conferences of generals and presidents to the individual grunt on the front line, offering as complete a portrait of this important episode in WWII as we are likely to see."--Publishers Weekly
"Holland deftly brings alive this harrowing and heroic story."--James Bradley, author of Flags of Our Fathers
“Holland tells the story brilliantly. He has delved in archives for letters and diaries and diligently tracked down survivors…Holland is also excellent on high strategy and the strengths and weaknesses of commanders…Vivid, intelligently, movingly, Holland’s monumental chronicle tells it like it was.”--Mail on Sunday (UK)
“His first book of military history, Fortress Malta, proclaimed the arrival of a promising talent. This one confirms it. With the sixtieth anniversary of the end of the war in Europe upon us, the bookshops are currently awash with Second World War titles. This one stands out from the crowd.”--Literary Review (UK)
Praise for Fortress of Malta:
"[A] superbly engaging history."--Publishers Weekly
“Powerful…Behind most great epic battles are the individual tales of human endurance and triumph, shards of tile that comprise the entire mosaic. Mr Holland provides those with painstaking care, frequently overlapping the daily lives of his subjects in real time, minute by minute…both a scholarly work and a gripping read…his meticulously researched book.”--Washington Times
“Combines painstaking research with effortless prose…a brilliant debut.”--Sunday Telegraph (UK)
Most helpful customer reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
Very good, if not for a few oddities
By David W. Nicholas
I've never read anything by James Holland before. Apparently I'm going to have to get used to historians (to say nothing of a President) who are younger than I, which is something of a jarring experience. The current book, however, is a well-researched, well-written account of the course of the campaign in Italy, basically from the last battle of Cassino up through the end of the war. The author spends a lot of time (more than used to be the fashion) discussing the impact of the war on civilians, and he also spends a lot of time discussing the lives of individual soldiers on both sides of the lines.
Cassino was one of the most frustrating battles of the war, for the Allies, and the author starts with it, recounting briefly the earlier battles, then recounting in considerable detail the successful attack by the Poles. He also spends a lot of time talking about the famous attack out of the Anzio bridgehead by Mark Clark's Fifth Army, and interestingly defends Clark's decision to turn towards Rome and capture it, as opposed to moving to the fabled Valmontane, where Alexander had ordered him to go. Holland discusses this incident, and the produces a map which shows the main German retreat routes from the Cassino front. Only one of them goes through Valmontane, and the author lets you know this was an alternate, less-important, route. The four further north, out of reach of Clark's forces no matter what he did, were the significant ones. Very interesting thesis.
That, in some ways, was the highlight of the book. There's a great deal of information here about various forces and battles, later in the campaign, and much of the information is very well-presented and the judgements are thoughtful. There isn't, however, anything in the way of ground-breaking scholarship for the rest of the book.
I did have a few misgivings. At times Holland's understanding of military technology seems a bit weak. One passage includes a discussion of something called an "Ofenrohre". I'm not the world's greatest expert on German militaria, but I know a lot of other amateur experts, and none of us had ever heard the term. It turns out "Ofenrohre" means "stovepipe" in German, and that this was the nickname for the Panzerschrek. *That* we would have understood, but he didn't include the name in the text or anywhere else. At other points he seems to get confused about gun calibers and things of that nature. He also has an odd habit of referencing U.S. Infantry divisions by their divisional nicknames, and occasionally getting them a bit wrong. So for instance, he refers to the 92nd "Buffalo" Division, when of course it should be (if you're going to do it this way) the 92nd "Buffalo Soldier" Division. The term "Buffalo Soldier" traces back to the Indian wars, when said Indians thought a black person's hair looked like buffalo fur.
Those few misgivings aside, this is an interesting, well-written book. It includes a considerable amount of information, and the text is well-illustrated by enough maps for you to follow the action as to what's going on. I really enjoyed the book, and would recommend it.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Occupied Italy and its' rescue.
By Paula Gambacciani
I was in Italy during WWII. Came to the U.S. in 1948. I have always felt that historians had not given the trials that Italy suffered enough credence. This book told it all. Not only the loss to the U.S. and british soldiers, but the atrocities that the Germans commited to the Italians but also to the armies of the Allies..
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful.
An excellent history of a forgotten conflict
By Manly Reading
Italy's Sorrow is the story of the often forgotten Italian campaign in WWII. Despite Soviet calls for a "second front" from 1942, somehow the 1943 invasion of Sicily, and subsequent slog up the Italian peninsula, did not even count as a second front in WWII, despite tying up a large number of German troops, especially after the Italian surrender, and then switching sides to fight alongside the Allies.
Nonetheless, the war in Italy was an important part of WWII, and James Holland tells the story well. All sides of the conflict are covered off - the Allied forces, including Free French and Polish troops as well as the GI's and Brits, and the German defenders under Kesselring, with the Italian people caught in the middle, whether as partisans, auxliaries to one side or other, or civilians.
The campaign is analysed from a military standpoint, but the impact on Italy itself is never overlooked. In Masters and Commanders and The Storm of War Andrew Roberts questioned the value of the Italian front after the capture of Rome, but Holland never considers the question - it is clear that to leave simply half of Italy in German hands and settle into defensive positions was not an option for democracies who claimed to be fighting for freedom. German atrocities against Italians are detailed, and the impact of the Allies was at times scarcely less brutal, especially the French colonial Goums.
When reading about D-Day and the second battle of France, the impact on civilian life - the collateral damage, in today's terms - is made clear. What is also clear after reading Italy's Sorrow is that Italy suffered far worse - perhaps rightly, as a former Nazi ally - and that this suffering can largely be laid at the feet of Il Duce Mussolini himself. A case could probably be made that Nazi Germany might have been better off with Italy remaning a friendly neutral in WWII, trading with Germany but not co-belligerant with it. With no North Africa and Greece to ensnare German troops to rescue Italian adventurism, the Eastern push might have been quite different in 1941-42. Certainly Italy would have been better off without entry into WWII, which ended with much of the country in ruins and a popultion starved and shell shocked by war.
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