Potenza September 1943

[Peter H]

According to Bevin Alexander,How Hitler could have won WW2,page 220:

A hundred German paratroops blocked Potenza,causing Montgomery to mount a full brigade attack--that is thirty times the strength of the German detachment--plus a huge air attack that killed 2,000 inhabitants of the town.

Can this civilian casualty figure be confirmed by anyone?

[Andreas]

The USAAF diary indicates that there were a number of raids including raids by heavies on Potenza just before it was taken, so I doubt there was just one huge air attack:

http://paul.rutgers.edu/~mcgrew/wwii/us ... ep.43.html

The Wikipedia article (I know) on Potenza states that it housed a lot of refugees from Napoli and other places in the south of Italy.

All the best

Andreas

[Lupo Solitario]

Could it be possible having an exact date?

[Andreas]

The air raids happened between 13-19 September, if I recall what I found on the link correctly.

All the best

Andreas

[Peter H]

This on the Canadians at Potenza:

http://www.legionmagazine.com/features/ ... /06-05.asp

Potenza, the largest city in the region of Basilicata, was founded in pre-Roman times as a village on the slope of a south-facing ridge above the Basento River. The poor agricultural land had led to the depopulation of the rural areas. However, Potenza had developed as a regional centre around its 12th- century cathedral. Beginning on Sept. 13, the Allied air forces began attacks on the city's railroad yards and road junctions. Potenza, crowded with refugees from the Salerno battle area, was targeted by Allied heavy bombers on six consecutive days and much of the city was destroyed in these attacks with heavy loss of life.

The decision to continue to bomb Potenza is just one example of the lack of overall strategic direction of this phase of the Italian Campaign. Allied intelligence, based on Ultra and other sources, had reported German intentions "to throw the Allies back into the sea" at Salerno. However, by Sept. 14 the crisis in the beachhead was ending and 8th Army was supposed to be on the move north. The first signs of a German withdrawal were noted on Sept. 17, but no one ordered the Allied air forces to cease attacking a town or the railway yards that the Allies would soon need.

Historian Lee Windsor, who has studied the battle for Potenza and walked the ground, describes the initial attack by the rifle companies of the West Novas as one that "sacrificed the stealth of a footborne approach for the speed of using trucks." Unfortunately, mines blocked this approach and sacrificed surprise. Two West Nova companies were pinned down in the dry riverbed and the advance stalled. The Germans had planned to hold Potenza with a regiment of 1st Parachute Div. but orders to withdraw to a new line left Potenza to be defended by a company-sized battlegroup ordered to stage a delaying action. When the Canadians mounted a second attack, using artillery, armour and an additional infantry battalion--the Royal 22nd Regt.--the German paratroopers withdrew. Canadian doctors treated 16 wounded Germans as well as 21 Canadians. However, the real tragedy of Potenza was the number of civilian casualties, estimated at over 2,000, including several hundred dead.

Major A.T. Sesia, the divisional historical officer reached Potenza on Sept. 21. "The city itself," he wrote, "lies sprawled partly on the height immediately north of the river and on the northern bank of the river itself...at the immediate approaches to the town there was considerable damage. The artillery and especially the air force had created huge craters...good cars were destroyed or burnt out and some were blown great distances by the force of exploding air bombs." While exploring the city, Sesia noted a huge group of civilians in front of a bakery where bread was being baked for the first time in 10 days.

But then the same website quotes this(by another author):

http://www.legionmagazine.com/features/ ... /97-09.asp

The Germans had already begun their withdrawal north, but they held onto Potenza with elements of 1st Parachute Div. The battle for Potenza lasted until the afternoon of the 20th when the enemy withdrew to avoid being cut off. The Canadian thrust had surprised the Germans and forced them to retreat much sooner than they had planned. The success of Boforce suggests 8th Army could have moved much more quickly north if ordered to. It also demonstrates the growing professionalism of the Canadian Army and the high quality of its leadership. Guy Simonds had taken Montgomery’s belated orders and created an effective all-arms battle group of the kind the German army is always being praised for employing. Unfortunately, Simonds fell victim to jaundice, an infection that has no respect for rank, and was forced to enter hospital and hand over 1st Div. to Chris Vokes.

Canadian casualties at Potenza were very light by the standards of later battles: Six killed and 21 wounded. It was the civilians who suffered the greatest losses with as many as 2,000 killed in air raids directed against a town that functioned as a railway centre and route for reinforcements.

One account says 2,000 civilians killed and wounded, the other 2,000 civilians killed.