Bidwell Shelford - Tug of war: the battle for Italy, 1943-45

We are greatly indebted to our fellow historians and other distinguished persons for help we received when working on this study of the Italian campaign. As they are variously located in Canada, England, France, New Zealand and the United States and we consulted them separately, we consider it appropriate to express our gratitude separately.

Bidwell thanks Lieutenant-General Sir Ian Jacob for an authoritative view of the problems of command and commanders at the highest level; General Sir Frank Simpson and Major-General Eric Sixsmith for answering questions on organisational matters; Major-General Adam Block, Colonel John Mennell, Lieutenant-Colonel P. S. Turner and Michael Glover for their impressions of events at the operational level, together with their perceptions of some commanders and national contingents. He received valuable advice and information from the military historians Correlli Barnett, Carlo DEste, Nigel Hamilton, the late Ronald Lewin and, in particular, from John Terraine, with whom he has long enjoyed a profitable dialogue. Roy Smith provided useful information concerning air support, and Michael Wasilewsky indicated sources to consult on the Polish Forces. He also consulted W. McAndrew (see under Graham).

To these names must be added those of J. Harding, Historical Branch (Army), Ministry of Defence; Patricia Methven, The Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, Kings College, London; Air Commodore H. A. Probert and Group Captain T. Flanagan, Royal Air Force Historical Section; Roderick Suddaby, the Imperial War Museum, and Richard Tubb, Librarian, the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies, together with the staffs of those establishments.

We are both especially indebted to Lieutenant-Colonel H. R. D. Emery, The French Embassy, London, for his help, and to Monsieur le Gnral Delmas, Chef de Service Historique for the gift of three volumes on the French participation in the Italian campaign.

Graham thanks Dr Alec Douglas and his staff at the Directorate of History, National Defence Force HQ, Ottawa and in particular Brereton Greenhous and William McAndrew for showing him material concerning their tour of the Gothic Line; Justice Sir John White for recalling events at General Freybergs HQ during the Battles of Cassino; the staff of the National Archives in Wellington, New Zealand; Martin Blumenson for conversations concerning Mark Clark and the Italian campaign, and his kindness in allowing him to see his biography of Mark Clark in manuscript; Richard Kohn and the staff at the Office of Air Force History for their kindness; and Richard Sommers at the Archives of the Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania for the trouble he took to find relevant documents. He is immensely grateful to Nick Straker, whose research in the British Cabinet Offices in 1970 laid the foundation for our study of the battles of Salerno, Cassino, Anzio and the Gothic Line. To these names he adds those of the late John Sherman, Robert Tooley, Valerie Graham, Pat Harahan and David Zimmerman for their comments on draft chapters; and of James Parton for providing information about Ira C. Eakers part in the operations at Cassino, and also The History of the Mediterranean Air Forces, which he wrote in the spring of 1945.

We wish to emphasise that though we researched separately we are both equally and jointly grateful to all the above.

Ion Trewin, now Editorial Director of our publishers, Hodder & Stoughton, provided encouragement, advice and criticism which has resulted, we hope, in a greatly improved and enlarged text. This was polished by the meticulous editing of Christine Medcalf, who also coordinated the sometimes mutually conflicting views of the co-authors with skill and tact. We thank them both.

Alec Spark drew the maps, adroitly compressing the essential information into a limited space without loss of clarity.

Jean Walter, whose flair as a sub-editor and reader is equal to her accomplishments as a copy-typist of the books of many authors, decrypted an often chaotic typescript to provide a text fit for the publisher.

Our last and warmest expression of thanks is to our wives, who provided the moral and logistic support on which we depended as draft chapters and mutual criticisms winged their way back and forth across the Atlantic.

In conclusion, we state formally that the responsibility for all expressions of opinion advanced by us and for errors of fact is ours alone.

CONTENTS