5 Northants Attack: Longstop Hill

Discussion in 'North Africa & the Med' started by Phaethon, Oct 13, 2010.

  1. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    I'm currently deep into the research surrounding the 1st battle of Longstop, and have just reached the point where the 5 Northamptons were ordered to secure the Tebourba Gap. This has been written about several times, but with googlemaps I have just located their final position they reached before withdrawing.

    For those that don't know the 5th (Bn?) Northamptons were incredulously ordered to secure the tebourba gap once Longstop Hill was taken by the 2nd Bn Coldstream and 18th RCT. Of course this never happened, but the roundabout rout they took is something to be believed.

    Equipped with mules they were to start off from HEIDOUS village (36.7348, 9.5938 or as near as damnit) and then attack the hill overlooking the gap (36.8212, 9.7620) from the rear and establish themselves there whist CCB drove north. This meant a trek of several days (well two) through the hills/mountains via some of the most unforgiving countryside in Tunisia, followed by an assault. They were entirely on their own, and the weather deteriorated to such a point that even mules couldn't move through the mud.

    Incredibly however, the men almost managed to gain their objective.

    On the 24th december whilst en rout, they were spotted and fired upon, having reached a German OP they secured it (although the men were able to get away and alert their HQ) and established themelves in a nearbye gulley (36.8167, 9.6963) whilst they assessed the situation.

    They were without radio contact (their mule had fallen down a cliff early on and taken the wireless with it) and patrols failed to find the americans they were meant to meet (who obviously never got any further then longstop). However they did spot a large enemy force, who had been alerted to their presence, heading their way.

    In attrocious weather the Northants held the attack, and then retreated under cover of darkness the way they had come. You can see the magnitude of the task they were faced with if you use the terrain relief function of google maps. medjez el bab tunisia - Google Maps

    Using original maps and the coordinates mentioned in the war diary I put their final location a great deal further north then Hyperwar.
    http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-MTO-NWA/maps/USA-MTO-NWA-7.jpg

    although they may have just been trying to save space on the map.

    All coordinates mentioned here are 1mile gridsquares and so not precise
     
  2. Earthican

    Earthican Senior Member

    Here's an image that combines the modern relief map (Google) and the US Army sketch map (Hyperwar). It helps identify the peak on the relief map that aligns with the "Hill 466" on the sketch map. It's not a perfect match but shows we're in the right area.

    Next I'll work on something that shows the where:

    On the 24th december whilst en rout, they were spotted and fired upon, having reached a German OP they secured it (although the men were able to get away and alert their HQ) and established themelves in a nearbye gulley (36.8167, 9.6963) whilst they assessed the situation.

    http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=38260&stc=1&d=1286982437
     

    Attached Files:

  3. Earthican

    Earthican Senior Member

    Here's a zoom of the top of the previous image. The 'A' balloon is what Google tells me is (36.8167, 9.6963) where:

    On the 24th december whilst en rout, they were spotted and fired upon, having reached a German OP they secured it (although the men were able to get away and alert their HQ) and established themelves in a nearbye gulley (36.8167, 9.6963) whilst they assessed the situation.

    http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=38261&stc=1&d=1286983864

    Love that topo/relief feature on Google, this is the first use I've seen of it
     

    Attached Files:

    dbf likes this.
  4. Tom Canning

    Tom Canning WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Phaethon
    Can you point me towards the King's Rules Regulations (KRR's) that says that all orders to advance on an objective has to be the most sensible route ?

    We did what appears to be the most stupid and idiotic things that one could imagine in order to gain objectives - sometimes they worked -sometimes they didn't - thus we called it "the fog of war"...

    but then we didn't have the 20-20 hindsight of history as we were too busy making that history....

    Cheers
     
  5. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    Phaethon
    Can you point me towards the King's Rules Regulations (KRR's) that says that all orders to advance on an objective has to be the most sensible route ?

    We did what appears to be the most stupid and idiotic things that one could imagine in order to gain objectives - sometimes they worked -sometimes they didn't - thus we called it "the fog of war"...

    but then we didn't have the 20-20 hindsight of history as we were too busy making that history....

    Cheers


    Tom; I'm not ciriticising the men involved. My point in this post was not to show their stupidity but the fact that they very nearly succeeded against all the odds. The 'odds' being the fact that should they have succeeded they would have been stranded far behind enemy lines with the loss of an entire Battalion. The weather and a journey across what ammounts to cliffside paths was an amazing gamble... that nearly worked.
     
  6. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    Here's the official report from 78th Div. And the Map with the grid squares marked. I may be wrong at this, but I believe their objective (not in the report) is the red square and the OP/Gulley at the green square. The location they retreated to is just south west.

    The map is folded slightly, I did not want to risk damaging it whilst taking the photograph.
     

    Attached Files:

  7. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    I have the 5th Northants battalion history published just after the war. The maps are pretty good - let me see what's in there.
     
  8. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    Ah - unfortunately the history only covers Italy.
     
  9. Earthican

    Earthican Senior Member

    Looking at the footnotes on the Hyperwar site, I see almost all their information came from German accounts. It's seems probable that there was some sort of mis-reading of the location of events that got translated into "Hill 466" (appearently the battle that never was).

    I could imagine the situation where a German "war diary" cites a coordinate and an elevation but there was no German map available to confirm the location so they used an Allied map and found an elevation that matched the general location. Not good.

    Reminds me to beware of secondary sources.


    53. (1) Info supplied by the Cabinet Office, London. (2) 1st Bn 18th Inf AAR, Engagement at Longstop Hill, 20 Mar 43. (3) Fifth Panzer Army, KTB II, 1.-31.XII.42, 22-26 Dec 42. (4) Rpt, Auszugsweise Abschrift aus dem Gefechtsbericht ueber die Kaempfe vom 23.-25.XII.42, in 10th Panzer Div, Ic, TB Anlagen, 29.XI.42-15.III.43, Anlage 40. (5) Lt. Col. E. R. Hill, "The Coldstream at Longstop Hill," Army Quarterly, XLVIII, No. 2 (July, 1944), 175-80. (6) MS # D-173, Die Kaempfe der Kampfgruppe Lang in Tunisien (10 Pz. Div.) Dezember 1942ñ15, April 1943 (Col Rudolf Lang). (7) 334th Inf Div, Ia, KTB, 1.XII.42-4.IV.43, and Anlagen zum KTB Nr. I, 14.XI.42-15.I.43.
     
  10. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    I've been thinking about this; and I'm interested to see that the Northants war diary isn't among them... or even their brigade, or 78 division. Which seems a little strange.

    I was thinkng that they might be using some source I'm not aware of. This report is after all, straight after they got back, and it was possible that other documents may be different once they had had time to review them... the answer will be in the northants diary I guess.

    In regards to secondary sources, I agree. It reminds me to always look it up yourself, I've had a few "What the..." moments looking at original documents which don't match what people have since interepreted.
     
  11. idler

    idler GeneralList

    A sketch map in the Northamptonshires' full history shows Pt 562 due east of Fezzanine and Pt 562 is identified with the OP in the text. I can't make out the spot height on your map, but the peak east of your green grid square looks like a lovely OP to me: 36.8152, 9.7086

    The reason they wanted Pt 562 was to be able to observe the ultimate objective and the route to it; they didn't have too far left to go.
     
  12. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    A sketch map in the Northamptonshires' full history shows Pt 562 due east of Fezzanine and Pt 562 is identified with the OP in the text. I can't make out the spot height on your map, but the peak east of your green grid square looks like a lovely OP to me: 36.8152, 9.7086

    The reason they wanted Pt 562 was to be able to observe the ultimate objective and the route to it; they didn't have too far left to go.

    I agree with that, Fezzanine is slap in the middle of my green square, and I thought about the likelyhood of the OP being atop the hill. Note that there is a track (not that a track would have done that much good in the weather at the time) just to the north that bisects the hills all the way to the objective.

    ... and you can see in the report that it mentions them seeing the enemy getting ready to attack. The locations put them in the wooded valley to the south, but the vehicles even further away. They would have to be atop the peak to see that far in the rain.
     
  13. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    they didn't have too far left to go.

    They didn't have far to go at all. Plus they didn't want to be observed all the way to the target. It makes you realize how open they were to counterattacks... especially when you realize that 64 tanks were reported to be near the Tebourba Gap and they had no AT weapons. The northants were completley reliant on the allied attack from the south reliving them.
     
  14. Mike L

    Mike L Very Senior Member

    Brilliant research guys. Wish I understood more about the campaign, guess I will have to read up on it all now! Keep it coming please.

    Mike
     
  15. Ron Goldstein

    Ron Goldstein WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Phaethon

    With regard to Longstop Hill, you may or may not be aware about Hunt's Gap that was named after Colonel Hunt of the 49th LAA Rgt. R.A,

    Wikipedia has something about it here:
    In fierce fighting the attack on Medjez was defeated by 78th Division but further south some tactical gains were made before the advance was halted. In the north progress was made towards Béja but, in fighting which lasted until 5 March and in terrible weather conditions, the attack was blunted at Hunt's Gap (about 15 miles (24 km) northeast of Béja) by 46th (North Midland) Division's 128th Infantry Brigade with substantial artillery and two squadrons of tanks from the North Irish Horse under command.[71] over several days intense fighting.[72]
    and some time ago our own Gerry Chester gave some more info about in response to a question I once posed.

    Perhaps some kind soul will supply me with the link to that thread ?

    All this happened, of course, before I joined the regiment but it was still talked about when I joined them at Tunis in April '43.

    Ron

    Ron
     
  16. Phaethon

    Phaethon Historian

    Although I can't help with the missing thread ( *Edit* is it this one?), I've just gone over some of the coordiates using english and german maps from the respective units war diaries, and can confirm that Hyperwar is using the German accounts from the 10th Pz division which states that an assault was made on point 466 aka Djebel Djebara.

    The northampton war diary however is very clear on the matter and states that the enemy OP was was on Sidi Feredj (point 562) and that they reached the village of Fezzanine to its west, sending a patrol to the Tebourba gap itself in order to locate the missing american battalion who were at this time still embroiled at Longstop hill.

    The two accounts correspond in every way except for location, so I doubt the Germans are confusing the 5th Bn with the 4th RTA which was also in the area to the west of the village of Montrosier. Since the 5th Bn was retreating back towards Heideous at this time, I see no reason why the battle was not in fact fought further south, however the evidence strongly suggests that the british advance reached much further north than this. As to why the American historians did this... well they had access to the captured german documents in NARA, and not the 5th Bn. So that makes sense.

    I think Hunts gap is above Beja isn't it Ron? Is it between Sedjanne and Tamara? I was never quite clear on what Hunts gap reffers to, as its not been part of my research, but this is definitely the Tebourba Gap.

    Either way you cut it, the 5th Bn accomplished something amazing those days.
     
  17. barerootbonsai

    barerootbonsai Junior Member

    Hi Phaethon
    If you have not got it yet I recomend

    The 5th Battalion in Noth Africa and Sicily printed by G.O.J. Harris, The Press On The Lake , Sandwich, Kent.

    I talks about this and ha eye witness accounts.

    Nick
     
  18. Ron Goldstein

    Ron Goldstein WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

  19. Tom Canning

    Tom Canning WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Phaethon
    I didn't take your remarks as an insult to the 5th Northants but merely pointing out that MOST of us were subject to the most idiotic ideas to obtain an objective - and now and again - they worked - and that's why we called it the "fog of war" -

    someone told "B" squadron of the NIH to climb Longstop with a virtually condemned Churchill Tank - it worked and there were NO enemy A/T guns up there as the enemy thought NO Tank could climb up that hill - and thus saved the Churchill - that was the German "fog of war"
    Cheers
     
  20. idler

    idler GeneralList

Share This Page